American Reacts to "Rare film about London during WW2"
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My mum's dad was a prisoner of war for nearly three years, but bless my Nan she had to work in a munitions factory I respect this generation. No way this generation could cope.
My mum worked in Ardeer in Stevenson Ayrshire, they used to tap the pipes in the winter when the Nitroglycerin froze. The German planes attacked and when the workers (mostly young women) came running out of the buildings they opened fire on them. Some were killed mere inches from my mum. She lived to tell the tale and had nine children. The greatest generation.
However, we did our bit in Korea, The Falkland's, Iraq and Afghanistan, also, Sierra Leone and other places.
A barrage balloon is a type of airborne barrage, a large uncrewed tethered balloon used to defend ground targets against aircraft attack, by raising aloft steel cables which pose a severe risk of collision to hostile aircraft, making the attacker's approach difficult and hazardous (source: Wikipedia)
and those baloons, attached by string steel cables, help to disaude low flying aircraft over critical targets, forcing enemy aircraft to fly above them, where the AA guns can reach them. the cables are designed to damage any aircraft that runs into them.
Also notice how all the crew for that AA gun and the range finder are all women ...
If you look, you will see that some ships off the coast of Normandy in 1944 also had barrage balloons
Also known as "blimps".
Nope, blimps are a type of powered airship.
@@Codex7777 That too:
the dictioary: a small airship or barrage balloon.
And if I'm correct, they send a lot of those balloons over to Germany to demolish electricity and phone cables and carrying explosive charges.
Something you might find interesting - and if you are curious about what it might have been like during an air raid in WWII - there were a series of 'live' broadcasts made by an American broadcaster named Ed Murrow. For these he would situate himself on the roof of a building during an actual air raid which was broadcast back to the States. He was a real friend to this country and I think he was responsible for gaining a lot of sympathy and support from the USA. He was later Knighted by the Queen for this service. The broadcasts can be found easily on UA-cam.
@9:01 "Shout out to Britain for the war effort" We owe our forebears so much for standing up to the tyranny of Nazi Germany. Hitler wanted his Third Reich to last for 1,000 years. If he had succeeded the whole of Europe and beyond would have been subjugated. Prime video did a miniseries called 'The man in the High Castle' that portrayed an alternate history in which Hitler's murderous regime won and even the USA fell under Nazi rule. It is a chilling depiction of what could have been.
Now we have a new threat(mo) and is gang.they are all over Europe, that what you get when you let your enemy move next door.
Now look at what we are walking into (giving up?!) with a certain religious demographic!
@@Dave.Thatcher1 Yes, that hasn't escaped my notice.
@@gdok6088 We owe our forebears more than we can imagine.
@@karonmorrison2531 That is true, however, you are being 'peacefully' invaded right now, right before your very eyes, and letting it happen.
You mentioned that there was uniformity in people's dress. Basically, everybody dressed smartly. I remember when I was ten (1965), my mother still insisted that I dressed smartly if we were travelling anywhere on public transport - train especially. 'Smartly' meant school uniform with tie and blazer.
My late mum always put her make-up and good clothes on before she went out in her 80s, even to the shops. This used to take an hour or so....
The lack of any sky scrapers around St Paul's and Tower Bridge is what stands out to me the most
I'm sure you've seen the iconic photo of St Paul's surrounded by flames but still standing.
Joel. Not many US people know about the effects of WWII on the UK. Rationing of food and everyday items was in place. Visiting US GI’s eat well on barracks canteens, but if they were invited to a private house then they came to see a family suffering from severe food rationing, food was bland and tasteless spices were imported and were less important than fuel, ammunitions and other war materials. I am sure the UK’s reputation from bland and small portions was the feeling taken back to the US when the GI’s returned home. Try UK food these days, the variety of foods is tremendous and tend to be more pure than their US counterparts.
after ww2 many european countries had the same problem, rationing food was all over the place, im not that ol but my mother and grandmother always told me how they were given a tickets for food for a whole month, 1kg of sugar, some salt, bread, potatoes and other stuff, cigarettes were a luxurious thing back then and they were trading a lot, ngl those times were pretty damn dark, hopefully this doesnt happen again. At least nowadays we all live in pretty decent times and food is actually great, greatings from Poland :)
@@novy1198I think we take for granted how easy we have it today compared to our European ancestors. My great grandparents never complained about anything, such strong people ❤
@@Shell2164 "Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times." Im not big of a fan of that quote, but it really shows nowadays its kindoff true
I live in Canada. My parents were 7 and 8 at the start of WWII and they remember rationing here too, especially meat, butter, coffee, sugar, things like that.
