---
title: 'Check Their Identity by the A.B. 64: Soldiers and A.T.S.'
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/check-identity-ab64-1940/
description: A large photographic face looms over a reproduction of an Army Book 64 and its open pages, with red arrows marking details to check.
section: Collection
---

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3. Check Their Identity by the A.B. 64: Soldiers and A.T.S.

[![Check Their Identity by the A.B. 64: Soldiers and A.T.S., 1940 UK poster: A large photographic face looms over a reproduction](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/check-identity-ab64-1940.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/check-identity-ab64-1940.jpg)

# Check Their Identity by the A.B. 64: Soldiers and A.T.S.

A large photographic face looms over a reproduction of an Army Book 64 and its open pages, with red arrows marking details to check. The closing line, 'Beware! The enemy may use false A.B.64s', is the fear appeal; the rest is procedural instruction to sentries and checkpoint troops.

## Propaganda techniques used in this poster

[Fear appeal](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/fear-appeal/)

## Text on the object

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

```
CHECK THEIR IDENTITY BY THE A.B.64
SOLDIERS AND A.T.S
ARMY BOOK 64. SOLDIER'S SERVICE AND PAY BOOK.
LOOK FOR THESE POINTS
Place of birth and nationality of father and mother at birth are not entered
National Health Insurance is essentially an English idea. Interrogation on this score may well floor a foreigner with a stolen A.B.64. N.B. Some holders are not insured and therefore will not have these details completed
Check date of enlistment on page 2 against details of leave, dates of inoculations and courses attended on pages 4 - 9.
Although signed by the holder this page is NOT filled in with holder's own handwriting; if in doubt obtain specimen signature and compare.
Normally bears no photograph or stamp of issuing authority.
AN A.B.64 CONTAINS A WEALTH OF INFORMATION REGARDING THE HOLDER, SO THAT IDENTITY CAN READILY BE ESTABLISHED. IF IN DOUBT RETAIN A.B.64 AND INTERROGATE.
An A.B. 64 contains photograph of holder and stamp of issuing authority when holder has been on leave to Eire or to or from Northern Ireland.
Allied forces carry the usual A.B. 64 with nationality endorsed, plus photograph of holder.
Sailors and Royal Marines—similar to A.B. 64, issued in various colours and photograph attached.
R.A.F. and W.A.A.F.—blue identity cards with photographs.
BEWARE! THE ENEMY MAY USE FALSE A.B.64s
PRINTED FOR H.M. STATIONERY OFFICE BY W. R. ROYLE & SON, LTD. P.R.106.
A. GAMES
```

[← Careless Talk Costs Lives: "...strictly between these four walls!"](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/careless-talk-four-walls-fougasse-1940/) [Chodźmy na roboty rolne do Niemiec! (Let us go to agricultural work in Germany!) →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/chodzmy-na-roboty-rolne-do-niemiec-1940/)

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- [Miniature of Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont, Les Passages d'outremer (BnF Fr. 5594, fol. 19r)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/passages-doutremer-council-of-clermont-colombe-1474/) (France · 1474 · Testimonial, Fear appeal). Content note: Medieval religious imagery and a French text describing alleged killings and captivity of eastern Christians, as used to argue for the First Crusade; the text is shown as written.
- [Anacoana fut pendue sans raison (engraving in Le miroir de la cruelle et horrible tyrannie espagnole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/anacoana-hanged-miroir-tyrannie-espagnole-1620/) (Dutch Republic · 1620 · Fear appeal, Name-calling). Content note: Engraving of a hanged, bare-breasted Taino woman, burning huts and people being killed by Spanish soldiers.
- [Der Warner (broadsheet lampoon on the Jesuits after Breitenfeld and Rain)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/der-warner-anti-jesuit-broadsheet-1632/) (Holy Roman Empire · 1632 · Scapegoating, Fear appeal)
- [Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/) (Kingdom of Great Britain · Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [Proclamation de Sonthonax en créole, Cap-Français (Proclamation of Commissioner Sonthonax in Creole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sonthonax-proclamation-creole-1793/) (France · Aug 29, 1793 · Fear appeal, Scapegoating). Content note: Colonial-era proclamation on slavery and emancipation in Saint-Domingue; speaks of slaves, whips and 'Nègues' in period terms.
- [Gazette of the United States, "The Jeffersoniad" no. VIII, 14 August 1800](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/gazette-us-jeffersoniad-1800/) (United States · Aug 14, 1800 · Name-calling, Fear appeal)
- [Tyrants Prostrate, Liberty Triumphant (pro-Polk cartoon on Dorr), 1844](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/tyrants-prostrate-liberty-triumphant-polk-1844/) (United States · 1844 · Name-calling, Fear appeal). Content note: Speech balloons contain anti-Catholic and nativist wording ('the ruins of Popery') in the mouths of the Whig figures, written by a Democratic cartoonist and shown unaltered.
- [Brolej Žemajčiaj! (Brothers Samogitians!): hand-painted broken-cross poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/brolej-zemajciaj-broken-cross-1862/) (Russian Empire · 1862 · Fear appeal, Transfer)