Title:THE 51ST (HIGHLAND) DIVISION GOES ONTO THE OFFENSIVE AGAIN (PART 2) [Allocated Title]
Film Number:A70 116-7
Other titles:
Summary: After successfully attaining their objectives for the first phase of Operation "Totalise", 2nd Canadian Corps' offensive down the Caen-Falaise highway, the 51st (Highland) Division and the 33rd Armoured Brigade consolidate their hold on the village of St Aignan de Cramesnil while the 1st Polish Armoured Division assembles for the second phase.
Description: Troops of the 1st Battalion Black Watch keep guard over prisoners digging slit-trenches for them. The prisoners taken from the 89th Wehrmacht infantry division include Soviet Asians as well as more obviously upright Aryan types. Like other Norman villages after a battle, St Aignan de Cramesnil is in ruins. Bombs from the 8th USAAF fall beyond St Aignan on German positions around St Sylvain. The Black Watch is reinforced by the 1st Northampton Yeomanry's Sherman tanks. The 1st Polish Armoured Division's Armour assembles outside St Aignan for its combat debut prior to Phase II of Operation "Totalise". Of interest is a Bren gun fitted with a drum magazine mounted on a Humber scout car. The Polish crew of a 10th Mounted Rifles Regiment Cromwell relax before going into action for the first time.
Production Details: Directorate of Public Relations, War Office (Production sponsor)
Army Film and Photographic Unit (Production company)
Walker (Sergeant) (Production individual)
Personalities, Units and Organisations: British Army, Black Watch, 1st Battalion (regiment/service)
British Army, Bde 154 (regiment/service)
British Army, Div 51 (regiment/service)
British Army, Yeomanry, Northamptonshire, 1 (regiment/service)
British Army, Bde, Armoured, 33 (regiment/service)
Polish Armed Forces in the West, 1st Armoured Division (regiment/service)
Canadian Army, Canadian Corps 2 (regiment/service)
Canadian Army, Army 1 (regiment/service)
Keywords: prisoners of war (object name)
weapons, British - smallarm: Bren (object name)
armour, British - tank: Crusader AA (object name)
armour, British - armoured car: Humber scout car (object name)
armour, United States - tank: M4 Sherman & [British] (object name)
armour, United States - funnies: M4 Sherman Firefly & [British] (object name)
operations, Allied military - routine: digging in (object name)
recreation, Allied military - casual (object name)
Operation Totalise 1944, Normandy, North West Europe, Second World War (event)
Calvados, France (geography)
Normandy, France (geography)
