0:00:02 > 0:00:04MILITARY DRUMBEAT
0:00:09 > 0:00:12OMINOUS MUSIC
0:00:16 > 0:00:20At three in the afternoon of May 7th, 1915,
0:00:20 > 0:00:24a rocket was fired high into the sky off the southwest coast of Ireland.
0:00:29 > 0:00:32It summoned the crew of the local lifeboat.
0:00:33 > 0:00:37A passenger ship had been spotted in distress on the horizon.
0:00:42 > 0:00:45The lifeboat of 1915 had no engine.
0:00:45 > 0:00:49It was powered by 12 strong volunteers,
0:00:49 > 0:00:53who, as they rowed, prayed,
0:00:53 > 0:00:56because they reckoned it would take at least three hours
0:00:56 > 0:00:59to reach the scene of the disaster.
0:01:04 > 0:01:07They were met with a horrifying sight.
0:01:07 > 0:01:09In the water, were hundreds of bodies
0:01:09 > 0:01:12and the wreckage of a vast ocean liner.
0:01:24 > 0:01:27The Lusitania had left New York six days earlier
0:01:27 > 0:01:30loaded with British and American passengers.
0:01:33 > 0:01:36She was the fastest ocean-going liner in the world...
0:01:39 > 0:01:41..a floating five-star hotel.
0:01:47 > 0:01:51The Lusitania was expected in Liverpool later that afternoon.
0:01:52 > 0:01:55But she would never reach her destination.
0:01:58 > 0:02:02The ship was the victim not of natural disaster,
0:02:02 > 0:02:05but of an unprecedented act of war...
0:02:08 > 0:02:09..by a German submarine.
0:02:15 > 0:02:20When Kapitan Walther Schwieger fired his torpedo from his U-boat,
0:02:20 > 0:02:23the U20, he scored a direct hit
0:02:23 > 0:02:26on the most famous ocean-going liner in the world.
0:02:26 > 0:02:31And, in so doing, he signalled the start of a new kind of warfare -
0:02:31 > 0:02:35a warfare which made no distinction between those who wore a uniform
0:02:35 > 0:02:37and those who didn't,
0:02:37 > 0:02:39between men and women,
0:02:39 > 0:02:41or between adults and children.
0:02:49 > 0:02:54Almost 1,200 people were murdered.
0:02:54 > 0:02:57It was the biggest single maritime disaster of the First World War.
0:03:03 > 0:03:06The bodies of the dead were brought ashore
0:03:06 > 0:03:08and laid on the quayside among the tins of paint
0:03:08 > 0:03:12and the coils of rope, while survivors searched
0:03:12 > 0:03:16desperately among them to try to identify missing relatives.
0:03:16 > 0:03:19One mother posted a notice in a shop window over there.
0:03:19 > 0:03:24It read, "Lusitania - missing baby, 15 months,
0:03:24 > 0:03:28"very fair, curly hair, rosy complexion...
0:03:28 > 0:03:30"tries to talk and walk."
0:03:38 > 0:03:41For the first time in the nation's history,
0:03:41 > 0:03:45ordinary people were being dragged into total war.
0:03:48 > 0:03:53This is the story of how that conflict transformed the lives
0:03:53 > 0:03:55of everyone in Britain.
0:03:57 > 0:04:01Each man and woman would have to play their part,
0:04:01 > 0:04:05and the nation would have to change utterly, and change quickly,
0:04:05 > 0:04:07to have any hope of victory.
0:04:18 > 0:04:21THEME MUSIC PLAYS
0:04:48 > 0:04:49BIRDSONG
0:04:53 > 0:04:55CROW CAWS
0:05:01 > 0:05:04Bodies of the dead from the Lusitania
0:05:04 > 0:05:07were washing up on the Irish coast for weeks afterwards.
0:05:10 > 0:05:15144 of the victims are buried in mass graves
0:05:15 > 0:05:17in this single cemetery.
0:05:29 > 0:05:33It was the fact that so many of the victims were women,
0:05:33 > 0:05:37so many of them were children, so many of them were babies,
0:05:37 > 0:05:39that really angered people.
0:05:39 > 0:05:42The sinking of the Lusitania seemed to bring war
0:05:42 > 0:05:47to a new level of barbarism, and ever closer to home.
0:05:53 > 0:05:56The reaction in Britain to the sinking of the Lusitania
0:05:56 > 0:05:59was instant and violent.
0:06:03 > 0:06:05Mobs surged through the streets
0:06:05 > 0:06:08smashing any remotely German-sounding property.
0:06:10 > 0:06:14In London, there were anti-German riots in the East End...
0:06:17 > 0:06:23..but public outrage provided the Government with an unexpected boost.
0:06:23 > 0:06:28It acted as a recruiting sergeant for Britain's volunteer army.
0:06:31 > 0:06:35The Secretary for War and hero of Empire Lord Kitchener
0:06:35 > 0:06:39pleaded for thousands more volunteers to go to fight
0:06:39 > 0:06:41in France and Belgium.
0:06:47 > 0:06:49But, at the front,
0:06:49 > 0:06:53nine months of heavy fighting had failed to drive out the Germans.
0:06:59 > 0:07:02The two sides faced each other along a line of trenches
0:07:02 > 0:07:05stretching almost 500 miles.
0:07:09 > 0:07:12In this new kind of industrial warfare,
0:07:12 > 0:07:16there was one thing the army needed even more than it needed soldiers.
0:07:20 > 0:07:22It needed munitions -
0:07:22 > 0:07:23guns...
0:07:23 > 0:07:25bullets...
0:07:25 > 0:07:27and shells.
0:07:29 > 0:07:31But despairing front line commanders
0:07:31 > 0:07:33claimed they were being supplied
0:07:33 > 0:07:37with the wrong kind of shells - simply not powerful enough
0:07:37 > 0:07:39to destroy well-built enemy defences.
0:07:53 > 0:07:57The shocking truth was exposed not in Parliament,
0:07:57 > 0:07:59but in the popular press.
0:08:01 > 0:08:05The patriotic Daily Mail decided it was time to break ranks,
0:08:05 > 0:08:08launching a sensational attack on the War Secretary,
0:08:08 > 0:08:10Lord Kitchener, himself.
0:08:12 > 0:08:16On May 21st, 1915, a fortnight after the Lusitania,
0:08:16 > 0:08:20the Daily Mail published an editorial.
0:08:20 > 0:08:24"The Tragedy of the Shells - Lord Kitchener's grave error."
0:08:24 > 0:08:28It alleged that the British government had sent the wrong kind
0:08:28 > 0:08:32of shells to the Western Front and thereby caused the deaths
0:08:32 > 0:08:34of British servicemen.
0:08:34 > 0:08:37Now, it doesn't look very much on the page,
0:08:37 > 0:08:41but, in the context of the time, this was a sensational accusation,
0:08:41 > 0:08:43because it maintained that the British government
0:08:43 > 0:08:47had been directly responsible for the deaths of its own citizens.
