8 Minutes

Released: April 28 1941

Sponsor: Ministry of Information

Production: Crown Film Unit

Commentary by: Sir Laurence Olivier

Words for Battle evocatively sets to film passages of quotation from poetry and prose including works by: Milton, Blake, Browning and Kipling. The famous “we shall never surrender'' speech by Winston Churchill and Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address are also quoted in the Film. It powerfully associates these passages and music by Handel and Beethoven with images of everyday life in Britain at war.

The Crown Film Unit file held in the National Archives: TNA: INF 6/338 synopsis reads: ….“A call to arms through images and words of Britain's countryside, people and poets”.