0:00:03 > 0:00:07Swinbrook House, in Oxfordshire,
0:00:07 > 0:00:091932.
0:00:11 > 0:00:15Two girls are glaring at each other across a room.
0:00:17 > 0:00:20It's been divided straight down the middle,
0:00:20 > 0:00:24fascist images on one side of the line,
0:00:24 > 0:00:27communist propaganda on the other.
0:00:29 > 0:00:33On the red side is a feisty 15 year old called Jessica Mitford.
0:00:33 > 0:00:40On the fascist side, her 18-year-old sister, Unity Mitford.
0:00:44 > 0:00:48After the fighting, the two Mitford sisters would snuggle up together
0:00:48 > 0:00:53and discuss how they'd feel if one of them were ever ordered
0:00:53 > 0:00:55to execute the other.
0:00:57 > 0:01:02Unity would later tell her sister how she dreamed of meeting Hitler.
0:01:04 > 0:01:08Jessica said that she was going to run away and become a communist.
0:01:10 > 0:01:12And you know what?
0:01:12 > 0:01:17Unity really did become a close, personal friend of Adolf Hitler,
0:01:17 > 0:01:22endlessly sitting at his feet while the Fuhrer stroked her hair.
0:01:22 > 0:01:28And Jessica really did elope with Winston Churchill's leftie nephew
0:01:28 > 0:01:32to the Spanish Civil War, later becoming a communist herself.
0:01:32 > 0:01:37The antics of the Mitfords transfixed Britain in the '30s,
0:01:37 > 0:01:39and have done ever since.
0:01:39 > 0:01:44They became the pin-up girls for the political madness of those years.
0:01:44 > 0:01:49In the real world, 99% of the British were much duller.
0:01:49 > 0:01:52Thank the Lord!
0:02:30 > 0:02:36For me, more than anything else, the 1930s is symbolised by hats.
0:02:36 > 0:02:43Podgy politicians in trilby hats, incompetent financiers in top hats,
0:02:43 > 0:02:46hard-faced manufacturers in bowler hats,
0:02:46 > 0:02:52and endless streams of the unemployed, their flat caps pulled down tight.
0:02:56 > 0:03:01Britain's new Prime Minister, Ramsay MacDonald was, hat-wise,
0:03:01 > 0:03:07a man for all seasons - top hat, homburg, bowler.
0:03:07 > 0:03:09Bad sign.
0:03:11 > 0:03:14And yet MacDonald was a remarkable man,
0:03:14 > 0:03:18a long-haired youthful agitator who'd helped to found the Labour Party,
0:03:18 > 0:03:23and who, in 1924, became its first Prime Minister, for just nine months.
0:03:26 > 0:03:30In June 1929, he was elected again.
0:03:31 > 0:03:36I can assure you that my idea is going to be
0:03:36 > 0:03:40to give this country a status in the world
0:03:40 > 0:03:43based upon the righteousness of its actions.
0:03:54 > 0:03:58When the victorious Ramsay MacDonald arrived here
0:03:58 > 0:04:00at London's King's Cross station,
0:04:00 > 0:04:05he was greeted by 12,000 people cheering wildly.
0:04:05 > 0:04:09As he got out of the train, they tried to lift him on their shoulders.
0:04:09 > 0:04:12One of the journalists wrote that,
0:04:12 > 0:04:17"In the slums of the manufacturing towns and the hovels of the countryside,
0:04:17 > 0:04:21"Ramsay MacDonald has become a legendary being,
0:04:21 > 0:04:27"the personification of all that thousands of downtrodden men and women
0:04:27 > 0:04:31"hope and dream and desire."
0:04:36 > 0:04:42But if we remember '30s Britain for one thing, it's for unemployment.
0:04:42 > 0:04:45And soon after MacDonald took office,
0:04:45 > 0:04:49his hopes for a better future were shattered.
0:04:52 > 0:04:54The stock market crashed,
0:04:54 > 0:05:00bringing the worst financial collapse the world had, up to that point, ever seen.
0:05:08 > 0:05:14By December 1930, unemployment in Britain had reached 2.5 million.
0:05:14 > 0:05:18In some areas, nearly everyone was out of work.
0:05:27 > 0:05:32The areas worst affected were in the north of England, Scotland and Wales,
0:05:32 > 0:05:37where millions of unemployed people eked out their lives on meagre benefits.
0:05:39 > 0:05:45And this was unemployment which left families really hungry,
0:05:45 > 0:05:49living in under-heated, almost bare houses,
0:05:49 > 0:05:53and always with the cosh of the means test waiting for anyone
0:05:53 > 0:05:58who showed the slightest sign of existing just a little above the breadline.
0:05:58 > 0:06:01Neighbours would rat on neighbours,
0:06:01 > 0:06:06and government inspectors quite literally looked inside people's cooking pots
0:06:06 > 0:06:09to check that they weren't eating the better cuts of meat.
0:06:15 > 0:06:18A young Lancashire man, Walter Greenwood,
0:06:18 > 0:06:25was living just this kind of life in a slum called Hanky Park in Salford.
0:06:25 > 0:06:30Walter Greenwood started work in a pawnbroker's when he was just 13.
0:06:30 > 0:06:35He never earned more than £2 a week, barely enough to pay the rent.
0:06:35 > 0:06:39When he was made redundant, he spent nine months
0:06:39 > 0:06:44burning up inside with fury at the poverty of his home town.
0:06:44 > 0:06:47And then, he began to write a novel.
0:06:47 > 0:06:51He said he wanted "to show the tragedy of a lost generation
0:06:51 > 0:06:57"who had been denied the natural hopes and desires of youth".
0:06:59 > 0:07:01Morning, Dad, morning, Mum.
0:07:01 > 0:07:03More like afternoon to me.
0:07:03 > 0:07:04Oh, give over, Dad.
0:07:04 > 0:07:09The best-selling novel was a morality tale following the Hardcastle family
0:07:09 > 0:07:12as they are torn apart by unemployment.
0:07:14 > 0:07:16God, just give me a job.
0:07:16 > 0:07:18I don't care if it's only half pay.
0:07:18 > 0:07:23Their daughter, Sally, played by Deborah Kerr in the 1941 film,
0:07:23 > 0:07:27is eventually forced into prostitution.
0:07:27 > 0:07:29So you'd go on the loose, would you,
0:07:29 > 0:07:32and make respectable folks like me and your mother the talk of the neighbourhood?
0:07:32 > 0:07:36It's sick I am of codging old clothes to try and make them look summat like.
0:07:36 > 0:07:38And it's sick I am of working week after week and seeing nowt for it.
0:07:38 > 0:07:41And it's sick I am of never having nowt but what's been in t'pawnshop
0:07:41 > 0:07:43and crawling with dirt and vermin.
