D-Day Invasion filmed from the German lines by an American Spy. Incredible Story.

[OutHouse]

I like Brad Metzler show "Lost History" He has one about this guy named George Ruud Hjorth. His stage name was George Ernest and was in 60 films including "Our Gang" with Spanky, Alfalfa, Buckwheat...


here is a quick over view. the video will go into more detail.

He leaves the Little Rascals and gets interested in camera work and was working the back lots of Hollywood doing camera work. WWII breaks out and he was going to join the Army. But John Ford knows about George and ask him to join a new unit super secret film crew that is part of the OSS which is now the CIA. so he does and is in the Navy.

He goes on many dangerous missions like parachuting into Nazi occupied France and photographs shit in Paris for the OSS.

Then one day the OSS pulls him aside and tell him they have a very secret mission for him that is of a very special event. he says yes and jumps into France again and is picked up by the French resistance and they hide him for a couple of day and tell him nothing. he still has NO IDEA wtf he is suppose to be filming when the Frenchies come get him and take him to the coast on a sand berm and leave him. its dark, still not knowing wtf is going on until the sun starts coming up.

then he sees thousand of ships, planes of the most massive invasion force ever in the history of the planet come out of the fog. now he knows what the special event was.

he films 7 reels of film for about 2 solid hours of the beginning of the invasion from the German side.... Most likely in color

once shit settles down he walks to our guys without getting shot and hitches a ride back to London with the film. He is in a room to view his footage and some jackass boots him out because it was classified. He tells the jackass that he was the one who filmed it but the jackass still booted him out.

those 7 reels of film are now lost. such a shame. makes me sick that such important footage of one of the most historical moment in history is lost. but not only his footage but all the other hundreds of reels of film that were shot by other cameramen that were either destroyed by being dropped in the water while being loaded on a boat or like Georges film, filed away and forgotten.


http://www.history.com/shows/brad-meltzers-lost-history/videos/d-day-footage

 

[Proprioceptive]

Wow... I would absolutely LOVE to see this footage.

 

[John Connor]

Damn! I thought I'd get a chance to see what it looked like from enemy lines. That just sucks!

 

[SKORPI0]

Watching a rerun at H2 right now. It was mentioned that most of the action was filmed in color during WWII, but developed/printed in B&W since it was cheaper. ^_^
7 reels filmed by him during D-Day gone.

 

[BUTCH1]

Wow... I would absolutely LOVE to see this footage.

Probably pretty grim as the Germans had 4 years to fortify the French coast against invasion, the 1st waves in had to have taken high casualties. I thought I read somewhere that we pummeled the coast with destroyers for a few hours before the landing and bombed the fortifications as well.

 

[kage69]

Cool story, love these. When I think of a photographer with a brass pair that took incredible pictures, Rob Capa immediately comes to mind. He went ashore at Omaha with the first wave, advanced into incredible fire to take shots of our troops coming ashore.

He makes it out not just alive but intact. He took more than 100 exposures, but later some ass in the lab destroys all but a handful in an accident.

Some bullshit right there. Same for dropping rolls of film into The Channel, how did crap like that happen to both the US and the Brits? The AV guys just really sucked back then I guess.

 

[Jon Garman]

I have a friend that lives in Devon England, who has been searching for George Hjorth's lost D-Day film footage for quite some time. He and I became acquainted after I ran across a forum that he posted to while researching LCI(L)'s for my book. He listed a short film that I viewed of LCI(L) 88 landing troops on the beach at H+15. The showing of the film slate clearly states that it was H+15. The problem with that, is that no LCI's landed until H+60. I could immediately tell, by looking at the foreground terrain, that the LCI was landing just east of Wn64, almost directly in between Wn64 and Wn62 to the east and out of the picture. Bullets from Wn62 can be seen in the film zipping the water and coming in from the east... Which correlates to the fact that the only mg42 (Heinrich Severloh's gun) at Wn62, the only mg that could reach the LCI from that distance, was doing the shooting. In Severloh's biography, he states that he was shooting at an LCI off to his left during the opening moments of the invasion... Interesting. During emails, my friend stated that his father, and now he, himself, had been looking for lost film footage shot by Ford's film crew. He thought that the LCI in his own footage might have been picking up the photographer and the film. Interestingly enough, my friend lives in Devon, where his father had also lived during the war. Devon just happens to be the place where Ford's film crew and the OSS were headquartered. It also happens to be the place where Hjorth's film footage was shown to VIP brass... The same film footage George was not allowed to view. During emails, I told my friend about the History Channel actively looking for the lost D-Day footage of Hjorth's. He then told me that the derelict base (WWII OSS Headquarters) was going to be demolished for new building, and that he knew where 60 reels of old film were located in a warehouse on that base. He didn't have the resources to acquire them, so I came up with the idea of contacting Brad Meltzer's lost history in hopes that they would perhaps fund and follow this possible lead. Unfortunately, they never contacted me... Perhaps they found the film (They state that it's in archives in Washington D.C.)... We think it never left England. Or perhaps they have given up the search... Too bad, cause I would give my left "You know what" just to view that extraordinary priceless film footage.

