Your Empire Needs You!

Ireland, September 1915. Central Council for the Organisation of Recruiting in Ireland; printed by John Shuley & Co., Dublin.

The man pointing at the viewer is John Redmond, leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party, beside his own words from a speech at Waterford on 23 August 1915: “Your first duty is to take your part in ending the war.” Below: “Join an Irish regiment to-day.” The National Library of Ireland catalogue says outright that the design follows Alfred Leete’s Kitchener cover. The print run was 10,000 copies.

The Home Rule Act had been passed in 1914 but suspended until the end of the war. Redmond urged the Irish to fight for Britain to earn their self-government: service now, reward later.

The technique is the same: a finger pointing at the reader. But here it offers a deal: the one pointing is not a symbol but a living politician, and he calls not only to duty to the Crown but to a down payment on self-rule. But the promise did not come true. After the Easter Rising of 1916 and the attempt to extend conscription to Ireland in 1918, Redmond’s party lost to voters who chose independence rather than self-rule earned by service. Redmond’s own family paid the price of the appeal: his younger brother Willie, also an MP, volunteered at 53 and was killed at the Battle of Messines on 7 June 1917, a major in the 6th Battalion of the Royal Irish Regiment.

Context

Ireland, September 1915. Central Council for the Organisation of Recruiting in Ireland; printed by John Shuley & Co., Dublin. It shows John Redmond (1856–1918) with his words from a speech at Waterford, 23 August 1915.