Assault on Normandy: Gold Beach - Battle for the Beaches

Gold Beach is the story of the highly successful assault by 50th Northumbrian Division and 231 Malta Bde on the central beach of the Allied D day landings. The beach was one of the 2 extra beaches that Montgomery had added to the COSSAC plan and the two veteran formations chosen were highly successful achieving nearly all their objectives despite some hard and bloody fighting. It was on this beach that WO2 Stan Hollis won the only VC of D Day.

Bletchley Park and the Ultra Secret

This film tells the incredible story of Bletchley Park and the Ultra Secret. Filmed at Bletchley in collaboration with the Bletchley Trust and with interviews with Bletchley Veterans the BHTV team explain the importance of Bletchley to the Allied War effort. As Sir Harold Hinsley a Bletchley Veteran and Official Historian of British Intelligence during WW2 said, Ultra shortened the war by two to four year's and that the outcome would have been uncertain without it. The film also shows how the allies used the intelligence on land, sea and air...

Assault on Normandy: Pointe du Hoc

This film tells the story of Col Rudder’s 2nd Ranger Bn and their heroic attack on the gun battery at Pointe du Hoc, which covered both Omaha and Utah beaches. Despite their thorough training scaling techniques that included sectional aluminium commando ladders, rocket grapples and ropes experienced commanders predicted a disaster. In the event bad weather, navigational errors and communications failure meant that less than 200 Rangers were delivered to the foot of the cliffs late and under enemy fire. Small groups of Rangers battled their w...

SAS and the Normandy Campaign: Operation Bulbasket

This programme follows the deployment of the main body of the SAS, the Recces on targets, the raids carried out both by the SAS and the bombing attacks they called in. As the SAS created havoc to the railway system the Germans were hunting them down. Eventually by the use of torture and information by collaborators the Germans tracked them down to their camp near Verrieres. The majority of the SAS were killed or captured. Those captured were later murdered by the Germans.. Their actions tied up large numbers of Germans in guarding the railwa...

Second Ypres 1915: The Great Gas Attack

The Second Battle of Ypres was fought from 21 April–25 May 1915 for control of the strategic Flemish town of Ypres in western Belgium, following the First Battle of Ypres the previous autumn. It marked the first mass use by Germany of poison gas on the Western Front. For the first time a former colonial force (the 1st Canadian Division defeated a European power (the German Empire) on European soil, in the Battles of St. Julien and Kitcheners' Wood. In the now established BHTV style, the BHTV Team join a selection of historians on the groun...

Arnhem: The Battle for the Bridges - Part 1

The Battle of Arnhem, fought in the early autumn of 1944, remains without a doubt the most hotly debated battle of the North West European Campaign, both then and now. From its inception in the sixteen cancelled airborne operations during August, we will chart the problems, many of which were ignored by men desperate to get into battle, the compromises and mistakes that pitched lightly armed and ill equipped paratroopers and glider infantry into an unequal struggle against an SS panzer troops. We follow the eight mile route that 2 Para took ...

Battle of the Bulge: Hitler's Last Gamble

In 1944 Adolf Hitler decided that his only military option " as Defeat was staring Germany in the Eyes" was to carry out a major offensive in the west to split the Allies Western Front by capturing Antwerp. This would he hoped buy time to halt the Russians in the East. this film examines his dilemma and the plan that was produced.

Battle of the Bulge: An Intelligence Failure?

On the 16th December 1944 Hitler launched Operation Wacht am Rhein against the largely unsuspecting American component of the Allied Army. Twenty Divisions consisting of 410000 men, 2600 artillery pieces nad 1400 tanks and assault guns attacked the American 1st Army on a 110 kilometre front. How had this happened ? This film examines why the Allies were not prepared.

Battle of the Bulge: German Field Artillery

in 1944 when the Germans launched their last major offensive of the war they had to compensate for their lack of aircraft, manpower and armour. They did this in the main by the use of surprise and artillery. This film examines the German Field Artillery and how it was used in the The Battle of the Bulge.

Battle of the Bulge: Saint Vith

The Northern most thrust into the wintery Ardennes of General Manteuffel's Fifth Panzer Army fell on the inexperienced 106th US Infantry Division, who had not only just arrived in the Europe but had only been in the line for five days, in what was supposed to be a 'ghost front'. One of the best German infantry divisions, the 18th VG fell on the over extended 106th dug in on the Schnee Eifel, where two US regiments were surrounded and forced to surrender.Major General Jones was unable to stem what became a general retreat but, as in all retr...

Battle of the Bulge: Kampfgruppe Peiper

This film tells the story of one of the most contentious combats of WW2, the actions of Kamfgruppe Peiper during the Battle of the Bulge.From the outset the King Tigers of December 1944, in poor winter weather, could not cut through the forest roads as the smaller Panzers had done in 1940 but were slowed down by determined resistance by small groups of American GIs, Obersturmbannfuhrer Jochan Peiper, commander of the elite spearhead, the Leibstandarte's 1st Panzer Regiment advancing west on one of the Division's three rolbhans became increas...

