ARMY MAGAZINE NO 5 [Main Title]

Log in to create clips, download free screeners and save clips/films in Collections. Click here to find out more.

  • Title: ARMY MAGAZINE NO 5 [Main Title]
  • Film Number: WOY 26
  • Other titles:
  • Summary: A British army film magazine showing items on serviceman training for a Pentathlon competition, the Longmoor Military Railway and location scenes on the set of the feature film The Longest Day.
  • Description: I. Three pentathletes on horse back ride through woods at Aldershot, jumping a fence, log and galloping along a muddy path before. They are watched by a riding coach, officer and a fourth pentathlete in a Great Britain track suit. The coach talks to one of the riders about his riding position. Cut to the three men training in a swimming pool. A swimming coach instructs one on diving technique. The three men are seen racing first at freestyle and then butterfly. Cut to the athletes cross country running up a steep hill in a wood. The commentary explains that the men have been selected to represent GB after trials of men from all three Services and amateur clubs. The selected unnamed men are a Corporal, a Private and a Flight Lieutenant. Cut to two of the men fencing with an epee under instruction. The commentary explains that the modern sport of Pentathlon began at the 1912 Olympics when the athletes were told to imagine that the five disciplines simulated the hazards of a soldier delivering a message in time of war. Finally the three athletes are seen target pistol shooting. II. The army railway training centre at Longmoor in Hampshire. Where Royal Engineers are trained to work on the railways, an essential aspect of transportation when fighting takes place over a wide area. A shunter locomotive (WD 106) is seen pulling wagons into the siding. Cut to a Standard Austerity class locomotive, Ahwaz (WD 203, HE 3803/53 ), being filled with water. Cut to an Engineer directing a diesel driven Light Shunter locomotive, Matruh, (WD 8205) coupling up to some goods wagons. A team of Engineers are seen oiling a British Austerity class locomotive, Kitchener, wheel formation 2-10-0, (NBL 25643/45). One trainee corporal is seen working in a signal box. The trainees take nine weeks to become a driver, preceded by eight weeks training to be a fireman. Kitchener pulls out of a station pulling carriages. III. Scenes on the set of the feature film The Longest Day (released 1962). A group of British airborne troops are seen in action close by a crashed glider, a mock shell explodes in a cauldron in the foreground. Lord Lovat, the commander of the Commandos on D-Day, is seen talking to the actor Peter Lawford, who portrays him in the film. Cut to the actor Richard Todd, who actually served with the airborne troops at Normandy, talking to Major John Howard who commanded the Parachute Regiment given the task of capturing and holding two crucial bridges over the river Orne. As well as the various military advisers on location to ensure authenticity, the actors were also supported by a number of serving British soldiers flown to France by the War Office, including men of the 1st Green Jackets, formerly the 52nd which was the unit which actually took Pegasus bridge. Thus as the commentary remarks, as well as providing valuable training, the film work also gives the men a unique opportunity to reconstruct their own regimental history. The camera spies various cameos of the location shooting, including a soldier advising the actor, Norman Rossington, in the correct way of handling a Sten sub-machine gun, the actor Sean Connery being given a wound by a make-up artist, and Lovat directing the men and actors hugging Pegasus bridge on how to move in a convincing way. The item concludes with the filming of the scene of the meeting of Lovat and the airborne troops on the bridge and the men walking across the bridge lead by Lovat and his personal bagpiper.
  • Alternative Title:
  • Colour: Colour
  • Digitised:
  • Object_Number: WOY 26
  • Sound: Sound
  • Access Conditions: Attribution: © IWM (WOY 26)
  • Featured Period: 1946-1975
  • Production Date: 1961
  • Production Country: GB
  • Production Details: Associated British Pathe (Production company)
  • Personalities, Units and Organisations:
  • Keywords:
  • Physical Characteristics: Colour format: Colour Sound format: Sound Soundtrack language: English Title language: English
  • Technical Details: Format: 35mm Number of items/reels/tapes: 1 Footage: 717 ft; Running time: 8 mins
  • HD Media:
  • Link to IWM Collections page:

    WOY 26

  • Related IWM Collections Objects:
Register