UNITED STATES MARINE CORPS IN NEW ZEALAND 1942-43. MARINES WORKING ON FARM

This is unedited raw film footage, shot by Academy Award winning US Marine cinematographer Norman T. Hatch for a US newsreel that was never completed, provisionally titled 'Meet New Zealand'. Around 21,000 Marines were stationed in camps around the Wellington region from June 1942 until November 1943. Most of their time was spent training hard preparing for the war in the Southwest Pacific against the Japanese.

This reel consists of several mute takes depicting a visit to a Gisborne sheep station in December 1942. A US Marine, with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, is steering a horse-drawn plough across a field. In another scene, with the farmhouse in the background, the farmer and his family are dressed in Sunday-best and converse with a Marine about sheep farming in New Zealand. Sheep are mustered by a Border-Collie sheepdog. Four Marines and the farmer pose for the camera. Female officers and civilians are seen coming and going from the Wellington train station. Parliament is seen from the vantage point of the corner of Molesworth and Aitken Streets. Repeat close-up takes of the first scene of the Marine ploughing the field.