0:07:43 > 0:07:45I'm sick of the sight of Hanky Park, aye, and everybody in it.
0:07:45 > 0:07:49You brazen slut! Keep your lying tongue off your mother, do you hear?
0:07:51 > 0:07:55The gritty dialogue and realism were totally new to most of its readers.
0:07:55 > 0:08:00One reviewer said it was "a terrible indictment of modern civilisation...
0:08:00 > 0:08:02"capitalism is utterly condemned".
0:08:06 > 0:08:07DOOR BANGS
0:08:10 > 0:08:12BAGPIPES PLAY
0:08:12 > 0:08:15MacDonald, that's the view to across the...
0:08:15 > 0:08:17Yet Britain's first socialist Prime Minister
0:08:17 > 0:08:21seemed to be living in another world.
0:08:21 > 0:08:24The only thing we have found to do here thus far, Mr MacDonald,
0:08:24 > 0:08:28is to walk over the moors and to get a little trout fishing.
0:08:28 > 0:08:30Perhaps I can lure you into taking a little of that
0:08:30 > 0:08:32sometime while you are here.
0:08:32 > 0:08:34Yes.
0:08:34 > 0:08:39MacDonald seemed hopelessly out of touch already with ordinary people,
0:08:39 > 0:08:44and he had no obvious solution to what he called the "economic blizzard".
0:08:44 > 0:08:48At the Labour Party Conference at Llandudno in 1930,
0:08:48 > 0:08:51MacDonald suggested that the best solution for the unemployed
0:08:51 > 0:08:58was to return to the land, "where they could till and grow, sow and harvest".
0:08:58 > 0:09:00Well, it's an idea, I suppose.
0:09:00 > 0:09:02But a rather more modern solution
0:09:02 > 0:09:06was coming from another member of the Labour Party.
0:09:06 > 0:09:12Enter, stage left, 1930's very own pantomime villain.
0:09:12 > 0:09:19We live in a period in which politicians are not very popular.
0:09:19 > 0:09:23And believe me, you have my sympathy.
0:09:25 > 0:09:28Oswald Mosley started as a Tory war hero,
0:09:28 > 0:09:32before discovering socialism and joining Labour.
0:09:33 > 0:09:37In his spare time, he liked to move among the rich and beautiful,
0:09:37 > 0:09:40trying it on with almost every female he met.
0:09:43 > 0:09:48Mosley was a flashy, dashing cad.
0:09:48 > 0:09:53But he confined his mistresses to the upper classes.
0:09:53 > 0:09:58His personal motto - "Vote Labour, sleep Tory".
0:09:58 > 0:10:04But when he finally settled down with the aristocratic heiress Cimmie Curzon,
0:10:04 > 0:10:08he promised an end to this vigorous hobby.
0:10:08 > 0:10:14He drew a line under it all and confessed to all his previous conquests.
0:10:14 > 0:10:16Well, not quite all.
0:10:16 > 0:10:19He conveniently forgot to mention his affairs
0:10:19 > 0:10:24with both his wife's sister and her stepmother.
0:10:28 > 0:10:31But Mosley took his politics seriously.
0:10:31 > 0:10:34Influenced by Mussolini's social-Fascist experiment in Italy,
0:10:34 > 0:10:40he came up with one idea after another to solve the problem of unemployment.
0:10:40 > 0:10:47We have resources, of craftsmanship, of skill, second to none in the world.
0:10:48 > 0:10:52But those resources must be mobilised
0:10:52 > 0:10:56for a great effort of a united nation.
0:11:07 > 0:11:11Mosley wrote up his plans for large-scale borrowing
0:11:11 > 0:11:15and ambitious public works schemes. It was called the Mosley Memorandum.
0:11:19 > 0:11:23But standing in his way was the Chancellor, Philip Snowden,
0:11:23 > 0:11:27a cold little man who blocked every radical policy to create jobs.
0:11:30 > 0:11:32"Wildcat finance",
0:11:32 > 0:11:34Snowden called Mosley's plans.
0:11:34 > 0:11:39MacDonald was a bit more sympathetic, but he flapped and dithered.
0:11:39 > 0:11:43Every time Mosley produced a detailed proposal,
0:11:43 > 0:11:48he was brutally slapped down until eventually he resigned.
0:11:48 > 0:11:53"I didn't come into politics to change the Labour Party," he said later,
0:11:53 > 0:11:55"but to change the country."
0:11:55 > 0:11:58Thank you. Goodbye.
0:12:07 > 0:12:11Very soon the streets of Britain are swamped with lines of marching men
0:12:11 > 0:12:17in search of work, on hunger marches, or promoting a new Big Idea.
0:12:30 > 0:12:35Among them are the most disciplined, impressive marchers of them all...
0:12:35 > 0:12:38Yes, it's the Green Shirts.
0:12:41 > 0:12:43The who? The what?
0:12:43 > 0:12:49The green-clad shock troops of the people's fighting front,
0:12:49 > 0:12:51as the Green Shirts came to be known,
0:12:51 > 0:12:55believed in a fairer society, the joys of outdoor living,
0:12:55 > 0:13:00but above all, the overthrow of the banking system.
0:13:07 > 0:13:10The Green Shirts were founded by a charismatic former Scout leader
0:13:10 > 0:13:14called John Hargrave, also known as White Fox.
0:13:18 > 0:13:21Hargrave's movement had begun in the 1920s
0:13:21 > 0:13:26as a non-political organisation called the Kindred of the Kibbo Kift.
0:13:26 > 0:13:32They were dedicated to the joys of camping, handicrafts, world peace...
0:13:32 > 0:13:34and silly dancing.
0:13:38 > 0:13:41There was a lot of silly dancing in the '20s,
0:13:41 > 0:13:43but the mood of the '30s was darker.
0:13:43 > 0:13:48Hargrave was converted to a new economic theory called Social Credit,
0:13:48 > 0:13:52which seemed a middle way between capitalism and communism.
0:13:58 > 0:14:00Working or not, young, old, sick,
0:14:00 > 0:14:05everybody would get directly their share of the national dividend.
0:14:05 > 0:14:11Why? Because the credit of a community belongs to the community.
0:14:11 > 0:14:12Very straightforward.
0:14:12 > 0:14:16And as a country grew richer through technical advance,
0:14:16 > 0:14:19everybody would have to work far less.
0:14:19 > 0:14:22Result - a leisure society.
0:14:22 > 0:14:25Now, what's wrong with that?
0:14:33 > 0:14:35Alongside the camping, the Green Shirt Movement
0:14:35 > 0:14:38now came up with new political slogans and propaganda.
0:14:38 > 0:14:43Kibbo Kift dancing was out, marching was in.
0:14:43 > 0:14:47The Green Shirts became more and more militant.
0:14:53 > 0:14:56A young, unemployed man called Michael Murphy
0:14:56 > 0:15:00threw a green brick into the windows of Number 11 Downing Street.