0:08:53 > 0:08:57The shells scandal raised an alarming question -
0:08:57 > 0:09:01were Britain's ruling class up to the job of winning the war?
0:09:03 > 0:09:08The reputation of Kitchener would never really recover.
0:09:08 > 0:09:12He was forced to make way for the man who, more than any other,
0:09:12 > 0:09:14saw that, to achieve victory,
0:09:14 > 0:09:18Britain itself would have to be transformed.
0:09:23 > 0:09:28David Lloyd George, the newly created Minister of Munitions,
0:09:28 > 0:09:30was a different sort of politician.
0:09:32 > 0:09:35A Welshman with the common touch...
0:09:35 > 0:09:38a passionate speaker...
0:09:38 > 0:09:41a wily deal maker...
0:09:41 > 0:09:43and the country's future Prime Minister.
0:09:48 > 0:09:53From now on, in many ways, it would be Lloyd George's war.
0:09:54 > 0:09:55Well, he was
0:09:55 > 0:09:58an exceptional man in his own time.
0:09:58 > 0:10:03And I think his great thing was that he had the foresight
0:10:03 > 0:10:07to think strategically ahead and to get things moving,
0:10:07 > 0:10:12and to mobilise the whole workforce in the country.
0:10:12 > 0:10:13He had a different imagination
0:10:13 > 0:10:16of how the war could be fought, didn't he?
0:10:16 > 0:10:18Yes. He did actually have two sons
0:10:18 > 0:10:22fighting in the front line in the war.
0:10:22 > 0:10:26My Uncle Dick was a sapper and my father Gwilym was a gunner.
0:10:26 > 0:10:30They were actually at the front throughout the war.
0:10:30 > 0:10:35They would come back on leave to Downing Street
0:10:35 > 0:10:37and he'd get first-hand information
0:10:37 > 0:10:39about what things were like in the war.
0:10:39 > 0:10:44And I think he saw very quickly that the way to increase
0:10:44 > 0:10:47supplies of shells, and things like that,
0:10:47 > 0:10:51was to harness businesspeople who were used to doing things,
0:10:51 > 0:10:54and were used to doing them to a timetable.
0:10:54 > 0:10:57- He really was the man for the job, wasn't he?- Yes.
0:10:57 > 0:10:59He had the vision, and he had the strategy,
0:10:59 > 0:11:01and he had the determination.
0:11:07 > 0:11:10Lloyd George needed every worker in Britain on side.
0:11:12 > 0:11:14But there could never be enough of them to produce
0:11:14 > 0:11:18the amount of munitions the country needed to fight a modern war.
0:11:21 > 0:11:25He'd have to mobilise a new workforce -
0:11:25 > 0:11:29a new industrial army -
0:11:29 > 0:11:31the women of Britain.
0:11:35 > 0:11:37The trouble was, some of the women in Britain
0:11:37 > 0:11:40saw the Government as their sworn enemy.
0:11:44 > 0:11:47The suffragettes wanted the vote for women
0:11:47 > 0:11:51and had made serious trouble before the war to get it.
0:11:53 > 0:11:56The Government had so far refused.
0:12:02 > 0:12:05But Lloyd George saw that women's rights
0:12:05 > 0:12:09and winning the war could be one and the same cause.
0:12:13 > 0:12:16He set up a meeting with the notorious leader
0:12:16 > 0:12:18of the suffragettes, Emmeline Pankhurst.
0:12:18 > 0:12:22She had just finished a jail sentence for a bomb attack -
0:12:22 > 0:12:24a bomb attack on his own house.
0:12:31 > 0:12:33Pinfold Manor was the country home
0:12:33 > 0:12:34Lloyd George had just built
0:12:34 > 0:12:37for himself in the Surrey stockbroker belt.
0:12:38 > 0:12:40Shortly before the outbreak of war,
0:12:40 > 0:12:43a bomb tore through the house, wrecking five rooms.
0:12:45 > 0:12:47The job of the police was made easy
0:12:47 > 0:12:50when hat pins were found at the scene.
0:12:52 > 0:12:56Emmeline Pankhurst and her suffragettes owned up to the attack.
0:13:02 > 0:13:06They got in through this very tiny window.
0:13:06 > 0:13:09- It is tiny, isn't it? - Absolutely minute.
0:13:10 > 0:13:12There were two bombs, I believe -
0:13:12 > 0:13:13one which went off, and one which didn't.
0:13:13 > 0:13:16- I think there were three...- Three?! - ..and one went off and two didn't.
0:13:16 > 0:13:19- Wow.- Had they gone off, probably more would have been damaged.
0:13:19 > 0:13:22- Lucky, otherwise you'd have nowhere to live, would you?- True.
0:13:25 > 0:13:30When asked why she had done it, Pankhurst replied, "To wake him up!"
0:13:30 > 0:13:34that is, to frighten the Government into giving women the vote.
0:13:36 > 0:13:39Fortunately for Lloyd George, he'd yet to move in.
0:13:41 > 0:13:44But now there was a war on. It was time for the suffragette bomber
0:13:44 > 0:13:47and the government minister to cut a deal.
0:13:51 > 0:13:54These were strange days and no time to be bearing a grudge
0:13:54 > 0:13:57over a little matter like someone trying to blow your house up.
0:13:57 > 0:14:00Lloyd George wanted women for the war effort,
0:14:00 > 0:14:04and Emmeline Pankhurst wanted women to have the vote.
0:14:04 > 0:14:05MUSIC: "The March Of The Women"
0:14:05 > 0:14:08# Life! Strife... #
0:14:08 > 0:14:10They would eventually get it,
0:14:10 > 0:14:13though they'd have to wait till the war was almost over.
0:14:15 > 0:14:17A mere few weeks after the meeting,
0:14:17 > 0:14:21Emmeline Pankhurst fulfilled her side of the bargain.
0:14:21 > 0:14:27On July 17th, 1915, she led 30,000 women down London's Embankment
0:14:27 > 0:14:30to demand a place in the struggle for victory.
0:14:32 > 0:14:36It was called the Women's Right to Serve March.
0:14:36 > 0:14:40What few people knew was that the Government was paying for it.
0:14:40 > 0:14:45# ..Shoulder to shoulder and friend to hand... #
0:14:45 > 0:14:49Many of those watching did so in horror.
0:14:49 > 0:14:50These marching women,
0:14:50 > 0:14:54with their strident demands and their noisy voices,
0:14:54 > 0:14:58did not conform to the traditional idea of femininity.
0:14:58 > 0:15:01But those watching would be astonished,
0:15:01 > 0:15:04because this was the start of the biggest social revolution
0:15:04 > 0:15:06of modern times.
0:15:09 > 0:15:12Women in the workforce were nothing new.
0:15:14 > 0:15:18But now women began to do jobs which only men had done.
0:15:19 > 0:15:22Suddenly, Britain began to look very different...
0:15:23 > 0:15:25..on the streets...
0:15:25 > 0:15:28in the fields...
0:15:28 > 0:15:29and in the factories.
0:15:41 > 0:15:43The biggest change in the fortunes of women
0:15:43 > 0:15:48would take place in a strange, sometimes frightening, new world.
0:16:02 > 0:16:06In 1915, this was one of the most dangerous places in Britain.
0:16:12 > 0:16:17It's pretty hard to believe now, but this peaceful place was once alive
0:16:17 > 0:16:22with 6,000 people making explosives for the armies on the front.
0:16:27 > 0:16:30These strange structures were designed
0:16:30 > 0:16:32to withstand accidental blasts.
0:16:33 > 0:16:36To mix the high explosive nitroglycerin.
0:16:36 > 0:16:42To make cordite, providing the bang that powered shells and bullets.
0:16:45 > 0:16:49For some, it wasn't the work that came as a shock,
0:16:49 > 0:16:51it was the accents.
0:16:51 > 0:16:53"Frankly, I didn't care for my companions,"
0:16:53 > 0:16:55said one middle class woman.
0:16:55 > 0:16:59"They struck me as rough, ill-natured, loud-voiced,
0:16:59 > 0:17:01"vulgar little hussies."
0:17:01 > 0:17:03But she added,
0:17:03 > 0:17:07"Within a week, I had come to like them and, finally, to love them."
0:17:12 > 0:17:15They were known as munitionettes.
0:17:15 > 0:17:18The ones who worked at the Royal Gunpowder Mills
0:17:18 > 0:17:23formed just a part of the million strong female workforce
0:17:23 > 0:17:27employed by Lloyd George's new Ministry of Munitions.
0:17:28 > 0:17:34The experience was exciting, new and dangerous.
0:17:37 > 0:17:39Inevitably, there were casualties.
0:17:44 > 0:17:48This is a photo of a woman called Charlotte Mead,
0:17:48 > 0:17:52mother of five children, with a husband fighting in France.
0:17:52 > 0:17:55It's taken in a photographer's studio,
0:17:55 > 0:17:59where she's posing in munitions factory overalls.
0:17:59 > 0:18:01It's probably just as well it's in black and white,
0:18:01 > 0:18:04because working in close contact with high explosives
0:18:04 > 0:18:06could do terrible things to you.
0:18:06 > 0:18:10It could, for example, turn your skin yellow.
0:18:11 > 0:18:14Within a year of this photograph being taken,
0:18:14 > 0:18:17she was dead of toxic jaundice.
0:18:18 > 0:18:21Not that you could have read about it in the newspapers,
0:18:21 > 0:18:24because the press was banned from reporting such things.
0:18:24 > 0:18:29By the time her husband returned from the front, it was too late.
0:18:39 > 0:18:43The need for bullets, guns and shells was almost insatiable
0:18:43 > 0:18:45in this relentless, total war.
0:18:49 > 0:18:52Meeting that need involved the most dramatic
0:18:52 > 0:18:55transformation of production the country had ever seen.
0:19:03 > 0:19:08Lloyd George's impact on the munitions industry was spectacular.
0:19:08 > 0:19:11Within six months, the number of shells being manufactured
0:19:11 > 0:19:14had increased 20-fold.
0:19:14 > 0:19:18Weapons, which had previously taken a year to manufacture,
0:19:18 > 0:19:21were now being turned out in three weeks.
0:19:25 > 0:19:28There would be no more shell scandals.
0:19:29 > 0:19:32But, for Lloyd George, this was just the beginning.
0:19:34 > 0:19:36"An undisciplined nation," he said,
0:19:36 > 0:19:40"was fighting the best disciplined country in the world."
0:19:40 > 0:19:43Every person in Britain had to dedicate themselves
0:19:43 > 0:19:45to winning the war.
0:19:45 > 0:19:48Starting in the pub.
0:19:48 > 0:19:51# Another little drink Another little drink
0:19:51 > 0:19:54# Another little drink wouldn't do us any harm... #
0:19:54 > 0:19:57Hangovers were harming the war effort.
0:19:57 > 0:20:00"Workers who drank," said Lloyd George,
0:20:00 > 0:20:02"were murdering men in the trenches."
0:20:04 > 0:20:08So brewers were ordered to water the beer,
0:20:08 > 0:20:11pubs to limit opening hours,
0:20:11 > 0:20:14and public figures - including the King -
0:20:14 > 0:20:16pledged to give up drink till the war was over.
0:20:16 > 0:20:19# ..Another little drink wouldn't do us any harm. #
0:20:22 > 0:20:24Under the No Treating rule,
0:20:24 > 0:20:27it became an offence to buy a drink for someone else.
0:20:28 > 0:20:34A man in Southampton was fined for buying his wife a glass of wine.
0:20:34 > 0:20:36So was his wife.
0:20:36 > 0:20:38So was the barmaid.
0:20:40 > 0:20:43Britain was learning to do as it was told.
0:20:47 > 0:20:49Or much of it was.
0:20:49 > 0:20:53For not everyone was so ready to knuckle down to government demands.
0:20:55 > 0:20:57On the banks of the Clyde, a crisis was brewing
0:20:57 > 0:21:01that threatened the very conduct of the war itself.
0:21:06 > 0:21:10The Clyde shipyards were at the heart of the war effort.
0:21:12 > 0:21:16From here came battle cruisers, destroyers,
0:21:16 > 0:21:19minesweepers and merchant ships.
0:21:23 > 0:21:26The shipbuilders of the Clyde were skilled,
0:21:26 > 0:21:30comparatively well paid and militant.
0:21:30 > 0:21:33And they weren't impressed by the Government telling them
0:21:33 > 0:21:37the nation had to pull together in a spirit of sacrifice.
0:21:37 > 0:21:41They saw the bosses doing very well out of the war.
0:21:46 > 0:21:49Because, to some people, the war was less about sacrifice
0:21:49 > 0:21:52and suffering than it was about an opportunity
0:21:52 > 0:21:54to make money, a lot of money.
0:21:54 > 0:21:57There were uniforms to be made, guns to be assembled,
0:21:57 > 0:21:59ships to be built.
0:21:59 > 0:22:02Some engineering firms saw their profits really soar,
0:22:02 > 0:22:06and some workers weren't prepared to put up with that.
0:22:10 > 0:22:12They called it profiteering.
0:22:12 > 0:22:15But when workers on the Clyde threatened to strike,
0:22:15 > 0:22:16there was outrage.
0:22:17 > 0:22:20Lloyd George went to meet them.
0:22:20 > 0:22:23Talk of patriotic duty fell on deaf ears.
0:22:25 > 0:22:29Strikers sang the Red Flag and told him to get his hair cut.
0:22:31 > 0:22:34The Government's patience snapped.
0:22:34 > 0:22:37The ringleaders were arrested under the Defence of The Realm Act -
0:22:37 > 0:22:41an emergency law designed to muzzle anyone undermining the war effort.
0:22:43 > 0:22:45The strike collapsed.
0:22:48 > 0:22:50A century later, the episode still evokes
0:22:50 > 0:22:53powerful feelings from local trade unionists,
0:22:53 > 0:22:57like Davie Torrance and Davie Cooper.
0:22:57 > 0:23:00There would be many people, and it was said, that it was an act of
0:23:00 > 0:23:05disloyalty for the trade unionists to start being difficult,
0:23:05 > 0:23:10disrupting things, making demands that were not very readily met,
0:23:10 > 0:23:11certainly by the employers,
0:23:11 > 0:23:14and there was a lot of public resistance too, wasn't there?
0:23:14 > 0:23:16Indeed. There was a feeling there that it wasn't our war,
0:23:16 > 0:23:20it was the bosses trying to carve out more capital for themselves.
0:23:20 > 0:23:23- That was the feeling.- But vast numbers of people did volunteer.
0:23:23 > 0:23:25Well, people got conned.
0:23:25 > 0:23:29They're still conning people to go to Afghanistan and Iraq.
0:23:29 > 0:23:30The point, of course,
0:23:30 > 0:23:32the people who wished to continue with the war,
0:23:32 > 0:23:35to a great extent, were profiteers
0:23:35 > 0:23:37and racketeers, in many cases.
0:23:37 > 0:23:41So, therefore, to say that we were less than patriotic
0:23:41 > 0:23:43I don't think is quite correct.
0:23:43 > 0:23:46You really think that the ruling classes unnecessarily
0:23:46 > 0:23:50prolonged the war so that some people could make money out of it?
0:23:50 > 0:23:54Yeah. Yep. It's a fair assumption.
0:23:54 > 0:23:58I get the strong impression talking to you two that you actually
0:23:58 > 0:24:01think that these guys who caused this industrial disruption,
0:24:01 > 0:24:03about which the Government was extremely
0:24:03 > 0:24:06exercised during the First World War,
0:24:06 > 0:24:08because of the dangers they saw to the war effort,
0:24:08 > 0:24:11that these guys are actually heroes of yours?
0:24:11 > 0:24:12- Definitely. Obviously. Definitely. - No?!
0:24:12 > 0:24:14Political and industrial heroes. Yeah.
0:24:14 > 0:24:17- You were difficult buggers, weren't you?- Aye, absolutely.
0:24:17 > 0:24:19Very well-organised, difficult buggers.
0:24:19 > 0:24:21THEY LAUGH
0:24:25 > 0:24:29The Government had acted tough with the striking shipbuilders...
0:24:29 > 0:24:31and won.
0:24:31 > 0:24:34But the pressure of war allowed - indeed, compelled -
0:24:34 > 0:24:37politicians to intervene even further in the lives
0:24:37 > 0:24:38of British citizens,
0:24:38 > 0:24:41including where they were to live.
0:24:49 > 0:24:52Men and women flooding into the shipyards
0:24:52 > 0:24:55and factories of Glasgow needed homes.
0:24:58 > 0:25:03In these rented tenements, families lived crammed together,
0:25:03 > 0:25:05eight families to a block.
0:25:05 > 0:25:09The fathers, husbands and sons worked in the shipyards,
0:25:09 > 0:25:12or were now away fighting at the front.
0:25:12 > 0:25:15With demand high, and the menfolk away,
0:25:15 > 0:25:19the landlords saw their chance.
0:25:19 > 0:25:22What better opportunity to raise the rents?
0:25:27 > 0:25:30The results were devastating.
0:25:30 > 0:25:35Families who had lived for years in this tightly-knit community
0:25:35 > 0:25:37now faced being uprooted.
0:25:51 > 0:25:54One woman decided she wasn't going to have it.
0:25:56 > 0:25:59Mary Barbour was a 40-year-old mother of two
0:25:59 > 0:26:02and a pillar of the local Socialist Sunday School.
0:26:05 > 0:26:09She decided to organise a campaign of resistance - a rent strike.
0:26:10 > 0:26:13Soon, over 20,000 Glasgow tenants
0:26:13 > 0:26:18were refusing to pay the rent increases.
0:26:18 > 0:26:22They quickly became known as Mrs Barbour's Army.
0:26:27 > 0:26:29It wasn't long before some of them
0:26:29 > 0:26:31ended up in court.
0:26:34 > 0:26:38On the morning of the 17th November, 1915,
0:26:38 > 0:26:42an enormous crowd of women and children from the tenements
0:26:42 > 0:26:47had gathered here outside the Sheriff's Court in Glasgow.
0:26:47 > 0:26:51Inside, 18 defendants were on trial for refusing to pay
0:26:51 > 0:26:53the increase in their rents.
0:26:53 > 0:26:57Mrs Barbour's Army had been joined by a new influx of recruits -
0:26:57 > 0:27:00men from the factories and shipyards -
0:27:00 > 0:27:03determined to force a confrontation.
0:27:07 > 0:27:12The crowd carried placards which caught the eyes of the press.
0:27:12 > 0:27:15The last thing the Government wanted were pictures
0:27:15 > 0:27:18of the families of soldiers being thrown out on the street.
0:27:22 > 0:27:25The crowd was getting restless, and the Sheriff was worried.
0:27:25 > 0:27:27He telephoned London and got through
0:27:27 > 0:27:30to the Minister of Munitions, Lloyd George.
0:27:30 > 0:27:33"The workers have left the factories", he said,
0:27:33 > 0:27:38"they are threatening to pull down Glasgow. What am I to do?"
0:27:38 > 0:27:41Lloyd George's response was instant -
0:27:41 > 0:27:43"Stop the case.
0:27:43 > 0:27:46"A Rent Restriction Act will be introduced."
0:27:46 > 0:27:48There was wild cheering in the streets.
0:27:52 > 0:27:56Tenants would now be protected from exploitation by landlords,
0:27:56 > 0:27:59and rents fixed at pre-war levels.
0:28:00 > 0:28:04It was one of the most important laws of modern times.
0:28:06 > 0:28:09Once again, the war had forced government
0:28:09 > 0:28:12to intervene in the lives of British citizens.
0:28:12 > 0:28:14It had put women into the workplace,
0:28:14 > 0:28:16it had made laws about strikes,
0:28:16 > 0:28:20it had even determined what and when people could drink,
0:28:20 > 0:28:23and now it was making a law about what they paid
0:28:23 > 0:28:26to keep a roof over their heads.
0:28:26 > 0:28:28A social revolution was under way.
0:28:32 > 0:28:37But whatever the Government might do for families at home,
0:28:37 > 0:28:40for men at the front, it could do almost nothing.
0:28:42 > 0:28:46The war had ground to a deadly stalemate.
0:28:48 > 0:28:51Life in the trenches was muddy and miserable.
0:28:56 > 0:28:59Rats and lice were everywhere,
0:28:59 > 0:29:02food was usually cold,
0:29:02 > 0:29:04and feet were rarely dry.
0:29:07 > 0:29:12The air was heavy with the smell of explosives, death and decay.
0:29:18 > 0:29:22The trenches were intended to protect you from bullets.
0:29:23 > 0:29:26Artillery shells were another matter altogether.
0:29:28 > 0:29:33A direct hit on a trench meant scorchingly hot metal,
0:29:33 > 0:29:38shards of wood, earth and body parts flying everywhere.
0:29:38 > 0:29:41One soldier recalled making his way along a trench
0:29:41 > 0:29:43when a shell landed behind him.
0:29:43 > 0:29:46He looked back and he saw just a black hole
0:29:46 > 0:29:49where, moments earlier,
0:29:49 > 0:29:53a lance corporal had been boiling water in his mess tin.
0:30:08 > 0:30:11In the muck and fear of the trenches,
0:30:11 > 0:30:14a new sort of family was formed.
0:30:14 > 0:30:18A corporal and a few men in a trench were like survivors
0:30:18 > 0:30:20from a shipwreck on a raft,
0:30:20 > 0:30:22was the way one veteran remembered it.
0:30:22 > 0:30:26# Oh, how I want you
0:30:26 > 0:30:30# Dear old pal of mine... #
0:30:30 > 0:30:35The extended family was the few dozen men in your platoon.
0:30:35 > 0:30:38And the father figure - the lieutenant.
0:30:38 > 0:30:43This was usually a boy of no more than 19 or so.
0:30:52 > 0:30:54As in the factories back home,
0:30:54 > 0:30:56the war was creating - if briefly -
0:30:56 > 0:30:59a new kind of society,
0:30:59 > 0:31:02bringing together people who'd scarcely been aware
0:31:02 > 0:31:03of each other's existence.
0:31:08 > 0:31:12It was the responsibility of young officers in their dugouts to read
0:31:12 > 0:31:16and, if necessary, to censor their men's letters home.
0:31:19 > 0:31:22As a lieutenant in the trenches, the future Prime Minister
0:31:22 > 0:31:26Harold Macmillan described the effect of reading their mail.
0:31:29 > 0:31:32"Dear Mother, are you on the drink again?
0:31:32 > 0:31:36"Uncle George says the children are in a shocking state."
0:31:37 > 0:31:42Macmillan found the task brought him much closer to his men.
0:31:42 > 0:31:45"They have very big hearts, these soldiers," he said.
0:31:45 > 0:31:49"It is very moving to read all their letters home."
0:31:52 > 0:31:54Before battles, soldiers wrote home
0:31:54 > 0:31:57for what they knew might be the last time.
0:31:58 > 0:32:00One was John Scollen,
0:32:00 > 0:32:03a miner from Durham who had volunteered with his friends
0:32:03 > 0:32:05early in the war.
0:32:07 > 0:32:11"We are about to attack those awful Germans.
0:32:11 > 0:32:15"If it's God's Holy will that I should fall,
0:32:15 > 0:32:19"I shall have done my duty to King and country."
0:32:19 > 0:32:22"Dear Tina, you have been a good wife and mother,
0:32:22 > 0:32:25"and brought up our canny bairns,
0:32:25 > 0:32:28"whom I'm sure will be a credit to both of us.
0:32:28 > 0:32:32"My Joe, Jack, Tina and Aggie,
0:32:32 > 0:32:35"not forgetting my bonny twins Nora and Hugh,
0:32:35 > 0:32:39"and my flower baby, whom I have only had the great pleasure
0:32:39 > 0:32:41"of seeing once.
0:32:41 > 0:32:45"I know these are hard words to receive,
0:32:45 > 0:32:47"but God's will be done.
0:32:47 > 0:32:54"From your faithful husband, soldier and father, John Scollen.
0:32:57 > 0:33:00"Goodbye, my loved ones. Don't cry."
0:33:04 > 0:33:07DISTANT EXPLOSIONS
0:33:07 > 0:33:10Five days later, John Scollen was killed in battle.
0:33:13 > 0:33:16His body was never found.
0:33:33 > 0:33:35By the end of 1915,
0:33:35 > 0:33:39British forces had suffered almost half a million dead
0:33:39 > 0:33:44and wounded for no significant military advantage.
0:33:44 > 0:33:47How, then, was the war to be won?
0:33:59 > 0:34:02The answer to some seemed obvious.
0:34:02 > 0:34:06There were still nearly two million men of fighting age
0:34:06 > 0:34:08who HADN'T volunteered.
0:34:08 > 0:34:12Why should some risk their lives at the front,
0:34:12 > 0:34:14while others stayed at home?
0:34:15 > 0:34:19Any man who wouldn't volunteer to fight should be made to fight.
0:34:21 > 0:34:22In other words, conscription.
0:34:24 > 0:34:28But compulsory military service went against the grain of the British
0:34:28 > 0:34:32way of doing things, of respect for individual freedoms.
0:34:32 > 0:34:34Never before in the nation's history
0:34:34 > 0:34:38had the law compelled men to fight in war.
0:34:41 > 0:34:45But never had the nation been in such desperate straits.
0:34:48 > 0:34:52In January 1916, men aged between 19 and 40
0:34:52 > 0:34:56were ordered to turn up at their local recruiting office.
0:34:57 > 0:35:01Failure to attend would be seen as desertion.
0:35:01 > 0:35:04The authorities began to round up
0:35:04 > 0:35:07men of military age in public places.
0:35:08 > 0:35:12At one London station, passengers found the exits blocked
0:35:12 > 0:35:15and taxis nowhere to be seen.
0:35:15 > 0:35:19Those without the right papers were taken away and questioned.
0:35:23 > 0:35:26But getting the dreaded call-up papers
0:35:26 > 0:35:28wasn't always the end of the story.
0:35:38 > 0:35:41All over Britain, tribunals of local worthies
0:35:41 > 0:35:45heard appeals from anyone who felt they had a right to stay at home.
0:35:48 > 0:35:52Over a million men - more than half the number called up -
0:35:52 > 0:35:55took the opportunity to plead their case.
0:35:58 > 0:36:00Presiding over the tribunal in Preston
0:36:00 > 0:36:03was the Mayor, Harry Cartmell.
0:36:05 > 0:36:11According to the law, anyone doing essential work was excused.
0:36:12 > 0:36:14But what exactly was essential?
0:36:17 > 0:36:20The Preston tribunal heard an application from a man
0:36:20 > 0:36:23who gave his occupation as tripe dresser.
0:36:23 > 0:36:28The man told Mayor Cartmell that he supposed the tribunal would accept
0:36:28 > 0:36:31that tripe, and pig's trotters and cow's heels,
0:36:31 > 0:36:33were items of food.
0:36:33 > 0:36:37The Mayor nodded. "We go for that, certainly," he said.
0:36:37 > 0:36:42The man went on - "In fact, they're essential foods."
0:36:42 > 0:36:44The Mayor wouldn't have any of that, though.
0:36:44 > 0:36:46The man protested.
0:36:46 > 0:36:51"But tripe and onions is a most useful dish," he said.
0:36:51 > 0:36:54"Delicious, I am told," said the Mayor,
0:36:54 > 0:36:56"but hardly essential."
0:36:58 > 0:37:01The tripe dresser was sent off to war.
0:37:01 > 0:37:05But tribunal verdicts varied widely.
0:37:05 > 0:37:08The men who looked after the horses of the Atherstone Hunt
0:37:08 > 0:37:13were exempted because the country needed a good supply of horses.
0:37:14 > 0:37:18Men who staffed bathing huts in one seaside town were exempted
0:37:18 > 0:37:21because they were said to promote public health.
0:37:21 > 0:37:27Corset makers claimed that "Ladies must have corsets."
0:37:27 > 0:37:30"The Army must have men," came the reply.
0:37:32 > 0:37:35There were some heart-breaking cases too.
0:37:35 > 0:37:38A widow appeared before one committee to argue that her
0:37:38 > 0:37:4111th son should be exempted.
0:37:41 > 0:37:44Of the ten elder brothers,
0:37:44 > 0:37:46five had already been wounded,
0:37:46 > 0:37:49two were prisoners in Germany,
0:37:49 > 0:37:51and one a prisoner in Turkey.
0:37:51 > 0:37:53The request was granted.
0:37:57 > 0:38:00About a third of the men who asked not to serve
0:38:00 > 0:38:04were granted exemption, if only for a few months.
0:38:07 > 0:38:11But there were some - around 16,000 in all -
0:38:11 > 0:38:13who claimed that any kind of killing was wrong,
0:38:13 > 0:38:16and they simply refused to serve.
0:38:18 > 0:38:21Conscientious objectors - or 'conchies',
0:38:21 > 0:38:25as they were mockingly called - weren't exactly popular.
0:38:25 > 0:38:29Angry mobs raided their meetings.
0:38:29 > 0:38:32They were accused of being soft on the Hun.
0:38:34 > 0:38:38They were routinely ridiculed in the press.
0:38:45 > 0:38:49Some of the conscientious objectors got pretty short shrift.
0:38:49 > 0:38:52"You are a coward and a cad," one was told,
0:38:52 > 0:38:57"nothing but a shivering mass of unwholesome fat!"
0:38:57 > 0:39:01But it seems to me remarkable that a country which considered
0:39:01 > 0:39:06itself in the grips of a struggle for national survival
0:39:06 > 0:39:09nonetheless allowed individual citizens to decide
0:39:09 > 0:39:11whether they could reconcile that struggle
0:39:11 > 0:39:14with their personal conscience.
0:39:14 > 0:39:16It didn't happen elsewhere in Europe.
0:39:21 > 0:39:24The authorities were faced with a new question -
0:39:24 > 0:39:28what should be done with men who refused point-blank
0:39:28 > 0:39:30to have anything to do with the war effort?
0:39:31 > 0:39:35The answers were often confused, even chaotic.
0:39:39 > 0:39:42In the spring of 1916,
0:39:42 > 0:39:44a group of objectors was brought here,
0:39:44 > 0:39:46to the medieval castle in Richmond.
0:39:51 > 0:39:53Among them, was Norman Gaudie -
0:39:53 > 0:39:55a young railway worker
0:39:55 > 0:39:59and a forward with Sunderland Football Club reserves.
0:40:04 > 0:40:07The group, who became known as the Richmond Sixteen,
0:40:07 > 0:40:11included a member of the Church of England, Quakers,
0:40:11 > 0:40:14Jehovah's Witnesses, a Methodist and a Baptist.
0:40:17 > 0:40:20For several months, Gaudie and the rest of the Sixteen
0:40:20 > 0:40:22were imprisoned in the castle.
0:40:24 > 0:40:27Some objectors were prepared to go to the front
0:40:27 > 0:40:29as ambulance drivers or labourers.
0:40:29 > 0:40:33Gaudie and his companions were absolutists -
0:40:33 > 0:40:35they refused absolutely
0:40:35 > 0:40:37to have anything to do with war.
0:40:40 > 0:40:44The cells still bear the evidence of their time here.
0:40:47 > 0:40:50The story of Gaudie's arrival at the castle is remembered
0:40:50 > 0:40:51by his daughter-in-law.
0:40:52 > 0:40:56When he first came here,
0:40:56 > 0:40:59it took eight soldiers
0:40:59 > 0:41:02to try and get his uniform on
0:41:02 > 0:41:05because he was a great sportsman. It was...
0:41:05 > 0:41:07- They were trying to get the uniform on him?- Yes.
0:41:07 > 0:41:09It was only his friend who said to him,
0:41:09 > 0:41:13"Well, that wasn't a very pacifist thing for you to do."
0:41:13 > 0:41:16Do you know why he was such a vehement pacifist?
0:41:16 > 0:41:21Because of his connection with the Church,
0:41:21 > 0:41:26and he believed that the message of Jesus was not to kill
0:41:26 > 0:41:30and to be friendly, to love one another.
0:41:30 > 0:41:33But if I said to you he was just being awkward?
0:41:33 > 0:41:37No, he really, genuinely believed
0:41:37 > 0:41:43that it was absolutely wrong to kill another fellow human being.
0:41:43 > 0:41:48- And...- What, even if it came at the price of your country being invaded?
0:41:50 > 0:41:54At any price. He... That's how he felt.
0:41:54 > 0:41:58And this seems to be a picture on the wall of his mother.
0:41:58 > 0:42:02- "N Gaudie's mother," it says here.- Yes, yes, yes.
0:42:02 > 0:42:04It's quite a good likeness, really.
0:42:04 > 0:42:05- Is it?- Yes.
0:42:05 > 0:42:10His mother had sewn a little pocket
0:42:10 > 0:42:14on his vest and put the photograph in it,
0:42:14 > 0:42:17and that's how he came to have the photograph
0:42:17 > 0:42:19of his mother with him.
0:42:19 > 0:42:23- And it's amazing how clear it still is, really.- It is, isn't it?
0:42:23 > 0:42:25100 years on, nearly.
0:42:31 > 0:42:35But the Richmond Sixteen were yet to face their ultimate test.
0:42:38 > 0:42:40They were ordered to France.
0:42:44 > 0:42:49Here, once again, they refused absolutely to serve in any way.
0:42:51 > 0:42:55But now they were under military discipline,
0:42:55 > 0:42:59and the punishment for refusing to fight was death.
0:43:03 > 0:43:07On a June morning, the men were marched onto a parade ground
0:43:07 > 0:43:09in front of hundreds of troops.
0:43:09 > 0:43:12They were led to a raised platform
0:43:12 > 0:43:17and there, their sentences were read out to the assembled soldiers.
0:43:17 > 0:43:23"The sentence of the court is to suffer death by being shot."
0:43:25 > 0:43:27There was a pause.
0:43:27 > 0:43:30"Confirmed by the Commander in Chief."
0:43:30 > 0:43:32There was another pause.
0:43:32 > 0:43:36"Commuted to penal servitude for ten years."
0:43:37 > 0:43:43It was a reprieve, but it was a reprieve most cruelly delivered.
0:43:49 > 0:43:53When it came to it, shooting men for sticking to their principles
0:43:53 > 0:43:56was a step too far for the Government.
0:44:00 > 0:44:06Instead, absolutist objectors served out much of the rest of the war
0:44:06 > 0:44:08in British jails.
0:44:14 > 0:44:17To be honest, the extreme conscientious objectors
0:44:17 > 0:44:19have always struck me as cranks.
0:44:19 > 0:44:23The war was dreadful and it was bloody,
0:44:23 > 0:44:27but unless Britain was prepared to see the rest of Europe
0:44:27 > 0:44:32turned into some enormous German colony, it had to be fought.
0:44:32 > 0:44:34And most British people saw that.
0:44:36 > 0:44:40One by one, the great majority of those who needed persuading
0:44:40 > 0:44:44had fallen into line to give their support for the war.
0:44:48 > 0:44:53With few exceptions, the people of Britain saw the war as a just cause
0:44:53 > 0:44:56and necessary for national survival.
0:45:02 > 0:45:07But the most bitter resistance to the conflict was still to come.
0:45:07 > 0:45:09There was one part of the realm
0:45:09 > 0:45:14where the war would unleash opposition, bloodshed and death,
0:45:14 > 0:45:17and change the course of a nation's history.
0:45:25 > 0:45:30In April 1916, much of the city of Dublin was reduced to ruins.
0:45:32 > 0:45:36Not by German bombs, but as the result of fighting
0:45:36 > 0:45:40between two forces supposedly on the same side -
0:45:40 > 0:45:44the soldiers of Britain and Irish citizens.
0:45:46 > 0:45:51Ireland in 1916 was part of the United Kingdom.
0:45:51 > 0:45:55But many Irish people believed they had been living for generations
0:45:55 > 0:45:57under foreign occupation.
0:45:59 > 0:46:02Their watchword was that England's difficulty
0:46:02 > 0:46:04was Ireland's opportunity.
0:46:07 > 0:46:10Rebel leaders such as James Connolly
0:46:10 > 0:46:12were prepared to turn to Germany for weapons.
0:46:16 > 0:46:18The revolution started here.
0:46:22 > 0:46:27On Easter Monday 1916, Connolly led a group of armed rebels
0:46:27 > 0:46:31as they seized the General Post Office, symbol of colonial power.
0:46:33 > 0:46:37Within hours, they had proclaimed the birth of the Irish Republic.
0:46:39 > 0:46:44British troops surrounded the building and prepared for a siege.
0:46:47 > 0:46:50On Wednesday, there was the sound of shelling,
0:46:50 > 0:46:53because the British had brought a gunboat up the Liffey.
0:46:53 > 0:46:55On Thursday, machine guns opened up
0:46:55 > 0:46:58and James Connolly was hit in the ankle.
0:46:58 > 0:47:03And then, on Friday, incendiary shells struck the building.
0:47:07 > 0:47:09With the Post Office in ruins,
0:47:09 > 0:47:10the rebels surrendered.
0:47:12 > 0:47:17What became known as the Easter Rising had been crushed.
0:47:18 > 0:47:21Connolly and the other leaders were brought
0:47:21 > 0:47:24to Kilmainham Gaol, in Dublin.
0:47:24 > 0:47:26For the British authorities,
0:47:26 > 0:47:29the rebels were simply traitors in time of war.
0:47:30 > 0:47:3315 of them were executed by firing squad.
0:47:33 > 0:47:35GUNFIRE
0:47:39 > 0:47:41Mass arrests followed of anyone
0:47:41 > 0:47:43suspected of being a rebel sympathiser.
0:47:45 > 0:47:502,500 Irish people were sent to internment camps.
0:47:54 > 0:47:56Reaction in Ireland was outraged,
0:47:56 > 0:48:02and the executed nationalists became martyrs in the cause of freedom.
0:48:06 > 0:48:11The Easter Rising had been a hopeless, scatterbrained failure.
0:48:11 > 0:48:15But the British response - the executions, the mass arrests,
0:48:15 > 0:48:20the internment without trial - had turned failure into triumph.
0:48:20 > 0:48:23James Connolly and his comrades had been amateurish
0:48:23 > 0:48:25and passionate and doomed,
0:48:25 > 0:48:27but they had made the cause
0:48:27 > 0:48:30of Irish freedom from British rule unstoppable.
0:48:36 > 0:48:40The executed rebels were buried in a British military prison cemetery,
0:48:40 > 0:48:44now venerated as a national monument in independent Ireland.
0:48:46 > 0:48:49- So Connolly's buried here? - Connolly's here.
0:48:49 > 0:48:51'The grandson of one of the leaders
0:48:51 > 0:48:54'testifies to their enduring influence.'
0:48:54 > 0:48:57The first week of the Rising was a failure,
0:48:57 > 0:49:00but it was a significant political success,
0:49:00 > 0:49:04so there's no harm in losing the battle if you win the war.
0:49:04 > 0:49:07And if I were to say that your ancestors,
0:49:07 > 0:49:08including your grandfather,
0:49:08 > 0:49:12were effectively on the side of the Germans, what would you say?
0:49:12 > 0:49:14I'd say that nothing could be further from the truth.
0:49:14 > 0:49:18The Irish people were on the side of the independence of this country.
0:49:18 > 0:49:22They had to, obviously, get arms from somewhere
0:49:22 > 0:49:25and the only people willing to give them arms were the Germans.
0:49:25 > 0:49:28Do you think it's an exaggeration then to say
0:49:28 > 0:49:32that the First World War MADE Ireland independent?
0:49:32 > 0:49:35I think it's fair to say that the circumstances warranted a response
0:49:35 > 0:49:37of the British to the Rising.
0:49:37 > 0:49:42It did precipitate the independent Ireland we have today.
0:49:50 > 0:49:54At the start of the war, Lloyd George had almost despaired
0:49:54 > 0:49:58of what he had called his "undisciplined nation".
0:50:00 > 0:50:04But by the summer of 1916, all that had changed.
0:50:08 > 0:50:11Britain had become a machine for waging war.
0:50:13 > 0:50:16Every factory and farm, every able-bodied man,
0:50:16 > 0:50:18and millions of women too,
0:50:18 > 0:50:23had been drawn into a titanic struggle to win the conflict.
0:50:24 > 0:50:26But would it be enough?
0:50:26 > 0:50:29The nation was about to find out.
0:50:38 > 0:50:40July 1916.
0:50:41 > 0:50:45The rolling landscape around the River Somme in northern France.
0:50:48 > 0:50:51Here, Allied generals planned an attack
0:50:51 > 0:50:54they hoped would decide the outcome of the war.
0:50:54 > 0:50:57MILITARY DRUMS
0:51:04 > 0:51:06Through May and June,
0:51:06 > 0:51:08some three-quarters of a million Allied soldiers
0:51:08 > 0:51:11gathered in preparation for an offensive,
0:51:11 > 0:51:15massive in scale and ruthless in execution,
0:51:15 > 0:51:18to end the stagnation of trench warfare.
0:51:20 > 0:51:24Key to the plan was the destruction of German defences
0:51:24 > 0:51:27before Allied troops even left their trenches.
0:51:35 > 0:51:37On June 24th 1916,
0:51:37 > 0:51:41the order was given to unleash the greatest artillery bombardment
0:51:41 > 0:51:43the world had ever seen.
0:51:54 > 0:51:58This was war on an industrial scale.
0:51:58 > 0:52:01Seven days and seven nights of bombardment
0:52:01 > 0:52:06in which a million-and-a-half shells poured down on the Germans,
0:52:06 > 0:52:10an apocalypse so violent it could be heard miles away,
0:52:10 > 0:52:14across the Channel, in the English Home Counties.
0:52:21 > 0:52:24But it wasn't over yet.
0:52:24 > 0:52:27The climax of the bombardment was still to come.
0:52:29 > 0:52:32Two minutes before the attack was set to begin,
0:52:32 > 0:52:35there was one of the biggest man-made explosions
0:52:35 > 0:52:37in the history of the world.
0:52:37 > 0:52:40This is the result.
0:52:40 > 0:52:43The British had spent six months tunnelling
0:52:43 > 0:52:45beneath the German fortifications
0:52:45 > 0:52:49and now, at 7.28 on 1st July,
0:52:49 > 0:52:53they detonated 30 tons of explosives.
0:52:53 > 0:52:58The debris flew 4,000 feet into the air.
0:53:09 > 0:53:13The generals were confident little could have survived the assault.
0:53:14 > 0:53:17So confident, in fact, that there had been jokes
0:53:17 > 0:53:20that all the troops would need to carry across no-man's-land
0:53:20 > 0:53:22were their umbrellas.
0:53:30 > 0:53:34At dawn, on July 1st, the men were assembled
0:53:34 > 0:53:38ready to clamber out of the trenches and go over the top.
0:53:38 > 0:53:42Most of them were volunteers from Kitchener's Army,
0:53:42 > 0:53:45including many from the so-called Pals battalions.
0:53:45 > 0:53:48It was a glorious summer's day.
0:53:48 > 0:53:51BIRDSONG
0:53:54 > 0:53:58At 7.30, whistles blew along the whole of the front.
0:53:58 > 0:54:00WHISTLES BLOW
0:54:00 > 0:54:04A football was kicked in the direction of the German trenches.
0:54:06 > 0:54:10The Battle of the Somme was about to begin.
0:54:10 > 0:54:13GUNFIRE
0:54:16 > 0:54:20Wave after wave of soldiers marched towards the German trenches.
0:54:23 > 0:54:26Among them were the 16th Battalion of the Royal Scots,
0:54:26 > 0:54:29known as the McCraes -
0:54:29 > 0:54:32a Pals battalion formed round the players and fans
0:54:32 > 0:54:34of Heart of Midlothian Football Club.
0:54:36 > 0:54:40But what met them was not what they had been told to expect.
0:54:44 > 0:54:46As the football fans marched on,
0:54:46 > 0:54:48German guns took a terrible toll.
0:54:51 > 0:54:55Thousands of British shells had failed to explode.
0:54:55 > 0:54:57The enemy wire had barely been cut.
0:55:00 > 0:55:04The Germans had had months to build their defences.
0:55:04 > 0:55:05Their dugouts were deep,
0:55:05 > 0:55:07many reinforced with concrete,
0:55:07 > 0:55:11and a week of shelling had caused only partial damage.
0:55:15 > 0:55:17As the day wore on,
0:55:17 > 0:55:22the hope for decisive victory turned into decided disaster.
0:55:25 > 0:55:28McCrae's Battalion came on steadily and bravely up the hill
0:55:28 > 0:55:30and then, to their horror,
0:55:30 > 0:55:33a German machine gun opened up on them from the side.
0:55:33 > 0:55:36They fell in great numbers.
0:55:36 > 0:55:40One survivor recalled the shock of seeing men he had looked up to
0:55:40 > 0:55:43cut down in front of him.
0:55:43 > 0:55:45His company sergeant major took a bullet,
0:55:45 > 0:55:49fell to his knees and his last words were,
0:55:49 > 0:55:51"Be brave, my boys."
0:55:51 > 0:55:53Then he fell forward, dead.
0:56:02 > 0:56:04Andy Ramage, who was a printer,
0:56:04 > 0:56:09had this photo taken of himself with his pal Frank Weston, a student.
0:56:10 > 0:56:14Ramage was hit in the throat by flying shrapnel.
0:56:16 > 0:56:21Weston was shot as he pulled him into a shell hole to protect him.
0:56:26 > 0:56:31810 members of McCrae's Battalion went over the top that day.
0:56:32 > 0:56:36576 were either killed or wounded.
0:56:40 > 0:56:42By the end of that first day,
0:56:42 > 0:56:49the British Army had suffered a total 57,470 casualties.
0:56:49 > 0:56:53A little ground had been taken,
0:56:53 > 0:56:56but there had been no breakthrough.
0:56:56 > 0:57:00It was the bloodiest day in the history of British warfare.
0:57:16 > 0:57:19The Somme offensive dragged on for months.
0:57:19 > 0:57:21It did eventually yield some gains,
0:57:21 > 0:57:25but they were bought at tremendous cost,
0:57:25 > 0:57:28and the whole thing raised really troubling questions.
0:57:28 > 0:57:31Were Britain's generals up to it?
0:57:31 > 0:57:33Were Britain's soldiers?
0:57:33 > 0:57:38Could the country cope with losses on this sort of scale?
0:57:38 > 0:57:40And bleakest of all -
0:57:40 > 0:57:42how much longer was it going to go on?
0:57:55 > 0:57:57Next time -
0:57:57 > 0:58:00German U-boats try to starve Britain into submission...
0:58:02 > 0:58:06..an alleged pacifist plot to murder Lloyd George
0:58:06 > 0:58:08lands this Derby family in prison,
0:58:08 > 0:58:14and the state intervenes to police the sex lives of British citizens.