We'll Get Them!
- Made
- 1916
- Place
- Paris
- Language
- French
- Kind of source
- poster
- Difficulty
- Accessible
- Intensity
- Low: a soldier charges with a rifle; no wounds or deaths are shown
First World War (1914–1918)Propaganda and persuasionTrade, markets and money
France, like Germany, paid for the war partly by borrowing from its citizens. Abel Faivre, a caricaturist and illustrator working in Paris, made this poster for the Second National Defense Loan in 1916. Its slogan, "On les aura!", repeats words that General Philippe Pétain used at the Battle of Verdun earlier that year.
Faivre's soldier charges with one arm raised, like the winged figure of Liberty in François Rude's sculpture La Marseillaise on the Arc de Triomphe, turning an ordinary infantryman into a hero. The Library of Congress calls it the most remembered French poster of the war.
Compare it with Fritz Erler's German loan poster from the following spring: two governments asking for the same thing, one with a cry of attack and one with a tired, watchful face.
The words printed on the image, in simplified modern English. Point at or tap a phrase to see the original behind it. Phrase links checked in a separate review.
Notes
- A loan from citizens to the government, which paid them interest every year; the bonds never had to be repaid. France raised four National Defense Loans during the war. back
Borrador: esta traducción todavía no se ha revisado por separado. Las palabras entre corchetes se añadieron para que se entienda mejor.
¡Los venceremos!
Segundo Empréstito de Defensa Nacional1
Suscríbase.
Abel Faivre, 1916
Impreso por Devambez, París
Notas
- Un préstamo de los ciudadanos al gobierno, que les pagaba intereses cada año; los bonos nunca tenían que devolverse. Francia reunió cuatro Empréstitos de Defensa Nacional durante la guerra. volver
On les aura !
One will have them!
We'll get them!
¡Los venceremos!
2ᴱ EMPRUNT
DE
LA DÉFENSE NATIONALE
2nd loan of the national defense
Second National Defense Loan
Segundo Empréstito de Defensa Nacional
- A loan from citizens to the government, which paid them interest every year; the bonds never had to be repaid. France raised four National Defense Loans during the war.
Souscrivez
Subscribe
Subscribe.
Suscríbase.
Abel Faivre
1916
Abel Faivre 1916
Abel Faivre, 1916
Abel Faivre, 1916
DEVAMBEZ Imp. PARIS
Devambez printer Paris
Printed by Devambez, Paris
Impreso por Devambez, París
Questions a reader might ask, with short answers and the sections they rest on. Not yet checked.
What happens
What is the poster asking French people to do?
To subscribe to the Second National Defense Loan, lending money to the government in return for yearly interest.
Where does the slogan "We'll get them!" come from?
It repeats words General Philippe Pétain used at the Battle of Verdun earlier in 1916.
Read section 1
Thinking further
How does the poster make an ordinary soldier look like a hero?
He charges with one arm raised, like the winged figure of Liberty in Rude's sculpture La Marseillaise on the Arc de Triomphe. The pose links a common infantryman to a famous image of the nation.
Read section 1
Who and what this source names, in the original. Each name links to every source in the library that mentions it. Not yet checked.
Ideas
- War and service Calls on ordinary people to fight, enlist or give their money so their country can win a war. Sections 1.
- War loans Bonds that governments sold to their own people to pay for a war. Sections 2.
People
- Abel Faivre French painter, poster artist and cartoonist, whose We'll Get Them! poster of 1916 called on the French to buy war loans. Sections 4.
Places
Dates
Difficulty: Accessible, only a few words on the poster; needs only the note on the loan.
Fits these units
- How does a poster persuade?. What did wartime posters ask people to do, and how did they make their case?
Key terms
- loan
- money lent to someone, here by citizens to their government, usually in return for interest
- subscribe
- to sign up for something; here, to agree to lend money to the government
- interest
- money paid every year to a person who has lent money, as a reward for lending it
- bond
- a paper a government gives in return for a loan, promising to pay interest
- slogan
- a short, easy-to-remember phrase used to spread a message
- infantryman
- a soldier who fights on foot
Questions
- Comprehension
What does the poster ask the viewer to do, and for which loan?
- Analysis
The slogan says "We'll get them!" but never says who "them" are, and the poster gives no facts about the loan. How do the picture and the slogan work together to make a case for lending money?
- Analysis (reliability)
Faivre made this poster for a government loan campaign in 1916. What can it tell us reliably about France in that year, and what can it not tell us about the war or about the soldiers who fought it?
- Connection
Look at Help Us Win! by Fritz Erler, a German war loan poster from early 1917. Both posters show a single soldier and ask people to lend money. Compare the two soldiers' faces, poses, and surroundings. What feeling does each poster seem to want from the people looking at it?
Activity
Students first cover the words and list what the picture alone tells them about the soldier and the moment. Then they uncover the words and note what the slogan and "Subscribe." add. In pairs, they write the government's request in one plain sentence and compare it with Faivre's poster, explaining which would move more people to lend and why.
A printable worksheet for this source · More on Hearth Learning
New translation from the French printed on the poster.
Nueva traducción al español sencillo. Claude (Anthropic) la redactó a partir del original, con nuestra versión en inglés como guía. Todavía no la ha revisado nadie por separado.
- Original
- Text as printed in the named edition or on the object, read from page images. Edition: Color lithograph, printed by Devambez, Paris, 1916. Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, POS - Fr .F35, no. 5 (scan from color film copy LC-USZC2-3863).
- Transliterated
- Not needed: the original is in the Latin alphabet
- Close English
- Close translation drafted by Claude (Anthropic), kept as a working draft
- Simplified English
- Drafted by Claude (Anthropic) from the original and checked unit by unit against the original in a separate review.
- Simplified Spanish
- Drafted by Claude (Anthropic). Not yet checked by a separate review.
- Editor’s review
- Not yet.
- Specialist review
- Not yet. Readings a specialist should confirm are listed for later review.
- Rights
- Original: public domain. Edition: public domain. Our translations and notes: CC BY-SA 4.0; credit “Hearth Library, hearthinteractive.com” with a link.
Sources for the notes
- Imperial War Museums. On les aura!, Art.IWM PST 10480. https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/8912
- Library of Congress. On les aura! 2e Emprunt de la Défense Nationale. Souscrivez / Abel Faivre. https://www.loc.gov/item/99613629/
- BNP Paribas. "The National Defence Loans of the Great War." Histoire. https://histoire.bnpparibas/?p=22293
- Smarthistory. "François Rude, La Marseillaise." https://smarthistory.org/?p=1338
- Bibliothèque nationale de France. "On les aura!" Essentiels. https://essentiels.bnf.fr/fr/image/e18e4ed5-817a-4948-a62c-b774dbef86c4-on-aura-2e-emprunt-la-defense-nationale-souscrivez