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Culture Express
  • 6/13/2025

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00:00At the turn of the century, Britain was the world's leading maritime nation.
00:17And Clydebank, in the southwest of Scotland, was the epicentre of British shipbuilding.
00:24Some of the most famous ocean liners ever to set sail had their origins here.
00:30Ships such as the Lusitania and Aquitania.
00:37But at the height of the Great Depression, Clydebank was a tomb.
00:42And little symbolised the economic crisis more dramatically than the locked gates of the John Brown shipyard.
00:49Behind them, the abandoned and rusting hulk of the largest ship in the world, the Queen Mary, 80% complete.
00:57The world's leading maritime nation was on its knees.
01:02Despite the tough economic times, other nations were earning profits and prestige for their large, powerful liners.
01:22The Italian liner Rex and the German superliners Bremen and Europa had all left Britain in their wake
01:30by taking the highly prized blue ribbon for the fastest ship on the North Atlantic.
01:35To make matters worse, across the English Channel, the French government had underwritten the construction of a giant ocean liner of similar proportions to the Queen Mary.
01:48At 79,000 tonnes, the Normandy would give France the largest ship in the world and the travelling public the most elegant ocean liner ever created.
02:00With Britain's reputation as the world's leading maritime nation at stake, the British government intervened in the crisis and work began again on the Queen Mary.
02:14When the Mary was being built and the Normandy was being built, their pictures were constantly in all the major papers of the world.
02:28Anything that happened to them was news, number one news.
02:32The French and the British were now locked into an extraordinary duel for dominance of the North Atlantic.
02:42A duel between the two largest and fastest ships the world had ever seen.
02:47On a cold, rain-soaked day, six months later, more than 200,000 people gathered to see British royalty lend its presence to the launching rituals of a merchant ship.
03:09I was standing halfway down the berth at the side of the ship, with my nerves on edge, and James McNeil, my boss, he was standing away down on the other side of the ship, a good bit further down the yard, and he was biting his nails.
03:33As the Queen Mary plunged into the river Clyde, she appeared to be gathering speed.
04:01Too much speed.
04:03The crowd fell silent, sensing disaster.
04:16The cables tauten as the 2,500 tons of drag chains take up the strain.
04:23Surely a tribute to British engineering is the fact that without the slightest hitch, the launch is accomplished.
04:29I see both of us kicking our fingers crossed that all would be well.
04:36Very relieved when it was.
04:38In late May 1935, the pride of France set out on her maiden voyage from Le Havre.
04:53The Normandie giant luxury liner of all the seas, carrying 3,000 souls, is a veritable floating city.
05:05The world has waited for this moment, and the question asked again and again is, will this 80,000-ton streamline giant wrest the blue ribbon of the Atlantic from the German line of Raymond?
05:20The French line said in 1935, we are definitely not going for the blue ribbon, it's not in the making, we'll do it later on.
05:27They would not admit to it for fearing something mechanically could backfire.
05:33As Normandie sailed for New York, she carried the hopes of her countrymen that she'd be the first French ship to win the blue ribbon of the Atlantic.
05:46For the next four days, Normandie became the floating headquarters of Parisian society.
05:51In the favourable sailing conditions, Normandie averaged almost 29 knots and immediately proved herself a thoroughbred.
06:03The blue ribbon was hers for the taking.
06:08When Normandie came into the port of New York for the first time in June of 1935,
06:13every window, every building, every roof is black with people.
06:17With the fireboats leading the reception, New York harbour roars, toots, whistles and shrieks of pandemonium of wealth.
06:26All records shattered as the Normandie makes the crossing in four days, three hours and fourteen minutes.
06:32Greatest of liners on the most acclaimed maiden voyage in the history of navigation.
06:38Well of course she captured the blue ribbon on her maiden voyage,
06:41and everyone was given a bronze medallion, blue ribbon, Normandie, and it said made in France,
06:46so they knew all along they were going to drive for it.
06:48Twelve months later, with her fitting out complete, the Queen Mary was ready to challenge her French rival.
07:09The liners' hotel-like interiors were modern, but not too modern, elegant, but not gaudy.
07:26But the reaction of the British critics was mixed.
07:29In the opinion of one London columnist, the design of her public rooms, her bars and her restaurants seem to have been aimed at dollar millionaires from the Midwest of America,
07:41and their opposite numbers in England, who claim that where there's muck, there's money.