Operation Market Garden: Arnhem - Battle of the Woods

Jumping in to Drop Zones eight to ten miles from Arnhem on the second day of Operation Market Garden was always going to be difficult for Brigadier “Shan” Hackett's 4th British Parachute Brigade. With little information on how 1 Para Brigade's battle went the day before or what faced them on the ground the stage was set for an epic battle. John Waddy, v company commander in 156 Para Battalion and a team of Arnhem experts cover the ground where 4 Para Brigade fought with 9 SS Pz Div in the woods to the west of Arnhem in what was to be an un...

Assault on Normandy: Sword Beach

The 3rd Division was in the van of the D Day assault force. Their task was to break through Hitler's Atlantic Wall on a stretch of Normandy beach codenamed SWORD. Once ashore their problems were only just beginning! Montgomery had tasked the Division with the capture of Caen but the Germans were deployed in greater depth and strength than the Allies assumed. Rommel had deployed 21st Panzer Division into positions immediately behind the invasion area. With bitter fighting in the villages and open ridges around Caen the two sides fought a desp...

12th Hitlerjugend Panzer Division

The most implacable opponents of the British and Canadians fighting in Normandy were the largely teenage soldiers of the Hitlerjugend. From D+1 through to attacking back into the Falaise Pocket, this unique division constantly thwarted Montgomery's plans and exacted a terrible price on the Allies for every mile gained. Formed from 'volunteers' from the Hitler Youth Movement in the aftermath of Stalingrad, this division of boys, aged 17 on recruitment into the SS, came of age and were declared fully operational just before D Day. Coming from ...

The Viking Invasion of Wessex 878 AD

The Viking Invasion of Wessex 878 AD is the second DVD in this sensational new series, The Dark Ages, which delves into a war-torn and obscure period of Britain's past to focus on some of the pivotal events that completely altered the history, culture and politics of the British Isles. In the year 878 AD, Alfred King of Wessex faced the fourth and most serious attempt by the devious Viking chieftain Guthrum to seize the last remaining Saxon kingdom. Thwarted in their conventional attempts in 871, 876 and 878, the Vikings, stole away from th...

100 Years War: Agincourt 1415

In 1415 a small English Army consisting mainly of Yeoman English and Welsh archers defeated and destroyed a much larger French army consisting mainly of the nobility of France at Agincourt. This film follows Henry Vth's campaign from his landing near Harfleur, his costly successful siege and his desperate attempts to cross the River Somme and escape to Calais culminating in the Battle of Agincourt on 25th Oct 1415. The BHTV team of military historians take you through the battle separating myth from fact to tell the true story of one of the ...

The Charge That Saved the Empire: Geluveldt 1914

On the 31st Oct 1914 the Germans were on the cusp of victory at Ypres. troops of the German 30th and 54th Divisions had broken the line at Geluveldt to the east of Ypres.The German troops were fired with enthusiasm as the Kaiser was said to be watching their action. If they succeeded the way to Ypres and even the coast was open, the BEF would be destroyed. This is the story of the last British reserve the 2nd Worcesters who were ordered to counter attack and drive the Germans out of Geluveld. Their attack was a success and was described by ...

The Germans in Normandy: 6th Fallschirmjaeger

The German paratroopers established a reputation in Crete as an elite force. A battalion commander now led a new Fallschirmjäger regiment, deployed to Normandy in the spring of 1944 to the very area where the US Paratroopers were to drop on D Day. This DVD will tell the story of this regiment, one that was more like a pocket division than a regiment, and its six day battle around the base of the Cotentin Peninsula to prevent the effective link up between Omaha and Utah Beaches.Using the established and popular style of expert interviews, pie...

Battle of the Bulge: Panzer Marche - The Dash for Bastogne

In this programe we examine the background to the campaign with a leading American historian before following the advance of one of Hitler's most successful panzer commanders, Hasso von Manteuffel, Fifth Panzer Army. We will travel in wintery conditions from the German border into the lightly held US front line. From the outset small groups of GIs did their best to delay the advance of the panzers, buying time for the vital crossroad town of Bastogne to be reinforced by 101st US Airborne Division. Under the cloak of bad weather, the Germans ...

Mons 1914

On the 22nd of August 1914 the recently deployed BEF fought and delayed the German First Army of Von Kluck in around the industrial coal mining town of Mons. After 2 days of hard fighting the 3rd and 5th Division of II Corps, assisted by the Cavalry division, having borne the brunt of the battle withdrew South West in the direction of Paris. Whilst this battle was in reality a minor Corps action, when taken in the context of the Great War, it showed that the British regular soldier was more than a match for the German army when he was prope...