WesWorld

1 February
In a small brick-built community hall in South London, Sergeant Pepper (Retired) began his first practice session with his new band.

17 February
The Royal Aircraft Establishment has formed a Rocket Propulsion Department formed at Westcott in Buckinghamshire. It will share facilities used by the Guided Projectile Establishment, also under the control of the RAE.

It was twenty years ago today
Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play

March
The harsh winter weather and the thaw has continued to cause misery across Britain.

On 4–5 March came heavy snow which left drifts across much of the country with some lying 7 metres (23 ft) deep in the Scottish Highlands. On 5 March one of the worst British blizzards of the 20th century occurred. Food supplies were again affected by the snow-bound roads and in some places the police requested permission to break into delivery lorries stranded by the snow. On 10 March milder air of 7–10 °C began to move north across the country from the south west, rapidly thawing the snow lying on low ground. After such a long frost the ground stayed frozen, causing much surface run off which resulted in widespread flooding. Further heavy snowfalls occurred as the milder air pushed northwards. On 14 March the deepest ever recorded depth of snow lying in an inhabited location was measured at Forest in Teesdale in County Durham at 8.3 ft (211 cm).

On 15 March a deepening depression moved in from the Atlantic, bringing heavy rain and gales. It was the start of the wettest March for 300 years. By 16 March winds reached 50 knots (90 km/h), gusting to 90 knots causing breaches in dykes in East Anglia resulting in the flooding of 100 square miles of land and blowing many trees down. The River Thames and the River Lea flooded in London. On 17–18 March the River Trent overtopped the riverbanks in Nottingham. Large parts of the city and surrounding areas were flooded with 9,000 properties and nearly a hundred industrial premises affected some to first floor height. Two days later, in the lower tidal reaches of the river, the peak of the flood combined with a high spring tide to flood villages and 2,000 properties in Gainsborough. River levels dropped when the floodbank at Morton breached, resulting in the flooding of some 77 square miles of farmland in the Trent valley. The flooding subsided in the west of the country by 20 March but rivers in the east were still rising and the Wharfe, Derwent, Aire and Ouse all burst their banks in the West Riding of Yorkshire. Selby was also badly affected with 70% of houses being flooded. More than 100,000 properties were affected by the flooding and the Army worked to prevent the spread of the floodwater, particularly at pumping plants and power stations.


Flooding following the bursting of the banks of the River Trent

The people of Canada sent food parcels to villages in Suffolk and the Premier of Ontario, George A. Drew, offered to help to distribute them personally. The flooding lasted for about a week, with some waters taking an additional ten days to subside.

The winter has has a devastating effect on Britain's industry; by February 1947 it was already estimated that that year's industrial output would be down by 10%. The effects of the March floods added a further £250–375 million in damage. Farming was particularly badly hit with cereal and potato harvests down 10–20% on the previous two years. Sheep farmers lost one quarter of their flocks.

Given the immensity of the disaster the German Government, through its ambassador, Prince Blucher, offers the assistance of elements of the Technische Hilfswerke to speed relief and recovery efforts.

A lot of misery indeed. Japan would have offered Britain to send aid as well, were it not for the fact that it was hit by the Nankai earthquake back in December.

The French offer to send some Unic ACM-4 amphibious trucks in order to assist in flooded areas...

The British government would gladly accept the offer of help from the Technische Hilfswerke and the French offer of ACM-4 amphibious trucks (Britain has nothing like the historical DUKW in WW).

Intermezzo – Fenchurch St. Paul, Norfolk

The wind-driven waters of the North Sea and the accumulated waters of the melting snow had lain on the land for more than two weeks – and for the small village of Fenchurch St. Paul things were approaching a crisis. No flood, no winter, in living memory had punished the Fen Country in the manner of the disaster of this year.

The Reverend Theodore Venables, rector of the parish of Fenchurch St. Paul, had organised preparations he had hoped would protect and save his flock and those living in the vicinity – an orderly evacuation had brought most of them into the safety of the namesake church, “the Cathedral of the Fens”, which stood on high ground, now surrounded by water. Their stored supplies, however, were running very short, and the planned-for boat-ferry service had fallen afoul of the storm that brought the flood – the surging storm tide had broken and scattered the boats across the fens for miles. The railways were cut, the roads were flooded, and the news broadcasts on the BBC were grim. The rector bowed his head in prayer, imploring the aid of the Almighty in their hour of need.

There was a knock at his door. “Come in,” said Mister Venables. It was Wally Pratt, one of the church wardens.

“Rector,” he explained. “Young Tom Blackett sent word from the bell tower that he’s seen movement in the direction of Leamholt; he thinks it may be a boat heading our way but he’s not sure.”

Venables gave a brief sigh. “Let us hope that it is so. I will be along in a moment.” Pratt went out, and the rector bowed his head again before leaving his study. When he returned to the nave of the church it was abuzz with the word of the sighting. Blackett had come down from the bell tower and explained.

“Well,” he began. “I saw something that looked like a boat headin’ our way from Leamholt; then Bill Rogers came up with old Colonel Thorpe’s field glasses and said it looked like a couple of barges, filled with men and a bunch of stuff under tarpaulins. But there weren’t like no barges I’ve ever seen.”

Reverend Venables could but hope, but as time progressed the reports coming from the watchers in the bell tower confirmed that indeed two barges – or two somethings – were slowly making their way over the flooded landscape towards the church, whose steeple rose high and served as a perfect landmark. He went out into the churchyard and from the edge of the wall – where water lapped at high tide – he could see the strange vessels, and hear the chugging of engines – like heavy lorries – but no lorry he had ever seen looked like these. He saw someone wave from the first vessel, and he waved in response.

“We will drive ‘round to the entrance” a voice shouted. He recognized it – it was Blundell, the police superintendent from Leamholt. “Drive?” thought Venables. “That is ridiculous.” Perhaps, but the two barges sailed past the wall of the church yard and then turned towards where sandbags blocked the entrance. As the barges drew closer the depth of water eased, and the barges suddenly leapt out of the water onto enormous tyres, revealing themselves to be some manner of lorry capable of traveling upon the water.

By now nearly all those who had sought refuge in the church were gathered to witness the strange apparition – quickly the entrance to the church yard was unblocked and the vehicles drove in. While some of those riding on the lorries dismounted and began to offload supplies of food, water, fuel, and blankets Blundell came over to explain.

“It took quite a while for these wonderful things to arrive from Germany, but they are doing yeoman work. Believe it or not, they’re from Krupps.” It was almost too much for the elderly clergyman, but at last help had arrived from the outside world. For the hundreds gathered around the church there was now no question that they would survive.

The Army as part of its flood relief efforts has deployed the few amphibious assets at its disposal. Among these were three early-production GTÉ TACT amphibious tracked vehicles along with three trailers which were fresh from the factory. They have been utilised to deliver supplies and evacuate flooded inhabitants to drier ground. The Army hopes to equip several units with the TACT which it has christened the Buffalo.