07:50But such criticisms did little to dampen the enthusiasm of Englishmen who looked upon their new maritime prodigy with pride touched with awe.
07:59And even the Queen, who gave the ship her name, was privately relieved.
08:04She and about 19 members of the Royal Family went down to Southampton to see the fitted out, finished Queen Mary.
08:11All very art deco and light years away from what the old Queen liked, but nonetheless she toured it with interest.
08:17She went back that night to Windsor Castle, and she wrote,
08:20Toured the new Queen Mary today, not as bad as I expected.
08:29The day of her maiden voyage had arrived, and no other ship in British maritime history seemed so important to the nation's prestige.
08:38At four o'clock, she said, at about three o'clock, they asked me to take a message over to the head office ashore.
08:49And I thought, well, normally you just go down the gangway across.
08:54I think it took me nearly an hour to get through the crowd, you had to push your way through, and everybody was pulling at you like a pop star, you know.
09:00They didn't know about pop stars then. They were tugging at you. Can I have a button? They were trying to pull your buttons.
09:05That's how it went, you know, really. It was quite a thing.
09:09Hearts will glow with admiration
09:13When our new liner leaves the key
09:17And a name, loved by the nation
09:21Will give her charm and dignity
09:24British Labour gave it skill
09:27As the Queen Mary set out on her maiden voyage to New York
09:31The fog of depression that had blanketed Britain for more than five years seemed to lift.
09:36I booked my trip for the USA
09:40So when I go over the sea
09:43The Queen Mary takes me
09:46Through out the voyage, conversations turned to the Queen's stunning progress
10:08And the inevitability of her capturing the blue ribbon from Normandy
10:12Only a day out of New York, a fog of the Atlantic kind engulfed the Queen Mary
10:25You know, I always felt very worried Titanic always loomed in the background fog, see, so she slowed right down
10:33And she slowed down for probably half the day
10:38She lost the mileage
10:40And it was a big disappointment, everybody's a little bit disappointed about that
10:44When the fog finally lifted, the Queen Mary powered towards New York at 33 knots
10:55A speed faster than any other liner in history
10:592-0-5
11:02She made up time, but not enough
11:05Less than an hour out of New York
11:07The honour of winning the blue ribbon slipped from her grasp
11:14A sea of ships are aimed, boats, yachts, rowing boats, anything that could float
11:20And then she went up the Udsiner and took a tape welcome for her
11:24Fantastic, there's nothing really I think has been seen like that ever since, not for a liner
11:29The coming of the Queen Mary inaugurates one of the greatest races of all time
11:34Which ship will turn out to be the faster, the Normandy or the Queen?
11:38That is the question of the hour
11:40Here is Commodore Sir Edgar Preston
11:42Are you going to try for the blue ribbon, Captain?
11:45Well, naturally, that's what we're out for
11:47What did we build her for?
11:48In the 1930s, New York was the busiest port in the world, and the most glamorous
12:13On any day, a dozen of the world's most prestigious liners could be tied up beside each other
12:31And in those tight money times, competition was stiff for the hearts and minds of the travelling public
12:37In the newsreels of the day, the comings and goings of liners and the celebrities who travelled on them became a cliché in itself
12:47But the reporters got a colour story for the next edition
12:52And the stars and the shipping lines got welcomed publicity
12:56Some lines even made passenger lists available to the media
13:00To ensure cameras would be pointing in their direction, rather than at the competition
13:04Crossing the gangway, so the brochures promised, one would immediately sense the glamour, romance and sheer fun of life on board
13:24One of the largest moving objects ever built
13:26And, of course, the lines embellish this through artwork and posters of the big bows surging through the Atlantic waves as they charge their way across the seas
13:35You know, you could just picture this huge muscle power down below churning, working those propellers as the ship made its way
13:41Ship's officers created a gala atmosphere, with games and diversions to keep their passengers' minds off the one aspect of ocean travel never advertised
13:54My first trip alone, after I'd been a movie star and had some money, I came to Europe all by myself on the Queen Mary
14:04And I always got terribly seasick on ocean liners
14:08And they didn't have any Dramamine in those days, or they didn't have anything for you
14:13You just had to eat celery, and they said to drink a little champagne, none of which did any good at all
14:18Any good at all
14:25The elegant salons and dining rooms were designed to help passengers forget about the rolling Atlantic
14:31And make the best of the $700 first class ticket
14:35You had to have a different dress for every night