I was going to state the same thing rationing up to and including the early 1950’s. I was watching MASH and it was in 1950-53. They always complain about the food, They had full plates with meat and vegetables. Sometimes they mention don’t go to the British their food is awful, same criticism from the other Commonwealth Countries eg: Canada and Australia. They didn’t go affected by the Nth Atlantic Convoys being taken out by German submarines. Now Americans eat processed, chemical crap.
If you think that there is no variety in appearance and that people were dressed drably, remember that clothes were rationed during the war. You couldn't just go out and buy something bright and fashionable when you needed the coupons to by warm clothes to see you through winter when there was very little fuel for heating.
there was also an attitude of work clothes and practical clothes for the daytime and nice clothes to go out in the evenings or special occasions, also sunday best.
Yep, the saying "Make do and mend" was coined back then, because even if your clothes were moth eaten, you had to make do with it and mend it.
Not only did you make do & mend but for example you'd use the best bits of an adults coat to make a child's coat. Dress styles were ones that used the least material. Only a few colours of material. Wedding dresses, if you were lucky, were used as something borrowed. Wedding cake could be a sandwich cake under a card cake. Food was rationed. In the 1950s I can remember playing shops with a Ration Book when rationing finished. I've still got my ID Card.
You may enjoy the light comedy 'good night sweetheart' starring Nicholas Lyndhurst (only fools and horses). A time traveller between the 1990's and 1940's.
That would work really well !
I've been trying to recommend this for ages!
Ahh yes good night sweetheart see you in the morning, good night sweetheart I'll g grab you without warning - Open All Hours.
I was born in 1959. Rations didn't stop after WW2. I think that mindset regarding food was indoctrinated. A salad in my home consisted of a lettuce leaf, a slice tomato and cucumber.
When I was born my Dad was about 33years old, worked as a Merchant Seaman as a youngster.... and his mantra was I'll never to to bed hungry again.
I was born in 1950 so clearly never aware, but food rationing ended completely in 1954
@@handypandy490rationing might have ended in 1954 but the mindset hadn't!!!!
Can't remember the last time I saw a man carry his raincoat folded over his shoulder....walking to the train, loving this.
You get a lot of respect from me watching this. My late grandparents were this generation, I look up to them immensely.
I was one years old when WW2 started. My father was away for five years, serving in North Africa.
To be honest, living in a village, we children escaped the worst horrors. Of course we were rationed, no sweets or ice cream etc but we had plenty of fresh home grown food.
Our cottage had no electricity or running water. Ice on the inside of the windows. One meagre coal fire.
However we were very happy.
Naturally it was a very different world back then. The Canadian airforce were stationed nearby and we were I troduced to chewing gum! The local dances were a bonus for the local girls and the handsome Canadians! A lot of heartbreak (and occasional baby), were the legacy they left behind.
I was one of those babies, a result of a Canadian airforce man. Luckily I was adopted by the most wonderful parents a child could wish for, obviously no longer here, because that was in 1943...I still miss them every day.
One of the biggest differences with a film today of London is that there are no tourists. The people in this old clip are just going to and from work. . love the guy standing in the tobacconist shop greeting people in his gloves .
we was bombed to hell but the British spirit pulled us through
More realistically, it was the USA's intervention, and Russia's might on the Eastern front.
@@artistinbeziers7916 Learn some more.... At this point in WW2 (1939-41) the USSR was Germany's "best friend forever" (well at least until 22nd June 1941) and was supplying the nazis with MILLIONS of tons of food, fuel and raw materials to sustain her assault on the UK, while the NEUTRAL US at the same time was busy profitting from BOTH sides of the European war by selling supplies to BOTH the British AND the nazis.
In 1940-41 Britain saved ITSELF... INSPITE of the US as much as BECAUSE of the US.
Happy to have been of help reducing your own ignorance of the situation back then.
Was the comment : 'water had to be cleaner back then' referring to the Thames? The river was an open sewer and must have been biologically dead for decades before it was officially declared so in 1957. Standing on the old London Bridge in the 50's, I could see the water looked like soup.
The Thames through London is a fast flowing tidal river and will always look muddy. Looking muddy doesn't necessarily mean it isn't clean. The real open sewer period was during and before the mid 1800s. The Thames (London) embankment is the result of the sewers being built. The sewers are beneath the road and riverside pavement.
@@AlanMacleod-hv5ee Salmon (indicator of clean water) were absent from the Thames throughout the 1900s until around 1968 when they were reported on national TV and the river declared as improving in quality of water.
Also London is a port and the docks were much closer to central London back then so probably oil and other nasties were in the water.
Surely although it was an open sewer as you say… it’s a tidal river so all sewage is washed away???
