Forensic Research Archive of Manipulation and Exploitation
They Gave Their Lives! Will You Replace Their Ships?, 1942 Canada poster: A collage of newspaper clippings headed 'List 642

They Gave Their Lives! Will You Replace Their Ships?

A collage of newspaper clippings headed 'List 642 Canadian Merchant Sailors As Dead' shows rows of named portrait photographs around an aerial photograph of a merchant convoy. The tell is transfer: the sailors' deaths and the real casualty list are attached to a request that the viewer help replace the lost ships.

Propaganda techniques used in this poster

Transfer
Date
1942
Period
Second World War
Made by
Department of Munitions and Supply for Canada
Region
North America
Country
Canada
Medium
Poster
Issuer type
State
Regime
Mackenzie King Government
Leader
William Lyon Mackenzie King
Audience
Domestic public
Purpose
Mobilize or secure compliance
Themes
War and the military, Labor
Event
World War II
Source
Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
Source
U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 44, World War II Foreign Posters, retrieved October 3, 2026
Rights
Public domain (Canadian Crown copyright, 50 years from publication, expired; no URAA restoration)
Department of Munitions and Supply for Canada, c. 1942. U.S. National Archives, RG 44.

Text on the object

Original (English) · read from the image, not independently checked

They gave their lives!

List 642 Canadian Merchant Sailors As Dead
THESE MEN DEAD, MISSING OR PRESUMED DEAD
Merchant Seamen Casualty List

WILL YOU
REPLACE THEIR
SHIPS?

This message is issued by the Department of Munitions and Supply for Canada

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