( CNN ) -- George S. Patton did not like Willie and Joe . Bill Mauldin , on top of a jeep ( his favored mode of transportation ) , was a hero to soldiers for his cartoons . The famed general was a spit-and-polish man , and `` Willie & Joe '' -- Bill Mauldin 's popular cartoon dogfaces , who appeared every day in the military newspaper Stars and Stripes -- were anything but : unshaven , rumpled , their boots caked with mud , eyes weary from days on the line . The general made it known that he was not amused , and eventually Mauldin -- a 23-year-old sergeant who 'd entered the Army to escape an aimless life in the rugged Southwest -- was summoned to Patton 's impressive headquarters , a requisitioned palace in Luxembourg . `` Now then , Sergeant , '' Patton said to Mauldin , as recalled in a new biography , Todd DePastino 's `` Bill Mauldin : A Life Up Front '' ( W.W. Norton ) . `` About those pictures you draw of those god-awful things you call soldiers . ... No respect for the Army , their officers , or themselves . ... What are you trying to do , incite a goddamn mutiny ? '' See some of Mauldin 's award-winning work » . That was the last thing on Mauldin 's mind . He was trying to tell the truth . The cartoonist , who died at age 81 in 2003 , had a storied career that included two Pulitzers -- including one for `` Willie & Joe '' -- several best-selling books and renown from veterans . But he never let his abiding concern for the regular guy stray far from his thoughts . `` If I see a stuffed shirt , I want to punch it . If it 's big , hit it . You ca n't go far wrong , '' he once said . DePastino , a history professor at Waynesburg College in Pennsylvania , found Mauldin 's work a revelation . Like many of the postwar generation , all he knew of Mauldin were the occasional references in Charles Schulz 's `` Peanuts , '' in which Snoopy would talk about quaffing root beers at Mauldin 's house . `` I got 'Up Front ' [ Mauldin 's first book ] , read it , and was stunned by the genius of the artwork , '' he recalls in an interview . `` It was like a hidden transcription of the war . ... I wanted to know what was behind the cartoons , and why they were allowed to be published . '' Indeed , `` Willie & Joe '' was unlike anything that had appeared in America during World War II . In the early years of the war , the U.S. government had focused on the upbeat , but as the optimism of U.S. entry gave way to the two-steps-forward , one-step-back grind of daily battle -- coupled with stark sacrifices at home -- the strategy fell apart . Mauldin 's characters were bluntly honest : War was dirty , absurd , bitter hard work . `` Willie & Joe '' quickly caught on with both enlisted men and -- upon syndication in the States -- the general public . `` I think the home front was hungry for the truth , '' says DePastino . Mauldin 's cartoons provided `` a needed dose of realism , '' he says . `` [ The message was ] the enemy is lethal and people overseas are sacrificing more than you are . '' But Mauldin had some officers on his side , up to and including the Supreme Allied Commander himself , Dwight D. Eisenhower . When Mauldin returned to the States , he was a hero . His first book , `` Up Front '' -- a memoir with cartoons -- became a tremendous best-seller , as did the follow-up , `` Back Home . '' For a time he lived in suburban Rockland County , New York , among other successful artists and writers . But life among the creative swells gnawed at him , and in the late '50s he became an editorial cartoonist , first for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch , later for the Chicago Sun-Times . He took on racism , Cold War politics , Vietnam and Chicago Mayor Richard Daley . He also went through the classic changes of his generation . He struggled with alcoholism . He was twice divorced , grappled with the counterculture , watched the World War II generation become forgotten and then deified . Through it all , he maintained a healthy skepticism for the establishment , whether it be martinet officers , self-important politicians or the suits in the corner office . DePastino remains surprised that his is the first biography of Mauldin , which perhaps speaks to the low regard our culture -- even pop culture -- has for cartoonists . `` If Mauldin had been a writer , there would have been a biography [ by now ] , '' he says . But the soldiers themselves -- men such as Schulz , a World War II vet who did n't meet Mauldin until years after first mentioning him in `` Peanuts '' -- knew Mauldin 's value . When he talks about the book , DePastino says , he gets his most emotional responses from veterans and their families . `` His art was about a group of men who are suffering unspeakable horrors in the trenches . His audience was those very men , '' he says . `` It 's odd -- he was kind of mirroring their lives back to them . ... He was doing this for those guys . How many artists do that ? ''
Bill Mauldin created award - winning ` ` Bill & Joe , '' about Army grunts , in WWII . Mauldin was young and like those he drew during war ; they died . Mauldin had long hair , yet many only knew him through ` ` Peanuts '' cartoons .