14:38Men were in clover, they wore the same dinner jackets
14:40But we had things for the morning, then we had afternoon clothes after the nap
14:47And then we dressed for dinner
14:49We had a lot of clothes with us, we were with steamer trunks
14:53All these rich people, and all these celebrities, when they came down into the Turkish bath and took their clothes off
15:00They were just ordinary people like me, I mean, we were all naked
15:05And we told stories, and we drank pints of beer
15:09I think half of them loved to be down there because they were away from their wives
15:17Only months after her maiden voyage, the Queen Mary captured the Blue Ribbon from Normandy
15:23And became the first ship to make the Atlantic crossing in less than four days
15:27Averaging more than 30 knots
15:29The following year, Normandy regained the prize with two record breaking crossings
15:37On the second, she averaged 31.2 knots
15:44Then, in 1937, the Queen Mary pushed the speed barrier even further, to 31.6 knots
15:52A record that wouldn't be bettered for nearly 15 years
15:55In the great race between the superliners of the 1930s, the Queen Mary won out over her rivals, not only in speed, but in profits
16:07The Normandy, as lavish and as wonderful as it was, was a little bit of overkill
16:12A lot of people who might have booked it said, gee, I don't know if we'll fit in on the Normandy
16:17It's just a little too luxurious, a little too posh, a little too over the edge
16:22So we'll go on a less pretentious ship
16:24And it's interesting that the only success of the 30s of that inner breed of superliners was the Queen Mary
16:30Because she had a wonderful sort of British sense of unpretention, coziness, good service, the whole bit
16:35That made it work, and she was the only successful giant of the 30s
16:50In Germany, by the mid-1930s, the darkness of depression had lifted to be replaced by the long shadow of Nazism
16:57Soon after he came to power, Adolf Hitler sent his people back to work on grand national projects
17:10As well as creating the finest infrastructure in Europe, Hitler saw Germany as a powerhouse of industry, trade and finance
17:17But in his vision for Germany, there was no place for trade unions, the breeding ground for dissent
17:28So he outlawed them, and forced all workers to join the state-controlled German labour front
17:38But how to win over the hearts and minds of the workers to Hitler's fascist ideals?
17:44The propaganda division of the Third Reich came up with the idea of offering inexpensive holiday voyages to workers
17:55Especially those who were members of the Nazi Party
17:58They called the scheme Strength Through Joy
18:02The aim was to give the German walkers the opportunity to relax
18:08For most of the passengers, it was their first encounter with the sea, and a chance to visit exotic destinations few Germans ever thought possible of seeing
18:27Wherever they went, the ships were diplomats of the Third Reich
18:31This stopover, at Naples, was greeted with wild enthusiasm, and signified the growing relationship between fascist Italy and Germany
18:44The German government was very interested to get a better image outside
18:48Because there were great opposition in many countries against the Nazi government
18:54And they tried to bring a more positive image to the foreign world
19:00So for instance, the great Olympic Games in 1936 were one of these cases
19:06And the Strength and Joy ships were one of these projects which were used in this way
19:12Strength Through Joy cruisers became so popular, the German Labour Front commissioned the construction of two new liners
19:30The 28,000 tonne Wilhelm Gustloff, launched in 1937, was the world's first specially built cruise ship
19:36She was a one class ship, and the first ever to offer the same standard of accommodation for crew and guests
19:47Egalitarianism had come to the high seas
19:53Two years later, Adolf Hitler sailed on the maiden voyage of the second liner in the series, the Robert Ley
19:59Propaganda cameras were also aboard, capturing the Fuhrer's rapport with passengers and crew alike
20:09Of course the Nazi Party here made propaganda with it
20:13Because they really had something to offer to the people
20:17And now they wanted that the people knew who built the ships for them
20:22And to whom they had to be grateful for it
20:25Strength Through Joy gave German workers an ocean-going inducement to continue their support for Hitler
20:41Before long, however, the fine music from the ships' orchestras would be drowned out by the drums of war
20:47Another catastrophe was in the making, and Joy would be in short supply for the duration
20:53Of course they had to be in short supply for the ships
20:54In late September 1938, as the clouds of war began to engulf Europe
21:10Queen Elizabeth arrived at the John Brown shipyard in Glasgow
21:14To launch a running mate for the Queen Mary
21:16In front of 300,000 people, the Queen took the opportunity to rally Britons to the cause of peace, not war
21:29We proclaim our belief that by the grace of God, and by man's patience and goodwill