1 March
Today marks the opening of Ysgol Gymraeg Dewi Sant in Llanelli, the first Welsh-language school in Wales.

3 March
In Palestine, an Irgun raid and the explosion of a homemade device has killed seventeen British officers.

11 March
Clement Attlee called Shinwell into his office at Downing Street for a situation report. The meeting went well and Manny was able to give assurance that supplies of coal were now moving and that the main power stations and the national grid were coping well with the flooding. As the meeting broke up and the aides rushed out clutching files of paper, Manny got up, thanked the Prime Minister was about the turn to go when Attlee gently tugged on his elbow.
"Manny, many in the party and outside it have criticised your handling of the situation. The press have been calling for you to go."
Manny's face fell, "But Clem, you know what those hacks wrote was rubbish, the mines had barely been nationalised only a few days before the first snows fell. If anything the managers sabotaged our directives and willingly prevented supplies getting out."
"I know, I know and against this bad weather nobody can have done more to try and overcome such events no government could ever plan for. But the economy is sliding and we need every tool of morale. The City is flagging and the public have your name on their lips as a public enemy."
"What can I do?"
"I'm sorry Manny but politics is a unfair business, I know we need your energy in the government but I think its best to let things cool off for a bit before finding you something better suited to you. We need to recover fast and the nation needs a firm hand, I'm calling a Cabinet meeting this evening to reorganise the posts."
Manny forced a weak smile, at least the Prime Minister was covering him, there was no need to make an embarrassing public resignation. He felt sure Clem would give him another chance.

12 March
Clement Attlee has announced a Cabinet reshuffle. The most noted move is the creation of Commonwealth Relations Secretary which replaces the positions of Colonial Secretary and Dominions Secretary. The main change highlighted by the press is the replacement of Emanuel Shinwell by John Wilmot as Minister of Power, although Shinwell has been given the new position of Commonwealth Relations Secretary.

Prime Minister: Clement Attlee
Lord Chancellor: Viscount Jowitt
Leader of the House of Commons and Deputy PrimeMinister: Herbert Morrison
Leader of the House of Lords: George Hall
Lord Privy Seal: Arthur Greenwood (also Paymaster-General)
Chancellor of the Exchequer: Hugh Dalton
Home Secretary: Chuter Ede
Foreign Secretary: Ernest Bevin
Commonwealth Relations Secretary: Emanuel Shinwell
Secretary of State for Scotland: Tom Williams
Secretary for War: John Strachey
Secretary for Air: William Wedgwood Benn (Lord Stansgate)
First Lord of the Admiralty: A. V. Alexander
President of the Board of Trade: Sir Stafford Cripps
Secretary for Overseas Trade: Hugh Gaitskell
Minister of Education: Ellen Wilkinson
Minster of Labour: George Isaacs
Minster of Health: Aneurin Bevan
Minister of Transport and Shipping: Alfred Barnes
Minister of Civil Aviation: The Lord Winster
Minister of Fuel and Power: John Wilmot
Minister of Supply: George Strauss
Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries: Joseph Westwood
Minister of Works: George Tomlinson
Minister of Town and Country Planning: Lewis Silkin
Minister of National Insurance: James Griffiths
Minister for Pensions: Wilfred Paling
Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster: John Hynd
Postmaster-General: The Earl of Listowel

Art
The Welsh artist Alfred Janes has exhibited his new work, Little Cactus.

Music
During 11–15 June the first Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod was held in Wales, with W. S. Gwynn Williams as its musical director. Another new music festival began on 22 August, the Edinburgh International Festival. Its co-founder and first director is Sir Rudolf Bing. The first Festival concentrates mainly on classical music, a highlight being concerts given by the Vienna Philharmonic.
In July the Conductor Malcolm Sargent was invested with a knighthood for his services to music.
The Royal Variety Performance, held at the London Palladium on 3 November and attended by King Edward VIII included performances by Bud Flanagan, Wilson, Keppel and Betty, Borrah Minnevitch's Harmonica Rascals, Valerie Tandy and Gracie Fields.

Popular Music
The popular hits of the year were:
Anne Shelton - The Night Has A Thousand Eyes
Lizbeth Webb - This is My Lovely Day, by Vivian Ellis, from the musical Bless the Bride
Gracie Fields hosts Our Gracie's Working Party on BBC radio; in the series, she visits twelve towns (beginning with Rochdale), compering and performing in a live show of music and entertainment, with local talents on the bill.

Classical Music
New works released this year were:
Lennox Berkeley – Piano Concerto in B flat
Doreen Carwithen (Mary Alwyn) – ODTAA (One Damn Thing After Another)
David Diamond – String Quartet No. 3
Ralph Vaughan Williams - Introduction and Fugue for two pianos
David Wynne - Sonata No. 1 for keyboard

Opera
Benjamin Britten premieres his comic opera Albert Herring, a successor to his serious opera The Rape of Lucretia. The libretto, by Eric Crozier, is based on Guy de Maupassant's novella Le Rosier de Madame Husson, with the action transposed to an English setting.
In December, Benjamin Britten and singers Joan Cross and Peter Pears combined with designer John Piper and producer Eric Crozier to found the English Opera Group.

Musical Theatre
On 7 April, Together Again, a London revue starring The Crazy Gang, opened at the Victoria Palace Theatre
On 26 April Bless the Bride opened at the Adelphi Theatre. The music is by Vivian Ellis, book and lyrics by A. P. Herbert and produced by Charles B. Cochran. It stars Georges Guétary, Lizbeth Webb, Anona Winn and Brian Reece.
On 7 June the London production of Annie Get Your Gun by Irving Berlin opened at the Coliseum
On 21 October the London production of Finian's Rainbow, by Burton Lane and E.Y. Harburg, opened at the Palace Theatre


Books
Cynthia Asquith has published, This Mortal Coil, a collection of fantasy and horror short stories.
This year’s published work by Agatha Christie is The Labours of Hercules, a short story collection in which Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, and gives an account of twelve cases with which he intends to close his career as a private detective. The stories have all been published in periodicals since 1939.

The popular playwright, novelist and short story writer William Somerset Maugham has published two books this year, Creatures of Circumstance and Theatre.
Great Northern is the twelfth and final completed book of Arthur Ransome's Swallows and Amazons series of children's books. In this book, the three families of major characters in the series, the Swallows, the Amazons and the Ds, are all reunited in a book for the first time since Pigeon Post.
Billy Bunter of Greyfriars School is a novel by Charles Hamilton writing as Frank Richards, using the characters and settings of the Greyfriars School stories published from 1908 to 1940 in The Magnet. The novel has been an immediate success, with sales of 25,000 copies within a few weeks.

Malcolm Lowry's second novel Under the Volcano was published this year. The novel tells the story of Geoffrey Firmin, an alcoholic British consul in the small Mexican town of Quauhnahuac, on the Day of the Dead, 2 November 1938. The book takes its name from the two volcanoes that overshadow Quauhnahuac and the characters, Popocatepetl and Iztaccihuatl.
Compton Mackenzie has published his humorous novel Whisky Galore. The plot sees a cargo vessel, the S.S. Cabinet Minister, wrecked off the remote fictional Scottish island of Great Todday with fifty thousand cases of whisky aboard. They manage to salvage several hundred cases before the ship sinks. But it is not all clear sailing. They must thwart the efforts of the authorities to confiscate the liquor. A cat-and-mouse battle of wits ensues. The story is based on a real-life incident that occurred in 1941 on the Hebridean island of Eriskay when the S.S. Politician ran aground.
Stephen Potter has published his humorous self-help book The Theory and Practice of Gamesmanship: Or, The Art of Winning Games Without Actually Cheating. The book purports to teach ploys for manipulating one's associates, making them feel inferior and thus gaining the status of being one-up on them.