0:15:00 > 0:15:04On it were two slogans - "Issue the National Dividend!"
0:15:04 > 0:15:07and "Power to the Green Shirts!"
0:15:07 > 0:15:13Social Credit had gone guerrilla, and the evolution of the Green Shirts
0:15:13 > 0:15:18from the mildly batty but entirely gentle Kibbo Kift
0:15:18 > 0:15:21to paramilitary street fighters
0:15:21 > 0:15:25is about as good a parable of the age as you're likely to get.
0:15:34 > 0:15:38By the summer of 1931, Government spending seemed out of control.
0:15:38 > 0:15:44The Treasury demanded a £67 million reduction in payments to the unemployed,
0:15:44 > 0:15:48which is the equivalent of £3.4 billion today.
0:15:52 > 0:15:54Could a Labour Government slash spending?
0:15:54 > 0:15:58And if not, would the Conservatives come in and do it instead?
0:15:58 > 0:16:03Very reluctantly, Ramsay MacDonald recommended the cuts to his Cabinet.
0:16:06 > 0:16:09REPORTER: What's going on behind these famous doors?
0:16:09 > 0:16:11The whole country and the rest of the world is watching
0:16:11 > 0:16:15to see how Great Britain is going to put its financial affairs in order.
0:16:16 > 0:16:19But the Cabinet was split. Many refused to agree.
0:16:19 > 0:16:23MacDonald's authority over his party had collapsed,
0:16:23 > 0:16:27and he felt he had no alternative but to offer his resignation to the King.
0:16:30 > 0:16:33But even before MacDonald had delivered his letter,
0:16:33 > 0:16:39the King announced that he trusted there was no question of him leaving office.
0:16:39 > 0:16:44MacDonald was the only man to lead the country through the crisis.
0:16:44 > 0:16:48Instead, MacDonald should form a National Government,
0:16:48 > 0:16:52including Conservatives and Liberals.
0:16:52 > 0:16:56Now, MacDonald knew that if he did this he'd be scuppered - in his own words,
0:16:56 > 0:17:01becoming "a ridiculous figure, unable to command support
0:17:01 > 0:17:06"and bring odium not only upon his party but himself".
0:17:06 > 0:17:11Yet, flattered by the King - at this moment of crisis,
0:17:11 > 0:17:16that little bit of magic royal oil - MacDonald agreed.
0:17:20 > 0:17:22For the national coalition to go ahead,
0:17:22 > 0:17:26MacDonald brought down his own Labour Government and Parliament was dissolved.
0:17:26 > 0:17:32On 28th September, he was expelled from the party he'd helped to create.
0:17:32 > 0:17:34Among Labour people to this day,
0:17:34 > 0:17:38Ramsay MacDonald is bitterly remembered as a traitor.
0:17:46 > 0:17:50But in the general election that followed, MacDonald was rewarded
0:17:50 > 0:17:54with one of the largest mandates ever won by a British Prime Minister.
0:17:54 > 0:17:57But with Tories Neville Chamberlain as Chancellor
0:17:57 > 0:18:01and Stanley Baldwin as the effective Deputy Leader,
0:18:01 > 0:18:07MacDonald now found himself at the beck and call of the Conservatives.
0:18:07 > 0:18:09CHEERING
0:18:09 > 0:18:13SLURRING: Conservatives win. Hooray for Ramsay Baldwin!
0:18:16 > 0:18:21One of Ramsay MacDonald's first challenges as the leader of the National Government
0:18:21 > 0:18:24was to paper over the cracks in the British Empire.
0:18:25 > 0:18:29REPORTER: Here he is at last, the mystery man of India, Mr Gandhi,
0:18:29 > 0:18:35dressed in just his loincloth, even in the chilly climes of Europe.
0:18:35 > 0:18:38He's carrying with him his pots and pans, which he declared at Customs.
0:18:41 > 0:18:47On September 12th 1931, Gandhi came to Britain to discuss the future of India.
0:18:54 > 0:18:56In the early '30s he'd begun a campaign
0:18:56 > 0:18:59of non-violent protest against British rule.
0:18:59 > 0:19:04The British Government reacted by arresting some 100,000 Indians,
0:19:04 > 0:19:06including Gandhi himself.
0:19:06 > 0:19:10The Empire was becoming a worldwide laughing stock.
0:19:18 > 0:19:24Here in Britain, Winston Churchill was infuriated by Gandhi's cheek
0:19:24 > 0:19:27and resigned in protest from the Government.
0:19:27 > 0:19:32Churchill saw the irritating little man in a loincloth
0:19:32 > 0:19:35as the beginning of the end for the British Empire.
0:19:35 > 0:19:41And nothing he said has worn quite as badly as his description of Gandhi
0:19:41 > 0:19:47as "a seditious Middle Temple lawyer, posing as a half-naked fakir".
0:19:47 > 0:19:54He said he'd like to see Gandhi bound, laid in the dust outside Delhi,
0:19:54 > 0:20:00and trampled upon by the Viceroy, riding an elephant.
0:20:03 > 0:20:06But now, to Churchill's horror,
0:20:06 > 0:20:09here he was having round-table talks with the British Government.
0:20:12 > 0:20:16While the talks were going on, Gandhi toured the country,
0:20:16 > 0:20:19visiting unemployed mill workers in Lancashire.
0:20:19 > 0:20:21MAN: Oh, he looks a likely lad.
0:20:29 > 0:20:35On November 5th, Gandhi was invited to tea with King George V at Buckingham Palace.
0:20:35 > 0:20:37The King was most unhappy.
0:20:41 > 0:20:45"I tell you what it is, Mr Gandhi," the King blurted out.
0:20:45 > 0:20:52"I am not having any of your damned interference in my Empire."
0:20:52 > 0:20:56Gandhi replied very calmly,
0:20:56 > 0:21:01"I must not be drawn into a political discussion with Your Majesty
0:21:01 > 0:21:05"while I am receiving Your Majesty's hospitality."
0:21:05 > 0:21:09As he was leaving the palace, he was asked by journalists
0:21:09 > 0:21:13if he really felt properly dressed for the occasion.
0:21:13 > 0:21:16"It was fine," said Gandhi.
0:21:16 > 0:21:20"The King was wearing enough for both of us."
0:21:24 > 0:21:29Gandhi left Britain, as eventually his country would too.
0:21:30 > 0:21:34Elsewhere, new empires were rising.
0:21:37 > 0:21:43Meine deutschen Arbeiter, das deutsche Volk hat nur einen Wunsch...
0:21:43 > 0:21:48In 1933, Adolf Hitler was elected Chancellor of Germany.
0:21:48 > 0:21:53He immediately began a massive expansion of the country's industrial production.
