UNITED NEWS [Series Title]

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  • Title: UNITED NEWS [Series Title]
  • Film Number: UNY 145
  • Other titles:
  • Summary: Edition of US-produced wartime newsreel, featuring tests of the XP-55 experimental aircraft; the liberation of thousands of Allied internees in Manila, capital of the Philippines; an inter-American conference in Mexico City; fighting in the Colmar Pocket region of Alsace, France; President Roosevelt's address to Congress following the Yalta Conference, and images of the American amphibious invasion of Iwo Jima in the Pacific.
  • Description: Reel 1: United News main titles. 'New fighter plane flies "tail first"'; views of a static XP-55 Ascender with demonstration of its canard surfaces. View of the aircraft's tail with propeller spinning (pusher configuration); its serial number is 278846. Taxiing and taking off and flypasts. '3700 civilians freed in Manila'; at Santo Tomas prison a US Army car pulls up and General MacArthur gets out. Freed internees with American troops. Smoke as the building is shelled by the retreating Japanese. American troops run out of the building. Burning building with two people (a doctor and a nurse?) hurrying towards camera carrying a large case. American field artillery firing back. High view of a number of shanty-looking huts with internees waiting. Ground level; a queue of internees waiting near a sign 'British and other nationals'. Internees chopping and sawing wood. A queue of internees (waiting for food?). A man and woman eating together; the woman drinks from a glass jar. Another woman internee takes a drag on a cigarette with an expression of profound satisfaction. At a desk mail censors at work; a blackboard is inscribed 'Lets cooperate - to expedite censorship and transmittal [?] write ONE letter! 2 pages on one side paper - More as soon as possible'. Close-ups female internees with letters. At a University Macarthur walks through a crowd. He gets into a car and is applauded as the car drives away. An American flag is unveiled. High shot, looking down on waving civilians. 'Inter-American conference opens in Mexico'; in Mexico City US Secretary of State Stettinius and Nelson Rockefeller arrive by plane. Arriving at the Chapultepec Palace. The party are applauded at the Chamber of Deputies. President Manuel Avila Camacho arrives with Foreign Minister Padilla. Applauding deputies. 'Through the Siegfried Line to the Rhine'; American-equipped French troops (French First Army?) pass a sign 'Kolmar [Colmar] 33km / Wittenheim 2 km' (this location presumably somewhere south of Colmar, near Mulhouse?). Troops going forward in action. A wounded man is helped away. A stretcher case is carried; it is snowing. A woman of the French Red Cross, wearing an American steel helmet, closes an ambulance door and drives it away; it is snowing heavily. A French tank (an M3 Stuart) passes in Colmar; it is cheered by local civilians. French civilians with armfuls of bread. Waving to passing armoured cars; a nearby building has a shell hole. Close-up waving French woman. Elsewhere American troops in white camouflage march through a thickly snow-covered forest. A soldier struggles to move in waist-deep snow. Men with mules. A 4.2-inch mortar battery in action. Mortars landing near some large buildings on the edge of the forest. Interior command post. American heavy artillery in action, including 155mm Long Toms. Self-propelled guns, field guns and pack howitzers in action. German prisoners. German prisoners, apparently dragging a dead body on a sledge behind them. A row of German graves, with close-up on the nearest cross 'Uffz. Anton Giefer - 4.GR.48 - geb.26.2.16 / gest.27.12.44'. Wider shot other graves. Dragons' teeth tank obstacles of the Siegfried Line; an M18 Hellcat tank destroyer drives past them. 'Pres. Roosevelt reports on Crimea meeting'; exterior Capitol building with motorcade passing. Interior Congress; applause for President Roosevelt. Roosevelt speaks of the need for Congressional support for the decisions made at Yalta. Aims of Yalta are given as the swift defeat of Germany and to 'build the foundations of an international accord to bring order and security'. He speaks of Yalta as a potential turning point in history. He speaks of the responsibility to avoid a future global conflict and of Yalta as a building block towards that goal. He receives a standing ovation. Reel 2: 'Invasion of Iwo Jima'; map of the Pacific with Tokyo, Iwo Jima and Saipan marked. Photograph of Iwo Jima with arrows marking the landing beaches and push onto Mount Suribachi. Aerial view of the island. Naval bombardment and aerial bombardment. Rocket barrage. Smoke rising from the beaches. A landing craft under fire, it receives either a hit or a very near miss. Onboard a landing craft armed with rockets and 40mm Bofors guns a crewman lies (dead?) on the deck. Another wounded man on deck. An aircraft carrier at sea. Flight deck; a Grumman Hellcat lands on its belly. An upside-down Hellcat, marked '50' and with a Christmas tree-shaped design on its tail, hits the water close to camera. Pilot swimming in the sea. He is transferred to the carrier by jackstay from a destroyer. Aerial view of the invasion force. Landing craft underway. An aircraft passes laying smoke. Aerial view; the flat sea is marked with the wakes of landing craft. Landing craft and tracked carriers going ashore. Further air and sea views of landing craft. Marines aboard a landing craft. Landing craft beaching; a Sherman medium tank drives ashore. Men haul an anti-tank gun up the beach along a path marked with mine tape. Beach with carrier moving along the beach, a parked crane and men hauling on ropes to steady a beached landing craft. A marine runs to join others on the beach. Two men run up the beach carrying something. Landing craft and carriers on the beach. A marine with a small, neat bullet wound to his thigh is treated. A number of able-bodied Japanese prisoners are brought aboard an American warship. On the beach; a parked bulldozer. Men coming up the beach. From of the beach from the sea. View from the inside of a marine flamethrower tank, showing other tanks moving, the tank's flamethrower being fired and infantry on the beach. Naval bombardment. Aerial view landing craft leaving the beach. Tank interior; a Sherman goes forward with infantry sheltering nearby. The rear of the tank is marked 'Cape Town'. View of Motoyama Airfield with tank's coaxial machine gun firing; a Sherman named 'Cobra' is seen. Infantry behind a Sherman named 'Comet' (possibly 4th Marine Tank Battalion). Tank interior; column of tanks with the nearest marked F2. More coaxial and flamethrower firing. Out of the tank; American troops examine a captured Japanese machine gun. Tank interior; troops going forward. Tank interior; the turret traverses rapidly and appears to fire its machine gun at some Japanese troops at close range, followed by its flamethrower. Tank interior; American troops advancing. Out of the tank; troops running forward. Aerial view of Iwo Jima with smoke. End title.
  • Alternative Title:
  • Colour: B&W
  • Digitised:
  • Object_Number: UNY 145
  • Sound: Sound
  • Access Conditions: IWM
  • Featured Period: 1939-1945
  • Production Date: 1945-03-09
  • Production Country: United States of America
  • Production Details: Office of War Information (Sponsor) United Newsreel Corporation (Production company)
  • Personalities, Units and Organisations: Roosevelt, Franklin Delano (person) MacArthur, Douglas (person) Stettinius, Edward R (person) Rockefeller, Nelson Aldrich (person) Camacho, Manuel Ávila (person) United States Marine Corps, 4th Marine Tank Battalion (regiment/service)
  • Keywords: Allied Prisoners of War Far East 1939-1945, Internment (event) Liberation of Manila 1945, Philippines, Pacific War 1941-45, Second World War (event) Battle of Iwo Jima 1945, Pacific War 1941-1945, Second World War (event) Colmar 1945, North West Europe, Second World War (event)
  • Physical Characteristics: Colour format: B&W Sound format: Sound Soundtrack language: English
  • Technical Details: Format: 35mm Number of items/reels/tapes: 2 Footage: 1727 ft; Running time: 20 mins
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    UNY 145

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