Michael Sadleir has published his latest novel, Forlorn Sunset, which like his previous work Fanny by Gaslight, is set in Victorian London and explores the underworld of vice that existed in the city.
Sydney Goodsir Smith has published his comic novel Carotid Cornucopius: caird of the Cannon Gait and voyeur of the Outlook Touer. His splores, cantraips, wisdoms, houghmagandies, peribibulatiouns and all kinna abstrapulous junketings and ongoings abowt the high toun of Edenberg, capitule of boney Sotland.

Evelyn Waugh has published Scott-King's Modern Europe. The story's central character is Scott-King, a middle-aged schoolmaster who for twenty-one years has taught classical languages at Granchester, an English public school which is his own old school. During his summer vacation, Scott-King visits Neutralia, a totalitarian republic ruled by a military dictator to take part in a scholarly conference. At the same time Neutralia is hosting several other events, including a large philatelic conference and an international gathering of women athletes and Scott-King meets a variety of remarkable characters. One of these, a scholar from Switzerland, is murdered, and Scott-King is tricked into laying a wreath for a questionable hero and unveiling a statue which is not what it seems, causing him to flee Simona disguised as a nun. On arrival at a Mediterranean seaport, he finds himself surrounded by anarchists, monarchists, Marxists, prostitutes, ballet dancers, spies and secret police officers. After a long sea journey, he arrives without his passport at a camp for Jewish illegal immigrants in the British Mandate for Palestine, where he is treated with suspicion until he is recognized by an old boy of his school and is thus able to establish his true identity.

George Orwell has published Lear, Tolstoy and the Fool, an essay inspired by a critical essay on Shakespeare by Leo Tolstoy. It was published in Polemic No. 7 (March 1947). Orwell analyses Tolstoy's criticism of Shakespeare's work in general and his attack on King Lear in particular. Tolstoy denounced Shakespeare as a bad dramatist, not a true artist at all, and declared that Shakespeare's fame was due to propaganda by German professors towards the end of the eighteenth century. Tolstoy claimed that Shakespeare was still admired only because of a sort of mass hypnosis. Orwell examines Tolstoy himself and notes that the special hatred Tolstoy reserved for King Lear could well be due to the curious similarity of his own story to Lear's, and to the fact that he suffered disappointments of the same nature after renouncing his estate, his aristocratic title and his copyrights. In conclusion, Orwell mentions how little difference Tolstoy's thunderous attack on Shakespeare has made. According to Orwell, the only criterion for the merit of a work of art is that it continues to be admired, and hence, the verdict on Shakespeare must be "not guilty", since more than a hundred years after Tolstoy's pamphlet Shakespeare remains as admired as ever.

New Welsh publications include; William Ewart Berry’s British Newspapers and their Controllers; J. Eirian Davies’ Awen y Wawr; Jack Jones’ Off to Philadelphia in the Morning; Michael Gareth Llewelyn’s White Wheat; John Cowper Powys’ Obstinate Cymric; Sir James Frederick Rees’ Studies in Welsh history and Elizabeth Watkin-Jones’ Y Cwlwm Cêl and Y Dryslwyn.

The political and literary periodical NOW, founded in 1940 by George Woodcock, and run by Freedom Press has ceased publication this year. NOW was established as a review for publishing literary matter and also as a forum for controversial writing and included works by Anarchists, Marxists and pacifists. In 1945, NOW had published Marie-Louise Berneri's "Sexuality and Freedom", one of the first discussions of the ideas of Wilhelm Reich in Britain.

Poetry
The most noted poems of the year were:
W. H. Auden, The Age of Anxiety
Kingsley Amis, Bright November
Patrick Kavanagh, A Soul For Sale
Philip Larkin, A Girl in Winter
Laurie Lee, The Bloom of Candles
Louis MacNeice, The Dark Tower
John Pudney, Low Life
Alan Ross, The Derelict Day
Stephen Spender, Poems of Dedication
Terence Tiller, Unarm, Eros
Henry Treece, The Haunted Garden

Television
During 10 February-11 March the BBC Television Service is temporarily suspended due to the national fuel crisis. On 9 November the memorial service is broadcast from the Cenotaph for the first time. On 20 November the Royal Wedding is watched by an estimated 400,000 viewers. Adelaide Hall appearing in Variety in Sepia is the first telecording by kinescope

New Programmes
The Care of Your Car is a series about looking after a car. The episodes aired in a 20-minute time-slot. The episodes were; "The Chassis" (26 January 1947),"Steering, Brakes and Tyres" (30 March 1947), "The Engine" (27 April 1947), "More About the Engine" (1 June 1947) and "Electrical Equipment" (4 July 1947).
Iberian Notebook is a television series which debuted 25 September. It is a programme of Iberian music and dancing.
Viewers' Viewpoint is a television series which presents discussions on television programmes with critics and viewers. It is one of the first television programmes about television itself.


Films

Black Memory is a crime drama starring Michael Atkinson, Myra O'Connell and Michael Medwin and directed by Oswald Mitchell. Two debuting actors are Sid James and Jane Arden.
Brighton Rock is a crime drama directed by John Boulting adapted from the 1938 novel Brighton Rock by Graham Greene and adapted by Greene and Terence Rattigan. It stars Richard Attenborough as Pinkie (reprising his breakthrough West End creation of the character), Carol Marsh as Rose, William Hartnell as Dallow and Hermione Baddeley as Ida. It was produced by Roy Boulting through the brothers' production company Charter Film Productions. The film centres on a gang of assorted criminals led by a psychopathic teen-aged hoodlum known as Pinkie. The film's real-life theme was the race-track gangs of the 1930s, which fought public battles with straight razors in their competition to control crime at racecourses in southern England. Pinkie is the strong arm for a small gang that operates at Brighton's race track. After a newspaper reporter named Fred writes a story that gets the gang leader killed by rivals, Pinkie takes over leadership and tracks Fred down, murdering him on an amusement park ride. The police think it a heart attack or suicide. But Pinkie still wants to cover his tracks and gets one of his gang members, Spicer, to take care of the matter. But Spicer accidentally leaves a clue that waitress Rose discovers. So Pinkie murders Spicer. He also courts and marries Rose so she can’t testify against him. But then, with self-appointed amateur sleuth Ida Arnold asking a lot of questions about Fred's murder, and the larger rival gang taking over racetrack racketeering, Pinkie decides he needs to kill Rose, too, before leaving town. So he convinces her that he will soon be caught and go to the gallows, and therefore the two should commit suicide together. Out of love for Pinkie she reluctantly agrees and almost follows through. But a member of Pinkie's gang turns on him and helps the police stop her just in time before Pinkie commits suicide by throwing himself off the pier.


