Detail
Collection H A Voss
Summary
H. A. Voss filmed his family life at home in Coulsdon, Surrey, as well as documenting his holidays and business trips around the world. His daughter later also filmed her family and trips abroad
Collection ID | 275 | Reference code | S 010320 / 5 |
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Title | H A Voss | ||
Dates | 1920s - 1970s | ||
Production | Mr. Herman Albertus Voss (deceased 1957). Rosalind Foster (Née Voss - Mrs. Wood’s sister, Hermann Voss' daughter) | ||
Materials | 16mm FILM FILM EQUIPMENT DOCUMENTATION | ||
Access status | Contact Screen Archive South East for details |
Description
This collection spans five decades and as many continents, comprising an enormous variety of films featuring everything from family outings to the workings of phosphate mines. Amateur filmmaker H. A. Voss worked for the British Phosphate Commission and travelled extensively both on business and for pleasure. The Voss family lived in Switzerland between 1948 and 1949, and many of the films in this collection feature travels abroad as well as domestic scenes of family life. After Voss's death in 1957, his daughter Rosalind Foster continued making films, and the later footage, including family scenes and films of a world cruise, is her work.
The earliest films date from the 1930s. Some record family life at home in Coulsdon, Surrey, and holidays in Britain, while others are documents of trips Voss made in a professional capacity to phosphate mines in America and the Pacific Islands. This collection contains some films made during the Second World War, and a great deal of films feature travel in the post-war period, including visits to bomb-damaged German cities. During the forties Voss also returns to America, documenting more of the Florida mines. He also travels across France and Spain, and make many trips to the Alps, recording some spectacular scenery en route. During the family's time in Switzerland, Voss films winter sports in the ski resorts. His later films feature travels in Norway, and across the US, from the East Coast cities to the southern states, California and Hawaii. The collection includes films of Egypt, Hong Kong, and extensive footage of Japan, which Voss visited three times between 1949 and 1953.
The latest films in the collection, filmed by his daughter, Rosalind Foster, feature family scenes as her children are born and grow up in Burpham, Surrey, and more travels abroad. Foster films the family at their villa in Menorca, and cruises which take in South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Central America and the West Indies amongst other locations.
Films in this collection:
Showing 1 to 15 of 43 results.
[Brooklands and Crystal Palace Car Racing]
Date | 1930; 28 June 1938 | ID | 1418 |
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Film from 1930 shows crowds milling around Brooklands racing track before a race. This is followed by footage from the London Grand Prix at Crystal Palace in 1938, filmed from the stands. The film ends with shots of the Crystal Palace grounds, where a tower is visible in the background, the only part of the Palace then standing after a fire in 1936.
[Children at Play; School Sports; At the Seaside; Garden Scenes]
Date | [1933?] | ID | 1417 |
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In a collection of family scenes children play with toys in the garden as their parents look on, and take part in a school sports day, before a trip to the seaside featuring boating and donkey rides. Later back at home, a garden picnic, a game of women's golf putting, children driving toy cars and camping under a tent with a picnic.

[At the Seaside]
Date | 1934 | ID | 1411 |
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Family film showing children playing at the seaside, divers at St Leonards Lido and children in a domestic garden.
[Garden Scenes]
Date | [ca. 1935] | ID | 1412 |
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A family chat in their front garden. A man and a woman playfully ride a child's tricycle and roll a hoop. Next, a baby is guided along as she learns to walk before being carried around the garden. Men in blazers and women in whites arrive with tennis rackets, greeted by the children, the next scenes are of a tennis match. Finally, a man and his car are filmed as he drives away.
[Phosphate Mining in America and the Pacific]
Date | 1935 | ID | 1441 |
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This film, in three parts, depicts phosphate mining and processing in Florida and the Pacific.
[Holidays in Scotland]
Date | August 1935; September 1936; 1937; 1938 | ID | 1442 |
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Footage of harvest time and a trip to Scotland, featuring a stay at Gleneagles and a visit to the Forth Bridge, are followed by scenes of summer holidays in Felpham, West Sussex.
[Children at Play in the Garden]
Date | [1936?] | ID | 1413 |
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Children play in the garden on bicycles and pedal cars as their mother watches.
[Phosphate Mines]
Date | [ca. 1936] | ID | 1415 |
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In a film documenting the last stages of the phosphate mining process on a Pacific island, phosphate is loaded onto a cargo ship moored offshore.
[“Cathkin” House Compilation]
Date | 1936; 1938; 1950; 1951; 1953 | ID | 1419 |
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A collection of films of "Cathkin", the Voss family home, featuring scenes of the children playing in the garden in summer and winter, and tennis matches with friends. A school sports day and wedding are also included.
[Purley Garden; Hoxton School Fete]
Date | 14 July 1936 | ID | 1420 |
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Mr Voss visits his sister at her house, Malmsmead. In the gardens are beehives, vegetable plots and flower beds. Children play on the lawns with a dog as women look on. The family pose together for the camera, and Voss films a plane flying overhead. The film ends with footage of young children at a schools sports day, doing the egg and spoon race before performing a dance for their audience.
[Spithead Naval Review; Air Display at Hendon]
Date | 20 May - 26 June 1937 | ID | 1422 |
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Battleships and cruisers at the Coronation Fleet Review of 1937, during which the HMS Victoria & Albert III is seen, open the film, shot by H A Voss, an amateur film-maker. Biplane and Bristol Blenheim fighter planes take part in the air display at Hendon, staged and filmed in the same year.
[Holiday in Cornwall; Garden Scenes; War Time Scenes]
Date | August 1939; September 1940; 1941; May 1942 | ID | 1443 |
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Four short films depicting family life - a seaside holiday in Perranporth; children playing in the garden; a holiday in Bude, including trips to Bideford Bay and Clovelly; and domestic scenes during the Second World War.
[Trip to Norway]
Date | July 1939; September 1951 | ID | 1450 |
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This film features journeys across Norway, and a short stay in Sweden. In 1949 Voss visits the Norheimsund settlement, the towns of Voss and Stalheim and the fjords of the area. From here he travels across the mountains to Oslo, where he stays with friends before moving on to Helsingborg and Gothenburg in Sweden. In 1951, Voss pays another visit to Oslo, as he does again in 1952, when he also travels to Granvin, Odda and across the mountains through the Telemark to Bø.
[I.M.C.C. Mines; Noralyn Air Plant]
Date | [ca. 1946 - 1951] | ID | 1445 |
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This film depicts the workings of a postwar phosphate processing plant. Mined phosphate rock deposits are separated from the surrounding silt and slurry, and packed for transportation.
[I.M.C.C. Mines: Dragline Operations]
Date | [ca. 1946 - 1951] | ID | 1451 |
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After a brief introductory shot of a phosphate mine, the dragline is filmed at work - the dragline being the large crane which excavates the topsoil to reveal the 'matrix' below, the layer of soil which contains phosphate rock.
Showing 1 to 15 of 43 results.