'Y "Darn Papur"'

This poster was published by the Parliamentary Recruiting Committee (PRC) in December 1914 in both English and Welsh language versions. 'Y Darn Papur' translates as 'the scrap of paper'.

Surprisingly few recruiting posters sought to justify the war, but those that did tended to focus on examples of 'Prussian aggression' and duplicity, especially the invasion of 'defenceless' Belgium. The neutrality of the latter had been theoretically guaranteed by the 1839 Treaty of London, signed by the German, French, British and Russian governments (among others). The treaty, contemptuously referred to as 'a scrap of paper' by the Kaiser's Chancellor, was effectively torn up following the invasion on 2 August 1914, which led in turn to Britain's entry into the war.

This perceived act of treachery on Germany's part was widely used in Allied propaganda, even though the treaty had been signed 75 years earlier and bore little relevance to the politics of 1914. The poster depicted here was extensively distributed throughout the UK and overseas. The PRC produced Welsh versions of several popular designs, despite the Army's pre-war ambivalence to the official use of the language by Welsh regiments.