Another crime thriller is Dancing with Crime directed by John Paddy Carstairs, starring Richard Attenborough, Barry K. Barnes and Sheila Sim. The film sees boyhood friends setting out in the world. Ted Peters (Richard Attenborough) becomes a taxi driver and hopes to marry Joy Goodall (Sheila Sim), a pretty chorus girl. Dave Robinson (Bill Rowbotham) seeking easy money, joins a gang which has its headquarters in a suburban palais-de-danse. Ted refuses to join them.
Dual Alibi is a crime drama directed by Alfred Travers and starring Herbert Lom, Phyllis Dixey and Terence De Marney. It was made by British National Films at Elstree Studios. In the film, a French acrobatic act, the de Lisle twins, are hired by a British promoter to perform in his Blackpool show. While working there one of the twins falls in love with a cigarette girl and aspiring singer Penny. After the twins win the French lottery, she steals their ticket with the help of a spivish publicity agent and goes to Paris to claim the prize. The twins follow them to seek revenge.

Dear Murderer is a thriller, directed by Arthur Crabtree for Gainsborough Pictures, and starring Eric Portman and Greta Gynt. The film was well-received for its tautness and ingenuity, with one reviewer noting: "Dear Murderer is a shrewd, semi-psychological thriller with Eric Portman, a well-known menace...being sinister to the height of his bent. The plot is good and chilling."It also received positive notices on its release in the USA.
Lee and Vivien Warren (Portman and Gynt) are trapped in a nightmare marriage. Vivien is despising, devious and habitually unfaithful while Lee is pathologically jealous. On his return from a lengthy business trip to New York, Lee finds several cards addressed to Vivien and determines to kill her latest lover, Richard Fenton (Dennis Price). He confronts Fenton, who admits to his affair with Vivien, and persuades him to end the relationship by writing her a farewell letter. He then kills Fenton, and stages the scene to look like a suicide, believing he has committed the perfect crime as the letter which Fenton had just written at his dictation has all the appearance of a suicide note. His scheme goes awry when he discovers immediately after the fact that Vivien and Fenton had in fact broken up some time before, and Fenton had been humouring him by writing the note. He is guilt-stricken at having killed Fenton needlessly, and realises that any suggestion of suicide on Fenton's part in despair over Vivien will now seem absurd to the police. When he discovers that Vivien now has a new beau, Jimmy Martin (Maxwell Reed), he takes the opportunity to frame Martin for the crime. While he arranges matters so that all the evidence points to Martin, the policeman in charge of the case has his doubts about the case but is unable to catch Lee out. Vivien begs her husband to intercede on Martin's behalf, promising to remain faithful in the future if he can devise a way to save Martin from the gallows without incriminating himself. Lee comes up with what he thinks will be the perfect solution to save Martin and thus keep Vivien, but then discovers he may have underestimated her cunning.

Black Narcissus is a Technicolor film by the British writer-producer-director team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, based on the 1939 novel by Rumer Godden. It is a psychological drama about the emotional tensions within a convent of nuns in an isolated valley in the Himalayas, and features Deborah Kerr, Kathleen Byron, Sabu, David Farrar, Flora Robson, Esmond Knight, and Jean Simmons. Black Narcissus has achieved acclaim for its pioneering technical mastery, with the cinematographer Jack Cardiff, shooting in vibrant colour, winning an Academy Award for Best Cinematography and a Golden Globe Award for Best Cinematography, and Alfred Junge winning an Academy Award for Best Art Direction.


The Loves of Joanna Godden is a historical drama film directed by Charles Frend and produced by Michael Balcon. The screenplay was written by H E Bates and Angus McPhail from the novel by Sheila Kaye-Smith. It stars Googie Withers, Jean Kent, John McCallum, Derek Bond, Chips Rafferty and Sonia Holm. The music was composed by Ralph Vaughan Williams. When Joanna Godden's father died, he bequeathed her a farm on the Romney Marsh in Kent. Joanna is determined to run the farm herself. Her neighbour Arthur Alce (John McCallum), laughs at her ambitions, but loves her. Choosing a new shepherd, she allows physical attraction to a man to overcome her judgment as a farmer and her scheme for cross-breeding sheep is unsuccessful. Her wealth gone, she turns to Arthur Alce for help, but not love. That she accepts from Martin Trevor (Derek Bond), a visitor from the world beyond the Marsh. But on the eve of their marriage Martin dies.

A Man About the House is directed by Leslie Arliss. The film is a melodrama, adapted for the screen by J.B. Williams from the 1942 novel of the same name by Francis Brett Young. It was produced by Edward Black and edited by Russell Lloyd, with cinematography by Georges Périnal and music by Nicholas Brodszky. Two impecunious English sisters, Ellen and Agnes Isit (Dulcie Gray and Margaret Johnston), unexpectedly inherit a Neapolitan villa from a deceased uncle and move to Italy to view and sell their property. A local man, Salvatore (Kieron Moore), has since a boy been employed by the deceased uncle becoming major domo and he now manages the villa and its vineyard. Exploring her late uncles' studio, Ellen uncovers a painting of a nude Salvatore as Bacchus. Soon Ellen becomes drawn to the carefree life of the locals and the romantic charisma of Salvatore, while the prudish Agnes resists. During the raucous revelry of the grape-treading festival, Agnes succumbs to her suppressed desire. The pair are quickly married and Salvatore now is master of the estate. Soon, Ellen becomes aware of a change in Salvatore's behaviour towards Agnes. Not long after the marriage, Agnes' health begins to deteriorate and Ellen's suspicions are aroused. She expresses her concerns to a visiting English doctor, Benjamin Dench (Guy Middleton) who is Agnes's former fiancé. Ellen is convinced that Agnes is being poisoned. She enlists Dench's help in trying to prove that Salvatore is slowly murdering her sister with arsenic. The villa once belonged to Salvatore's family and he has long been determined to regain ownership. Having poisoned his employer to inherit he had not anticipated the sisters arrival on the scene. The film culminates in a clifftop struggle between Salvatore and Dench, who beats Salvatore and tells him to leave at once or face the consequences. Ellen and Dench return to the villa to tend the sickened and weak Agnes. Suddenly they learn that Salvatore is dead, having cast himself from the clifftop rather than lose his family property. Ellen and Dench, who have fallen in love, depart together and leave the recovered Agnes who is determined to remain at the villa and to fulfil her dead husbands' wishes restoring the vineyards.

Mine Own Executioner is a psychological thriller drama film starring Burgess Meredith and directed by Anthony Kimmins, and based on the novel of the same name by Nigel Balchin. It was entered into the 1947 Cannes Film Festival. The title is derived from a quotation of John Donne's Devotions, which serves as the motto for the original book. Felix Milne (Meredith) is an overworked psychologist with psychological problems of his own. Molly Lucian has a husband traumatised from having been in a terrible accident, and she needs Milne's help in treating her husband, Adam. Adam is about to become severely schizophrenic. To make matters worse, Felix finds his own home life deteriorating.

The Brothers is a melodrama, starring Patricia Roc and John Laurie, from a novel of the same name by L.A.G. Strong. It is set in the Western Isles of Scotland, and the long and murderous grudge between two clans there, the Macraes and McFarishes. Patricia Roc plays a serving girl, whose arrival to work for the Macraes inflames the conflict and causes an internal power-struggle between two brothers in the Macrae clan (played by Maxwell Reed and Duncan Macrae).

