Section VII: The 'Real' British Resistance in WWII

Section VII: The 'Real' British Resistance in WWII
With Andy Chatterton
Home Front and Civilian content on WW2TV
• The Home Front
You might want to skip to 4 minutes in as we had audio/connection issues at the beginning • Section VII: The 'Real...
Today we discuss the little-known, highly secret, pre-prepared post-occupation civilian force - Section VII - The 'Real' British Resistance! There will be stories of women trained in unarmed combat, resistance newspapers, teenage assassins and even the Womens' Institute.
Andrew Chatterton is a Second World War historian and Public Relations professional. His role as Press Officer for the Coleshill Auxiliary Research Team (CART) www.staybehinds... led to his fascination with the secret layers of defence in place in case of an attempted German invasion during the Second World War. CART maintains the British Resistance Archive where the story of some of the civilian volunteers is kept, providing public recognition of the significant role they would have played in the event of an invasion.
/ staybehinds
Britain's Secret Defences: Civilian Saboteurs, Spies and Assassins During the Second World War by
Andrew Chatterton
UK uk.bookshop.or...
USA bookshop.org/a...
Andy's first appearance on WW2TV back in the early days of the channel
• Churchill's Secret Arm...
You can become a KZbin Member and support us here / @ww2tv
You can become a Patron here / ww2tv
Please click subscribe for updates
Social Media links -
/ ww2tv
/ ww2tv
/ ww2tv
WW2TV Bookshop - where you can purchase copies of books featured in my KZbin shows. Any book listed here comes with the personal recommendation of Paul Woodadge, the host of WW2TV. For full disclosure, if you do buy a book through a link from this page WW2TV will earn a commission.
UK - uk.bookshop.or...
USA - bookshop.org/s...

[@davidlavigne207]

I learned from viewing this charming discussion, that I would definitely not wanted to have been a German occupier after a potential defeat (which was a serious possibility) of England in say 1940. One only needs to look at the history of Britain and what took place going back to the Roman occupation, the Viking occupation, the various attempts by France to invade to see that it would have been a deadly serious, and hazardous job for the Germans. That this planning was taking place and actual training being conducted by the British people is revealing of the character of a proud and patriotic population. "There will always be an England" was no mere sentiment, but a rallying cry. Just think of what violence can happen at the average football match, and that's just sport!! I hope that more information will come forth from this first excellent WW2TV foray. Well done!

[@1089maul]

Woody/Andy. Thanks for such an interesting presentation. I knew nothing of Section 7 and have learnt so much tonight. I will look for your previous presentation! Thanks. Bob

[@KevinJones-yh2jb]

I thoroughly enjoyed tonight’s presentation by Andrew, and all his hard work in trying to uncover this subject. For me a subject I had heard a little about. I will rewatch it again, I missed the first 5 to 10 minutes.However I had no idea the extent of the resistance networks and how this seems to be a somewhat classified subject today. Thanks Paul and Andrew for bringing this to WW2TV, yet again WW2TV at its best

[@alistairclarke6726]

I'm a serial re-watcher :)

[@MbSaidSo]

"Gentler sex" my arse! I loved every minute of this discussion today. Fascinating stuff!

[@loreleikomm5802]

absolutely fascinating and compelling show. love the pots and pan salesman getting the boot from a young and seemingly harmless housewife. what a great visual!

[@scottgrimwood8868]

What an amazing presentation. I was blown away to hear about the detailed preparation for what publicly was unthinkable, the Nazi occupation of the UK (excluding the Channel Islands). I loved the story of the housewife tossing the pot salesman! Thank you, Andrew for doing all this ground breaking research.

[@loreleikomm5802]

me, too, my fav part!

[@thomasrotweiler]

When I hear the words "stay-behind" forces I think of Operation Gladio (the name is specifically about Italy, but is often used to cover stay -behind units across Europe) that would be activated in the event of Soviet invasion post-1945. It seems axiomatic that in the UK, many of the people who would be used (and indeed their hidden bunkers etc) would be those who had been involved with similar activities in WW2. As time went by and people got older I suspect that younger people didn't get recruited and so they fizzled out. Anyways I knew nothing about Section VII, so I'm off to buy a copy of Andy's book - it looks a must read.

