Genuine Chromed-Bronze car mascot or hood ornament of WW1 cartoon legend "Old Bill"

Maker marked "Deacon" with Registered design # & Patent # Signed "Bruce Bairnsfather"

SIZE = 155 mm from pedestal base

Captain Charles Bruce Bairnsfather (9 July 1887 – 29 Sept 1959) was a prominent British humorist & cartoonist

His best-known cartoon character is Old Bill

Bill & his pals Bert & Alf featured in Bairnsfather's weekly "Fragments from France" cartoons published weekly in "The Bystander" magazine during WW1

He resigned in 1907 to become an artist, studying at the John Hassall School of Art.

WWI

In 1914, he joined the Royal Warwickshire Regt as a 2nd lieut & served with a machine gun unit in France until 1915, when he was hospitalised with shellshock & hearing damage sustained during the 2nd Battle of Ypres

Posted to the 34th Division HQ on Salisbury Plain, he developed his humorous series for the Bystander about life in the trenches, featuring "Old Bill", a curmudgeonly soldier with trademark walrus mustache & balaclava

The best-remembered of these shows Bill with another trooper in a muddy shell hole with shells whizzing all around. The other trooper is grumbling and Bill advises

"Well, If you knows of a better 'ole, go to it"

Many of his cartoons from this period were collected in Fragments From France (1914) & the autobiographical Bullets & Billets (1916)

Despite the immense popularity with the troops & massive sales increase for the Bystander, initially there were objections to the "vulgar caricature". Nevertheless, their success in raising morale led to Bairnsfather's promotion & receipt of a War Office appointment to draw similar cartoons for other Allies forces

Post-WW1

"Old Bill" and Bairnsfather himself continued in popularity between WW1&2. Many police officers of the time had similar facial hair & that may have led to British police being referred to as The Old Bill. "The Bill" was a UK TV series which incorrectly shortened the original commonly-used phrase