Fougasse was art editor of the magazine Punch when World War Two broke out in 1939, and he offered his services free to the British Government. He produced propaganda material for almost every ministry, and his gossiping cartoon characters injected welcome humour into propaganda posters in February 1940. Their popularity set a new tone for official mass communication. Despite an extended and illustrious career as a cartoonist, illustrator and commercial poster designer, it is probably for his 'Careless Talk Costs Lives' posters, issued by the Ministry of Information for display in public transport, that he is best known. Fougasse used the caption of this poster as the title of his BBC radio talk about the dangers of gossip. He tried to convey the concept that in no place was it safe to talk on any subject that related to the War and Britain's part in it, and that any information, once divulged, was beyond control, posing a risk to the nation's security. The humour here derives from the incongruity of the disguise worn by Adolf Hitler, the hated Nazi German leader.