Title:SCENES OF UNITED STATES AIR FORCE PERSONNEL IN ENGLAND [Allocated Title]
Film Number:MGH 6824
Other titles:AMATEUR FILM BY UNIDENTIFIED US AIR FORCE AIRMAN [Alternative Title]
Summary: Miscellaneous and erratic assembly of sequences, possibly all shot by the same American cameraman, include views of Shaftesbury Avenue in wartime and a variety of dummy buildings to deceive German aerial reconnaissance during the Second World War.
Description: Several American servicemen in US Army Air Force (USAAF) uniforms, and evidently known to the cameraman, walk along the pavement of Shaftesbury Avenue in the theatre heartland of London in the evening light. Beyond No 116 [Egmont House] a gap in the streetscape may indicate a blitzed building. A bright sign advertises the Terence Rattigan play "Flare Path" at the Apollo Theatre [premiere on 13 August 1942], while another announces "No Orchids for Miss Blandish", by James Hadley Chase (1942) at the Prince of Wales Theatre [in Coventry Street, off Shaftesbury Avenue]. No 22 bus passes, with distinctive eyes advertisement on top deck. (Kodak US stock date 1941)
USAAF airmen practise pistol shooting on a range, then check their target scores. Airmen wear distinctive patch of 325th Bombardment Squadron. (Kodak US stock date 1941)
Prominent display on railway bridge with shunting train over wide trunk road advertising "Use Brockhouse Trailers" and "Berry's Spring Repairs". (Kodak UK stock date 1942)
Camera records a pair of odd-looking buildings, like modern toll houses, possibly intended for deception.
Smartly uniformed women of the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) march briskly along country road in cold weather. (Kodak UK stock date 1942)
Alternative Title:AMATEUR FILM BY UNIDENTIFIED US AIR FORCE AIRMAN [Alternative Title]