@@jacquelinewalters4241 It's a tidal river - that means every 12.5 hours the direction of the tide rotates (standard tide duration) - 5h10m in, 1h slack, 5h10m out, 1h slack, etc. So with one hour of slack water at high and low tide, it means that for 5.10 of every 12.5 hours the water flow is moving inland and stronger than the outflowing river water.
Because of this, it pulls the sewage back into the river and it sticks to the banks, culverts, sewer lower segments etc. It's not a 24x365 outflow.
I’m afraid American civilians have no idea what it was like during the war as they didn’t suffer any of the deprivations that people in the UK had and it went on for years after the war ended. I remember losing the ration book and there was hell to pay.
Look at how slim people are, product of getting just enough to live. Bovril is one of the strange British obsessions, its a beef extract, with hot water gives a healthy beef tea. Similar to Marmite, a malt extract drink or spread. Both filled a need food or vitamin.
that music with the vocals in is actually super relaxing, and the balloons were barrage balloons, like sky mines to stop low flying planes.
Before I even watch, I know that we know that Joe’ll “get it” because he’s been here, he knows that grit & determination that’s been handed down through generations
It’s not something we boast about or even really talk about, it’s just there…
0ķ
Considering that clothing was rationed, everyone on the streets and at the train station looked very smart even if they were just going to the shops or going on a journey. It was also noticeable that everyone (women and men) were wearing hats.
Most people had to "make do and mend" with many aspects of their lives.
Barrage balloons were used to keep enemy bombers at a high altitude. They were part of an integrated air defence system which is basically coordinating anti aircraft fire, fighter aircraft, barrage balloons, (from information received by radar and observers), onto enemy aircraft. The US uniforms dates the film from 1942 onwards. Dominic
I believe the train station was Waterloo. The sign said SR (for Southern Railway) which would make sense if all those sailors on were on home leave from Portsmouth.
Yes, it's London Waterloo and you're spot on about the sailors returning from the south coast, likely Portsmouth.
This colourisation and middle class theme misrepresents how it really was for most people, in reality it was dismal, dingy and dangerous and people were near starvation apart from the elite and the working class were grieving the loss of husbands, fathers, sons and brothers lost in battles abroad or suffering from separation through evacuation to rural areas. It was not the stuff of what this movie depicts.
The miners got extra food rations during WW2 like others in heavy manual jobs . My father ran a facet to his dairy/bakery business during the war that had a canteen preparing packed lunches that were delivered to the mines ( pre nationalisation they didn't have canteens )
Also you think only the working classes died in the war? Look in any war graveyard. Your letting the chip on your shoulder distort your views. Lady Macrobert from Aberdeenshire ( landed family ) lost her three sons and there are countless other examples .
I identify with this decade more than I do now. How simple life was. Nobody looking downwards to their mobile phones, no aggressive attitudes, no homelessness, no road rage. No stabbings everywhere, no takeaways and people not being pleasant to one another. Be proud of your ancestors who fought to make a difference. Unfortunately their efforts only made some difference the rest is history. It is important to remember the sacrifices that were made and hopefully it will not be forgotten.
There was definitely aggressive attitudes, gangs were rife, lots of rackateering. With that came violence, stabbing and shooting. Spivs also were a thing. Lots of theft.
Also there was a war on, so the average person would see more violence than now, not less. The no takeaways point is somewhat valid, though pretty much the only food that wasn't rationed was fish and chips (the main takeaway) so yes, less takeaways, but also hardly any food.
As for homelessness, 2.25m were made homeless in this period in England. Also the terrible workhouses were still open.
It's very easy to watch a nice video with lovely music and feel nostagic. The truth is this time was brutal to live through. People in general may have been nicer and had a better sense of community, which is important, but that's about it.
@@joescarecrow❤
What's wrong with takeaways?
Thank you Joel for showing this video. It brought back so many memories.
I'm an ex-Londoner (now over 60 years in Adelaide, South Australia) but I wasn't born until 1947. However, I can honestly say that nothing much had changed while I was growing up. We never questioned all the bomb sites that we played on. Our home was a 'temporary' prefabricated house. These were intended as emergency housing as so many houses were lost in bombing, but were still being used decades later. Lots of other memories were there, the steam trains, the horse-drawn delivery vehicles and the men with their raincoats reminded me of my father coming home from work.
Wonderful memories!
No crazies with pink hair back then or people with bladed instruments of enrichment.
8:01 that is a barrage balloon.
Nah, just the crazies trying to bmb the eff out of us 😅
Back then, pretty much everyone capable of getting stabby was given a bladed article of enrichment and shipped off to be pointed at someone they should be stabbing.
