Captain Bruce Bairnsfather (9 July 188729 September 1959) was a prominent British humorist

Humour

Humour or humor is the tendency of particular cognitive experiences to provoke laughter and provide amusement...

 and cartoonist

Cartoonist

A cartoonist is a person who specializes in drawing cartoons. This work is usually humorous, mainly created for entertainment, political commentary or advertising...

. His best-known cartoon character is Old Bill

Old Bill (cartoon character)

Old Bill is a fictional character created in 1914-15 by cartoonist Bruce Bairnsfather. Old Bill was depicted as an elderly, pipe-smoking British "tommy" with a walrus moustache. The character achieved a great deal of popularity during World War I where it was considered a major morale booster for...

. Bill and his pals Bert and Alf featured in Bairnsfather's weekly "Fragments from France" cartoons published weekly in "The Bystander" magazine during the First World War.

Early life

Born to a military family in Murree

Murree

Murree city is a popular hill station and a summer resort, especially for the residents of Rawalpindi/Islamabad, and for the cities of the province of Punjab, Pakistan...

, British India (now Pakistan

Pakistan

Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

), he spent his early life in India, but was brought to England in 1895 to be educated at the United Services College

United Services College

United Services College was an English private boys' public boarding school for the sons of military officers, located at Westward Ho! near Bideford in North Devon...

, Westward Ho!

Westward Ho!

Westward Ho! is a seaside village near Bideford in Devon, England. The A39 road provides access from the towns of Barnstaple, Bideford and Bude...

, then at Stratford-upon-Avon

Stratford-upon-Avon

Stratford-upon-Avon is a market town and civil parish in south Warwickshire, England. It lies on the River Avon, south east of Birmingham and south west of Warwick. It is the largest and most populous town of the District of Stratford-on-Avon, which uses the term "on" to indicate that it covers...

. Initially intending a military career, he failed entrance exams to Sandhurst

Royal Military Academy Sandhurst

The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst , commonly known simply as Sandhurst, is a British Army officer initial training centre located in Sandhurst, Berkshire, England...

 and Woolwich Academies but joined the Cheshire Regiment

Cheshire Regiment

The Cheshire Regiment was an infantry regiment of the British Army, part of the Prince of Wales' Division.The regiment was created in 1881 as part of the Childers reforms by the linking of the 22nd Regiment of Foot and the militia and rifle volunteers of Cheshire...

.

He resigned in 1907 to become an artist, studying at the John Hassall

John Hassall (illustrator)

John Hassall was born in Walmer, Kent on 21 May 1868, died 8 March 1948 and was an English illustrator.Hassall educated in Worthing, at Newton Abbot College and at Neuenheim College, Heidelberg. After twice failing entry to The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, he emigrated to Manitoba in Canada...

 School of Art. Unsuccessful at first, he worked as an electrical engineer. Working this capacity for the Old Memorial Theatre

Royal Shakespeare Theatre

The Royal Shakespeare Theatre is a 1,040+ seat thrust stage theatre owned by the Royal Shakespeare Company dedicated to the British playwright and poet William Shakespeare. It is located in the town of Stratford-upon-Avon - Shakespeare's birthplace - in the English Midlands, beside the River Avon...

, Stratford

Stratford-upon-Avon

Stratford-upon-Avon is a market town and civil parish in south Warwickshire, England. It lies on the River Avon, south east of Birmingham and south west of Warwick. It is the largest and most populous town of the District of Stratford-on-Avon, which uses the term "on" to indicate that it covers...

, brought him into acquaintance with Marie Corelli

Marie Corelli

Marie Corelli was a British novelist. She enjoyed a period of great literary success from the publication of her first novel in 1886 until World War I. Corelli's novels sold more copies than the combined sales of popular contemporaries, including Arthur Conan Doyle, H. G...