[@stuartbuxton4316]

Awesome show. Many years ago I got talking to a chap who said Germans would not have over run Britain " as Hitler could not defeat the mason's "! He gave a cheeky wink and this came during a conversation about the auxiliary. Fascinating show, can't wait for a future update as info comes out!

[@martymantell9633]

What an incredible story! Very enjoyable discussion. And thanks for the drinkies Andy.....

[@patm8622]

Stunning, absolutely stunning. This is a fascinating presentation which delves into a rarely dealt with subject, Britidh resistance irfs, abd a part of same i was unaware of. Its a subject that will have to be revisited again and again, (multiple bookings for new shows required @WW2TV :-) ! )as Author and historian Andy Chatterton finds more and more information as his research continues. As it is, this is a must watch if you are interested in what was going on in the UK as they faced the very real prospect of a German invasion. Watch it, you won't regret it !!

[@mdog111]

What an absolutely fascinating presentation!Thanks very much. Definitely one of your best ever in my opinion.

[@rsz7607]

Thanks for the amazing insights of Section Vll and all its activities. Looking forward to hearing about new stories on this WW2 podcasts.

[@christopherridle7670]

Paul & Andrew. Thank you for the presentation. Everyone really enjoyed it. Remember to be polite to the government folks when they come to, "Have a chat" with you. It goes a long way.

[@jaycrew1409]

Wow great show , to think theres a whole story out there 🫣 looking forward to finding out more 👍👍

[@TheVigilant109]

Fantastic presentation. Thank you. I'd love to hear more from Andrew when he gets more information

[@WW2TV]

Will do!

[@nigeh5326]

Possibly the MI5 officers who ‘cleaned’ the gentleman’s home in the nineties were doing so in order to keep public knowledge of these WW2 operations out of the public eye because at the time there were people trained to conduct similar operations, but against any Soviet/Russian invasion that may occur. We know during the Cold War there were units in other NATO countries so no doubt we had them in Britain too. Lol as I am typing this you mentioned post WW2 continuation of units into the Cold War. Fascinating stuff thanks Paul and Andy

[@michaelmulligan0]

Wonder if the reason it was kept secret in modern times was a similar Cold War organisation….. there was on the Continent

[@FilipDePreter]

A very enjoyable presentation. One can only wonder how many documents were destroyed after the war as a result of the secret nature of section VII.

[@alancranford3398]

Thank you for this presentation. My information, based on rumor and gossip and wild guesswork, was that World War Two didn't start for Britain with declaration of war in September 1939 nor did it end with VJ Day in 1945. I wonder if the publication of "The Last Ditch," that 1968 book by David Lampe, wasn't deliberate diversion from the possibility that the organizations behind the Home Guard Auxilliary Units were still active because of the danger of invasion by the USSR. There are indications that as late as the dissolution of the USSR some sort of organization controlling "stay behind" units was operating. As early as 1938 British agents were attempting to establish spy and sabotage networks inside Nazi Germany and had arraigned escape of a few scientists from Germany. Networks in the Middle East were being established before Italy attempted to eject the British from North Africa--and were a factor in the success of the Long Range Desert Group. Section VII is probably just another small piece of the puzzle.

[@philbosworth3789]

A great presentation from Andy, covering a topic that you don't hear too much about. Thankfully we didn't need these guys. Great show & topic again Woody @WW3TV

[@buonafortuna8928]

Paul I'm starting to sigh now at the end of these - "Oh, another book to buy" - still Christmas is around the corner and it beats socks. Another great one Paul

[@jonathanmarsh5955]

I did think I had a reasonably good grasp - local museum job, local contacts and early read of The Last Ditch! - of this area! This has blown me away, in best possible meaning! I suppose that some applied thought would, maybe, have picked up on the possibility, if not probability, of this extra layer of secret recruitment but I must admit that I hadn't done so. Top marks!

[@hazchemel]

Amazing, thank you. I'd never before considered my grandfather's childhood including secret sniper training, nor my teenage future grandmother role playing the use of a garotte. I'm keeping a wary eye on our old cat now, in case he should turn around with: "You know I'm not just your three legged house pet ..."

