What would persuade you to go to war, and possibly to die? Adventure? Duty? Propaganda? Friendship? Money? This section explores some of these.
Soldiers came to Gallipoli from all over the world and the three recruitment posters below show three ways that the army tried to persuade them to join up.
A short interview on CBC – Canada’s national TV and radio organisation – considers how young men were given the idea that going to war would be a great adventure. There is an extract from the British poet John Masefield’s book about Gallipoli describing how excited the men were to be there.
Perhaps your school trained you to be a soldier – this was certainly the case in Australia where all boys aged 12-18 had to attend military training, so that by 1912 there were 89,000 trained senior cadets, many of whom went to war in Europe. ‘Soldier Boys‘, a book by Max Waugh, describes this.
Australian historian Peter Stanley is still concerned that the Australian curriculum is too militaristic. Watch his video here.
All sides used recruitment posters to encourage young men to sign up. Follow the links to find out more about recruitment in Canada, Germany and Britain .