Description
Object description
Unedited and uncensored newsreel rushes showing Clement Attlee, Leader of the Opposition in the House of Commons and head of the Labour Party, inspecting positions held by the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in northern France after the onset of cold winter weather.
Full description
Attlee, wearing a dark winter coat and a flat cap, visits the sector of the Allied front line held by the 1st British Division along the Franco-Belgian border between Bachy and Berçu, accompanied by officers from units and formations of the British Expeditionary Force stationed in the area. The visit takes place on a bright but cold winter's day. From the roof of a pill box (?), Attlee is led by Major-General Harold Alexander, 1st Division commander, and General Lord Gort, the Commander-in-Chief of the British Expeditionary Force, past a steel anti-tank barrier similar to a type known as a Belgian Gate and is shown a reinforced concrete pill box being built by British troops. Gort, Attlee and two senior army officers climb up a ladder to look at the construction more closely. Afterwards, Gort, wearing a gabardine trench coat and a scarf, looks on as another officer points out local tactical features to Attlee. A general view of the landscape under a covering of snow. Scenes showing Gort showing Attlee around in company with the Duke of Gloucester, Chief Liaison Officer at BEF Headquarters, and other officers, including a hand-held backwards walking shot of the party walking along a country road lined with poplars. Attlee inspects a neat and dry trench system in company with an officer (a Lieutenant-Colonel ?) and then rejoins the rest of the party who are looking at British soldiers building more defences. He watches men at work on the foundations for a ferro-concrete pill box and listens to Alexander point out local tactical features with his walking stick. Members of the party of officers escorting the Leader of the Opposition during his tour of the BEF frontline are seen crossing a snow-covered field; in the background, there is a French-built pill box which they have just inspected. They leap over a shallow ditch at the edge of the field and Captain Lord Munster, Gort's aide-de-camp, nearly loses his walking stick as he does so. Royal Engineers wearing woolly hats and the new British Army battledress drive stakes into the ground during the construction of a barbed wire barrier; Attlee observes them at work. A system of trenches is seen being built with the assistance of a Ruston Bucyrus 10RB trench excavator; the trenches are revetted with wattle (?) held in place with small tree trunks. Alexander, Munster and another officer (almost certainly Brigadier Percival, I Corps' Chief-of-Staff) are nearest the camera and Attlee is furthest away on the other side of the trench. A close up of the Labour Party leader in his flat cap. He is seen with the Duke of Gloucester (who is in the uniform of a Major-General in the British Army) and Lord Gort. The party sets off across a snow-covered field away from the camera.
Physical description
35mm