War Horse

[Pat Holscher]

I'd be curious if any of our British viewers have any comments on the films depiction of pre war rural Britain.

[unclearthur]

Hi Sandy,
I really am not well posted on horse prices in either 1914 or now - perhaps John M. can help out.
The sum I showed was a conversion of Pat's 1914 £30.00 using the referenced site comparison/inflation calculator.

Was £30.00 a large sum for a horse in 1914?
It would certainly have been a major investment for a farm labourer, whose average pay for the period Jan 1914 - Dec 1914 is quoted as £0/16/9 for a 58 hour week at this site:
http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~alan/fam ... .html#1850

In 1813 the Duke of Wellington suggested in a letter 'would there be anything unreasonably extravagant in giving £40 or 40 guineas for five or six year old horses or mares for the regiments on service, and £45 or 45 guineas for horses for the artillery abroad?'

Handn't they heard about inflation in those days?

http://cavalrytales.wordpress.com

[Sam Cox]

Well i finally went to the flicks

It was a massive let down,Spielberg gave it the Indy 4 treatment.

[John M Φ]

On the uniform details of the film, I have a question for our knowledgeable British participants. In the practice charge taking place in the UK in 1914, the cavalrymen turn out in a blue uniform. They were earlier shown wearing their "khaki" uniform, so we presume they're turned out in a dress or semi dress uniform. Anyhow, what was the blue uniform?

There's a reference in the 1914 cavalry action dialog to a separate action by the "Royals". I've sometimes heard of the "Blues and the Royals". Is the unit depicted the "Blues" and what does that mean?

Am not very knowledgeable concerning uniforms so, like Pat, I wonder if anyone can identify the British cavalry regiment in which Joey commenced his wartime adventures. Presumably a Yeomanry regiment?.

[Steve]

I agree with Sam. The play was much better. Perhaps my expectations were to high.

[Jim Bewley]

I have not sen the movie, but a friend told me today that several people had told them, that the tack was wrong and the bits used were not around in WWI. I had heard, here and other places, that the tack was spot on, so I wanted to confirm this before I responded to them.

Jim

[John M Φ]

Jim, I watched the film once and was not aware of any errors. I can only comment re the British equipment. I intend to watch it again and also pause it now and again to look more carefully at the tack and bits. My first impression was that the bits looked correct.
I would be interested as to which British regiment was portrayed as, at this time, the official saddle for officers was the MKIV....introduced in 1903. But the officers chargers were fitted with the Yeomanry type saddle...without the front burrs to the sideboards. So the Regiment was possibly a Yeomanry regiment, though I do not think a Devonshire one, although the early setting for the film appeared to be rural Devon.
John.M.

[Pat Holscher]

Here's a blog that has posted some stills (I don't know anything about the blog):

http://www.anutinanutshell.com/2011/12/ ... se-review/

You can get a sense of the depiction of the British tack there, including a mounted charge scene. I'm not an expert on British tack by any means, but it appears generally correct to me. Note the reversible Portsmouth bits.

One thing I would note in watching it is that getting tack details as you watch it, particularly in regards to bits, is more difficult than you'd suppose. It's much more difficult than picking out the tack details in the John Ford movies. This doesn't indicate any errors, but just that a lot is going on and World War One tack is sort of busy, as even these stills show. In watching the film, I can't say that I ever got a really good look at the German tack, but of course I'm not an expert on German tack either. And a person would have to know something about German harness tack to really opine on that, which I do not.

Having said all of that, the British tack looked right to me. No error in German tack leaped out at me. The horse powered farming equipment early in the film looked correct to me also.

[Jim Bewley]

Thank you gentlemen.

Jim

[hbtoday98]

Well I thought that the British tack should been Londen tan,russett .Artilery trace being used pre ww1 unlikely to pull the pough and fences that look western that would not keep sheep in or out, not what I would thought for devon or France.Indan troops scouting in boer war uniform interesting. German guns being pulled with British artitery harness.Germans with 1928 model A truck when the girl rides over the hill.I could wrong as I have one viewing but its a good story cheers mal

[unclearthur]

Hi Sandy,
I really am not well posted on horse prices in either 1914 or now - perhaps John M. can help out.
The sum I showed was a conversion of Pat's 1914 £30.00 using the referenced site comparison/inflation calculator.

Was £30.00 a large sum for a horse in 1914?
It would certainly have been a major investment for a farm labourer, whose average pay for the period Jan 1914 - Dec 1914 is quoted as £0/16/9 for a 58 hour week at this site:
http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~alan/fam ... .html#1850

In 1813 the Duke of Wellington suggested in a letter 'would there be anything unreasonably extravagant in giving £40 or 40 guineas for five or six year old horses or mares for the regiments on service, and £45 or 45 guineas for horses for the artillery abroad?'

