The Forgotten Cartoons of World War One

Lincolnshire’s County Archives have provided researchers with a ground breaking discovery. University of Lincoln lecturer Andrew Kerr uncovered a series of unseen cartoons depicting the everyday lives of prisoners of war during the first world war. The prisoner who drew the cartoons was held in a Lincolnshire prisoner of war camp. Although the camp is well known during it’s use in the second world war, there was no record until now that it even existed during World War One.
The images show how the prisoners lived their daily lives, including digging turrets, carrying meat and playing card games. The pencil and water colour images even show caricatures of the camp’s boss.
The group researching the cartoons have been given a large grant to continue and further their research. Member of the research group and Professor of Communications at the University of Lincoln, Jane Chapman, said:”The cartoons show them labouring in the fields and one scene of them bringing back an enormous side of pork, with captions in German.
“It’s just a magical find.”
The larger research group is running from the University of Hertfordshire and are working in a partnership with the University of Lincoln.