21:36Order may yet be brought out of confusion, and peace out of turmoil
21:41With that hope and prayer in our hearts, we send forth upon her mission this noble ship
21:48At 83 and a half thousand tons, and a thousand and thirty feet in length, the Queen Elizabeth would supersede all before her in size
21:49At 83 and a half thousand tons, and a thousand and thirty feet in length, the Queen Elizabeth would supersede all before her in size
22:02Along with the Queen Mary, she'd give her owners, Cunard Whitestar, its long-awaited two-ship weekly service to New York
22:23In less than a minute, the largest ship in the world arrived in her natural element
22:32But she would not see service for the purpose she was built for another seven long years
22:38Dawn, on the 1st of September 1939
22:51For the new German armies and Air Force, a baptism of fire
22:58As the tanks of the Fatherland rolled into Poland, Germany ignited the Second World War
23:04At Glasgow, that same fateful morning, 1,400 passengers boarded an anchor Donaldson line steamer, the Athenia
23:17Bound for Montreal
23:21Two days later, the day Britain declared war on Germany
23:25The Athenia crossed paths with a German U-boat, 250 miles northwest of Ireland
23:30Despite an order from the commander of the U-boat fleet, Admiral Donuts, not to attack unarmed passenger liners, the U-boat captain gave chase
23:44The Athenia sank in 20 minutes, with the loss of 112 passengers, including several Americans
24:03The survivors were picked up by freighters and ferried to safety
24:10Facing international condemnation, Germany denied responsibility for the sinking
24:17Eyewitness reports told a different story
24:21We saw the submarine to our left, a distance of about 200 yards
24:26We saw it for a considerable time, there's no doubt about being a submarine
24:30For Germany, the Athenia sinking was a propaganda disaster
24:34And it proved that from day one of the war, that liners and their passengers weren't going to be exempt from the carnage
24:44Like the First World War, this conflict was total war
24:50The war at sea comes to the Atlantic coast of America
24:59The US cruiser Tuscaloosa and a sister ship are on patrol
25:02A radio message comes from the giant German luxury liner Columbus
25:05That she has met a British cruiser
25:07And the Tuscaloosa is speeding to witness the inglorious end of one of Germany's proudest ships
25:11The Pate Gazette now shows you more than is seen even by the Tuscaloosa's captain
25:14We take you aboard the doomed German liner
25:17Each member of the crew is at his station as the light boats go over the side
25:21While they are lowered, others are spreading benzene throughout the ship
25:24When almost all are safely in the light boats shoving off from the vessel
25:27A suicide squad of ten and the captain start the fires and open the sea valves
25:32And Germany's 32,000 ton liner Columbus begins to burn
25:35These scuttlings can mean only one thing
25:38That in his own mind, Hitler has already lost the war
25:40His hopes are fading in pillars of smoke and fire at sea
25:55If Hitler had lost the war, nobody had told the German Luftwaffe
26:02They were soon hunting enemy naval and merchant ships
26:05And enforcing Hitler's blockade of Britain
26:10British Admiralty feared the Luftwaffe would soon have their sights fixed on the giant shipbuilding centre on Glasgow's River Clyde
26:25Where the world's largest liner, the Queen Elizabeth, was still being fitted out
26:30Her escape was to be one of the most daring of the war
26:35Certain that spies were in the area, a deliberate rumour was spread that the liner would be sailing to Southampton for dry docking
26:44But her real destination was unknown to all on board, even the captain
26:50Well, I think all they were told was to take clothes for a
26:55Possibly absence on the ship for a bit
26:58But they didn't know where they were going
27:00At sea, Captain Townley opened sealed orders
27:05The destination, New York
27:10As she sped across the North Atlantic, Nazi bombers were spotted over the Solent
27:18Precisely where she would have been sailing en route to Southampton
27:21It was a dramatic escape, especially for a ship that had never been to sea before
27:29And there was still launch gear fixed beneath the water
27:33She'd had no engine trials, she'd had no trials of any kind
27:36Her sea trials were crossing at speed, evading U-boats across the North Atlantic
27:42She arrived unannounced
27:46The Coast Guardsmen standing on the beach out at Fire Island
27:50Suddenly saw what he described as a great grey ghost coming out of the mist
27:54And it was the Queen Elizabeth
27:56It was the first time the maiden voyage of such an important liner had gone unheralded
28:01Next to that of the Titanic
28:05It would have to rate as one of the most dramatic maiden voyages in history
28:08At New York, the Queen Elizabeth found herself in good company
28:16And she and the Mary and the Normandy
28:20The three monsters, the longshoremen call them
28:23Tied up in New York for two weeks together in March of 1940