Captain Boycott is a historical drama directed by Frank Launder and starring Stewart Granger, Kathleen Ryan, Mervyn Johns, Alastair Sim and Cecil Parker. Robert Donat makes a cameo appearance as Charles Stuart Parnell. The film covers a period of Irish history known as The Land War, when Irish tenant farmers were being squeezed dry by absentee English landlords. Some resorted to violence to achieve justice, but others, inspired by the Irish statesman Charles Stewart Parnell, adopted a form of passive resistance. The farmers are led by Hugh Davin (Stewart Granger), who, with the help of the local priest, Father McKeogh (Alastair Sim), encourages his fellow tenants to ostracize their land agent, the bombastic Captain Boycott (Cecil Parker). The resultant stand-off attracts international news coverage and will ultimately introduce a new word – to boycott – to the English language.

The Courtneys of Curzon Street is a drama starring Anna Neagle and Michael Wilding. The son of a baronet shocks class-conscious 1900 British society by marrying an Irish servant. The film chronicles 45 years in their lives together and apart. The film is one of the most seen British films of the year.
The End of the River is a drama made in Brazil about a South American Indian boy who leaves the jungle to the city, where he is accused of murder. It was directed by Derek Twist and written by Wolfgang Wilhelm, based on a novel by Desmond Holdridge. The film stars Sabu and Bibi Ferreira. The film was produced by Powell & Pressburger.
Fame is the Spur is a drama directed by Roy Boulting. It stars Michael Redgrave, Rosamund John, Bernard Miles, David Tomlinson, Maurice Denham and Kenneth Griffith. Its plot involves a British politician who rises to power, abandoning on the way his radical views for more conservative ones. It is based on the novel Fame Is the Spur by Howard Spring, which was believed to be based on the career of the Labour Party politician Ramsay MacDonald.
The Foxes of Harrow is an Anglo-American production directed by John M. Stahl. The film stars Rex Harrison, Maureen O'Hara and Richard Haydn. The film was nominated an Academy Award for Best Art Direction (Lyle Wheeler, Maurice Ransford, Thomas Little, Paul S. Fox). In the pre-Civil War New Orleans, roguish Irish gambler Stephen Fox (Rex Harrison) buys his way into society, something he couldn't do in his homeland because he is illegitimate.
Green Fingers is a drama directed by John Harlow and starring Robert Beatty, Carol Raye and Nova Pilbeam. The film's plot involves a young man who discovers that he has what appear to be healing powers.
The Hills of Donegal is drama directed by John Argyle and starring Dinah Sheridan, James Etherington and Moore Marriott. It follows a young Irish woman who abandons a promising career as singer to get married, only to discover that her husband is not the man she thought he was.
Hungry Hill is directed by Brian Desmond Hurst and starring Margaret Lockwood, Dennis Price and Cecil Parker with a screenplay by Terence Young and Daphne du Maurier, from the novel by Daphne du Maurier. A feud is waged between two families in Ireland, the Brodricks and the Donovans, over the sinking of a copper mine in Hungry Hill by Copper John Brodrick. The feud has repercussions down three generations.

It Always Rains on Sunday is a film adaptation of Arthur La Bern's novel of the same name, directed by Robert Hamer. The film has been compared with the Poetic realism movement in French cinema. The film concerns events one Sunday (23 March 1947) in Bethnal Green in the East End of London. Rose Sandigate (Googie Withers) is a former barmaid married to a middle-aged man (Edward Chapman) who has two teenage daughters from a previous marriage. She is a bossy, strident housewife, coping with the difficulties of poverty, near-slum housing and a drab, joyless environment. A former lover, Tommy Swann (John McCallum escapes from prison and is discovered by Rose hiding in the family's shed. He asks her to hide him until nightfall. Rose initially refuses but, clearly still in love with him, eventually allows him to hide in the bedroom. However, it proves extremely difficult to keep the presence of the escapee a secret in such a busy, bustling household. It is Sunday morning and the lunch must be cooked, the girls admonished for their misdemeanours of the previous night and the husband packed off to the pub out of the way. The strain is intolerable and as the day progresses, the police net closes, after a newspaper reporter interrupts them, as Tommy is about to flee, and soon tips off the police. By nightfall her secret is out and a panic-stricken Rose tries to gas herself, while the prisoner is cornered in railway sidings and arrested by the detective inspector (Jack Warner) who has been patiently tracking him. As the film ends, Rose is in hospital recovering, and reconciles with her husband, who then returns alone to their home, under a clear sky.


Jassy is a melodrama, based on a novel by Norah Lofts. It is a Gainsborough melodrama, the only one so far to be made in Technicolor. A fine country estate has just been lost at the roll of a dice, and the Hatton family have to move out as the Helmars take possession. As new landlords, the Helmars then have to face an angry mob of villagers, demanding better working conditions. They are led by Tom, who is mortally wounded by a drunken Helmar. The Hattons have been employing Tom’s wild half-gypsy daughter Jassy as a servant, but sack her when she gets too close to their son Barney. She makes friends with Helmar’s daughter Dilys, who gets her a job as her father’s housekeeper at the big estate. Soon she marries him, but after a riding accident, he becomes violent towards her. A dumb servant-girl Lindy poisons Helmar for his brutality to his wife. Lindy and Jassy are both charged with the crime and found guilty. But the shock has restored Lindy’s power of speech, and she is able to exonerate Jassy, who signs over the estate to Barney, as its rightful owner, and the two of them are reunited.
The Master of Bankdam is a historical film directed by Walter Forde from the novel, The Crowthers of Bankdam, by Thomas Armstrong. It stars Anne Crawford, Dennis Price, Tom Walls, Stephen Murray, Linden Travers and David Tomlinson. Two generations of brothers struggle for control of the family business in 19th-century Yorkshire.

The Ghosts of Berkeley Square is a comedy film, directed by Vernon Sewell and starring Robert Morley and Felix Aylmer. The film is an adaptation of the novel No Nightingales by Caryl Brahms and S. J. Simon, inspired by the enduring reputation of the property at 50 Berkeley Square as the most haunted house in London. Two 18th century officers, General Burlap (Morley) and Colonel Kelsoe (Aylmer), are desperate to prevent war, so they hatch a plan to capture the Duke of Marlborough and hold him prisoner until the threat of hostilities passes. Unfortunately, while testing the efficacy of the contraption they have designed to entrap the duke, they manage to kill themselves. Their stupidity incurs the wrath of Queen Anne in the afterlife, and as punishment they are condemned to haunt the Berkeley Square house until such time as a British monarch crosses the threshold of the property. Things get off to a rocky start when the ghosts of Burlap and Kelsoe blame each other for the fiasco, quarrel, and refuse to speak to each other for 66 years. Once they have resolved their differences, they set about trying to engineer the required royal visit. Over the decades they interact with the succession of different occupants of the house, but never manage to lure a monarch to enter. As the years pass, the house becomes variously the home of a French-run bordello; an Indian rajah complete with harem; the home of the PT Barnum theatre: a Boer War soldiers' hospital and a Great War officers' club. Their time in purgatory eventually comes to an end when Berkeley Square is bombed during a zeppelin raid and Queen Mary comes to visit the damaged properties, allowing the pair finally to take their place in the afterlife.
Holiday Camp is a comedy directed by Ken Annakin, starring Jack Warner, Jimmy Hanley, Kathleen Harrison and Dennis Price. It documents a working-class London family's annual visit to a summer holiday camp. The film is a kaleidoscope of various lives at play by the sea, in a Butlin's holiday camp. These include a pregnant young girl, a group of gamblers, and a murderer seeking his next victim.