0:22:02 > 0:22:08In Italy, Benito Mussolini, or Il Duce, was planning the invasion of Abyssinia.
0:22:16 > 0:22:22MUSIC: "Rule, Britannia!" by Thomas Arne
0:22:22 > 0:22:26In Britain, we had a different sense of national destiny.
0:22:29 > 0:22:34Let's look the other way, vote for dull politicians and keep our fingers crossed.
0:22:34 > 0:22:39And after all, there were other distractions.
0:22:39 > 0:22:44# I've tasted their waffles and corn on the cob
0:22:44 > 0:22:47# But give me some hotpot... #
0:22:47 > 0:22:50Oi! Are you dreamin'? Come on!
0:22:50 > 0:22:52None bigger, none louder,
0:22:52 > 0:22:57than Britain's very own superstar of the talkies, Gracie Fields.
0:23:00 > 0:23:04This was a great age of film, and Gracie was, by far,
0:23:04 > 0:23:06the most popular entertainer in Britain.
0:23:08 > 0:23:12Even her director, Basil Dean, seemed puzzled by her success -
0:23:12 > 0:23:16what he called her "almost freakish drawing-power".
0:23:16 > 0:23:21"Gracie's personality literally bounces off the screen," he wrote.
0:23:28 > 0:23:33Queen Mary wondered how it was possible that she sang so beautifully,
0:23:33 > 0:23:39while at the same time making "those rough noises".
0:23:43 > 0:23:47# I'm walking in the shade Sticking out my chest
0:23:47 > 0:23:51# Hoping for the best Looking on the bright side of life... #
0:23:52 > 0:23:56Our Gracie was born Gracie Stansfield
0:23:56 > 0:24:00in 1898 above a chip shop in Rochdale, Lancashire.
0:24:00 > 0:24:04She escaped the cotton mills with a career in music hall,
0:24:04 > 0:24:07and by the time she was 25, she was a household name.
0:24:12 > 0:24:16In 1934, she appeared in the box office hit Sing As We Go,
0:24:16 > 0:24:20the story of a mouthy mill worker called Gracie Platt.
0:24:20 > 0:24:24Well, Grace, this lot's knocked the song and dance out of you.
0:24:24 > 0:24:25Oh, no, it hasn't, long face.
0:24:25 > 0:24:28Come on, lads and lasses, let's leave the mill in good style.
0:24:28 > 0:24:30Sing as we go!
0:24:30 > 0:24:34# Sing as we go and let the world go by
0:24:34 > 0:24:37# Singing a song we march along the highway
0:24:37 > 0:24:41# A song and a smile make it right worthwhile
0:24:41 > 0:24:46# So sing...as we go along. #
0:24:46 > 0:24:50When she hears she's going to lose her job in the Depression,
0:24:50 > 0:24:53Gracie takes it on the chin.
0:24:53 > 0:24:58"If we can't spin, we can still sing," she insists as she warbles her way
0:24:58 > 0:25:02out of the factory gates and off into an uncertain future.
0:25:02 > 0:25:05She gets on her bike and ends up here in Blackpool...
0:25:08 > 0:25:11..where she tries various jobs. She's a waitress...
0:25:11 > 0:25:14Hold on, you haven't said, "How do you do?" to me yet.
0:25:14 > 0:25:15..a spiritualist...
0:25:15 > 0:25:18Your astral form is very visible to me. It's bright red.
0:25:18 > 0:25:21I feel the radiation coming through to me at once.
0:25:21 > 0:25:25..and a vendor of Krunchy-Wunchy Toffee here on the seafront.
0:25:25 > 0:25:28Threepence or sixpence a packet, Krunchy-Wunchy Toffee.
0:25:34 > 0:25:35CHEERING
0:25:35 > 0:25:37After a series of adventures,
0:25:37 > 0:25:42Gracie returns triumphantly to the reopened factory.
0:25:42 > 0:25:44# Sing as we go along
0:25:44 > 0:25:48# Sing as we go and watch the world go by... #
0:25:48 > 0:25:54Fairytale or not, this is probably the worst film I have ever seen.
0:25:54 > 0:25:58But in the 1930s, Britain lapped it up.
0:26:01 > 0:26:03One critic at the time wrote,
0:26:03 > 0:26:07"In the cinema there is too much sex appeal.
0:26:07 > 0:26:11"But the performance of Gracie Fields brings a breath of fresh air.
0:26:13 > 0:26:18"This helps keep the right spirit of England together -
0:26:18 > 0:26:22"clean living and a total absence of anything unnatural."
0:26:22 > 0:26:28Except, of course, the unnatural appeal of Gracie Fields herself.
0:26:28 > 0:26:32In history, not everything can be explained.
0:26:32 > 0:26:34BOOING
0:26:34 > 0:26:36Boo!
0:26:46 > 0:26:50The worldwide fascist movement has made a new advance in Germany.
0:26:50 > 0:26:52They have reached power
0:26:52 > 0:26:56after polling over 17 million votes in a general election.
0:26:56 > 0:27:02And we believe that Britain will be the next country to give fascism a chance.
0:27:03 > 0:27:09In 1932, Oswald Mosley was ready for his next costume change.
0:27:11 > 0:27:15He launched the British Union of Fascists.
0:27:18 > 0:27:22CHEERING
0:27:23 > 0:27:28Fundraising for his new party, Mosley approached the businessman Israel Sieff
0:27:28 > 0:27:31who'd later run Marks & Spencer's.
0:27:31 > 0:27:36Sieff obligingly organised a dinner for a dozen business leaders.
0:27:36 > 0:27:40In what must be one of the most cack-handed attempts
0:27:40 > 0:27:43at political fundraising in British history,
0:27:43 > 0:27:46Mosley told Israel Sieff and the assembled gathering that,
0:27:46 > 0:27:52"A political party must capitalise on emotion and have a hate plank.
0:27:52 > 0:27:56"And today," he said, "the best hate plank is the Jews."
0:27:56 > 0:28:02Realising that this might be just a little tactless, Mosley hastily added,
0:28:02 > 0:28:06"Of course, this doesn't apply to Jews like you, Israel."
0:28:06 > 0:28:09Sieff said nothing,
0:28:09 > 0:28:15but rang his bell to alert the butler that Mosley would be leaving.
0:28:15 > 0:28:19"But I haven't finished my brandy yet," spluttered Moseley.
0:28:19 > 0:28:23"Charles, Sir Oswald is leaving."
0:28:27 > 0:28:29And Mosley struggled.
0:28:29 > 0:28:33While fascists overseas were holding vast military rallies
0:28:33 > 0:28:35and making plans to invade other countries,
0:28:35 > 0:28:40the British Blackshirts spent quite a lot of time frolicking at the seaside.
0:28:44 > 0:28:48In organised camps they could learn about party principles, practise boxing,
0:28:48 > 0:28:51relax in the sun or take a bracing dip.
