Aussie Soldiers Magazine – February, 1919

Description

Aussie The Australian Soldiers Magazine was a commercial magazine of opinion, review and entertainment, published on a small printing press in the field in France during WWI, by Lieutenant Phillip Harris.  The initial print run was ten thousand copies, but it soon reached one hundred thousand.  It distributed news and provided light hearted ways of seeing war experience.

The first thirteen issues of Aussie were sold to soldiers for ten centimes a copy, with much of the proceeds going to the A.I.F Trust Fund and to raise money for Australia’s national War Museum.  The majority of the contents came from diggers themselves, with clips and works added by well known Australian writers such as Banjo Paterson, Henry Lawson and CJ Dennis.

Following the end of the war Harris repatriated Aussie Magazine and published an issue of Aussie – now in civvies.  The peacetime magazine was titled Aussie: The Cheerful Monthly.  It was published until 1932.

This February 1919 Edition measures  25.5cm x 18.5cm.  It appears to have been sent to a man living in Auckland, New Zealand and was received early May, 1919.