Hue and Cry is a comedy directed by Charles Crichton and starring Alastair Sim, Harry Fowler and Joan Dowling. London forms the backdrop of a crime-gangster plot which revolves around a working-class children's street culture and children's secret clubs.


An Ideal Husband, also known as Oscar Wilde's An Ideal Husband, is a Technicolor adaptation of the play by Oscar Wilde. It was made by London Film Productions and distributed by British Lion Films and Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation. It was produced and directed by Alexander Korda from a screenplay by Lajos Bíró from Wilde's play. The film stars Paulette Goddard, Michael Wilding, Diana Wynyard, Hugh Williams, C. Aubrey Smith, Glynis Johns and Constance Collier. The plot sees a mysterious lady attempts to blackmail a respected politician into giving a speech in parliament that supports her interests.
Just William's Luck is a comedy film directed by Val Guest and starring William Graham, Garry Marsh and Jane Welsh. The film is based on the Just William series of books by Richmal Crompton. In the film, William and his gang, The Outlaws, investigate a haunted house.
Meet Me at Dawn is a romantic comedy directed by Peter Creswell and Thornton Freeland and starring William Eythe, Stanley Holloway and Hazel Court. A very skilled pistol shot hires himself out to fight duels in early twentieth century Paris.

27 March
Two new aircraft carriers, specially designed ‘light carriers’ for scouting work with smaller task forces have joined the fleet today. HMS Centaur and HMS Albion commissioned and joined the new 7th Carrier Squadron at Portsmouth.

29 March
The new submarines HMS Wakeful, Whelp, Wrangler, Wager and Warlock commissioned and formed the 19th Submarine Flotilla at Singapore today. This formation will continue the modernisation of the submarine fleet in the Far East.

Politics in 1947

By-Elections
The Normanton by-election was held on 11 February. The seat had become vacant when the Labour MP Tom Smith had resigned to take up the post of Labour Director of the North-Eastern Divisional Coal Board. Smith had held the seat since a by-election in 1933. The Labour candidate, George Sylvester, held the seat for his party, heavily defeating the Conservative Party candidate Enoch Powell.

The Jarrow by-election was held on 7 May. The by-election was held due to the death of the incumbent Labour MP, Ellen Wilkinson. It was won by the Labour candidate Ernest Fernyhough.

The Liverpool Edge Hill by-election was held on 11 September 1947. The seat became vacant on the death of the constituency's MP Richard Clitherow. The result was a hold for the Labour Party.

The Islington West by-election was held on 25 September. The by-election was held due to the appointment to hereditary peerage of the incumbent Labour MP, Frederick Montague. The seat was retained by the Labour candidate Albert Evans.

The Gravesend by-election was held on 26 November to fill the vacant seat of Gravesend. The vacancy arose when the sitting MP, Garry Allighan, was expelled from the House for making allegations of corruption. The seat was considered a marginal, having been won at the 1945 general election from the Conservatives, who had held it since the 1924 general election. Labour selected as its candidate Sir Richard Acland, a baronet and former Liberal MP for Barnstaple. He had left the Liberal Party in 1942 to found the socialist Common Wealth Party. After his own defeat in Putney at the 1945 general election Acland had joined Labour. The Conservative Party candidate was Frank K. Taylor. The Liberals, who had polled only 12% of the vote in 1945, did not contest the seat. Labour, who had not lost a seat at a by-election since the general election, had done badly in the recent local elections and were concerned that the unpopularity of their economic policies might cause a loss of the seat. Although their majority was slashed from 7,056 to 1,675 they were satisfied with the result.

The Edinburgh East by-election was held on 27 November, caused by the appointment of the incumbent Labour MP George Thomson as Lord Justice Clerk. The result was a hold for the Labour Party, with their candidate John Wheatley.

The Howdenshire by-election was held on 27 November, caused by the retirement of the incumbent Conservative MP Clifford Glossop. The result was a hold for the Conservative Party, with their candidate George Odey.

The Epsom by-election was held on 4 December. The vacancy arose when the sitting MP, Sir Archibald Southby resigned from the House of Commons by accepting the Stewardship of the Chiltern Hundreds. Malcolm McCorquodale comfortably held the seat for the conservatives.

Acts of Parliament
The Local Government (Scotland) Act 1947 was passed on 1 October. This Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom reforms the structure of local government in Scotland. For the purposes of local government, Scotland will be divided into counties, counties of cities, large burghs and small burghs, and the landward area of every county will be divided into districts.

Burma
General elections were held in Burma on 9 April for the House of Representatives. Voter turnout was 59.8%.
The results were:
United Party - 31 seats
Independents - 31 seats
Sinyetha (People’s Party) - 15 seats
Thakin (Master) - 13 seats
Chit Hlaing's party - 11 seats
Myochit (Burmese Nationalists) - 4 seats
Europeans - 9 seats
Independent Karen – 3 seats
Anglo-Burmans - 4 seats
Marxist Party of Burma – 2 seats

Gibraltar
A new trade union has been founded this year, the Gibraltar Confederation of Labour. It is promoted by the Association for the Advancement of Civil Rights (AACR). Its first elected president is Albert Risso, also the president of the AACR.

Jordan
General elections were held in Jordan on 20 October. As political parties are currently banned, all candidates were independents.

Malta
General elections were held in Malta between 25 and 27 October. They are the first elections held under universal suffrage and property qualifications for voters have been abolished. It is also the first time using the single transferable vote system. The number of seats has been increased from 10 to 40.
The results were:
Labour Party - 24 seats
Nationalist Party - 7 seats
Democratic Action Party - 4 seats
Gozo Party - 3 seats
Jones Party - 2 seats

1 April
Corby in Northamptonshire has been designated today as the next New Town. Corby is 23 miles north-east of the county town, Northampton and has been an important steel town since the 19th century. By 1939 the population had risen to 12,000. William Holford has been appointed as chief architect and it is hoped the development plan will be unveiled next year.

3 April
A British-registered ship, the 1,580 ton SS Stancliffe, had recently run aground off Sharpness, Wales loaded with 3,000 tons of timber. A local shipyard engineer, Ivor Langford, has managed to cut the vessel in two and sail both parts down to Cardiff Docks to salvage her.

9 April
A general election has been held in Burma for the House of Representatives.

The BBC broadcasts a new programme on radio today on the Home Programme. The theme of the programme is gardening and is called 'How Does Your Garden Grow?'

Quoted

The theme of the programme is gardening and is called 'How Does Your Garden Grow?'

Sounds like a very 'exciting' program to me.

