Reginald MountHaving worked as a designer for various advertising agencies in the 1930s, Mount joined the Ministry of Information at the outbreak of the Second World War. During 1939-45 Mount, working with designer Eileen Evans, produced many posters for campaigns varying from security and salvage to road safety and the renowned anti-VD campaign of 1943-44.
Fritz in Nazi bomber, 1942
Catalogue ref: INF 3/1421The caption on the image reads: ‘Fritz in Nazi bomber'. The cartoon depicts determined (but subservient) looking German air force men flying towards Britain (note the map in their hands) as the evil-looking animated fire-bomb Fritz sits back, relaxes and awaits his opportunity to cause a fire storm.Fire-bomb Fritz, 1942
Catalogue ref: INF 3/1426Experimental drawing for ‘Fire-bomb Fritz', an animated incendiary bomb whose expression – comic, rather than terrifying – was intended to reassure people of the harmlessness of incendiaries if tackled in time – see accompanying illustration in INF 3/1425 for Colonel Stirrup Pump.Hawker Hurricane cradled in a human hand, Post-1941
Catalogue ref: INF 3/328This Soviet-style image depicts a Hawker Hurricane cradled in a human hand, which is emerging from below a sea horizon, with a sea foreground. This image was ‘No. 5' in a series of posters (the others included a tank, lorry and parcels), designed possibly for British factories, but more likely for export to the Soviet Union, as the finished design is accompanied by Russian text.
In 1942 Lord Beaverbrook had returned with a collection of original Soviet posters, which were published, with English translations, in British factories and the British looked to provide posters in return.
The hand represents the British merchant navy carrying war supplies to ‘Russia', in this instance a Hawker Hurricane. The Hawker Hurricane equipped numerous Soviet squadrons at a time when industrial production was dislocated by the German onslaught.