Funnily, I recognised the song Harbour Lights. I was born in 1944, towards the end of the war but that song must have played for some time afterwards for me to know it. There would have been a lot of uniforms around as servicemen were on leave. Many reasons for the uniformity of dress, but in wartime there was no money around for fashion. It was all we could do to eat. Powered egg, most things rationed. That went on after the war for a time. I remember ration books, bomb sites, and so on. And yes those were American troops towards the end.
My family ( parents and grandparents) lived through the bombing of Liverpool UK. My uncles and grandfather all fought and 3 severely injured. My grandmother worked in the munitions factory.
My mother and her siblings were evacuated along with hundreds of other children. Strong, strong people ❤
I was born in Oct' 44, and that period, the music, the clothes, and the dreary atmospherics of the time, just seeped into my soul and have remained in a special 'drawer' - in a quiet corner of my memory banks gathering cerebral dust : I only open it when, on special occasions I want to be sharing thoughts with my, now deceased parents, and wider family, also deceased. Nothing really changed right through the 50's, regarding music and clothes, but the atmosphere substantially brightened in the early 60's : the Beatles appeared and changed everything. Another great video - respectfully reviewed. Cheers. Sheffield South Yorkshire
This must have been 1943 or 1944 because of the number of U.S. uniforms, which wouldn't have been the case before then. Everyone being so uniform in their dress may have been due to clothes rationing. The amount of destruction is so sad to see. Parts of my home city, Liverpool, were just as bad. There were still large gaps, where houses used to be, when I was your age in the 1980/90s. That war left its scars for too long. That's probably why Brits talk about it so much. People my age saw the devastation. The rubble had all been cleared away long ago but the roads, pavements, street lights, red post boxes were all still there, but no houses or buildings. They were ghost streets.
at 10:18 is a shot of the Windmill Theatre which famously "Never Closed" during the war. It had shows consisting of young girls in a state of deshabille and acts of comedians and other varieties. Many UK comedians, who later becoame famous, got their experience here, being shouted at "get off, bring back the young girls" by the audience.
Considering the rationing of clothing, people would have obtained clothes from proper clothes retailers or tailors, I think a lot of people in 2024 are dressed by Sports Direct.
My aunt made all our clothes, used rationing points.We managed very successfully.
One of the fascinating things for me is the lack of road markings ! Everyone wearing suits. People trying to carry on normal life despite the bombing and blown up buildings. The lack of cars and still horses and carts going about the place. As you say Joel brands such as Guinness Bovril and Schweeppes a still going strong today !!
As a child born in 1956 the only information you could get was from newspapers and radio ,bbc , tv later on and ITV
I do wish the youngsters of today would watch this kind of reminiscent video. Just to let them see how the UK looked back then and for those of a certain age ( 71) being reminded of how it was for our parents and grandparents, they really had it tough in two world wars. Purely about survival and not expecting the world to fall at their feet. No NHS until 1948 !! WE owe our forefathers so much for the sacrifices they had to make to give us freedom from tyranny. Don't get me started on what the UK looks like today.....freeloading nation 😢
I think I read somewhere that in fact the diet during wartime was actually more healthy than at other times. There was 'just enough' of everything, and it had been very carefully thought out; things like butter were severely rationed, for example. People were encouraged to grow food wherever they could, and city parks were dug up for the same purpose. I wasn't born till 1951, but I did have a ration card for a couple of years, apparently, though it would have mostly been for clothing in the early months, I suppose, as my mother fed me herself.
I love the music too and if you search Spotify for 1940's music you will find endless songs from this era. The words were so meaningful back then too.
MERCI AMERICA FABRICE FROM FRANCE
The balloons are Barrage Ballons. They were known as Blimps and were tethered balloons, attached to the ground with a metal cable, intended to deter low-flying enemy aircraft; used especially in World War II.
I just love this music. Endless film footage of London. Thank you for bringing this to our attention it makes us realise where we are now.
To stand out the front of the shop is known by a couple of terms. In Aussie Slang it's "spruiking". In England back in those times it was probably know as "Hawking" or "Touting". A classic form of advertising your business, right there & then. Touting or Spruiking while its exact origin is unknown, spruik may have been borrowed from German Sprüche “patter, spiel,” the plural of Spruch, “a saying; empty talk,” among other senses. It was adopted by the Ottoman Empire, you can still hear it in Bazaars' of the Middle East & Northern Africa.
My parents met and married when they both worked in munitions during the war. My father was unfit to fight as he had bone tuberculosis. Even after the war ended if my father had a boiled egg in the morning before work he would pour the water the egg was boiled in into his shaving mug. My father hated waste and I believe it goes back to the war years when everything was precious and even hot water was rationed.