0:28:51 > 0:28:53Fascism-on-Sea.
0:28:58 > 0:29:03As ever, Mosley was busy flirting, but not with women this time.
0:29:03 > 0:29:05Nope - newspaper tycoons instead.
0:29:10 > 0:29:13Lord Rothermere was a particular enthusiast,
0:29:13 > 0:29:15and soon his newspaper, the Daily Mail,
0:29:15 > 0:29:18was encouraging its readers to join the Blackshirts.
0:29:18 > 0:29:25It ran pound-a-week prizes for the best letter on Why I Like The Blackshirts.
0:29:25 > 0:29:29It ran beauty contests for Blackshirt women,
0:29:29 > 0:29:34and in January 1934 it abandoned all pretence of neutrality
0:29:34 > 0:29:41and ran the foamingly pro-Mosley headline, "Hurrah for the Blackshirts!"
0:29:51 > 0:29:54Only a small splash for the Blackshirts...
0:29:56 > 0:30:00..while at Westminster, politics as usual chugged on.
0:30:00 > 0:30:04Ramsay MacDonald retired and Stanley Baldwin took over.
0:30:06 > 0:30:11A placid-looking fellow, he didn't make waves, either.
0:30:17 > 0:30:21Baldwin was always a strangely anonymous figure.
0:30:21 > 0:30:24Once he was travelling on the train
0:30:24 > 0:30:29and noticed that a fellow passenger was staring at him.
0:30:29 > 0:30:34After a while, the man leaned forward and tapped him on the knee.
0:30:34 > 0:30:37"You're Baldwin," he said.
0:30:37 > 0:30:39"Harrow, '84."
0:30:39 > 0:30:45And Baldwin nodded in agreement and his former school fellow seemed satisfied.
0:30:47 > 0:30:52Then a few moments later he leaned forward and tapped the Prime Minister again.
0:30:52 > 0:30:55"So," he said, "tell me,
0:30:55 > 0:30:58"what are you doing now?"
0:31:02 > 0:31:06Baldwin might have been bland, but he did make a lot of promises.
0:31:06 > 0:31:11One was to take thousands off the dole queues by building houses across Britain.
0:31:16 > 0:31:20On the Continent, the '30s building boom
0:31:20 > 0:31:25had produced white, boxy, sharp-edged houses with flat roofs
0:31:25 > 0:31:28inspired by modernist architects with an eye on the future.
0:31:31 > 0:31:35We had a few here, but most Britons were having none of that.
0:31:35 > 0:31:39Instead we got mock-Tudor and mock-Elizabethan homes
0:31:39 > 0:31:42that gave the impression of unshakeable stability.
0:31:42 > 0:31:48Homes for commuters spread out along the Metropolitan Railway and far beyond.
0:31:48 > 0:31:50They called it Metroland.
0:31:55 > 0:32:02European modernism seemed simply unable to answer some deep instinct in the British.
0:32:02 > 0:32:07Something to do with our love of privacy on a small, crowded island.
0:32:07 > 0:32:14Our sense that the past, for all its faults, was perhaps a kinder country.
0:32:14 > 0:32:18Metroland expresses British conservatism,
0:32:18 > 0:32:21our small dreams,
0:32:21 > 0:32:28so easy to sneer at in an age of big, bad ideas.
0:32:34 > 0:32:40At dawn on March 7th 1936, in contravention of the Treaty of Versailles,
0:32:40 > 0:32:47Adolf Hitler ordered 19 German infantry battalions to march into the Rhineland.
0:32:50 > 0:32:53The reaction in Britain was muted.
0:32:53 > 0:32:58One diplomat said it was "no more than the Germans walking into their own backyard".
0:33:01 > 0:33:05Winston Churchill disagreed.
0:33:05 > 0:33:09CHURCHILL: There is a nation which has abandoned all its liberties
0:33:09 > 0:33:13in order to augment its collective strength.
0:33:13 > 0:33:17There is a nation in the grip of a group of ruthless men
0:33:17 > 0:33:21preaching a gospel of intolerance and racial pride,
0:33:21 > 0:33:25unrestrained by law, by parliament or by public opinion.
0:33:31 > 0:33:35Alarmed British officials were feeding Churchill secret information
0:33:35 > 0:33:38about Britain's woeful lack of military preparations.
0:33:38 > 0:33:42He understood the Nazis and he was worried.
0:33:44 > 0:33:49On this, Churchill was right and he was relentless.
0:33:49 > 0:33:53But he was mostly dismissed, not least by the Prime Minister.
0:33:57 > 0:34:02Stanley Baldwin once said that he dreamt of making a speech to the House of Commons
0:34:02 > 0:34:05that would go something like this.
0:34:05 > 0:34:11"When Winston was born, lots of fairies swooped down on his cradle with gifts -
0:34:11 > 0:34:16"imagination, eloquence, industry, ability.
0:34:16 > 0:34:19"And then came a fairy who said,
0:34:19 > 0:34:24"'No one person has the right to so many gifts,'
0:34:24 > 0:34:28"and picked him up and gave him such a shake and a twist
0:34:28 > 0:34:34"that with all these gifts, he was denied wisdom and judgment.
0:34:34 > 0:34:37"And that is why, while in this House
0:34:37 > 0:34:43"we delight to listen to his eloquence, we do not take his advice."
0:34:43 > 0:34:46CHEERING
0:34:52 > 0:34:57Instead, Britain was getting to know its own, home-grown, little Hitler.
0:35:02 > 0:35:07This nation again and again in the great hours of its fate
0:35:07 > 0:35:13has swept aside convention, has swept aside the little men of talk and of delay
0:35:13 > 0:35:17and have decided to follow men of moment.
0:35:19 > 0:35:23In October 1936, Oswald Mosley remarried.
0:35:23 > 0:35:28His new bride, Diana, was part of one of Britain's most notorious families.
0:35:28 > 0:35:32Yes, it's those Mitfords again.
0:35:32 > 0:35:36Diana Mitford was the older sister of Jessica and Unity.
0:35:36 > 0:35:40Like Unity, Diana was fascinated by Hitler.
0:35:40 > 0:35:45So when it came to the wedding, what better place than Goebbels' private house,
0:35:45 > 0:35:48with special guest Adolf Hitler?
0:35:54 > 0:35:57Hitler gave the happy couple
0:35:57 > 0:36:01a signed photograph of himself in a silver monogrammed frame,
0:36:01 > 0:36:06complete with German eagle, presented in a leather case lined with red velvet.
0:36:06 > 0:36:08Very nice.
0:36:08 > 0:36:12With Diana at his side and increasingly under Hitler's spell,
0:36:12 > 0:36:17Mosley now turned his party in a more violent and anti-Semitic direction.