28:27And it was a low point of the war for the Allies
28:30Because the low countries were being overrun, France was about to surrender
28:33And then the Queen Mary went to war
28:36In mid-April 1940, after a four-week voyage from New York
28:42The Queen Mary sailed through Sydney Heads
28:46Over the next two weeks, Australian ship workers would transform the luxury liner into a troop ship
28:53She was joined in Sydney by six other British liners
29:00Including the New Mauritania
29:03And the First World War veteran, Aquitania
29:06Together they were to make the first great armada of the Second World War
29:10The Second World War
29:11The Liners were soon packed with 14,000 Australian and New Zealand soldiers
29:24prepared to sail to the other side of the globe to fight yet another war for their King and Empire
29:42The Queen Mary was the largest and fastest troop ship the world had yet seen
30:00And her impressive departure couldn't have gone unnoticed by fifth columnists in Sydney
30:07If she came to grief at the hands of a U-boat, it would be a propaganda coup for Germany
30:14The voyage would take more than five weeks to reach Scotland
30:20Its speed dictated by the slowest of the vessels
30:22Everyone involved was conscious of both the risks and the importance of the mission to the survival of Britain
30:29When you're down below in a ship, in the hull of a ship, you're normally in the lower part of the ship
30:34You can see the still structure of the ship there, near your bunk there
30:39You think, crikey, death is if a torpedo hit us there, I was frightened
30:43After rounding the Cape of Good Hope, the convoy sailed north
30:56But the liners were built for the bitter cold of the North Atlantic
30:59Not the stifling heat of equatorial waters
31:04Unfortunately, the Aquitania was not air-conditioned
31:07She was a hot ship
31:08She stunk with heat
31:09I mean, I used to sleep on the far deck on a mattress
31:12I never slept there, but it was too hot
31:14And the Australians used to try and get onto the deck
31:17So the whole upper structure of the ship was full of Australian soldiers and crew
31:22To get air, terrible
31:27What should have been a triumphant arrival in Britain
31:30Was overshadowed by the news that France had offered its surrender to Germany only hours before
31:35Hitler was soon standing on a French beach, casting his eye across the English Channel to Britain
31:43A mere 20 miles away
31:50Bombs were soon falling on London
31:53And Britain was now facing one of the most dangerous periods in her long history
31:57Despite the fear of a German invasion, Britain's new Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, dispatched another fleet of liners carrying British troops away from their homeland
32:12They were destined for the Middle East, where Italy had opened up another front
32:17For nearly 100 years British liners had sustained the Empire
32:36Now they were fighting for its very survival
32:38At stake, the Suez Canal, the lifeline for vital supplies from her dominions
32:45Convoys also arrived at Suez from Australia and New Zealand
33:01But by late 1940, it was clear that to have any hope of survival, Britain needed more fighting men
33:09And even more ships to carry them
33:14In November that year, the largest ship in the world, the Queen Elizabeth
33:18Slipped out of New York Harbour to join the Queen Mary
33:21Shuttling troops from Australia to the Middle East
33:23The America she was leaving was staying out of the conflict
33:28But the next time she visited, the United States would be at war
33:33Since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan
33:38A state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire
33:44Within hours of declaring war on Japan, President Roosevelt seized the French liner Normandy
34:00And ordered her to be transformed as quickly as possible into a troopship
34:04When I came out of the subway, the entire sky was brown from the smoke of the Normandy
34:19During her conversion into a troop transport, fire breaks out in the 83,000 ton liner Normandy
34:24Recently renamed Lafayette
34:25Thousands of workers had to flee for their lives as flames roared through the one-time French luxury liner
34:37The dockside at New York Harbour is cleared as firemen and apparatus from all over Manhattan
34:42Fight the stubborn blaze that rages for four hours
34:47Not sabotage? I wonder
34:49The Normandy wasn't done in by a German saboteur
34:55She was done in by sheer carelessness
34:58Men were cutting a cutting job in the Grand Salon
35:02And the man holding the asbestos shield
35:05Took it away a fraction of a second too early
35:07And white-hot fragments fell onto Kapok life preservers
35:11Bundled in tarred paper and new burlap
35:14And they started to burn
35:15While the fire was contained to the top three decks
35:20A new danger presented itself
35:22The closing of the fireproof doors prevented the escape of thousands of tons of water poured into her from the fire hoses
35:30Gradually Normandy became top-heavy and took on a dangerous list
35:37I found Vladimir Yorkovich in the crowd
35:41He was the designer of the hull of the ship
