Family's secret 'German' picture

By Steven McKenzie
Highlands and Islands reporter, BBC Scotland news website

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It was feared the image would be in breach of wartime secrecy laws.

A picture of a female RAF wireless operator relaxing in a seaside village with a man in German uniform has been a family secret for more than 60 years.

The snap was taken illicitly during the shooting of a British propaganda film in Portmahomack, Easter Ross, in 1942.

It shows local woman Sheila Forbes with two members of its cast - playing the roles of a fisherman and a soldier.

Ms Forbes' sister Rosemary MacKay said public knowledge of its existence then would have led to criminal charges.

Outside of its inclusion in a display at Portmahomack's Tarbat Discovery Centre, this is the black-and-white photograph's first wider public showing.

The film - Before the Raid - was made for the Ministry of Information and released in cinemas 65 years ago in 1943.

It was directed by Prague-born Jew Jiri Weiss, who was forced to leave what was then Czechoslovakia when Germany took over in 1938, and it shows a Norwegian village under occupation.

It would have seen her on a charge, the two men in the picture on a charge and our mother on a charge because it was her camera the photograph was taken on Rosemary MacKay

The shooting of it caused a stir in the tiny Highlands fishing port, but those who volunteered to be extras in it and residents watching from the sidelines were under strict instructions not to talk about it.

Mrs MacKay said: "The village policeman came up to the school and told us we weren't allowed to mention it.

"Any mail going out of the place was also censored."

But Sheila Forbes, a 19-year-old Women's Auxiliary Air Force wireless operator at the nearby Tain firing range, took her chance to pose with some of the cast during a break in filming.

Mrs MacKay and her twin Yvonne were 10 at the time, and she said her mother Isabella forbade the family from speaking about the photograph outside their own circle.

She said: "It was a secret. Mother wouldn't let us speak about it outside the house.

"A plane crashed in a field on the farm where we stayed and one day the guards posted on duty at the site asked my father for some boiling water so they could shave.

"Father told us to go down to the house and tell our mam he was sending the soldiers to the house and that he would do without porridge and for her to give it to them instead.

"Later, sitting at the table, we said to them 'do you want to see a picture of our sister with a German' and mam gave us a sharp poke or a kick under the table."

Military police

Getting the photograph developed presented its own challenges.

Mrs MacKay said: "Sheila couldn't take it to the chemist because they would have reported it.

"It would have seen her on a charge, the two men in the picture on a charge and our mother on a charge because it was her camera the photograph was taken on.

"I think Sheila got someone in aerial reconnaissance to develop it for her."

The screening of Before the Raid would later cause much amusement to a local soldier in a cinema.

Mrs MacKay said the man, startled by seeing familiar faces, began shouting "they're not Norwegians, that's so-and-so from the Port".

Portmahomack in more peaceful times

Military police were called and hauled him away.

For the twin sisters, they missed out on a role in the film.

Mrs MacKay said: "You had to get written permission from your parents to be allowed out of school to be in it and ours didn't do this.

"Our cousins Bill and Isobel did get permission from our Auntie Jean. Yvonne's since said if our mother had let us do the same we would have been film stars too."

Allan Kilpatrick, of the Royal Commission on Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland who regularly leads walks around wartime defences in Ross-shire, said there were good reasons for shooting the film in Portmahomack.

He said: "Filming it in a remote Highland location meant it wouldn't alarm the population at large.

"Having so many Norwegian troops based in the Easter Ross area would have helped the producers to choose the location.

"The film was a propaganda vehicle and it does not suggest anything good about the Germans.

"It is designed to show that life was incrediably harsh under Nazi control. It also showed that the people in those occupied areas did their best to fight the Axis powers and take action against the collaborators."

Mr Kilpatrick added: "The film shows the village of Portmahomack at a point in time when the world was a very different place, it provides a valuable record of the buildings of the village, and any footage from this period is rare as photography or filming was frowned upon during the war."