0:36:21 > 0:36:23REPORTER: 5,000 fascists rally to their mobilisation
0:36:23 > 0:36:26for the much-advertised march through the East End.
0:36:26 > 0:36:31And Sir Oswald Mosley, Blackshirt leader, arrives to inspect his followers.
0:36:32 > 0:36:36On October 4th, Mosley organised a fascist march
0:36:36 > 0:36:40through the predominantly Jewish areas of London's East End -
0:36:40 > 0:36:42a deliberate act of intimidation.
0:36:49 > 0:36:52But Britain's anti-fascists were ready and waiting.
0:36:55 > 0:36:57REPORTER: Thousands of East Enders prepare to resist the invasion.
0:36:57 > 0:36:596,000 police are already concentrated in the area.
0:36:59 > 0:37:02Others are rushed to reinforce them.
0:37:03 > 0:37:09By around 2pm, some 50,000 Jews, communists, trade unionists,
0:37:09 > 0:37:11Labour Party members and dockers
0:37:11 > 0:37:18had arrived here at Gardiners Corner in Aldgate to halt the march, chanting,
0:37:18 > 0:37:22"They shall not pass. They shall not pass,"
0:37:22 > 0:37:27and, "One, two, three, four, five, we want Mosley, dead or alive."
0:37:33 > 0:37:36Hundreds of policemen were soon holding the line
0:37:36 > 0:37:39between the Blackshirts and the anti-fascists.
0:37:42 > 0:37:44Word filtered out that the Chief of Police
0:37:44 > 0:37:46had directed Mosley to march along Cable Street.
0:37:46 > 0:37:49Demonstrators barricaded the street.
0:37:51 > 0:37:53The police feared a riot.
0:37:53 > 0:37:58At 3.40, the police ordered Mosley and his men to abandon their march.
0:37:58 > 0:38:01They then turned on the demonstrators.
0:38:06 > 0:38:09All around, there were running battles.
0:38:20 > 0:38:25Horses' hooves went flying as children threw marbles onto the streets.
0:38:25 > 0:38:28HORSE WHINNIES
0:38:28 > 0:38:33Women emptied the unappealing contents of chamber pots onto policemen's heads.
0:38:42 > 0:38:46More than 100 people were injured in the battle.
0:38:46 > 0:38:4883 of the protesters were arrested.
0:38:56 > 0:39:01It became known as the Battle of Cable Street.
0:39:01 > 0:39:03The overwhelming public reaction
0:39:03 > 0:39:10was one of disgust and - very important, this - mockery.
0:39:13 > 0:39:19The interesting thing is how quickly Mosley became a national figure of fun.
0:39:19 > 0:39:24The peaked cap, the shiny boots, all that shouting, just didn't work.
0:39:24 > 0:39:29When we ask why Britain never fell for a totalitarian leader,
0:39:29 > 0:39:31it's about our suspicion of all politicians,
0:39:31 > 0:39:37our national inability to go the whole hog, and that sense of humour.
0:39:37 > 0:39:40Cable Street was most unusual.
0:39:40 > 0:39:45Generally, when people saw lines of marching men in silly uniforms,
0:39:45 > 0:39:47they simply sniggered.
0:39:50 > 0:39:54TRUMPET FANFARE
0:39:55 > 0:39:58It hath pleased Almighty God
0:39:58 > 0:40:05that the high and mighty Prince Edward Albert Christian George...
0:40:05 > 0:40:10On Wednesday 22nd January 1936, King Edward VIII watched the proclamation
0:40:10 > 0:40:15of his own accession to the throne from a window at St James's Palace.
0:40:15 > 0:40:19..is now become King.
0:40:19 > 0:40:24At his side was a 40-year-old American called Wallis Simpson.
0:40:24 > 0:40:27God save the King.
0:40:35 > 0:40:38Their drama would be played out
0:40:38 > 0:40:43at a toy castle outside London called Fort Belvedere.
0:40:49 > 0:40:52The new King was a super celebrity,
0:40:52 > 0:40:56in many ways a perfect symbol of modernisation.
0:40:56 > 0:40:58Informal, handsome, beautifully dressed,
0:40:58 > 0:41:06this man was Hollywood-on-Thames at a time when frankly this country
0:41:06 > 0:41:09didn't have a lot in the way of home-grown glamour.
0:41:13 > 0:41:18But by the time he came to the throne, Edward had already been having an affair
0:41:18 > 0:41:24for two years with the once-divorced and married Mrs Simpson.
0:41:24 > 0:41:28His father, George V, had predicted trouble.
0:41:28 > 0:41:35"When I'm dead," he once said, "that boy will ruin himself in 12 months."
0:41:49 > 0:41:53Edward knew that his affair with a married woman would be a scandal.
0:41:53 > 0:41:57But the British media kept their deferential distance.
0:41:57 > 0:42:00The Americans had no such qualms,
0:42:00 > 0:42:05and paparazzi followed the King and his mistress wherever they went.
0:42:05 > 0:42:08REPORTER: Edward says she makes him happy.
0:42:08 > 0:42:10Bright hours by the blue Mediterranean.
0:42:10 > 0:42:13Exclusive Movietone pictures.
0:42:13 > 0:42:16There have been rumours that he might elope with her
0:42:16 > 0:42:19and abandon crown and throne for her.
0:42:21 > 0:42:26In October 1936, the Foreign Secretary, Anthony Eden, arrived at Number Ten
0:42:26 > 0:42:30to discuss world events including the Spanish Civil War
0:42:30 > 0:42:33and the mounting threat from Nazi Germany.
0:42:36 > 0:42:39Baldwin's first question to Eden
0:42:39 > 0:42:42was whether he'd had a lot of telegrams about the King.
0:42:42 > 0:42:44Eden replied that he hadn't.
0:42:44 > 0:42:51Baldwin said he'd had, "a great many, some from the most extraordinary people.
0:42:51 > 0:42:55"I foresee I shall have a lot of trouble over this.
0:42:55 > 0:43:00" I hope that you won't trouble me too much with foreign affairs just now."
0:43:04 > 0:43:09By now, Wallis Simpson was filing for divorce from her second husband,
0:43:09 > 0:43:13opening the way for her to marry Edward and become Queen.
0:43:13 > 0:43:18Baldwin panicked and made an appointment to visit the King
0:43:18 > 0:43:20at his Fort Belvedere retreat.
0:43:24 > 0:43:28To calm his nerves, Baldwin first asked for a drink
0:43:28 > 0:43:30and then he came straight to point.
0:43:30 > 0:43:33"You may think me Victorian, sir.
0:43:33 > 0:43:37"You may think my values are out of date.
0:43:37 > 0:43:41"But I believe that I know how to interpret the mind of my own people.
0:43:41 > 0:43:46"And although it is true that standards are lower since the war,
0:43:46 > 0:43:50"that only leads people to expect higher standards from their King."
