AS the 80th anniversary of Liberation draws closer, a new two-part docuseries exploring the Occupation of the Channel Islands has been announced on Channel 4.
Produced by Minnow Films, Britain Under the Nazis: The Forgotten Occupation will feature on the national channel and will see actors bring to life eyewitness accounts from diaries, memoirs and letters – of both the occupiers and occupied – with the help of historians Gilly Carr and Louise Willmot.
Visit Jersey also supported the Minnow Films team with production support and planning last year.
Announcing the two-part series, a Channel 4 spokesperson said: “The invasion of Guernsey, Jersey and Alderney was a propaganda coup for Hitler, who began a building campaign to transform the islands into an impregnable fortress.
“But what started as a so-called ‘model occupation’ degenerated into a nightmare roll-out of Nazism – with persecution, antisemitic orders, informants, mass deportations, starvation, slave labour camps.”
They continued: “There was no official investigation into the Occupation, but the fallout from the division it caused remains toxic to this day.”
Emily Shields, commissioning editor at Channel 4, added: “Drawing on incredible first-person testimony, with stories that intersect, overlap and defy each other in their ‘version of the truth’, Minnow have created a mesmerising portrait of life under enemy rule.”
Minnow Films has said the series is “coming soon”.