Gardner 1: "Well... uhm... I put seeds in the ground... give it water... and with plenty of sunshine, nature will do the rest I guess..."
Gardner 2: "Well... uhm... I put seeds in the ground... give it water... and with plenty of sunshine, nature will do the rest I guess..."
Gardner 3: "Well... uhm... I put seeds in the ground... give it water... and with plenty of sunshine, nature will do the rest I guess..."
Gardner 4: "Well... uhm... I put seeds in the ground... give it water... and with plenty of sunshine, nature will do the rest I guess..."
Vicar: "Miracles happen when you pray to God. When I walk through the graveyard in the evening I notice that at times flowers will have appeared out of nowhere on the graves."

Exercise Venerate had been delayed by a month due to the severe weather conditions that had struck North-Western Europe. The delay however meant preparations were made extra thoroughly and two lucky additions were possible. First, the new light aircraft carriers HMS Centaur and Albion had very recently joined the fleet and were now in their working up period, although they had spent less time at sea than the Admiralty would have liked. Second, the navy’s standard cipher which was due for routine replacement in April was hurried forwards by the relative inactivity since Christmas. By early March all RN vessels had new code books issued to them and this afforded the exercise a degree of additional security from shore-based eavesdroppers across Europe.

The aim of Phase I of the exercise was simple; a Red Force mimicking a German taskforce would head up the North Sea and into the Atlantic. Blue Force was to intercept the force and either cripple its major units or force it to retreat. A second objective in Phase II would see a Red Force replenishment force trying to break out into the Atlantic.

Red Force was commanded by Admiral Harold Burrough.
The ships within it were:
10th Destroyer Flotilla (Meteor, Musketeer, Myrmidon, Milne, Matchless, Marksman, Moon and Matador)
23rd Light Cruiser Squadron (HMS Guyana, Uganda, Malaya, Sudan and Burma)
7th Carrier Squadron (HMS Centaur and Albion)
HMS Hercules
HMS Fury, Foresight and Fortune
HMS Chelmer and Colne
RFA Abbeydale
RFA Fortol
RFA Brambleleaf
RFA Appleleaf

The ships of Red Force had gathered at Harwich and set sail at 06:00 on 14 April to be in position for the start of the exercise. On reaching Cleaver Bank they changed course to NNE to bring them just east of Dogger Bank. The formed into the task force formation before dusk. The 10th Destroyer Flotilla in the lead, followed by the 23rd Light Cruiser Squadron and the three carriers with HMS Fury, Foresight and Fortune with the tankers RFA Abbeydale and Fortol bringing up the rear.

At 00:01 15 April the first ships of Admiral Edward Neville Syfret’s Blue Force left harbour to take up their patrol positions. The 20th Light Cruiser Squadron (HMS Lancaster, Leonidas, Latona, Leander and Largs) left Rosyth heading for the Fisher Banks to form their patrol line. The 2nd Submarine Flotilla (HMS Salmon, Sealion, Spearfish, Seawolf and Snapper) had already left harbour and they formed another patrol line to the west backed up by the destroyers HMS Yeoman, Yonder, Yorker and Yukon from the 12th Destroyer Flotilla.

Admiral Burrough’s plan was to sail roughly due north towards Ling Bank to avoid sailing too close to either the British or Scandinavian coasts and risking detection from the air. This was wise as even before dawn Vickers Wellington GR.Mk.VIII patrol aircraft from 182 Sqn were airborne. During the morning HMS Centaur put up a patrolling screen of 830 Sqn Fairey Barracuda AS.Mk.III aircraft. Equipped with ASV they were ideal for the role. Centaur and Albion’s air groups were working up as much as the ships crews were. Only the two Barracuda units were experienced in carrier operations with many crews having several deck tours under their belts. HMS Albion put up a CAP composed of BCAC Sea Fang FN.Mk.I fighters but deck handling was initially slow which delayed the take-offs. Orders were for minimal radio use so the pilots had to operate largely via hand signals to each other.
At 05:20 Burroughs had ordered a zig-zag course for the fleet in case of submarines operating in the area.

Further north the bulk of Blue Force, the 6th Carrier Squadron (HMS Leviathan and Magnificent); HMS Nelson, Rodney and Duke of York; the 4th Heavy Cruiser Squadron (HMS Northumberland, Dorsetshire, Surrey and Cornwall) and the 3rd Light Cruiser Squadron (HMS Amphion, Phaeton, Iris, Mercury and Apollo) set sail from Scapa Flow. There was little urgency due to the distance of the enemy but by noon they were headed in neat formation to a blocking position just to the northeast of Shetland while the 4th Heavy Cruiser Squadron and the destroyers HMS Cadiz, Gravelines, Sluys and Vigo headed to Viking Bank (these ships were known as Force Z).

Coastal Command put up patrols of BCAC Buccaneer GR.Mk.I and Vickers Wellington GR.Mk.VIII patrol aircraft in the southern North Sea and across the North Sea from the Firth of Forth to Jutland a line of Short Sunderland flying boats was formed. The day was spent by both sides probing. Just out of shore-based radio-location cover Red Force continued north. The Barracuda’s ASV Mk III centimetre-wave RL sets picked up numerous small fishing boats and commercial ships. This was a problem, some of the small fishing boats could easily be surfaced submarines or sloops. In wartime there would be much less civilian traffic but for peacetime exercises it was a serious problem, and a relatively important one. It was easier today to find ships but it wasn’t any easier to identify them without visual contact. A large cargo boat or passenger steamer could easily be a cruiser. [Author's note: I generally refer to radar as Radio-Location (RL) for aircraft and Radio-Direction Finding (RDF) for ships]

Blue Force’s Force Z comprised the newest ships of the fleet, they had the latest passive detection systems; the Type 293 Passive Radio Intercept and Type 297 Passive RDF Intercept sets. The operators manually had to tune across the wavebands, listening for potential targets. Surprisingly they came thick and fast; RAF ASV sets on nearby Sunderlands, other RN vessels further north and commercial sets. The Bergen to Aberdeen steamer with its Erickson navigation S-band set was plotted as it headed westwards. Again, selection and interpretation was key. The ‘enemy’ in this exercise had standard British kit so they would ‘sound’ like friendlies and vice-versa and of course the operators knew the Red Force would try to minimise its electromagnetic emissions as much as possible. Vice-Admiral Louis Henry Keppel Hamilton in command of Force Z on the bridge of HMS Northumberland mused how in Nelson’s day things were much simpler. The modern Admiral had to be technically minded, it was no longer a trade of just gunnery arcs and ‘crossing the T’ but careful use of radio and RDF, listening for the enemy and using what tools you possessed to outwit the enemy before even sighting them steaming over the horizon. With four modern heavy cruisers and destroyers all armed with automatic main calibre guns with radio-directors Hamilton had more destructive firepower that Nelson could ever have imagined. In a couple of minutes his ships could bring a devastating broadside to any enemy fleet.

