Description
Object description
Silent 8mm colour footage taken by Commander George C Blundell as his ship, the battleship HMS Nelson, returns to active service in the spring of 1942 (?) after an extensive refit and takes part in Operation 'Pedestal', a bold and costly attempt to resupply the besieged island of Malta in August 1942.
Full description
START 00:00:00 Scenes on Scapa Flow filmed in the spring of 1942 (?) - yellow primroses, an unidentified seabird sitting on the waves and birds feeding in grassland ashore. Views of the starboard side of the battleship HMS Nelson (now in an Admiralty disruptive camouflage scheme and armed with a Mk VIII 2-pounder pom-pom on B turret and 20mm Oerlikon cannon mountings on X turret instead of the unsuccessful Unrifled Projector rocket launchers). The entrance to a farm on the Orkneys at Scapa Flow. A cliff top view (Old Man of Hoy (?)), a violet, more primroses, two puffins nesting on a vertical cliff face and a fulmar swooping low over the endge of a cliff.
Full description
00:02:24 Filmed from the bridge, a 16-inch gun shoot at sea off the Orkneys; A and B turrets are trained to starboard.
Full description
00:03:36 Slow-motion shots of two Fleet Air Arm target towing aircraft - a Hawker Henley and a Blackburn Roc - buzzing HMS Nelson in Scapa Flow; among the warships visible at their moorings in the background are a capital ship (possibly HMS Renown) and the cruiser HMS Edinburgh (or HMS Belfast, depending whether this footage was shot in early or late 1942).
Full description
00:04:41A view of a fast freighter (possibly SS Port Chalmers) on HMS Nelson's port quarter at sunrise in the Mediterranean during Operation 'Pedestal', circa 10 August 1942. The destroyer HMS Lightning (pennant number 'G55') comes alongside the battleship's port quarter and one of her petty officers fires a line over to the smaller warship with a carbine. Crew members on HMS Lightning's foc'sle make the gunline secure and a message cylinder is sent across from the destroyer to HMS Nelson.
END 00:05:53
Physical description
8mm