One of the ways in which the British government attempted to control public opinion was through the use of propaganda. Multiple poster campaigns were commissioned and Ministry of Information newsreels were watched by thousands every week. Radio broadcasts, listened to by a large proportion of the country, were also heavily influenced by the government. The only radio station available was owned by the BBC, which was in constant communication with the Ministry of Information about how events should be reported. Even light entertainment on the radio often contained an underlying message. Censorship was also carried out. Journalists had to submit articles for checking and some newspapers which breached these regulations were officially banned. Several pictures and clips of film footage deemed not suitable for public viewing, such as a film of a mass burial following raids on Coventry, were concealed and not unearthed until after the war.
The government felt a need to censor images which were particularly distressing or which showed the country not coping well with disaster. A photograph of the bombed playground of Catford Girls’ School is an example of an image that was not shown to the public. Dead bodies in bags are seen strewn all over the ground. Photographs of this nature were unlikely to have been approved for publication because actual, rather than implied, death is clearly shown. This might have disturbed people, especially those who had not had a personal experience of sufferings of this magnitude. Actually to see a picture of the dead bodies of children just casually lying around is far more depressing than an impersonal, relatively meaningless list of casualty figures. Also, the viewing of images showing despair or intense grief was restricted. The government wanted to put across the message that Britain was coping well and pulling together; being psychologically unaffected. Film clips such as one of a bereaved woman overcome with grief after a funeral would not corroborate this and so were banned.
However, many scenes of physical destruction were not censored, but used as pieces of propaganda. This was so that the people of Britain could be shown rising above the devastation around them and emerging as a united, confident, glorious nation. The film ‘Neighbours Under Fire’ shows many newly-made homeless people who are singing, laughing and apparently pulling together as a community. This courage is made more startling by the repeated shots of the completely wrecked buildings around them. Their homes and belongings may have been destroyed, as we are constantly reminded, but their spirit has not. This use of propaganda was not directly hiding the effects of the Blitz but rather slightly misrepresenting the psychological and social ramifications. We see a country whose spirit is completely unaffected by the hardship; which is becoming a stronger nation because of it. There is no mention of the terrified residents of Coventry trekking out every night and sleeping in the fields or the vast, fearful crowds gathering to force the government to open the Tube stations as shelters. Also, if the message of the propaganda had been that Britain was barely affected at all then the anger of the people who knew otherwise would have been aroused and little notice would have been taken of the material. The films were made more plausible by the showing of some measure of destruction and this actually helped to disguise the real situation because people would have seen little reason to question the image of unity and perseverance conveyed.
The British government tried to hide the effects of the Blitz by these means to preserve the morale of the people. They knew that a nation without patriotic resilience could not sustain the multi-faceted war effort at home and so through radio broadcasts, newsreels and poster campaigns sought to manage the public perception of and reaction to the Blitz.
