---
title: Carry Your Identity Card Always
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/uk-carry-your-identity-card-always-1939/
description: Two outstretched hands, one blue and one grey, pass a National Registration Identity Card bearing the royal arms.
section: Collection
---

1. [Home](https://propagandaarchive.org/)
2. [Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/)
3. Carry Your Identity Card Always

[![Carry Your Identity Card Always, 1939 UK poster: Two outstretched hands, one blue and one grey, pass a National Registration](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/uk-carry-your-identity-card-always-1939.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/uk-carry-your-identity-card-always-1939.jpg)

# Carry Your Identity Card Always

Two outstretched hands, one blue and one grey, pass a National Registration Identity Card bearing the royal arms, under the headline 'Carry your identity card always'. The text states that police or military may demand it at any time and that the holder must not alter it; the royal arms on the card lend state authority to the instruction (transfer, a weak fit), otherwise it is a plain compliance notice.

## Propaganda techniques used in this poster

[Transfer](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/transfer/)

## Text on the object

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

```
CARRY YOUR
IDENTITY CARD
ALWAYS

YOU MAY BE ASKED FOR IT AT ANY TIME TO PROVE TO THE POLICE OR MILITARY WHO YOU ARE & WHERE YOU LIVE

Your card must bear your usual address. If you move go to the National Registration Office and have the address altered there. You must not alter the address yourself or anything else on your card.

ISSUED BY THE MINISTRY OF HEALTH
PRINTED FOR H.M STATIONERY OFFICE BY ST MICHAEL'S PRESS LTD LONDON. 51-9542.
```

[← You're Doing a Fine Job... Carry On Canal Workers](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/uk-carry-on-canal-workers-1939/) [Choose for Victory - Try a V Dish To-Day →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/uk-choose-for-victory-try-a-v-dish-1939/)

## More propaganda examples that use the same techniques

- [Fragments of the Abydos king list from Ramesses II's temple, in the British Museum: rows of royal cartouches](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/abydos-king-list-ramesses-ii-temple-british-museum/) (New Kingdom Egypt · 0000 · Card stacking, Transfer)
- [Clay cylinder with the Ehulhul inscription of Nabonidus, king of Babylon, describing work on three temples](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/cylinder-nabonidus-ehulhul-inscription-555bce/) (Neo Babylonian Empire · 0000 · Transfer)
- [Seated limestone statue of Hatshepsut as king, with feminine royal titles on the throne, reassembled from fragments broken up at Deir el-Bahri](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/hatshepsut-seated-statue-limestone-met-1458bce/) (New Kingdom Egypt · 0000 · Transfer, Testimonial)
- [Glazed-brick panel with a striding lion, from Babylon (reign of Nebuchadnezzar II)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/ishtar-gate-panel-striding-lion-nebuchadnezzar-ii-604bce/) (Neo Babylonian Empire · 0000 · Transfer)
- [Limestone relief block of Ramesses II wearing the White Crown, a jubilee relief from his temple at Herakleopolis](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/jubilee-relief-ramesses-ii-herakleopolis-met-05-4-256/) (New Kingdom Egypt · 0000 · Transfer)
- [Line drawing of the Great Kadesh battle relief on the walls of the Ramesseum, from Breasted's History of Egypt](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/kadesh-relief-ramesseum-breasted-drawing-1275bce/) (New Kingdom Egypt · 0000 · Card stacking, Transfer). Content note: A drawing of an Egyptian royal battle relief showing Hittite soldiers and horses killed and drowned, as the king's monument presented the battle; it is a one-sided image made by the winning side's own account.
- [Gypsum alabaster slab inscribed in cuneiform, from Nimrud (Kalhu), reign of Ashurnasirpal II](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/nimrud-slab-ashurnasirpal-ii-inscription-883bce/) (Neo Assyrian Empire · 0000 · Transfer, Glittering generalities)
- [Egyptian alabaster jar inscribed with the name of Xerxes the Great in four languages (Old Persian, Elamite, Babylonian, Egyptian), 486 to 466 BCE](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/xerxes-jar-four-languages-486bce/) (Achaemenid Empire · 0000 · Transfer)