 

[kranky]

Interesting first post and welcome to AnandTech.

 

[twinrider1]

And THAT is why I put up with all the troll and mental defect thread makers in ATOT. Once in a while there is an absolute gem. Such a cool thread Outhouse and just an amazing post Jon Garman.

 

[CraKaJaX]

Wow, that would be so cool to see. The intro of Saving Private Ryan is one of my favorites. It'd be amazing to see the real deal. I can't even imagine what those guys were feeling like...

Edit: just realized the necro, but I enjoyed the read anyway....

 

[Auric]

Probably pretty grim as the Germans had 4 years to fortify the French coast against invasion, the 1st waves in had to have taken high casualties. I thought I read somewhere that we pummeled the coast with destroyers for a few hours before the landing and bombed the fortifications as well.

Sure they had four, but it was more like two or less before serious effort. Of course naval, air, airborne, and special forces began the invasion. The amphibious landings were weakly opposed due to various factors including the attacker's total naval and air superiority, plus defender's lack of resources and thus strategy to counter after landing rather than prevent it. Frontline troops consisted largely of young, elderly, infirm, and international conscripts (i.e. not commited volunteers such as SS).

Fun facts: defense of four of the five beaches held for only about an hour, and airborne casualties accounted for about half the attacker's total.

 

[DigDog]

Return of the Wall of Text

you want to see that footage? watch Saving private Ryan.

 

[Auric]

Saving Private Ryan lacks a sense of the true scale and does not present the defenders' view of what must have been an awesome and fearful sight.

Documentary footage at least provides an idea of scale from the attackers' view.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifKrJAYTRyI
https://youtu.be/rr-cekyZN04?t=100

 

[Auric]

Another fun fact: French civilians suffered the highest casualties, with 15000 killed by preparatory bombings and another 20000 in the battle for Normandy.

 

[z1ggy]

WWII- an amazing yet horrific and devastating world event.

Marked for later.

 

[CraKaJaX]

WWII- an amazing yet horrific and devastating world event.

Marked for later.

One of the coolest museums I've been to is the WW2 museum in New Orleans. Interesting, creepy, cool, weird... all in one. If you ever get the chance to go, I highly recommend it.

Note: I was slightly buzzed as this was the week of Mardi Gras and also my birthday. :thumbsup:

 

[Jon Garman]

Another fun fact: French civilians suffered the highest casualties, with 15000 killed by preparatory bombings and another 20000 in the battle for Normandy.

Auric, you forgot to mention the 75,000 civilians of Caen who lost their lives during the fighting for Normandy...

 

[OutHouse]

Auric, you forgot to mention the 75,000 civilians of Caen who lost their lives during the fighting for Normandy...

Thanks for your 2 post in my thread and the necro bump.

My uncle (by marriage) landed on Utah. he talked about it 1 time to my dad when i was around 8 or 9 years old. that was the only time i heard him talk about the war. he retired as a 1st sgt.

 

[OutHouse]

Saving Private Ryan lacks a sense of the true scale and does not present the defenders' view of what must have been an awesome and fearful sight.

Documentary footage at least provides an idea of scale from the attackers' view.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifKrJAYTRyI
https://youtu.be/rr-cekyZN04?t=100

damn geoblocking!!!

 

[Jon Garman]

you want to see that footage? watch Saving private Ryan.

