IWM Letters from home

[Skipman]

IWM Letters from home (8.55)

Object description

Partially dramatised account of a letter being sent from a mother in Britain to her son serving in a trench on the Western Front, early 1916.
Full description

The young 'mother', at a table, begins her letter, "dear son" (acted). British troops unload sacks of mail for France at one of the Channel ports. The mail is taken across the Channel by ship and unloaded at a French port. A special "express" lorry is loaded with mail for headquarters, while British troops and French officials load other mail into goods trains. The express lorry arrives at GHQ Army Post Office at Saint Omer where the mail is unloaded and sorted. At the railhead the sacks of letters for the troops are unloaded from the train onto lorries. At a "refilling point" soldiers crowd round the lorry, the sacks are distributed and battalion orderlies sort the mail. At a field post office, a brick building beyond German shell range, soldiers queue to collect mail from pigeon holes. In a final scene (acted) letters are distributed to Highland troops in a front line trench while under shellfire.

Physical description

35mm

Mike