[@jeffbraaton4096]

This was one of the most intriguing presentations I've seen on WW2TV, so many layers, as an American it reminds me of all the spy novels I've read over the years. From the sidebar conversations I got the sense that some folks knew of people who were maybe involved in something like Section VII but didn't know the details. It would be wild to be in Andy's situation and have folks bring him these stories, they seem crazy, but they are verified by somebody else story. Who ordered the formation of Section VII, how was it funded? So many questions. There's a movie/TV series here. It would be so much fun to trip around the UK and visit these sites. Thank you Andy and Paul, I look forward to the next Section VII stories.

[@WW2TV]

Yes, its really exciting to watch Andy's research develop. There's a really cool story hidden there somewhere

[@Pam_N]

A thoroughly "Wow!" show. Wonderfully revelatory.

[@CFarnwide]

Having family who are military I had to laugh at the “scary NCO” part… I mean… what NCO isn’t scary?!

[@Schmittyapolis]

First slide should read "LtoR..."

[@curtiswebb8135]

Sorry I'm late....Perfect example of your work. World class. Thank you from Redding California.

[@WW2TV]

Thanks for watching!

[@jollyjohnzz]

Brilliant film about this called Resistance . Filmed in the next valley to where I grew up on the Welsh borders .

[@jonb3311]

A book "The Quiet Operator" by John Simpson, who writes about Len Wilmott, a radio operator. He was undercover in Europe at the beginning of the war. He was trained in the UK, originally by the army, but moved to MI6. I'm surprised by the use of fixed radio transmitters. The Germans had excellent RDF during the war. They would also cut off power supplies to areas where they believed a transmitter was operating. They caught many radio operators by shutting power down to street level. Having a back window escape route isn't going to be of much use when a 100 troops are surrounding a street. Leo Marks, in his book "Between Silk and Cyanide" tells how basic and easily broken the codes being use by SOE at the beginning of the war. The codes came from MI6. I don't believe Section 7 would have lasted very long after any invasion. That the young runner mentioned knew the identity of the 2 women radio operators shows how easily any 'section' could be broken by the capture of one of it's members.

[@andychatterton9715]

Hi Jon. The fixed transmitters were for Special Duties Branch only. They were only expected to be operating during the invasion period and had a life expectancy of two weeks. - hence there was no need to give them the means to escape and fixed transmitters gave them the best chance of getting timely accurate information to GHQ before too much had changed on the ground. The window escape for Section VII might well have been for morale purposes than anything else (rather like the escape tunnels of the Auxiliary Units Operational Bases). It’s very hard to see how long Section VII would have lasted - as we mentioned in the chat ‘success’ for this group is much harder to gauge (certainly compared to the civilian anti-invasion groups such as the Aux Units and SDB who had set amounts of time to be effective).

[@alancranford3398]

This isn't British, but two American operations where the participants were asked to volunteer without knowing what they were volunteering for were the Doolittle Raid and the 509th Composite Bomb Group. An international effort was the American Manhattan Project producing the atomic bomb--quite a few of the scientists were asked to volunteer for a project and didn't learn what they were doing until President Truman announced their success after Hiroshima. Quite a few secret projects were compartmented to the degree that the participants didn't know that they were a small part in a larger project. It is no surprise to me that there were organizations more secret than the Auxilliary Units. Churchill commented that he had a bodyguard of lies protecting secrets.

[@jared3475]

Really enjoy this channel. As I finished up watching I was out with the dog, not 5 metre from the entrance to are local Stay behind billet. Sandford culvert North Somerset.

[@dorothyramser7805]

About 4 years ago a friend of mine was shocked to discover, her late father, a farmer, was in the British Resistance.

[@dorothyramser7805]

Of course i sent her the link to your excellent presentation.

[@michaelmulligan0]

Do you have a link to the first show please?

[@WW2TV]

It's in the description

[@KeithBell-e9s]

Would be good to have a kindle or e edition of the book

[@tinark1962]

There is a Time Team episode (On Shooter's Hill) that showed a room under a rockery that would have been used during occupation.

[@funfox8133]

That was a very obvious family air raid shelter with a large open entrance - the 'expert' got carried away and sexed the find up wrongly.

[@grahamfisher5436]

Google- Struggle for survival Written by Steven fox I'm sure that . FILE 2 Will be interesting reading .. Probably the foundations of the ROC Also the Tv programme - *Arena A very British nuclear war. shows the Uk still used the general public..