, who introduced him to Thomas Lipton

Thomas Lipton

Sir Thomas Johnstone Lipton, 1st Baronet, KCVO was a Scotsman of Ulster-Scots parentage who was a self-made man, merchant, and yachtsman. He created the Lipton tea brand and was the most persistent challenger in the history of the America's Cup.-Parentage and childhood:Lipton was born in Glasgow...

, a connection that led to commissions to draw advertising sketches for Lipton

Lipton

Lipton is a brand of tea currently owned by Unilever.-History of Lipton Tea:Lipton was created at the end of the 19th century by a grocer, Sir Thomas Lipton, in Glasgow, Scotland. In 1893, he established the Thomas J. Lipton Co., a tea packing company with its headquarters and factory in Hobo ken,...

 tea, Player's cigarettes, Keene's mustard, and Beecham's Pills

Beecham's Pills

Beecham's Pills were a laxative first marketed around 1842 in St Helens, Lancashire. They were invented by Thomas Beecham , grandfather of Thomas Beecham ....

.

World War I service

In 1914 he joined the Royal Warwickshire Regiment and served with a machine gun

Machine gun

A machine gun is a fully automatic mounted or portable firearm, usually designed to fire rounds in quick succession from an ammunition belt or large-capacity magazine, typically at a rate of several hundred rounds per minute....

 unit in France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 until 1915, when he was hospitalised with shell shock and hearing damage sustained during the Second Battle of Ypres

Second Battle of Ypres

The Second Battle of Ypres was the first time Germany used poison gas on a large scale on the Western Front in the First World War and the first time a former colonial force pushed back a major European power on European soil, which occurred in the battle of St...

. Posted to the 34th Division headquarters on Salisbury Plain

Salisbury Plain

Salisbury Plain is a chalk plateau in central southern England covering . It is part of the Southern England Chalk Formation and largely lies within the county of Wiltshire, with a little in Hampshire. The plain is famous for its rich archaeology, including Stonehenge, one of England's best known...

, he developed his humorous series for the Bystander

Bystander (magazine)

Bystander, a British weekly tabloid magazine, featured reviews, topical sketches, and short stories. Published from Fleet Street, it was established in 1903 by George Holt Thomas...

about life in the trenches

Trench warfare

Trench warfare is a form of occupied fighting lines, consisting largely of trenches, in which troops are largely immune to the enemy's small arms fire and are substantially sheltered from artillery...

, featuring "Old Bill", a curmudgeonly soldier with trademark walrus moustache

Walrus moustache

The walrus moustache is characterized by whiskers that are thick and bushy in nature. Its name derives from the fact that the whiskers usually droop over the mouth, giving an appearance to the human face that is very similar to that of a walrus.-History:...

 and balaclava. The best remembered of these shows Bill with another trooper in a muddy shell hole with shells whizzing all around. The other trooper is grumbling and Bill advises::

‘If you know of a better ‘ole go to it’.

Many of his cartoons from this period were collected in Fragments From France (1914) and the autobiographical Bullets & Billets (1916).

Despite the immense popularity with the troops and massive sales increase for the Bystander, initially there were objections to the "vulgar caricature". Nevertheless, their success in raising morale led to Bairnsfather's promotion and receipt of a War Office

War Office

The War Office was a department of the British Government, responsible for the administration of the British Army between the 17th century and 1964, when its functions were transferred to the Ministry of Defence...

 appointment to draw similar cartoons for other Allies

Allies of World War I

The Entente Powers were the countries at war with the Central Powers during World War I. The members of the Triple Entente were the United Kingdom, France, and the Russian Empire; Italy entered the war on their side in 1915...

 forces.

Post-World War I

In 1921 Bairnsfather married Cecilia Agnes Scott.

"Old Bill" and Bairnsfather himself continued in popularity between the World Wars. Many police officers of the time had similar facial hair, and that may have led to British police being referred to as "The Bill

The Bill

The Bill is a police procedural television series that ran from October 1984 to August 2010. It focused on the lives and work of one shift of police officers, rather than on any particular aspect of police work...

