Content note: Stylised hand-to-hand combat between two soldiers; the enemy is labelled a 'murderer' in the headline. This object is shown as it was published. Why
Za naši samostatnost! Hrr na vraha! Za demokracii! Československá armáda (For our independence! Charge at the murderer! For democracy! Czechoslovak Army)
A green-and-black recruiting poster shows two soldiers locked in close combat, one in a spike-crested helmet, beneath 'For our independence! Charge at the murderer! For democracy! Czechoslovak Army.' The tell is the enemy reduced to a single moral epithet, 'murderer', and two virtue words, independence and democracy, offered as the reasons to enlist with no terms or conditions of service.
- Date
- 1918
- Period
- First World War
- Made by
- Czechoslovak Recruiting Office, New York (Czechoslovak National Council campaign); designed and printed at the Wentworth Institute, Boston; artist listed by LOC as Vojtech Preissig
- Region
- Western and Central Europe
- Country
- Czechoslovak National Council
- Medium
- Poster
- Issuer type
- Military
- Regime
- Czechoslovak National Council
- Leader
- Tomas Garrigue Masaryk
- Audience
- Diaspora or minority
- Purpose
- Recruit
- Themes
- War and the military, Race and ethnicity
- Event
- World War I
- Techniques
- Name-callingGlittering generalities
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- Library of Congress, retrieved September 29, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (published 1918; LOC: no known restrictions on publication)
Czechoslovak Recruiting Office, New York; Wentworth Institute, Boston, 1918. Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, LC-DIG-ppmsca-50583.
Text on the object
ZA NAŠI SAMOSTATNOST! HRR NA VRAHA! ZA DEMOKRACII! ČESKOSLOVENSKÁ ARMÁDA ISSUED BY CZECHOSLOVAK RECRUITING OFFICE, TRIBUNE BUILDING, NEW YORK DESIGNED AND PRINTED AT THE SCHOOL OF PRINTING AND GRAPHIC ARTS OF WENTWORTH INSTITUTE, BOSTON, MASS. U.S.A. · WENTWORTH POSTER NO. [1 or 7, uncertain] [monogram in image, lower left: WI P.G.A.]
FOR OUR INDEPENDENCE! CHARGE AT THE MURDERER! FOR DEMOCRACY! CZECHOSLOVAK ARMY (The issuer and printer lines are in English.)
Czech headline text and English imprint are as printed; the trailing poster number is uncertain at this resolution.
