POPULAR NEWSPAPERS DURING WORLD WAR I

Part 1: 1914-1915 (The Daily Express, the Daily Mirror, the News of the World, and The People)

When the world descended into the First World War, a barbaric struggle of unparalleled brutality, the primary method for the dissemination of news was the popular press. The British Government realised this and exercised strict controls over reporting. However, these newspapers still have a great deal to offer historians of this period.

Many reporters followed the troops at the front and provide eye-witness reports of conflicts such as the Somme and Gallipoli. They report on the resigned bravery of the common soldier, and the attitudes of their commanders; on the efforts of the nursing corps, and the fate of prisoners of war; on the inflexible nationalist fervour of domestic politicians, and the revolutionary struggles in Russia.

Complete sets of The Daily Express, The Daily Mirror, The News of the World, The People and Sunday Express enable researchers to compare and contrast the reporting of the particular issues and events across the breadth of the popular press. In the case of The Daily Express, scholars can see the impact made on the editorial content of a newspaper by a change in ownership - as William Maxwell Beaverbrook, aged 36, acquired The Daily Express from R D Blumenfeld in 1915.

Part 1 covers 1914-1915. War did not seem at all inevitable in early 1914 and on 4 January 1914 The News of the World even ran a story on “Our New and Cordial Relations with Germany”. Even in May 1914, talk of war is more likely to refer to the American war in Mexico. Women’s Suffrage issues are widely and contrastingly reported. But after 28 June when Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife were murdered at Sarajevo, Bosnia, with shots that rang out around the world, the imperatives of nationalism forced Austria to declare war on Serbia (28 July), Russia to support Serbia, Germany to declare war on France (3 August) and Britain to declare war on Germany in support of Belgium and France (4 August). By 16 August the newspapers were describing “the World’s Greatest Battle: 2,000,000 Men Meet in Mighty Conflict”. Allied attempts to overcome the stalemate of trench warfare by maintaining landings in Gallipoli in 1915 are also described in detail. The ultimate failure of the assaults on Turkey and Mesopotamia caused widespread gloom.

These newspapers provide a mass of evidence for the social history of this period, as the popular press always sought to reflect popular culture and stay in touch with public opinion concerning the war, labour disputes, women’s right to vote and work, and the human issues of the period.