". Bairnsfather was the subject of one of the first British sound film

Sound film

A sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades would pass before sound motion pictures were made commercially...

 in 1927, wrote and directed the 1928 Canadian film Carry On Sergeant

Carry On Sergeant

Carry On Sergeant is the first Carry On film. Its first public screening was on 1 August 1958 at Screen One, London. Actors in this film who went on to be part of the regular team in the series were Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey, Hattie Jacques, Kenneth Connor and Terry Scott...

, and took part in the early Alexandra Palace

Alexandra Palace

Alexandra Palace is a building in North London, England. It stands in Alexandra Park, in an area between Hornsey, Muswell Hill and Wood Green...

 television transmissions in 1936. Old Bill appeared in numerous books, plays, musicals and films. In 1939 he published an autobiography, "Wide Canvas".

In World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, he continued Old Bill work, but was not asked to help with the British war effort. Instead, he became official cartoonist to the American forces in Europe, contributing to Stars and Stripes

Stars and Stripes (newspaper)

Stars and Stripes is a news source that operates from inside the United States Department of Defense but is editorially separate from it. The First Amendment protection which Stars and Stripes enjoys is safeguarded by Congress to whom an independent ombudsman, who serves the readers' interests,...

and Yank

Yank, the Army Weekly

Yank, the Army Weekly was a weekly magazine published by the United States military during World War II. The idea for the magazine came from Egbert White, who had worked on Stars and Stripes during World War I. He proposed the idea to the Army in early 1942, and accepted a commission as Lieutenant...

, whilst residing at Cresswell House in Clun

Clun

Clun is a small town in Shropshire, England. The town is located entirely in the Shropshire Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The 2001 census recorded 642 people living in the town...

, Shropshire

Shropshire

Shropshire is a county in the West Midlands region of England. For Eurostat purposes, the county is a NUTS 3 region and is one of four counties or unitary districts that comprise the "Shropshire and Staffordshire" NUTS 2 region. It borders Wales to the west...

. He also drew cartoons at American bases and nose art

Nose art

Nose art is a decorative painting or design on the fuselage of a military aircraft, usually located near the nose, and is a form of aircraft graffiti....

 on aircraft. His works are considered to have influenced artists such as Bill Mauldin

Bill Mauldin

William Henry "Bill" Mauldin was a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist from the United States...

.

In later life, he had found himself typecast as the creator of Old Bill, and his Times

The Times

The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...

obituary concluded of his career that he was "fortunate in possessing a talent ... which suited almost to the point of genius one particular moment and one particular set of circumstances; and he was unfortunate in that he was never able to adapt, at all happily, his talent to new times and new circumstances". He died in 1959 of complications of bladder cancer

Bladder cancer

Bladder cancer is any of several types of malignant growths of the urinary bladder. It is a disease in which abnormal cells multiply without control in the bladder. The bladder is a hollow, muscular organ that stores urine; it is located in the pelvis...

, in Worcester

Worcester

The City of Worcester, commonly known as Worcester, , is a city and county town of Worcestershire in the West Midlands of England. Worcester is situated some southwest of Birmingham and north of Gloucester, and has an approximate population of 94,000 people. The River Severn runs through the...

.

Legacy

A commemorative blue plaque

Blue plaque

A blue plaque is a permanent sign installed in a public place to commemorate a link between that location and a famous person or event, serving as a historical marker....

 appears outside one of his old studios, 1 Stirling Street, Kensington

Kensington

Kensington is a district of west and central London, England within the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. An affluent and densely-populated area, its commercial heart is Kensington High Street, and it contains the well-known museum district of South Kensington.To the north, Kensington is...

