Lost and Found: The German Naval High Command (1916)

In an earlier weblog we mentioned our discovery of films shot by American cinematographer Nelson E. Edwards in June 1916, showing the German Naval High Command shortly after the Battle of Jutland. We recently came across similar footage taken by Edwards in the CBS Collection at the National Archives in Washington, D.C.
       

Edwards and German naval officer, June 1916. Courtesy Wiegman family

Link to scan newspaper clipping

Edwards's film work in wartime Germany has been described in more detail in our book American Cinematographers in the Great War. He ranked among the first, pioneering newsreel cameramen in American film history. From 1914 Edwards filmed for Hearst International News Service and covered the Mexican Revolution. In 1916 he filmed the Turkish and the German side of the World War. He was also chief cameraman for Fox Newsreel during the year of its birth in 1919, and thereafter a longtime stringer for Paramount News.

In 2016, we found four scenes taken by Edwards, featuring Admiral von Hipper and his staff, as well as Admiral Scheer visiting his flag ship Friedrich der Grosse. The footage is on 35 mm and the original negatives are from the Grinberg Collection. As it turns out, CBS also used the Grinberg Collection while assembling film for their World War I TV series in 1964. After the series was edited CBS in a magnificent gesture turned its unused footage over to the National Archives - a real boon for researchers. And that's how Edwards' World War I films ended up in the National Archives.

Films Found at the National Archives

The scenes that we located at the National Archives are on a reel with stock newsreels excerpts (CBS-WW1-75) that were not used by CBS for the TV series. These show Admiral von Hipper and his staff, as well as a close up of Admiral Scheer. The intertitle mentions Hearst International News Pictorial, the film company Edwards worked for. Similar scenes shot by Edwards were used by CBS in the World War I TV series. Episode 7 on the Battle of Jutland in the CBS series has a scene showing Admiral Scheer boarding his flag ship, as well as a shot showing Scheer and his staff, posing for Edwards' movie camera.

We have uploaded the outtakes found at the National Archives, as well as the scenes from the CBS TV series that were used, on our YouTube channel.