My own father who came from working class roots in Bootle Liverpool just after the first world war ALWAYS lived a frugal life. Some would say he was an old "tight fist", but having lost his WW1 soldier father from his war wounds in 1930 at the height of the "great depression" and having just his mum to look after him and his two brothers meant that he'd had a hard upbringing. Out working a full day's heavy labour at 14 in the mid 1930s, the a full 6 years PROPER active service in the RN through WW2. I still remember him the 1970s, ripping up strips of newspaper to use in the toilet..... even though we had toilet rolls !!!
Hard learned habits die hard.
The important bit about barrage balloons is not so much the balloon, it's the steel cable it lifts into the air. It discourages low-flying bombers since the cable will bring down a machine if contact is made - there are many accounts of this. You wouldn't want to hit the actual balloon either, but at least you can see them. If bombers are forced to fly at medium altitude, they're easier for ground-based anti-aircraft fire to hit, and able to bomb less accurately.
Where all the sailors came off the train, it's probably come from Portsmouth or another south coast port, given it's a Southern Region loco. I don't know my London stations well enough to say which one it was.
Don't forget Port of London also docked RN ships that arrived with the North Atlantic convoys (post-Blitz).
It looks like Waterloo station.
@@maxwellturnbull1903 Thanks. I suspected it might be.
I believe the camera would have stood on a tripod therefore a lot of interest is shown. Especially the shop keeper.
I was born in 1938 and spent a lot of my time in communal air raid shelters when the sirens went off and if not their then next door in our neighbour's Morrison or Anderson shelters. Then we were evacuated to Bridgwater in Somerset and lived on a farm that grew Apples for cider productions. They were halcyon days for we kids, away from the dangers.
If you like, there's a lovely movie called Carrie's War, about sibling evacuees taken in by a Welsh household.
I'm not convinced much of the footage is from WW2 as there is a distinct lack of people carrying gasmasks.
My old workplace at Waterloo Station (featured here) in the 1960's. Apparently it doesn't look anything like it now!
Working in the Building Dept' I had access to all areas, from the numerous underground tunnels and caverns, to the roof, where on a sunny day I'd get up there for a bit of sunbathing during my breaks! Left there in late 1965 to train to be a Signalman.....first Signal Box at Crystal Palace.
No working docks in Londodn anymore and I see American uniforms in the first bit of film, so it can't be pre-1942 and might be early '44 in the immediate pre D-day days. Lots of Americans in later excerpts.
The chap with one leg could well be a casualty of WWI. It is really quite rare to see amputees these days and in the immediate aftermath of WWII you could see many more burn survivors after plastic surgery made such leaps forward at that time.
Barrage balloons could be raised and lowered from the ground (they were unmanned) and the idea was that the steel cables would be invisible to bombers and the resulting crashes would bring enemy planes down.
We had a choice . Hitler didnt want to invade Britain, he didnt want to go to war with Britain . But we chose to declare war on Germany and to fight for Europe and the free world on 3rd September 1939 . America did not join the war until 7th December 1941 following the bombing of Pearl Harbour by the Japanese, it then declared war on Germany on 11th December 1941 .
As a child, my mother was sent to live with her grandmother in the countryside, where she lived among Italian prisoners of war! She said they were lovely people. My Dad stayed home, as our town only got bombed a couple of times. He did get shot at once ,at the end of his street, the bullet holes are still there! He also recovered a bomb , which he took to my grandad, who war an ARP Warden at the time. My auntie was working as a nurse in one of the buildings bombed, luckily she survived!
Just look at that beautiful lack of traffic
What you didn't see were the thousands of people using the tube (underground) to get around..... Petrol was strictly rationed, and wasn't available for pleasure motoring. People such as the police, doctors, the military etc, had access to fuel, but few others had.
@@Brian-om2hh Oh I know, but then again there's still more people using the underground now. I'd be interested to see if there was significantly more road traffic prior to the war beginning, I imagine it would still be tame by today's standards however.
I found a photo from 1933 which still looks pleasantly calm, I don't know if it's a particularly quiet part of London though etc, but it's still nice and calm on the photo I'm looking at. UA-cam won't let me link it so I'll just share the title of it on the London Transport Museum website "B/W print; Holborn Circus traffic scene, by Topical Press, August 1933"
@@irreverend_ Rest assured there was still PLENTY of traffic jams in the innner cities from the 1920s onwards.... public transport/private car ownership met with horse drawn transport and even steam powered haulage vehicles.... Over the decades I've seen many images of CHAOTIC scenes in early to mid 20th century city and town centres.
In those days, you had one 'suit of clothes'. Sunday best if you were lucky.
