MADE TO ORDER: AN INTERPRETATION OF MASCULINITY IN BRITAIN DURING THE GREAT WAR ________________ A University Thesis Presented to the Faculty of California State University, East Bay ________________ In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts in History ________________ By Adam Fitch March, 2014 Copyright © 2014 by Adam Fitch ii Preface ! For the past two years I have been researching what it meant to be male in Great Britain during the period leading up to and during the First World War. I’ve examined the masculine identity shared in the ranks of British soldiers serving on the continent as well as among the men who remained at home. I have looked at how the British male living in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century saw himself and how that self-image was the result of a unique historical transformation -- the masculinization of British society. British males living around the turn of the last century expressed a constructed historical masculinity, one that the government and organs of the state fostered and also profited from. The inspiration behind this project, however, was decided long before the subsequent research, and finding extensive pre-existing works in this area was at once exciting and also disappointing as I wanted to be the first to investigate these waters. The historian Simon Schama observed correctly that all history tends towards autobiographical confession, and writing this thesis has, at various times, been deeply personal. In these pages, it is my hope that I have done some justice towards further understanding what motivated those lost as a result of man’s folly, and that in some small way I have kept the memory of the war alive. iv Acknowledgments !The author wishes to express appreciation to the Department of History at California State East Bay for their support, especially to Professor Henry Reichman and Professor Jessica Weiss for their vast reserve of knowledge in and their dedication to the field of history, and of course their patience. To Professor Nancy Thompson who graciously agreed to read and edit this work. Professor Khal Schneider’s kindness and encouragement helped me in completing all parts of the history program. Henry Adams suggested that teachers affect eternity as they never know where their influence stops, so to that end this thesis is as much a product of my eighth grade history teacher at Joaquin Miller Middle School, Mr. Madsen, who unknowingly rescued me from childhood loneliness by showing me worlds beyond the one I knew. I also want to dedicate this thesis to my former professor Dr. Bernard A. Cook who taught at Loyola University New Orleans when I was an undergraduate. Although he likely wouldn’t remember me, his lasting impression was as a gentle, intelligent, and the kindest of human beings. !The small staff at the Imperial War Museum in London was very helpful in showing me how to navigate their collection. The British Library and the National Archives have moved towards digitizing their vast archival materials making for user friendly navigation and made some of my research more manageable. !This thesis would never have been completed without the devotion of my mother and father. Special thanks to my friend Dr. Jade O’Dell who agreed to v edit my work, and to my friend Michael Clark who inspired me by example. This thesis is also dedicated to Paul Wakefield, whose broken promise and unrealized potential would unintentionally give me the kernel at the center of this thesis. And for another Paul, the protagonist in Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front, whose lost innocence is hopefully reflected in the following pages. vi Table of Contents Preface..................................................................................................................iv Acknowledgments..................................................................................................v List of Abbreviations............................................................................................viii List of Figures........................................................................................................ix List of Plates..........................................................................................................xi Introduction: Subject, Historiography and Method of this Investigation.................1 Chapter One: Of Mustaches and Men.................................................................22 Chapter Two: Anthem For Doomed Youth...........................................................46 Plates and Figures: The Changing Face of British Masculinity............................66 Chapter Three: Song to the Men of England.......................................................81 Chapter Four: Dulce et Decorum Est Pro Patria Mori........................................102 Conclusion.........................................................................................................120 Bibliography ......................................................................................................130 vii List of Abbreviations ANZAC....................................................Australian and New Zealand Army Corps BEF...............................................................................British Expeditionary Force DORA..............................................................................Defense of the Realm Act IWM......................................................................................Imperial War Museum NCF…………………....…………………………………..No-Conscription Fellowship PRC................................................................Parliamentary Recruiting Committee viii List of Figures Figure 1, Percy Bysshe Shelley..........................................................................66 Figure 2, Charles Dickens in 1839......................................................................66 Figure 3, Benjamin Disraeli in 1852....................................................................66 Figure 4, Sir Frederick Leighton, 1871................................................................67 Figure 5, Lord Cyril Flowers, 1872......................................................................67 Figure 6, Lord Kitchener, ! as ideal masculine patriot and warrior fingering the viewer, 1914........70 Figure 7, Another Kitchener Poster appearing one year after the first, ! this time with the added threat of conscription.....................................71 Figure 8, Enlist Today: He’s Happy & Satisfied, Are You? ! Recruitment Poster created by the PRC, 1915....................................72 Figure 9, There are THREE types of Men: To Which do YOU Belong? ! PRC poster, 1915................................................................................72 Figure 10, “When are the other boys COMING?” ! From the Central Council for the Recruitment for Ireland, 1915.......72 Figure 11, An APPEAL to YOU: “Give us a hand old man!” ! From the Central Council for the Recruitment for Ireland, 1915..........72 Figure 12, Are YOU in this? ! A Lord Baden-Powell designed recruitment poster, 1915..................73 Figure 13, Everyone Should Do His Bit: Enlist Now ! Boy Scout contemplating enlisting. PRC poster, 1915......................74 Figure 14, British Athletes! Will you follow this Glorious Example?....................74 Figure 15, ANZAC “worthy sons of Empire”........................................................75 Figure 16, English inspired poster from Australia...............................................75 Figure 17, Women of Britain say “GO!” PRC poster, 1915.................................78 ! ix Figure 18, The Conscientious Objector at the Front, PRC Poster, 1916............78 Figure 19, Picture Postcard by artist Archibald English, 1916............................79 Figure 20, Daily Mail cartoon by artist Frank Holland, depicting the lazy conscientious objector...........................................79 x List of Plates Plate 1, Lord Kitchener of Khartoum, 1885: The countenance of Empire...........67 Plate 2, Douglas Haig, aged 23 in 1885: Lieutenant in the Hussars...................67 Plate 3, Colonial Officers in India, 1910..............................................................68 Plate 4, Boys of the Sleyne School, exercising early 1900’s..............................68 Plate 5, Physical exercises for recruits in the covered tennis hall at Trinity in Cambridge, 1915........................69 Plate 6, Physical Inspections by Recruiting Physicians, 1915............................69 Plate 7, BEF Troops preparing for deployment August 6, 1914..........................70 Plate 8, Recruiting Office London, 1914.............................................................70 Plate 9, British Officer Maneuvers at War’s outbreak, 1914...............................71 Plate 10, Scouts in uniform from Britain and France ! along with their respective flags, 1912.................................................73 Plate 11, Baden-Powell and George V handing out Scout Badges....................73 Plate 12, The Duke of Connaught inspecting Boy Scouts..................................74 Plate 13, 51st Highland Division on Parade........................................................75 Plate 14, Irish BEF soldiers resting in a back trench ! at First Battle of the Somme, 1916......................................................76 Plate 15, King George V inspecting the 25th Infantry division............................76 Plate 16, Soldiers at Gallipoli..............................................................................77