War loans and war bonds

In 1917 Germany called its sixth war loan the "decisive loan." One appeal told people to lend the Fatherland, "the safest debtor in the world," all the money they did not truly need to live on.

Nearly every country at war borrowed this way. Germany raised nine loans between 1914 and 1918. They brought in about 98 billion marks, and by one estimate the government borrowed about 86 billion more for short terms from banks and industry. People subscribed about 39 million times, at banks, post offices, schools, clubs, and factories. Some 19 million subscriptions of 200 marks or less brought in only 1.5 billion marks. France raised four loans from 1915 to 1918, worth about 55 billion francs on paper, though much was paid with older bonds rather than new money. These bonds never had to be repaid; instead they paid interest of 5 percent, or 4 percent for the last two loans, every year. The United States sold four Liberty Loans in 1917 and 1918, and a Victory Loan after the armistice. The four Liberty Loans raised more than $17 billion, about two-thirds of the war's cost. About 20 million people bought them, in a country of about 24 million households.

Selling the loans took advertising. Germany's first five loans were advertised without pictures. After the fourth raised only modest sums, the Imperial Treasury hired well-known commercial artists, and picture posters began with the sixth loan. French banks paid for many loan posters, some by artists such as Abel Faivre. In the United States, the Treasury ran the drives through the Federal Reserve Banks; the government's Committee on Public Information ran the publicity, with donated billboards and rallies by film stars. How much the posters added is hard to measure, the historian Irina Renz notes. Germany lost. Those who sold right after the war got back about a quarter of their money, and many who held on lost everything in the inflation of 1923.

Two library posters show these appeals. Faivre's We'll Get Them!, for France's Second National Defense Loan of 1916, shows a soldier charging with one arm raised, shouting words used at Verdun. Fritz Erler's Help Us Win!, for Germany's sixth loan in early 1917, shows a soldier in a steel helmet, with a serious face, looking out past barbed wire. It appeared after the hungry "turnip winter," when people were slow to lend.