A bomb ravaged city but still getting on with life and work. Not ignoring what is going on but working around it all. So very British, how utterly marvelous. I wonder how things would be different now! I hope we would behave at least as well but I fear there is less sense of community and people would be far more “every man for himself”, you never know until it happens though.
You only have to tell modern people there is a sniffles bug going round nowadays and the whole dumb country is running scared of each other.
There was a lot more "every man for himself" then than gets remembered. There was a huge black market. I think if the threat was felt to be as severe as people felt it was then, then today's Brits would react in much the same ways as then.
@@carelgoodheir692 The big difference now is that modern day governments do NOT act in the best interests of their fellow countrymen and instead act in the best interests of the globalist corporations that provide an ever increasing proportion of their party political funding.
I love how nice and smart dressed decently every one looks !!
A barrage balloon is a type of airborne barrage, a large uncrewed, tethered balloon used to defend ground targets against aircraft attack. It does this by raising up steel cables which pose a severe risk of collision to the Luftwaffe planes, making the Luftwaffe’s approach difficult and hazardous. They had to look out for these steel cables tethered from the ground into the sky that would decimate their aircraft if they hit one. They were watching out for these at NIGHT in total darkness where their visibility from the plane would’ve been extremely poor. One source has Balloons responsible for 102 aircraft crashes into the cables, resulting in 66 crashed or forced landings….
My dad was a bomb aimer in a Lancaster bomber, he got shrapnel to his head and till the day he died he has a horrible scar in his scalp. My mum did firewatching in Liverpool from the age of 16 until the end of the blitz. Very proud of both of them 😊
Dad was in the Burma Campaign❤ Mum was in pophams Plymouth England
used to leave plymouth City at night withe her family away from the Bombing her dad built a shed on dartmoor for thwm to sleep ❤
My mother was 16 when the war started and was serving in the Auxiliary Territorials - which had it's roots in WW1 as the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps. She wanted to be in the land Army, but my grandmother had heard some tales and put her foot down about that. However, when, the then, Princess Elizabeth joined the ATS, she thought that must be alright! Mum was mainly stationed at Bristol, a walk away from the suspension bridge. As she had vertigo, she only walked on that once! A shame as she said it was a nice walk and it wasn't vertigo. 😄🤔🙄🙄
I am 1943 vintage no central heating then he was most likely standing there to catch the sun and say morning wouldn't dream of trying to get customers that is a modern thing my mother had a shop in 1947 for about 12 years so different then.
Great video, Joel, and very nostalgic for some of us. The station shown in the film is Waterloo. I travelled through this station today and mentioned to my partner that it had changed surprisingly little in essence since the 50's when I first went there.. The flooring was rougher, there were no automatic ticket barriers and now there is no more smoke and steam, which t.b.h., I rather miss. There were many men in uniform because Waterloo served one of our naval bases, Portsmouth and the army training bases around Salisbury. Today most passengers appeared to be rather earnest looking young people from all over the world.
My grandparents got married in 1942, my Grandpa wore his one good suit (he was a research chemist - a reserved occupation - so no military uniform) and my Granny wore a feminine version, ie a smart jacket and skirt with her Sunday best hat. I can remember her telling me about how clothing and household linen were a constant problem as they were rationed. Even if you had the money to buy them, you had to have the right number of clothing coupons and even then you might not be able to find anything in the shops to buy. When my Mum was born in 1943, all her clothes were homemade from old garments or sheets which were beyond repair, but in which there was enough good fabric left to cut out a little dress or similar. Outgrown knitwear was unravelled, wound into a ball and handknitted into new cardigans or sweaters. Fortunately my Granny was good at sewing, and had learnt the art of smocking to make pretty the little dresses she made out of Grandpa’s old shirts or a sheet. A world away from today’s disposable fashion.
Aye "make do and mend" as the old saying was. My own mum and grandmother were committed knitters and clothes "repurposers"... kept me and my siblings warm through the winters of the 60s and 70s with their CONSTANT knitting.
Born in December 1945 I can remember rationing . Our milkman, the man who came round with his jugs of milk for my mum, always gave her a little more as my sister and I would be but babies. Mum told me. We didn’t know there was rationing but we knew there were things we couldn’t have. Two phrases I remember very clearly, ‘I want doesn’t get!’ and , ‘eat your food there are children around the world who don’t have any’. You know what, we were happy, much happier than the world today. And in our Christmas stocking we would maybe get an orange. Wow.
Huge posters should be made of photos and put up all around LONDON,to remind people of today how and why we fought two world wars and won ,and how we should never forget the sacrifices of those men and women
And how the British spirit pulled us through,remember all of this for the future
Thanks for sharing your reaction Jp, I really enjoyed watching it.
