---
title: Enlist
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/enlist-lusitania-1915/
description: A mother holding an infant sinks through dark green water, eyes closed, a trail of bubbles rising from her hair, above the single word 'Enlist.' The…
section: Collection
---

[Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/)

**Content note:** A mother and infant drowning in the Lusitania sinking. This object is shown as it was published. [Why](https://propagandaarchive.org/about/#as-it-was)

[![Enlist](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/enlist-lusitania-1915.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/enlist-lusitania-1915.jpg)

# Enlist

A mother holding an infant sinks through dark green water, eyes closed, a trail of bubbles rising from her hair, above the single word 'Enlist.' The image recalls the May 1915 sinking of the Lusitania. The tell of fear-appeal is the pairing: death by drowning of the most defenceless passengers, and one remedy offered with no terms, no enemy named and no alternative.

- **Date:** 1915
- **Period:** [First World War](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#era=wwi)
- **Made by:** Boston Public Safety Committee; Fred Spear (artist)
- **Region:** [North America](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#region=north-america)
- **Country:** [United States](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#country=united-states)
- **Medium:** [Poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#medium=poster)
- **Issuer type:** [Mixed](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#actor=mixed)
- **Regime:** [Wilson Administration](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#regime=wilson-administration)
- **Leader:** [Woodrow Wilson](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#leader=woodrow-wilson)
- **Audience:** [Domestic public](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#audience=domestic-public)
- **Purpose:** [Recruit](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#purpose=recruit)
- **Theme:** [War and the military](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=war-military)
- **Event:** [World War I](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#event=world-war-i)
- **Techniques:** [Fear appeal](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/fear-appeal/)
- **Source:** Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- **Source:** [Library of Congress](https://www.loc.gov/item/00651156/), retrieved September 27, 2026
- **Rights:** Public domain in the U.S. (published before 1931) Spear, Fred, artist; Straight, Willard Dickerman, 1880-1918, collector. 1915. Library of Congress, LC-DIG-ppmsca-50552.

## Text on the object

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

```
ENLIST

Fred Spear

ISSUED BY THE BOSTON PUBLIC SAFETY COMMITTEE.

SACKETT & WILHELMS CORPORATION, NEW YORK
```

The publisher and printer credit lines run in very small type along the bottom margin (left and right respectively) and are faint in this scan; transcribed with medium confidence, consistent with the entry's own sourcing notes.

[← Der neue Dreibund (The New Triple Alliance): postcard](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/der-neue-dreibund-postcard-1915/) [Vote Against Woman Suffrage →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/georgia-vote-against-woman-suffrage-1915/)

## Using the same techniques

- [Der Warner (broadsheet lampoon on the Jesuits after Breitenfeld and Rain)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/der-warner-anti-jesuit-broadsheet-1632/) (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/) (Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [豬叫取胎圖 (Picture of the Pig Sect Extracting a Foetus), from Reverently Obeying the Sacred Edict: A Complete Picture Gallery to Repel Heterodoxy](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/pig-cry-taking-foetus-hunan-1891/) (1891 · Fear appeal, Name-calling). Content note: Colour woodblock caricature depicting foreign Christians as members of a 'pig' sect and showing them cutting a foetus from a woman; violence against a woman and derision of Christianity.
- [The Radical Programme, No. 4: Dismemberment of the Empire (Gladstone & Co. auction India), St Stephen's Review Presentation Cartoon](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/radical-programme-selling-india-st-stephens-review-1891/) (Oct 31, 1891 · Fear appeal, Scapegoating)
- [En posesión de su presa (In Possession of Its Prey)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/en-posesion-de-su-presa-el-diablo-1894/) (Jun 2, 1894 · Fear appeal)
- [劉永福懸賞抓拿日本奸細告示 (Liu Yongfu's notice offering rewards for capturing Japanese spies), Taiwan](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/liu-yongfu-reward-notice-japanese-spies-1895/) (1895 · Name-calling, Fear appeal)
- [Sífilis: Curación absoluta y radical en el Sanatorio para sifilíticos (Syphilis: Absolute and Radical Cure at the Sanatorium for Syphilitics)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sifilis-sanatorio-abreu-1900/) (1900 · Fear appeal)
- [時局圖 (The Situation in the Far East / Map of the Present Situation), newer version with English labels](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/situation-in-far-east-tse-tsan-tai-1900/) (1900 · Fear appeal)