1944 General Montgomery addresses factory workers

Date: 6th April 1944

Location: BIRMINGHAM, ENGLAND

Source: Reuters Historical News Collection: BRITISH PARAMOUNT NEWSREEL (REUTERS)

ENGLAND: Birmingham:

EXT

GV Monty's car thru crowd.

SV Monty's car thru crowd.

SV pan Home Guard keeping back crowd.

CU Monty shaking hands.

GV Monty on platform on canteen.

CU Monty speaking (Nat.sd)

SV factory workers seated at tables clapping.

SCU type clapping.

FCU Monty speaking (Nat.sd)

LV Monty on stage being cheered by workers.

SOUND EFFECTS

CU Monty speaking - Now, why is it that today the tide has turned and we are beating the Germans and coming towards the final climax of the war? I will tell you why it is. It is because we have got far the best equipment and we have got far the best men - women too (cheers) far the best". I can tell you that our British equipment is far superior to the equipment of the enemy because of the enemy - I've seen both. I know ours and I have seen the enemy's and it is very, very good. Now the great thing when you are fighting, of course, my business as you know is fighting - fighting Germans - and anybody else who wants to have a fight" (laughter)

FCU Monty speaking - Well, you can choose your own date and put your money on - I've got some money on, I'm not telling my date but there is no shadow of doubt - no shadow of doubt - that this war is going to end in the only proper way, the only proper way, and in none other. There is not the slightest shadow of doubt. Now, when you come back from the battlefront as I have and you come to the homefront, one is filled with admiration at what is going on at home in this country and when you compare the two fronts - the battlefront and the homefront - I would say that it is the homefront which is far the most important. I used to feel that, you know, when I was fighting away in the desert, or in Italy - the soldiers used to be anxious sometimes about their people at home and so long as they knew that all was well on the homefront, they did not care for anything, but they had to know that. So you see why this homefront is so terribly important.

SV Monty speaking - If the battlefront and the homefront really get down to it this year, we can get the things almost finished - we can get it so tight that next year - we just topple it over.

Now I won't keep you here. I am awfully pleased to have been here. Really delighted. We know each other, between us we can do anything and will - we will do anything. Goodbye to you. Thank you very much.

BLUE SCENES ORIG NEG ORIG NEG IN W.W.N.

GOOD SCENES

CU Monty.

SV pan factory workers sitting at tables.

CU type eating.

SV Monty speaking (Nat.sd)

SV pan factory workers clapping.

SV Monty speaking (Nat.sd)

SV types listening.

CY type listening.

GV pan factory workers in canteen listening.

SV Monty speaking (Nat.sd)

SOUND EFFECTS

SV Monty speaking "I ask for a lot of tanks and guns and a lot of things like that, what really matters is you want both, you want good equipment and you want good men, now we've got the best in the world. I know, because the army that I commanded the 8th army consisting of the fighting men of the British Empire, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, every Dominion of our Empire, they are the 8th army which is finest of the world and they, the fighting men of the British Empire are the best in the world

SV Monty speaking - But here, of course, where are you, where you have people from all over England, from all places in the British Isles, and no one can say about the people from the British Isles, there the people who? But you think of the changes that have come over the world, think of the changes in the last year and a half and the last two years, think back to 1940. They were bad days, very bad days. I got pushed in myself the same at Dunkirk. I expect you did too. Very unpleasant, but I do the pushing now, we do it you know, what we did in Africa, we pushed the Germans right across Africa,

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