Handn't they heard about inflation in those days?

http://cavalrytales.wordpress.com

Off the point a bit, but on the subject of prices/inflation I recently came aross my grandfather's WW1 pay book (1915) for the Duke of Cornwall's Light Infantry. Privates were paid 1 shilling per day with 6d deducted for keep etc, making a grand total take-home of 3s 6d a week (that's 17.5p in today's sterling or USD 0.58). Strange thing is, the rate of pay for a redcoat in 1800 is given as...1 shilling per day before deductions.

[Pat Holscher]

Well I thought that the British tack should been Londen tan,russett .Artilery trace being used pre ww1 unlikely to pull the pough and fences that look western that would not keep sheep in or out, not what I would thought for devon or France.Indan troops scouting in boer war uniform interesting. German guns being pulled with British artitery harness.Germans with 1928 model A truck when the girl rides over the hill.I could wrong as I have one viewing but its a good story cheers mal

The British saddles are russet, but at least from the photos, some of the other tack appears black. But I'll defer. And in film snippets this can be difficult, as oiled russet tack can appear to be black.

Is that an artillery trace in the plough scene? Again, I'll defer, and I'm not an expert in ploughing harnesses, but that didn't leap out at me at all. Indeed, I'm not sure that's correct, but then I'd probably have to freeze the frame of that depiction in order to be able to really tell much about it.

The fences comport with photographs that I've seen of rural England and Scotland in the same period. They're sometimes a shock to the eye for that reason. Again, I'm not an expert on the British countryside, and indeed I've never seen it, but fence wise that didn't strike me as off.

Nor did the Indian uniforms, but again I'll defer to those who actually know something about British and Indian uniforms. That scene is quite early in the war, and I'm not sure that isn't accurately depicted.

On the German items, as well as British artillery tack, I'm not knowledgeable enough to comment, so I won't. Maybe if Gordon M or Joe P stops buy they can fill us in on the truck, if they've seen the film.

[Gordon_M]

Afternoon all,

I've not seen the film, but I expect the transport was as accurate as the horse stuff.

If you wan't some idea of how much money they spent on the tank copy, which apparently appears only for moments, have a look at the video;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFbYTYt6Ok8

Gordon

[Jim Bewley]

That was amazing. It must have been done correctly for them to buy it, so everything else had to be as correct as possible. Well done.

Jim

[hbtoday98]

Well I thought that the British tack should been Londen tan,russett .Artilery trace being used pre ww1 unlikely to pull the pough and fences that look western that would not keep sheep in or out, not what I would thought for devon or France.Indan troops scouting in boer war uniform interesting. German guns being pulled with British artitery harness.Germans with 1928 model A truck when the girl rides over the hill.I could wrong as I have one viewing but its a good story cheers mal

The British saddles are russet, but at least from the photos, some of the other tack appears black. But I'll defer. And in film snippets this can be difficult, as oiled russet tack can appear to be black.

Is that an artillery trace in the plough scene? Again, I'll defer, and I'm not an expert in ploughing harnesses, but that didn't leap out at me at all. Indeed, I'm not sure that's correct, but then I'd probably have to freeze the frame of that depiction in order to be able to really tell much about it.

The fences comport with photographs that I've seen of rural England and Scotland in the same period. They're sometimes a shock to the eye for that reason. Again, I'm not an expert on the British countryside, and indeed I've never seen it, but fence wise that didn't strike me as off.

Nor did the Indian uniforms, but again I'll defer to those who actually know something about British and Indian uniforms. That scene is quite early in the war, and I'm not sure that isn't accurately depicted.

On the German items, as well as British artillery tack, I'm not knowledgeable enough to comment, so I won't. Maybe if Gordon M or Joe P stops buy they can fill us in on the truck, if they've seen the film.

[hbtoday98]

The ww1harness 1916 date stamped that I have was use to 1931 and sold off 1966 it all is all russet as it was stored cleaned and smeared with mutton fat.

[Pat Holscher]

Interesting harness examples. I'll post a cross post over on the general forum so we can get some additional tack comments.

[Trooper]

The author interviewed:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2012/jan ... -spielberg

[Joseph Sullivan]

Our family saw the film last night and everyone, including me, enjoyed it thoroughly. As did others on this thread, I found it realistic without being just overwhelmingly awful. My wife (an avid horsewoman) and I had a chuckle about the training scenes which were obviously written for people who don't actually train and work with horses -- but there was nothing objectionable about that. As one who has seen very bad wire cuts up close and for real, I was actually relieved that they were downplayed in the film. Flayed muscle hanging off of legs would not make good entertainment, even in a war movie.

Overall, a good movie with just enough depth, sensitively if somewhat romantically played out.

Go see it.

[Brian P.]

The author interviewed:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2012/jan ... -spielberg

A good article. I love the story of the stuttering boy talking to the horse.