 (51.4995°N 0.16686°W). The blue plaque was initiated by Tonie and Valmai Holt who later wrote Bairnsfather's biography (In Search of the Better Ole - the Life, the Works and the Collectables of Bruce Bairnsfather) and also sponsored a memorial plaque to Bairnsfather on the cottage at St Yvon in Belgium at the edge of Plugstreet Wood where Bairnsfather drew his first 'trench' cartoons.

A plaque commemorating Bruce Bairnsfather was unveiled at his former home, Victoria Spa Lodge, Bishopton, Stratford upon Avon (52.205018°N 1.731122°W) on 10 September 2005 by cartoonist Bill Tidy

Bill Tidy

William Edward "Bill" Tidy, MBE , is a British cartoonist, writer and television personality, known chiefly for his comic strips. Bill was awarded an MBE in 2000 for "Services to Journalism". He is noted for his charitable work, particularly for the Lord's Taverners, which he has supported for over...

. The plaque was instigated by Mark Warby, Editor of The Old Bill Newsletter, the official journal for Bairnsfather enthusiasts and collectors.

On 24 September 2011 a plaque commemorating Bruce Bairnsfather was unveiled on the wall of Colwall Royal British Legion Club in Crescent Road, Colwall, near Malvern in Worcestershire. The plaque was instigated by the Colwall Village Society and was unveiled by Mark Warby. Bairnsfather lived in Colwall from 1951 to 1954 and was well-known at the British Legion Club in the village.
Bill & Alphie's, the Royal Military College of Canada

Royal Military College of Canada

The Royal Military College of Canada, RMC, or RMCC , is the military academy of the Canadian Forces, and is a degree-granting university. RMC was established in 1876. RMC is the only federal institution in Canada with degree granting powers...

's on-campus cadet pub in Kingston, Ontario

Kingston, Ontario

Kingston, Ontario is a Canadian city located in Eastern Ontario where the St. Lawrence River flows out of Lake Ontario. Originally a First Nations settlement called "Katarowki," , growing European exploration in the 17th Century made it an important trading post...

 is named after Bruce Bairnsfather's Great War cartoon characters. Yeo Hall at the College of Canada features sculptures of Bill and Alphie. There is a large mural drawn on the wall of the main staircase in the Royal British Legion Victory House Club in Ludlow Shropshire.

Filmography

• The Better 'Ole
  The Better 'Ole
  The Better 'Ole, also called The Romance of Old Bill, is an Edwardian musical comedy with a book by Bruce Bairnsfather and Arthur Elliott, music by Herman Darewski, and lyrics by Percival Knight and James Heard, based on the cartoon character Old Bill, an infantryman, drawn by Bairnsfather...
  
  Welsh-Pearson Films (1918)
• Old Bill Through the Ages
  Old Bill Through the Ages
  Old Bill Through the Ages is a 1924 British silent comedy fantasy film directed by Thomas Bentley and starring Syd Walker, Arthur Cleave and Jack Denton...
  
  Ideal Films (1924) - personal appearance
• The Better 'Ole
  The Better 'Ole
  The Better 'Ole, also called The Romance of Old Bill, is an Edwardian musical comedy with a book by Bruce Bairnsfather and Arthur Elliott, music by Herman Darewski, and lyrics by Percival Knight and James Heard, based on the cartoon character Old Bill, an infantryman, drawn by Bairnsfather...
  
  Warner Bros (1926)
• Old Bill's Christmas RKO (1930)
• Old Bill & Son Legeran Films (1941)

External links

• http://www.brucebairnsfather.org.uk - Official Website
• Bruce Bairnsfather and Old Bill Dugout - The first tribute website
• Fragments from France - scans from World War I work
• www.brucebairnsfather.com official website
• http://guide-books.co.uk/bairnsfather.html - Bairnsfather biography
• http://www.bb4h4h.co.uk/- Bairnsfather 50th Anniversary Commemorations
• British Pathe film of Bruce Bairnsfather, 1923
• British Pathe film showing Bairnsfather sketching Prime Minister David Lloyd George, 1910