You're right, the music was great in the 30s/40s & the singers back then had great diction so you could tell what they were singing about....
For years I thought " A Town Called Malice", was "A Town Called Alice", talk about great mis-heard lyrics of the 20th century, my kids still tease me about it!
My mum told me so many stories about life in WW2, about food & clothes rationing, having a cardboard cut out of a wedding cake, passing wedding/bridesmaid dresses on to friends & family because of clothes rationing, working double shifts or two jobs because the men had gone off to war, growing their own fruit & veg in their garden in the "Backs to the Land" campaign to help with food shortages. Life was so different to the convenience of shopping online today or going instore & getting same day delivery.
Mum worked as an apprentice seemstress before the war but during the war she worked in a factory making the tools needed to make aircraft. She always looked smart & her clothes were tailored to fit her, not off the peg. She'd have new cuffs or a new collar on a jacket or immitation pockets to give an outfit a new look, or she'd put an inverted pleat down the side or back seam of a skirt to brighten it up... "Make do and mend" was one of her maxims. She still drank her tea weak, black with no sugar up until the day she passed away, because she hated it any other way during the war, she didn't like powdered milk & could never get used to fresh milk in her tea again. 🌺🇬🇧
The bridge at the start of the video is Westminster bridge. I live on that road and make that walk to the office every weekday!
Much of this is what I remember from my early years. The music, especially the singing stuff, is American as are most of the military personnel. Except where they are alighting from the train at Waterloo station in which case they are UK Naval personnel arriving from Portsmouth. The barrage balloons had cables which made low flying by the enemy very difficalt. At that time, you have to remember that clothing was made from natural materials such as cotton and wool - no synthetics - so everyone dressed similarly. The traffic is crossing Westminster Bridge not Tower Bridge.
"Utility CC41" clothing, footwear and furniture....RIGHT the way up until 1952 !!!
I remember in the 1960's that everyone was allowed off the trains first and went through one exit gate and it wasn't until the last passenger had gone through that gate that the passengers queuing at another gate were allowed onto the platform to board the train. Everyone's ticket was checked as they went through the gate (both ways). I remember the old steam trains with 8 people in the carriages in first and second class. In third class there were benches in rows and there was also a carriage to store baggage and sacks of mail and bicycles etc. I remember when electric trains with overhead wires replaced the steam trains in the mid-1960's. The journeys were smoother, cleaner and quieter. Happy days.
Did you know that stockings were unavailable until the GIs turned up in '43? My mum used to paint her legs with tea and put seams down the back with eye brow pencil.
8:04 A barrage ballon part of the anti-aircraft defense. They ascended to low altitude and were tethered to the ground by a heavy steel hauser. They were used as an airspace denial weapon - if an enemy aircraft hit the cable, that was the end of the aircraft.
So they were positioned to prevent enemy aircraft getting near valuable targets.
The German bombers used to use the Thames estuary as the rallying point for raids on London and then follow the Thames to navigate straight to the East End where all the docks and built up areas were. Since the British knew they would be using this route every day, they set up lots of barrage balloons in their path as traps to make it dangerous for the bombers. The balloons flew quite high and were secured to the ground by steel cables that were strong enough to severely damage any bomber that collided with them.
Hi Joel greetings from England 🇬🇧 we Brits really do "Keep Calm and Carry On" its in our DNA, no matter what happens we just get on with life and whats the use of worrying. We look out for each other and The UK is a unique country and we are known for our stiff upper lip!!! We Brits just get it.
my mom loved those times she as out lived all her siblings. she was the oldest and still alive at 98
Food rationing didn’t end until 9 years after the war.
Joel, those balloons as you rightly said, were barrage balloons. They were used as obstructions more than anything but doubt they were that effective. A very enjoyable and thoughtful reaction video as usual Joel.
Notice no real high rise buildings. The view of Tower Bridge shows cranes hence docks. All gone.
So many men in uniform, and that copper on his bike. Priceless!
In old films it often seemed that wearing a hat was a necessity for citizenship. Different times.
I watch a lot of war documentaries and I remember in one where an American soldier was skeptical that England could withstand the Nazis until he spent three days in London during the blitz he said he came away with a completely different attitude after witnessing first hand the spirit & determination of normal folk and their will to carry on regardless
People were told not to talk openly to strangers as war spies could be around. This would explain to lack of people standing around in conversation. The train station was the main arrival/departure point for military personnel and that's the reason for so many in uniform. Looks like more than half of the regular London population are elsewhere on duty!
..even the clouds look nostalgic!
I can remember an April falls played by the BBC shortly after the war. We were told everyone had to grow potatoes in window boxes because saying there was a potatoe shortage. 😂
It wasn't really a joke. Much parkland was given over to the growing of food, including some football grounds.
