The
Plain
Synopsis
In December 1897 the British Army made its first purchase of a small piece of Salisbury Plain. That plot has now grown to become the largest military training area in the UK, taking up an area about the size of the Isle of Wight.
"The Plain" is a 4 part aural history series, which tells the story of how life has changed for people on Salisbury Plain since the army arrived there. The series interweaves the human stories with the history of the development of armed warfare using personal testimonies from both the civilian and military perspectives. The series' oldest witness is 106 year old Robert Burns, one of the few surviving World War One veterans who actually underwent training on The Plain. Using unique and in many cases previously unseen archive film and photographs, the story unfolds.
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Programme One looks back to the early years, the impact of the army's arrival on the local community; the early manoeuvres which involved 50,000 men to be accommodated on the Plain; the birth of the Royal flying Corps at Larkhill and the horrors of the First World War. After declarations of 'Peace in our time' the army continued to prepare itself for war, in spite of major financial cuts. Programme Two tells of the apparently idyllic lives of the people of the Plain in the run up to WW2; the slow collapse of the class structure and how women's roles both in the home and out of it started to change. The arrival of American troops during World War 2 provoked excitement among the local people; especially Jim Stoodley a 14 year old boy who stole an American plane in an attempt to fly to Germany to assassinate Hitler... It failed. This programme also reveals the story hitherto untold about the 'friendly fire' killing of 27 top army officers and civic dignitaries who had gathered to watch a demonstration of strafing by specially converted Hurricane fighters. |
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Programme Three picks up on the post war period and the effects of the cold war, resulting in an ever bigger and bigger army presence. With the ending of National Service in the early sixties, we saw the birth of a professional army. The 70s & 80s saw the arrival of the hippies and UFO anoraks. After a long battle with local authorities, the army built the controversial village of Copehill Down. The intention was to provide a replica of a German village, to train soldiers in the event of a Soviet invasion of West Germany. Just months after the village was built, the Warsaw Pact collapsed. |
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Programme Four looks at Salisbury Plain today and how the army has taken its responsibility as custodian of what is now the largest area of unspoilt grassland in Europe. As a major training exercise takes place on The Plain, involving just 750 men and women with 1,000 times the fire power of the exercise which took place 100 years ago with 50,000 soldiers, we meet Paul Toynton the army's environmentalist and Ian Barnes the army's archaeologist who have the responsibility to protect the grassland and advise the army on its responsibilities. We meet the people who look after Stonehenge and the farmers who continue their uneasy alliance with their military landlords. |
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The Plain - 4 x 25 minutes for HTV West @ Meridian Broadcasting 1998 Producers
Pamela Jane Hunt / Chris Corden |
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