35:43And he had just been to Admiral Adolphus Andrews
35:47Who was the Navy man in charge
35:49And he told me, he said, I told him, let me on board
35:54I can find the seacocks blindfolded
35:58I will open the seacocks
36:00The ship will sink three feet
36:02And be perfectly level
36:03She will not tip over
36:05Andrews said, this is a Navy job
36:08And that was the end of the Normandy
36:11You can't imagine the size of this monster laying on its side
36:17She looked like some big whale that just rolled over in the berth
36:21But some people, I think, came down at one time and sailed there
36:24And just to look at her and damn near cry that she was gone
36:27It was a disaster that did not have to happen
36:32And it also deprived us of one of the greatest troops ships in the world for World War II
36:37And we needed troops ships right at that time
36:48Nine days after the loss of the Normandy
36:50The Queen Mary was flying the American flag and carrying her troops to the other side of the globe
36:57Their task, to begin the battle for the Asia-Pacific
37:01And help defend Northern Australia
37:04Which by now was under Japanese attack
37:06Her troop carrying capacity had been increased from 5,000 to 8,000
37:12And her defences upgraded to fend off enemy raiders
37:21During the voyage, the Queen Mary had two close encounters with U-boats
37:26Off the Brazilian coast
37:28The ship's wireless operator picked up a bizarre German radio report
37:32The radio officer ran up to the wheelhouse
37:33He said, Captain, Captain, I've just overheard Berlin radio has announced
37:38That we've just been sunk and all 15,000 on board have drowned
37:42To which the captain says, How interesting, but don't tell the boys they'll get upset
37:48The 40-day, 18,000-mile voyage from Boston to Sydney via South Africa
37:53Ranks as one of the greatest expeditions in American military history
37:57And it was not the last
37:59Thanks, Mr. Roosevelt, it's swell of you
38:04For the way you're helping us to carry on
38:08Over the next two years, more than one million Americans would arrive in Australia
38:14A country with a pre-war population of only 7 million
38:20There was something about them
38:23That they were a little more giving, a little more attentive, I think, than Australian men
38:27And they also found that we were a little different to American women
38:34More appreciative we were, I think
38:38And our mothers loved them
38:44Depleted of its own fighting men, the influx was to have an extraordinary effect on Australian culture
38:50A culture that was 20 years behind in fashion, attitude and sophistication
38:54We're saying thanks, Mr. Roosevelt, we're proud of you
39:01Fall away, you're helping us to carry on
39:06In November 1942, the greatest armada in history sailed from Britain and the United States
39:16Codenamed Operation Torch, the top-secret expedition involved 170 warships and 350 merchant ships crammed with American and British troops
39:31Their aim, to make an all-out assault on the German and Italian forces in North French Africa
39:37The convoy was timed to land just as the American congressional elections were taking place
39:50The American president hoped its success would influence the result
39:53But the landing was delayed by four days, and the domestic propaganda value to President Roosevelt was lost
40:02In the strategy of global war, Operation Torch was a brilliant success
40:10It supplied the enormous manpower and machinery that would push the Axis armies from the African continent
40:15And give the Allies a major morale-boosting victory
40:21In that of the desert, out of Cairo, there has come tonight the news for which we have been waiting
40:28The Axis forces in the desert are in full retreat
40:32There's no shadow of doubt about it, the enemy are on the run
40:36We are on the run, and we are after it
40:49The Second World War wasn't just sustained by ships, they were the vital factor
40:57The greatest movement of troop ships was on the dangerous North Atlantic
41:00From the United States to Britain, supplying much-needed troops who would finally turn the tables on Germany in the battle for Europe
41:09But the convoys were slow, and prime targets for German U-boats
41:16On the high seas in those deadly days, vigilance was the price of life
41:20Only two troopers seemed to be naturally immune to the undersea raiders
41:33The Queen Mary, and the Queen Elizabeth
41:37For most of the war, they sailed without escort and out of convoy
41:42Between them, ferrying one and a quarter million men around the globe
41:46The Germans were not able to intercept these ships because they were too fast for the submarines
41:53There were very few cases when a German submarine even saw some of these big ships
41:59And there was never a possibility to make a real attack against one of these big ships
42:06Carrying 15,000 troops in one voyage
42:09Now you can soon, you know, on a five-day trip, bring whole armies over
42:15And that's precisely what those two ships did
42:19It isn't surprising that in his memoirs, Winston Churchill