Beautiful innocent days
Joel, Highly recommend 1982's Bob Hoskins (Roger Rabbit) walking the Thames foreshore. The show was Omnibus, and comes in 7 or 11 minute versions. His historical knowledge was mind-blowing.
I lived in London for 40 years and from age 19 to 21 I worked on the West End, Piccadilly, as shown beginning at 4:40. The buildings there were, fortuitously, spared the German bombing and are currently unchanged from what we see now in the footage you ahow. It's know as tye West End or "Theatre land" and is world famous for its incompatible variety of world class plays, comedy venues, opera and drinking joints. I, having travelled farther and wider than 90% of Britw, contend that there is no worthy foreign comparison.
Awesome footage of a time when there was a tide of darkness, yet unity and good times too.
You should look at the Coventry blitz the city center was destroyed by German bombers in nov 1940 the cathedral was destroyed a new one was built in 1961
The river Thames was definitely NOT cleaner back then! 😂 Sewage was dumped into it. It apparently stunk the entire city out
That mostly stopped in the late 19th century after the addition of waste treatment plants to J W Bazalgette's earlier sewerage system. But the Thames WAS highly polluted by industrial effluent from the thousands of factories in the London area. Forced de-industrialisation of the UK from the 1970s onwards is the main cause of our rivers now being much cleaner (and for the now widespread pollution of far eastern rivers). Unfortunately over the last 20 years the massive increase in illegal migration coupled with the profiteering corporate ownership of the country's water companies now means ever more untreated sewage is once again being dumped into our rivers.
Great video. The first part is so interesting to me with Big Ben as the building at the front of the screen is St Thomas' Hospital, where I work now. I knew it was very grand (parts still are), but it looks nothing like this now.
Not many people then went out without wearing a hat!
In the 40s You only the BBC Radio 20:27
Yes the music was cool. Sat listening in the garden thinkng about when my grandparents were separted for national service
When i was in infant school we covered the war kids were encouraged to bring in items from that period for the displays some kids brought gas masks from their grandparents and ration books
This wouldn't have been 1940, Joel, because U.S. servicemen are in shot. Glad you joined us in the end though!
That last scene with people buying newspapers reminded me of the 1970s ..... on Saturday you'd nip out at 5.30 or 6.00pm to buy the late edition of the Evening Standard with the football results and reports and updated league tables after Saturday's afternoon matches. Just like that ........ a guy stood on the corner with a pile of newspapers,
My great grandma drove ambulances in london during ww2, my great grandfather couldnt fight so he joined the police and my other great grandfather fixed gas works so he had to stay. All worked in london during the blitz. Crazy times we must not forget though i feel we really are starting to lose touch
I'm looking after my dad who is going to 100 in September. Although physically fit (he was jet washing the drive this afternoon !) he has dementia so for the last couple of years I've been listening to 1930/40's music which he knows all the words to. I feel I've stepped back in time sometimes. He was on the anti aircraft guns trying to shoot the planes down as they came into London.
God bless him, lost my old feller who served 6 years in the RN during WW2 back in 2013 aged 93, he too had dementia for the last 6 or 7 years, SO I did likewise playing him all his favourites from the 1940s, his favourite being Nelson Eddy & Jeanette Macdonald singing the "Indian love call" (though it drove me mad).
Still miss him 11 years later. Respects to your father.
I was told as a kid that the roads on the north side of the bridge are wider because it got bombed more so they had to rebuild it that’s why the roads on the south side are narrower
Did you see how many Americans were walking about in London, how everyone had hats and shiny shoes and how the rubble from the bombed buildings had been tidied up in neat piles?
It's weird that the men wore suites or Jacket's and trousers, shirts, tie and hats and women wore skirts or dresses and carried hand bags. I remember pictures when I was young of my Grandda and Grandma on the beach and my grandfather had his suit on with his handkerchief on his head to keep the sun off his head. My mother talked about outside toilets which served three families and they got washed in a tin bath in front of a coal fire and part of her chores was to go and change the accumulator which was around the size of a car battery which shops charged up and you paid as you gave them the dud one to get a fully charged one to listen to the radio and find out how close the Natzi's were to bombing the Forth rail bridge . Definitely changed days , some young people don't appreciate how lucky they are even compared to when I was young .Great Video 👍
It would be interesting to know what is everyone favorite time period they either lived in or would like to live in and where? For me London late 70's to mid 80's as people respected what had gone before, new innovation with tech and had hope for a possible future.
The 60s definitely. There was so much optimism and enthusiasm after the dullness of to 50s.
My mum who was born in 1926, said in those days people would always dress smartly when they were out.