Australian
Screen

Clip description

A family sits around the breakfast table after son Ted has finished his night shift at the munitions factory. His mother tells him how proud she is of both her sons – one in the armed forces fighting overseas on the frontline, the other working in the factory to make weapons – and that they both form a 'great partnership, an unbreakable one’. The youngest child, Topsy, listens wide-eyed in silence, with food on her face. Over a montage of Australian scenes, the mother talks about her and her husband passing on to their children the Australian heritage of freedom and liberty. Men continue to labour in the factories as the voice-over commentary praises their efforts in producing the weapons wielded by Australian troops overseas.

Curator’s notes

The dramatised sequence at home places the factory workers in the context of their family relationships and national pride. The film featured non-professionals, many of whom were employed in munitions plants. Soldiers Without Uniforms positions the work done on the home front in the factories as being as important as that of the soldiers fighting overseas. The voice-over reinforces this vital partnership between workers and troops in protecting the nation’s sovereignty and connecting father with son, brother with brother, and soldier with mate.