WAR WOMEN ENGLAND

WAR WOMEN ENGLAND Main Title (IWM 474)

Object description

The contribution of British women to the war effort as shown in the WAR OFFICE TOPICAL BUDGET newsreel 1917-1918.

Full description

I. A recruiting march by girls of the Women's Land Army in central London, April 1918. Members of the Women's Land Army form an escort for the Lord Mayor of London, Charles A Hanson, as he enters Saint Paul's Cathedral, probably also in April. The Duke of Portland reviews a parade of Land Girls through the streets of Nottingham, 25th May 1918. A recruiting sergeant for the Women's Land Army addresses a crowd from the top of a hay wagon in central London, May 1918. A semi-staged piece of women entering a WAAC recruiting centre in London and leaving in uniform, followed by a column of WAACs marching to Waterloo Station and boarding a train together, "for men must fight and women must work". In France the WAACs do various jobs from motor maintenance to potato peeling. The Lord Mayor's Show in London on 9th November 1917 includes a Land Girls' pageant. The opening of the WAAC recruiting hut in Trafalgar Square on 7th November 1917. At the opening the Controller of the WAAC, Mrs Chalmers Watson, invites Lieutenant-General Sir Francis Lloyd to inspect the guard of honour of "the Women's Auxiliary Army Corps, popularly known in France as the 'Waxs'". Opening the hut with Lieutenant-General Lloyd is Lieutenant-General Sir Nevil Macready. II. In addition to war service is the question "will there be women MPs ?" showing, left to right, Christabel Pankhurst, her mother Mrs Emmeline Pankhurst, 'General' Flora Drummond and Annie Kenney outside the Queen's Hall on 7th November 1917, on the occasion of the foundation of the Women's Parliamentary Party from the Women's Social and Political Union. III. Further to this, Mrs C S Peel, the Director of the Women's Section of the Ministry of Food, leaves her office at Grosvenor House, December 1917. Finally, the march past Winchester Cathedral in January 1918 of "the Lady Ploughmen" of the Hampshire Women's Land Army.
Copyright courtesy of IWM.