42:23pays great tribute to those two ships
42:26And goes so far as to say that in his judgement
42:30They probably clipped at least two years off the length of the Second World War
42:33Tremendous historical impact of two big artefacts, if you like
42:45In the Second World War, thousands of merchant ships from both sides were destroyed
42:50Amongst the victims, some of the world's most renowned liners
42:55I was stationed on the 39th Squadron in Italy
43:00Near a town called Termoli
43:02Well, that started quite early in the day
43:05When we were suddenly told that we were to stand by
43:09In readiness to sink the Italian liner Rex
43:14The Germans were supposed to be sailing her out of Trieste Harbour
43:17And it was believed that they were going to sink her in the harbour mouth
43:21As a block ship
43:23To prevent any of our ships from getting into the harbour
43:26This was all that we knew
43:32And we were just above the treetops
43:34And then quite suddenly the ground fell away
43:36And below us was the coast
43:39And there we saw the Rex, our target
43:43She was 51,000 tons of course
43:46And an infinitely bigger target than we were accustomed to
43:49Once we had lined up on her
43:51The Mustangs went in first of all to straf any AK AK positions
43:57And then we came in firing rockets of course
44:05Between our eight aircraft, 64 rockets were fired into her
44:08And by that time, by the time we turned away
44:12There were clouds of smoke coming up from her full length
44:17The splendid flagship of the Italian Merchant Marine
44:20A holder of the blue ribbon of the Atlantic
44:23Was lost to the world
44:29Adolf Hitler's Strength Through Joy ship, the Wilhelm Gustloff
44:33Was torpedoed by a Russian submarine in late January 1945
44:38She was crammed with thousands of refugees and wounded soldiers
44:43It was torpedoed and sank in less than 20 minutes
44:47And 5,900 people perished
44:50Which is so much greater than the Titanic
44:52And that is the greatest loss of life ever in history
44:54To be lost at sea and especially on a passenger ship
44:57And yet the Wilhelm Gustloff is not even known outside of, say, Germany even
45:00Another staggering casualty was the German liner Capa Kona
45:07Once the largest and fastest passenger ship on the South American run
45:11She was lost in a British air attack only days before the end of the war
45:16Stranded without fuel, she and another ship nearby
45:20Were easy targets for British warplanes
45:22Records recovered from the wreck confirmed that more than 8,000 people, mainly prisoners from concentration camps, were on the two ships
45:37It's believed more than 7,000 people perished in the incident
45:43At least 5,000 were on board the Capa Kona
45:46It was a crazy and absolutely crazy thing which can only be explained from both sides with that special atmosphere in the very last days of the Second World War
46:00The Second World War was, as we all know, the war with the aim of a total devastation of the enemy from both sides
46:04It was a total war of par excellence
46:14For many liners and their crews, war duties were far from over
46:18There were millions of battle-weary troops, POWs and war brides to deliver safely to the four corners of the globe
46:37Without Britain's extraordinary fleet of liners, the outcome of the Second World War may have been markedly different for the Allies
46:48The ability to move great numbers of troops, fast, was an essential ingredient of global war
46:55Airplanes could never do it, so it had to be the liner
47:00The liner did make global war much more practical and possible
47:04At the end of the war, Britain's preeminent shipping line Cunard set about re-establishing its dominance of the North Atlantic
47:23By late 1946, the Queen Elizabeth had been transformed from a war machine to a floating palace
47:29With thousands of passengers aboard, including 50 millionaires, she set out on her first peacetime voyage
47:40With Russia's Mr Molotov aboard, the Queen Elizabeth noses her way into New York's Hudson River
47:58End of a trip that made sea history, and the famous New York skyline sees the world's biggest ship flying a British pennant
48:03The following year, the Queen Mary joined the Queen Elizabeth on their long-awaited twice-weekly service from Southampton to New York
48:17The Queen's were these huge dollar earners
48:28America fell in love with a transatlantic travel, which had been denied throughout the war
48:34Suddenly they had these two splendid ships, fast, big, smart, stylish ships
48:39And Mary and the Elizabeth made a fortune
48:48But on the North Atlantic in the late 1940s, the demand for speed and passenger comfort left little place for liners like the antiquated Aquitania
48:57In 1950, she left Southampton on her final voyage bound for the ship breakers
49:09She'd survived service as a troop ship in two global conflicts
49:13But wouldn't be around for the next war
49:16A war already feared in the minds of military strategists, particularly in America
49:20There was the cloud of possibly World War III lingering in the sky
49:25And would we need a big troop ship?
