Teeth At War

It is now well documented that in the early stages of the Second World War the British government contemplated using human teeth as ammunition, but recently a correspondent to this journal raised the question of how the population’s teeth would actually have been requisitioned if the plans had gone ahead.

The War Office proposed that when people registered to sleep in bomb shelters, as well as giving their details and showing identification, they would then have to line up at a separate desk to be punched hard in the mouth. The resulting windfall would have been rushed to the front line. Posters were printed and distributed, ready for the campaign (see below). Only after Churchill insisted that some kind of tests be conducted first was the scheme halted.

    

(no subject)

Poster design in the Second World War is justly celebrated, but occasionally a campaign would turn out to be a dud. This poster, for example, was never used as it was judged to be far too ahead of its time: