Battlefield Britain

Documentary

BBC / ABC / Roadshow

R4 DVD

There is something rather rousing about being on a spot where a major action took place. To see what the combatants saw, to follow their movements during the battle, and perhaps to see the remnants and reminders is a powerful feeling. The traditional abbreviated version of history often covers these with a curt “In xxxx A defeated B in the Battle of ABCD”. But what happened during the battle itself? What was it like for the soldiers? Why were so many battles decided largely by an incorrect decision by one leader? Why did they make that disastrous decision? This series covers a number of the major battles fought on or over British soil over the centuries, from the Roman occupation to the Battle of Britain.

Each episode uses extensive computer graphics and quite good animations to show the battle’s progress in a clear way. Peter and Dan Snow, the show’s father and son presenters, describe clearly the ebb and flow of the battles. Sometimes they can trace the movements of the combatants on the ground from the features still remaining – a hill or bog, a hedgerow, ruins. You now look at these ruins with a new perspective.

Often reenactment groups are used to show what a typical soldier of the period looked like, what weapons he carried and how he used them. The weapons may seem quaint to us now but at the time they were generally the best killing weapons available. Even today a sixteen foot long pike looks deadly and you can appreciate how it must have looked to a charging horseman. This was, despite its age, still savage warfare. The killing was a very closeup affair. The victors, as is pointed out often during the episodes, were usually the ones who were better disciplined in their fighting, better trained and sometimes better equipped. One scene that still sticks in my memory is of a Roman technique of arranging their troops in a sawtooth formation. This funnelled their attackers deeper into the Roman formation where they could be attacked from two sides. It must have required tremendous discipline to hold that formation in the face of thousands of charging Britons, and tremendous skill to keep the formation intact when the line was ordered to move forward into and over the bodies of their enemies. The CG explains the technique clearly and leaves you with a slight feeling of horror and awe at just how efficient a killing machine a disciplined army was, even in those days.

While Peter explains the history leading up to each battle his son Dan will be examining and trying out the weapons where possible. Dan will climb down to the bottom of a stream valley to find out why troops didn’t go that way or experience the high-G effects of a very fast fighter plane, even if he must fly in a newer plane rather than the genuine article. Dan also gets to carry the heavy sixteen-foot pike overnight to see how the soldiers could cover such distances in short times, and to ford freezing rivers while trying to keep a bag of gunpowder dry. This brings a reality to the dry history. The extra detail really does make a difference to our understanding of a battle.

There are weaknesses in the series. The re-enactments are generally very good but often the descriptions must be padded out with modern film footage. When you talk of Boudicca’s army moving to sack Londinium a shot of the “Gherkin”, a very modernistic building, is incongruous. Similarly the shot of Edinburgh with a very prominent power station in the centre of the picture. When you talk of German bombers attacking the London docklands a modern film clip of the Thames seems out of place. In each episode there are mock “interviews” with actors playing the parts of combatants from either side. Although their words can be quite moving I’m afraid it still just looks like padding out the show. These are fairly minor defects, though. There are also a number of minor historical inaccuracies in the modern footage.

The series covers Boudicca’s revolt against the Romans in 61AD, the Battle of Hastings in 1066, the battle for control of Wales in 1403, the Spanish Armada in 1588 (a particularly powerful episode), Naseby in 1645, the battle of the Boyne in Ireland in 1690 where two competing kings battled for the position of King of England, Culloden in Scotland in 1746, and finally the Battle of Britain against the Luftwaffe in 1940. It’s a lot to cover but the series does it well and usually includes the politics leading up to the battle. Academics may prefer more detail but the purpose of the documentary is to arouse interest in the general public about their history. The series does this very well.

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