49:28Because we'd leased the Queen's during the war to carry the GIs
49:31Should we have a troop ship of our own?
49:33So the Truman government said, yes, let's go ahead and build one
49:40America's newest challenge for world supremacy and merchant marine is launched at Newport News
49:45Senator Tom Connolly's wife wielding the bottle of champagne
49:54For their money, the Pentagon insisted on three prime ingredients for the United States
49:59Safety, speed and quick conversion to a military troop ship
50:08Her massive turbines were designed for aircraft carriers
50:10And on paper she was 40% more powerful than the Queen Mary
50:16In July 1952 she set out on her maiden voyage
50:22With the blue ribbon directly in her sights
50:27After clipping ten hours off the Queen Mary's Atlantic crossing record
50:30The United States fastest liner in the world
50:33Proudly approaches Le Havre to make her first docking in Europe
50:35And the French turn out to give a royal welcome to the new Queen of the Atlantic
50:43The United States averaged more than 35 and a half knots
50:47Cutting almost half a day off the sailing time across the Atlantic
50:51For the first time in a hundred years
50:54America had proven itself a serious competitor on the most important sea lane in the world
50:59It was such a phenomenal ship
51:02It was a symbol of Yankee genius at that time
51:05World's safest, world's fastest, one of the world's largest
51:08Convertible to troop ship in a matter of two days
51:11I mean it was a stunning tour de force
51:14A centrepiece of American productivity in that high water period of the 1950s
51:17In the decade following the war competition soared on the North Atlantic
51:30Anyone who was anyone had their favourite ship
51:36And again the lines capitalised on their allegiances as they offered their opinions to newsreel cameras
51:43I just want to tell you that it's been a wonderful trip on this United States
51:49It was a great, great trip
51:51That's a beautiful ship
51:53And I understand the Cunard Line gave it a 21 torpedo salute when it came in today
52:02According to Cunard, getting there was half the fun
52:05And more people than ever could afford to travel just for the sake of it
52:12But despite the optimism of the times, there was trouble ahead for the liners
52:18A new threat was lurking in the skies above
52:21In October 1958, the first commercial jet began a regular transatlantic service to London
52:35Suddenly, the crossing could be measured in hours, not days
52:39Within the year, more people would be flying the Atlantic than sailing
52:55And on some voyages, crews would be outnumbering passengers
53:00Even on the luxurious Queens
53:02Throughout its extraordinary history
53:03The ocean liner had been one of the great symbols of the industrial age
53:15Now, a new age was dawning
53:18And the ocean liner faced possible extinction
53:22But the great race for dominance of the sea was far from over
53:26A new race was about to begin
53:30A new race was about to begin
53:56The world's雲 a new race
53:57A new race was about to begin
53:58A new race was about to begin
54:03The lassitude of the ship
54:05The sky was about to begin
54:07The sailor's ship
54:10And the sea were��고 on the hill
54:13The ocean liner was about to begin
54:16The air-loss and air-loss of a new sheep
54:19The sea is about to begin
54:21The river, the sea is about to begin
54:24Transcription by CastingWords