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“To the Women of Canada.” First World War Canadian Expeditionary Force recruiting broadside.
“To the Women of Canada.” First World War Canadian Expeditionary Force recruiting broadside.

“To the Women of Canada.” First World War Canadian Expeditionary Force recruiting broadside.

“And so now we appeal to the women—the women who are the mainspring of all masculine action”


A recruitment leaflet issued by the Royal Grenadiers Overseas Battalion, 123rd Canadian Expeditionary Force urging women to shun and shame men refusing to fight in World War I:

“While Canada is in imminent danger of suffering the same were it not for the millions who are cheerfully enduring the horrors and privations of bloody warfare for the millions who stay at home watching the war pictures and drinking tea. Bar them out, you women. Refuse their invitations, scorn their attentions. For the love of Heaven, if they won’t be men, then you be women. … Tell him to join the colors while he can to do so with honor. And the day is not far off when he will have to go. The old mother has issued the last call to her sons. Make your son, your husband, your lover, your brother, join now while he yet retains the remnants of honor. ... Get the apologist, the weakling, the mother’s pet, into the service. Weed out all, and we will find out who are the cowards.” ( G.G. Starr, reprinted from the Evening Telegram)

This blunt tactic pitted women against men to coerce volunteer military service. The Toronto-based battalion’s tactic had some success: “Of the total 1,100 soldiers on strength on December 28, 1915, only 110 had come from the Central Recruiting Depot; all others had come from the direct recruitment efforts of the battalion itself.” (Wikipedia

Recruiting leaflets, like this example, were handed out in 1915 to young women on Toronto’s streets to pass on to their loved ones. See Ian Hugh Maclean Miller’s Our Glory and Our Grief, Torontonians and the Great War (Toronto, 2002), pp119ff.


Description: “To the Women of Canada.” First World War Canadian Expeditionary Force recruiting broadside.

[Canada, ca. 1915]. Broadside. 10½ x 6 inches. Folds; three previous tape mends on verso, else very good.

[3733323]

Price: $150.00