0:43:55 > 0:43:57A few days later, the King received a letter
0:43:57 > 0:44:00from his personal private secretary.
0:44:00 > 0:44:04It warned him that his affair was doing untold damage.
0:44:04 > 0:44:07The Government was threatening to resign.
0:44:07 > 0:44:10Mrs Simpson, he concluded, MUST leave the country.
0:44:16 > 0:44:22Two days later, on 11th December 1936, Edward spoke to his people.
0:44:22 > 0:44:27EDWARD VIII: I have found it impossible to carry
0:44:27 > 0:44:29the heavy burden of responsibility
0:44:29 > 0:44:37and to discharge my duties as King as I would wish to do
0:44:37 > 0:44:42without the help and support of the woman I love.
0:44:49 > 0:44:53Britain erupted with an outpouring of support for the King,
0:44:53 > 0:44:55but hostility towards Wallis Simpson.
0:44:59 > 0:45:03In playgrounds across the country children chanted,
0:45:03 > 0:45:07"Mrs Simpson stole our King!"
0:45:07 > 0:45:11But I think she did this country an enormous favour,
0:45:11 > 0:45:17for Edward was pro-German and just a little too close to the Nazis.
0:45:17 > 0:45:20He even visited Hitler shortly after he abdicated.
0:45:25 > 0:45:31By removing this vain, petulant and politically naive man from the throne,
0:45:31 > 0:45:37Wallis Simpson also took away a real source of domestic danger.
0:45:37 > 0:45:40Far from being a national blow,
0:45:40 > 0:45:46the abdication was a great stroke of national luck.
0:45:52 > 0:45:55As Britain recovered from abdication fever,
0:45:55 > 0:46:01a little revolution was taking place at the seaside, and no, not a fascist one.
0:46:08 > 0:46:10Its leader?
0:46:10 > 0:46:12Billy Butlin.
0:46:12 > 0:46:15Billy Butlin was a tough little character,
0:46:15 > 0:46:20a natural showman who carried a cut-throat razor in his top pocket.
0:46:22 > 0:46:28He told friends he had three aims in life - power, money and women.
0:46:30 > 0:46:34He started off with a humble hoopla stall, but his big break came
0:46:34 > 0:46:39when he bought the European licence for the new, all-American...
0:46:41 > 0:46:43..Dodgem car.
0:46:46 > 0:46:50The vision of a holiday camp came to Billy Butlin when he noticed
0:46:50 > 0:46:54hordes of miserable holidaymakers wandering the streets in the rain,
0:46:54 > 0:46:57desperately looking for something to do.
0:46:58 > 0:47:01Not everything changes.
0:47:04 > 0:47:09He found a location here in Skegness, and began to design the camp himself
0:47:09 > 0:47:13with vast dining rooms, theatres and swimming pools.
0:47:23 > 0:47:27Guests would stay in individual, hutch-like, mock-Tudor chalets.
0:47:31 > 0:47:36Billy's first guest was Freda Monk from Nottingham.
0:47:36 > 0:47:42Unable to contain her excitement, Freda had turned up a day early.
0:47:42 > 0:47:47One of the managers found her wandering around the still unfinished camp.
0:47:47 > 0:47:54Clutching her suitcase and looking lost, she was quickly bundled into her chalet.
0:47:54 > 0:47:57Then it began to snow.
0:47:57 > 0:48:00Freda spent her first night shivering with cold.
0:48:00 > 0:48:05She was spotted the next morning having breakfast wearing her overcoat.
0:48:05 > 0:48:09But Freda Monk didn't care about the weather.
0:48:09 > 0:48:14She was just delighted to have a week away from ordinary life.
0:48:18 > 0:48:22In 1938, the Government passed a new law
0:48:22 > 0:48:25giving a week's paid holiday to all industrial workers in Britain.
0:48:27 > 0:48:31Hello, dear. Well, this year, we've got holidays with pay.
0:48:31 > 0:48:32Ooh!
0:48:32 > 0:48:34# Who's been polishing the sun
0:48:34 > 0:48:37# Brightening the sky today?
0:48:37 > 0:48:40# They must have known just how I like it
0:48:40 > 0:48:43# Cos everything's coming my way... #
0:48:43 > 0:48:48Butlin came up with the catchy slogan, "Holidays with pay, holidays with play.
0:48:48 > 0:48:52"A week's holiday for a week's wage."
0:48:58 > 0:49:01The morning-to-bedtime activities
0:49:01 > 0:49:03provided by the relentlessly jolly Redcoats
0:49:03 > 0:49:07seemed to be exactly what grey Britain needed.
0:49:07 > 0:49:13Billy Butlin offered colour and fun and, for the time, surprisingly good food.
0:49:13 > 0:49:16So when the news arrived about the Italians invading Abyssinia,
0:49:16 > 0:49:18or the Nuremberg rallies,
0:49:18 > 0:49:21here there was a constant diet of distraction,
0:49:21 > 0:49:24from light opera to ballroom dancing
0:49:24 > 0:49:28to the notorious knobbly-knees and glamorous-grannies contests.
0:49:28 > 0:49:31You didn't get that in the Hitler Youth.
0:49:43 > 0:49:49On 12th March 1938, Hitler's troops marched into Austria.
0:49:56 > 0:50:00In Britain we had a new Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain.
0:50:03 > 0:50:07He announced that, "Nothing could have arrested this action by Germany
0:50:07 > 0:50:12"unless we and others had been prepared to use force to prevent it."
0:50:12 > 0:50:14And they weren't.
0:50:14 > 0:50:18Appeasement, not confrontation, was the British way.
0:50:21 > 0:50:28The word "appeasement" is now loaded with shame and embarrassment.
0:50:28 > 0:50:34But it once had a gentler meaning - simply to bring peace, or calm down.
0:50:34 > 0:50:39And as a strategy for dealing with Hitler, never forget that it was hugely popular
0:50:39 > 0:50:43with millions of Britons who supported it at every stage.
0:50:43 > 0:50:49Appeasement was pursued by politicians and diplomats with skill,
0:50:49 > 0:50:54determination and even nerve, like a chess game.
0:50:54 > 0:50:59Only one problem - Hitler wasn't playing chess.
0:51:01 > 0:51:04REPORTER: The guns boom from the mountains behind Gottesberg,
0:51:04 > 0:51:08as a million German men turn field and forest into a practice battleground.
0:51:11 > 0:51:13Once Austria was folded into the Reich,
0:51:13 > 0:51:15Hitler turned his attention to part of Czechoslovakia,
0:51:15 > 0:51:20the Sudetenland, on Germany's eastern border.
0:51:21 > 0:51:23Chamberlain did nothing.
0:51:25 > 0:51:29By all accounts, Chamberlain was not an appealing man.
0:51:29 > 0:51:32He was cold and he was sarcastic.
