A television documentary to be released next year revealing how Spitfire fighter planes were built in secret during World War II will have a preview at Winchelsea New Hall on Saturday October 14. The film’s co-producer, Karl Howman, recently moved to Winchelsea.
The film, entitled The Secret Spitfires, explains how aircraft sub-assemblies were made in sheds, garages, warehouses and so on in the centre of Salisbury and Newbury. The finished sub-assemblies were covertly transferred to abandoned barns outside the towns, assembled into complete aircraft and flown straight to waiting fighter airfields.
The enterprise only recently came to light. The work began because the Luftwaffe regularly bombed known munitions factories across the UK. Towns with no known military presence were not targets. All those involved, many of them young women at the time, were made to sign the Official Secrets Act. They talk about their work for the first time in the film.
The Secret Spitfires will be released in 2018 to coincide with the creation of the Royal Air Force 100 years earlier. A trailer can be seen online.
The film will be accompanied by a short film made in the 1920s of Winchelsea and its environs, which includes the New Inn, Wesley’s Tree, Greyfriars and the town’s medieval gates. The film was tracked down to the Screen Archive South-East archives at the University of Sussex following detective work by Jurat David Merrifield. The film show is being organised by Mayor Cynthia Feast in order to raise money for repairs to the Court Hall. The event is due to start at 3pm. Tickets are £8.
Photo: film still