Digdog, Saving Private Ryan gave you somewhat of a good idea of what is was like on the morning of the 6th... they could have done better. But that's Hollywood. If I was an advisor on the set, I would have insisted that the casemates be made to look like the ones that were actually there that day, and not a replica of something from, say, the Pas-de-Calais. I would have demanded that they have some sort of cgi fleet in the back ground as the 2nd Rangers made their way to shore. And I would have begged them to have the Hembalkin obstacles on the beach at least face the right direction. Why I'm so interested in Hjorth's footage, is because of the film having somewhat of a point of view from the German side. In my fictional novel, one of my main characters is a German gefrieter stationed at Wn62. Doing my research - some of it on site - I wanted the point of view of the German soldier to be as realistic as possible. Translated biographies of soldiers stationed at Wn62 helped tremendously. To see footage never released, film that would give you some idea of what it was like from the defenders side, is something that would interest me a great deal. Finding Hjorth's lost footage would be an incredible historical find... a find that would be worth viewing no matter what point of view a person is interested in. While Saving Private Ryan is nice, there's nothing quite like the real deal...

 

[Ruptga]

I'm not questioning the value of what you have to contribute but, dude, PARAGRAPHING. Seriously.

 

[John Connor]

damn geoblocking!!!

I used my VPN to watch the videos. These are just WWII in color snips. You more than likely seen this on The Military Channel (AHC) The first video is meh. Second one is a little better showing more of the beaches, etc.



Why fuck headed YouTube doesn't allow you to view in the U.S is stupid as all hell! Especially when this was our soilders and these archives should be free for all! to see. Then Chrome won't allow you to download videos from YouTube since Google owns the whole damn thing. Filthy bastards.

PM sent.

 

[Jon Garman]

I like Brad Metzler show "Lost History" He has one about this guy named George Ruud Hjorth. His stage name was George Ernest and was in 60 films including "Our Gang" with Spanky, Alfalfa, Buckwheat...


here is a quick over view. the video will go into more detail.

He leaves the Little Rascals and gets interested in camera work and was working the back lots of Hollywood doing camera work. WWII breaks out and he was going to join the Army. But John Ford knows about George and ask him to join a new unit super secret film crew that is part of the OSS which is now the CIA. so he does and is in the Navy.

He goes on many dangerous missions like parachuting into Nazi occupied France and photographs shit in Paris for the OSS.

Then one day the OSS pulls him aside and tell him they have a very secret mission for him that is of a very special event. he says yes and jumps into France again and is picked up by the French resistance and they hide him for a couple of day and tell him nothing. he still has NO IDEA wtf he is suppose to be filming when the Frenchies come get him and take him to the coast on a sand berm and leave him. its dark, still not knowing wtf is going on until the sun starts coming up.

then he sees thousand of ships, planes of the most massive invasion force ever in the history of the planet come out of the fog. now he knows what the special event was.

he films 7 reels of film for about 2 solid hours of the beginning of the invasion from the German side.... Most likely in color

once shit settles down he walks to our guys without getting shot and hitches a ride back to London with the film. He is in a room to view his footage and some jackass boots him out because it was classified. He tells the jackass that he was the one who filmed it but the jackass still booted him out.

those 7 reels of film are now lost. such a shame. makes me sick that such important footage of one of the most historical moment in history is lost. but not only his footage but all the other hundreds of reels of film that were shot by other cameramen that were either destroyed by being dropped in the water while being loaded on a boat or like Georges film, filed away and forgotten.


http://www.history.com/shows/brad-meltzers-lost-history/videos/d-day-footage

Outhouse, won't let me send you a message, as I haven't had 25 posts yet. To answer your question, I live in Frederick, just a little southeast of Longmont. I also do quite a bit of work in Boulder...

 

[John Connor]

Lots of oil rigs in the Frederick, Dacono area. I live near Fort Collins.

 

[OutHouse]

Outhouse, won't let me send you a message, as I haven't had 25 posts yet. To answer your question, I live in Frederick, just a little southeast of Longmont. I also do quite a bit of work in Boulder...

sweet! I travel to Boulder everyday on 52 and a friend of mine bought a house in Frederick last year. Had to crash at his house during the last blizzard due to 52 being closed at the 7-11 in dacono.