At 12:24 the RL operator of Barracuda ‘Yellow 4’ spotted two contacts moving at 25 knots roughly due west. These were the cruisers HMS Leander and Largs heading to their patrol boxes in the Fisher Banks. The crew agreed they must be the enemy scouting screen and radioed back a brief spotting report to HMS Centaur. Shortly afterwards the cruisers had the Barracuda on their scopes. They were fitted with the Aerial/ Surface Search Type 278 set which was the first British set with a PPI scope. This allowed easy readings of bearing and range. HMS Leander reported the contact to Admiral Syfret aboard HMS Leviathan and to shore. The enemy was likely to be at least 25-50 miles away, possibly more. A shore-based strike would take at least two hours to arrive and no carrier-borne aircraft were present. The cruisers altered course a little further south. Admiral Burroughs could have done one of two things, order a carrier strike to cripple the cruisers or alter course to avoid them. His objective was to reach the Atlantic and preserve his airwings for operations there to severe British lines of communication. So he altered course 30 degrees to starboard and increased fleet speed to 30 knots. HMS Hercules was detached with the tankers and three destroyers to take slower support vessels along a different route to the Grand Fisher Bank much further towards the west to later reunite with the main force.

At 13:04 HMS Seawolf’s skipper Lt. Commander Harold Crimple sighted two large and two smaller vessels heading north through the search periscope. Visibility was perfect, the ships being about five miles off the port beam. They were moving too fast and were too far away for a torpedo attack but he logged the position and radioed a brief contact report. The Type 293 operator aboard HMS Albion picked up the transmission, HMS Myrmidon and Milne getting a fix on the position with their HF/DF equipment. Both destroyers were detached to hunt the submarine contact. A returning Barracuda was ordered to join the hunt. The RL operator was unable to locate the periscope even in the modest swell. Visually they did not spot it either. The Seawolf hearing the destroyers closing went deeper. Picking up a submerged contact on her ASDIC at 13:19, HMS Milne commenced her first attack run. For the next forty minutes the two destroyers hunted the submarine contact. Crimple was able to evade at least two attacks but the umpire aboard the Seawolf indicated some machinery and machinery damage as training charges went off fairly close to the hull on HMS Myrmidon’s third run. The umpires aboard the destroyers were not convinced of a successful engagement given the weak ASDIC contacts that were maintained. Rather than losing further time, Burroughs recalled them as the main force had been able to open a wider gap from the threat but he was wary more submarines might be lurking across his path. He conceded the submarine had probably radioed a contact report but he felt he was safely ahead of the Red Force screening units further to the west based on the contact report from Barracuda 'Yellow 4'.

Indeed, although two Barracuda’s from HMS Hercules were able to keep HMS Leander and Largs under intermittent contact during the day the Blue Forces were unable to make surface contact. The only craft that did spot the Red Fleet was a German-flagged fishing vessel that shadowed from a distance for about three hours. Indeed, she was not the last such vessel observed hovering just outside the exercise areas by ships and aircraft of both sides. HMS Largs attempted to send up her Swordfish seaplane to conduct an aerial search but a catapult fault prevented take-off. At 15:02 sensing the enemy had moved quicker than estimated the three Blue cruisers moved further north before resuming course for their intended patrol area in the Fisher banks at 17:46.

Dusk was falling as Burroughs made contact with his supply train again off the Grand Fisher Bank. Intermittent contacts on the Type 294 Passive RDF Intercept sets with the Blue cruisers to the south encouraged him to move much further east than planned. They moved off towards the Eigersunds Bank, hoping RAF air patrols would not extend that from the British coast. Burroughs ordered a ceasing of zig-zag pattern as darkness descended to avoid any collisions during the night and he left the risk of detection by submarine and torpedo attack was far less at night.

At 22:08 a Sunderland of 202 Sqn made RL contact with the tail of the Red Force formation and shadowed for at least forty minutes before it had to turn for home due to its fuel status. The Red Force ships had detected the Sunderland and as it turned for home Burroughs ordered a sharp alteration of course to the west.

At the early morning briefing in the wardroom of HMS Leviathan on 16 April Admiral Syfret received the latest updates. The latest sightings had put Red Force somewhere near the Eigersunds Bank. The question was where were they now? Rear-Admiral Rhoderick Robert McGrigor, Syfret’s Chief of Staff, felt the enemy would try and sneak up the Nordmark coast before taking the northern route to the Greenland Strait. Syfret thought they might be daring and push further west in the hope Blue Forces would be drawn too far West. McGrigor felt this would be risky as it would skirt too close to the aerial patrols around the Shetlands and Orkneys. Syfret decided to back both horses. Force Z was ordered to split into two units, one to head west (Force Zb) and other to search to the east of Viking Bank (Force Za). Already there were six Sunderland flying boats covering Force Z. The southern patrol line was ordered to remain in position in case the Red Force had doubled back.
HMS Zebra, Zeus, Zest and Zulu set up a patrol zone off Shetland.

With German flying boat activity heavily evident the RAF had taken steps to add this factor into the exercise and organised fighter protection for the Sunderlands. Hawker Tempests operated closer to the British shores but de Havilland Hornet FB.Mk.I twin-engine fighter from 23 Squadron at RAF Biggin Hill made longer-range sorties across the North Sea using drop tanks to further increase endurance.

At 08:17 a 202 Sqn Sunderland made contact, it was able to guide HMS Surrey, Cornwall, Cadiz and Vigo towards the enemy. They were only some 56 miles to the west. HMS Cornwall was fitted with the new RU-series jammer for trials. Detecting one of the two patrolling Red Barracudas the set was switched on and the Barracuda’s scope became a fuzzy mess of interference. This proved RL was not infallible for detection, although Burroughs was now aware the enemy was closing in, he had no idea exactly where they were. The Sunderland soon fell to the guns of one of Albion’s Sea Fangs. Burroughs had been ready and 849 Sqn aboard Albion and 859 Sqn aboard Centaur, both with Blackburn Firecrest FSN.Mk.I strike-fighters, were rapidly launched. By the time they had formed up the Blue Force Za was only just over the horizon. They had seen the Red aircraft launching on their RDF sets and called for air support. The carriers of Blue Force were only 80-95 miles to the north. Aboard HMS Leviathan and Magnificent the decks were busy as Blackburn Firecrests, Fairey Spearfish TBR.Mk.I and Sea Fang fighters were readied and began to take off.

At 08:43 the Red air force began their attacks on HMS Surrey, Cornwall, Cadiz and Vigo. All were equipped with the latest AA equipment and guns including 40mm 2pdr guns, 57mm 6pdr guns and 4.5in Mk.VI automatic mounts (all ships totalling 18 4.5in, 20 6pdr and 24 2pdr mounts). All ships were also fitted with the Type 988 RDF set on the Mk.VI HA/LA director with an associated ‘Tallboy’ console for computing barrage fire.
The Sea Fangs of 811 Sqn dived in to make their simulated rocket attacks to attack the AA guncrews and their mounts. Behind them the Firecrests came in low and fast aiming to make skip bombing or torpedo runs. With sufficient directors for four quarter fire-control the two heavy cruisers made a good account of themselves. The umpires judged the kill ratio to be around 45% of the attacking force (14 from 32). The destroyers were judged able to evade air attack but HMS Cornwall was deemed to have suffered a torpedo hit forward after a successful two-pronged attack by six Firecrests.

Admiral Burrough had already detached HMS Guyana, Uganda, Malaya, Matchless, Marksman, Moon and Matador to engage the Blue cruisers following up the air strike.

To be continued...