0:51:32 > 0:51:33But he wasn't stupid.
0:51:33 > 0:51:37He'd had a finger in almost every international crisis
0:51:37 > 0:51:39since the early 1930s.
0:51:39 > 0:51:44He thought that only his wisdom had kept Britain out of the Spanish Civil War.
0:51:44 > 0:51:46Only he could soothe Mussolini.
0:51:46 > 0:51:48When he became Prime Minister at last, he said,
0:51:48 > 0:51:55"I only have to raise a finger and the whole face of Europe is changed."
0:51:55 > 0:51:58Chamberlain's problem wasn't ignorance.
0:51:58 > 0:52:02It was colossal and tragic vanity.
0:52:04 > 0:52:08REPORTER: A gasp of amazement and satisfaction runs around the world.
0:52:08 > 0:52:09The Prime Minister decides to fly
0:52:09 > 0:52:11to a personal meeting with the German Chancellor.
0:52:11 > 0:52:15The world has realised that war would be a folly and a crime.
0:52:21 > 0:52:26When Chamberlain arrived in Munich, he was greeted by saluting Nazis.
0:52:26 > 0:52:29He responded by waving his homburg hat.
0:52:33 > 0:52:37Then it was off to Hitler's Alpine retreat, Berchtesgaden,
0:52:37 > 0:52:38and the mission of his life.
0:52:42 > 0:52:48This was history's first modern summit, and it was give and take -
0:52:48 > 0:52:51British give and German take.
0:52:51 > 0:52:55Chamberlain accepted entirely that three million Czechs
0:52:55 > 0:52:59wanted to leave their country and join the Reich,
0:52:59 > 0:53:04and promised to do his bit to bully the Czech government into agreeing.
0:53:04 > 0:53:07And in return he got what?
0:53:07 > 0:53:13A short delay and the German promise not to actually invade Czechoslovakia,
0:53:13 > 0:53:19unless, of course, they were provoked by "terrorist incidents" on the border.
0:53:19 > 0:53:22Round one to Hitler.
0:53:27 > 0:53:31Britain was selling Czechoslovakia down the river,
0:53:31 > 0:53:35but when Chamberlain returned home, this diplomatic disgrace
0:53:35 > 0:53:38was greeted with huge enthusiasm.
0:53:38 > 0:53:39Anything to avoid war.
0:53:41 > 0:53:45REPORTER: The tumult and the clamour are for the man who has brought to politics
0:53:45 > 0:53:47the commonsense point of view of the man in the street.
0:53:47 > 0:53:51On his sane judgment we base our hopes of peace and happiness.
0:53:51 > 0:53:54CHEERING
0:53:54 > 0:53:59Hip, hip, hooray! Hip, hip, hooray!
0:54:03 > 0:54:06Two weeks later, Chamberlain was off again.
0:54:06 > 0:54:07At a summit on the Rhine,
0:54:07 > 0:54:12Hitler gave notice that German troops were now ready to invade the Sudetenland.
0:54:14 > 0:54:19Chamberlain protested, but Hitler had decided he was a ninny.
0:54:22 > 0:54:25But in Britain, the mood was now rapidly changing.
0:54:25 > 0:54:29Preparations for war were under way.
0:54:29 > 0:54:31Churchill's instincts had been right all along,
0:54:31 > 0:54:34and at last people were starting to listen.
0:54:40 > 0:54:44One senior official at the Foreign Office wrote in his diary that he knew
0:54:44 > 0:54:50Britain was in no condition to fight, "But I'd rather be beat than dishonoured.
0:54:50 > 0:54:55"How can we look any foreigner in the face after this?"
0:54:58 > 0:55:01Then Hitler blinked.
0:55:01 > 0:55:05Instead of invading Czechoslovakia, he called yet another summit.
0:55:05 > 0:55:08Chamberlain called it
0:55:08 > 0:55:14"the last, desperate snatch at the last tuft on the very verge of the precipice".
0:55:18 > 0:55:23The summit didn't achieve much.
0:55:23 > 0:55:26Chamberlain persuaded Hitler to sign a waffle-filled piece of paper.
0:55:34 > 0:55:37REPORTER: And the Prime Minister comes home,
0:55:37 > 0:55:40home to a welcome that he will never forget.
0:55:40 > 0:55:45On his return, Chamberlain was met by a large crowd waiting in the rain.
0:55:45 > 0:55:49He waved his precious piece of paper and read it out.
0:55:49 > 0:55:54"We regard the agreement signed last night and the Anglo-German naval agreement
0:55:54 > 0:55:58"as symbolic of the desire of our two peoples
0:55:58 > 0:56:01"never to go to war with one another again."
0:56:01 > 0:56:03CHEERING
0:56:09 > 0:56:13Back at Downing Street, there was another cheering crowd.
0:56:16 > 0:56:19Chamberlain leaned out of a window
0:56:19 > 0:56:22and announced that he had brought back peace with honour.
0:56:22 > 0:56:25It was, he said, "peace for our time".
0:56:38 > 0:56:44On 1st September 1939, German forces invaded Poland.
0:56:46 > 0:56:52Chamberlain gave Hitler an ultimatum - withdraw or face the consequence.
0:56:56 > 0:56:58REPORTER: The fateful hour of 11 has struck
0:56:58 > 0:57:02and Britain's final warning to Hitler having been ignored,
0:57:02 > 0:57:06a state of war once more exists between Great Britain and Germany.
0:57:08 > 0:57:11With the declaration of war, there was a steady crescendo
0:57:11 > 0:57:15of demands for Winston Churchill's return to government.
0:57:15 > 0:57:17Chamberlain bowed to the inevitable
0:57:17 > 0:57:23and invited Churchill to join his War Cabinet as First Lord of the Admiralty.
0:57:23 > 0:57:27We tried again and again to prevent this war.
0:57:27 > 0:57:31And for the sake of peace we've put up with a lot of things happening
0:57:31 > 0:57:34which ought not to have happened.
0:57:34 > 0:57:37But now we are at war, and we are going to make war,
0:57:37 > 0:57:45and persevere in making war until the other side have had enough of it.
0:57:51 > 0:57:55Churchill hadn't set foot in the Admiralty since 1915.
0:57:55 > 0:58:01But when he went in and opened a cupboard, he found one of his own old maps
0:58:01 > 0:58:06charting Royal Naval positions from the Great War still hanging there.
0:58:06 > 0:58:11Later that day, the Admiralty sent the fleet a signal.
0:58:11 > 0:58:15It consisted of just three words.
0:58:15 > 0:58:18"Winston is back."
0:58:30 > 0:58:35In the next programme, Churchill to the rescue...
0:58:35 > 0:58:36Spitfire magic...
0:58:36 > 0:58:40tanks, yanks...
0:58:40 > 0:58:42and Dad's Army.