OtherUpliftingUK6 Oct 20261 min read

A son restores his father’s film of Hastings’ 1966 re-enactment

Sixty years after his father filmed a Battle of Hastings re-enactment, Cliff Wootton has restored the colour footage so it can be shared with new audiences.

Cliff was 12 when he helped record sound at the 1966 event, commissioned by Hastings Town Council for the battle’s 900th anniversary. His father Alan ran a local electronics business.

After Alan died, Cliff inherited 300 reels of film. He has been reviewing and enhancing them, and released the restored re-enactment to English Heritage with a new soundtrack by historical musician Jonny Dyer.

The memories are still there too. Original participant Peter Sampson told the BBC that he was recruited with the promise of beer and a coach trip.

Stone ruins of Battle Abbey beneath a blue sky — Battle Abbey, the setting for the annual re-enactment. Context photograph from April 2021. Photo: Balon Greyjoy / Wikimedia Commons, CC0.

But identifying everyone remains unfinished work: English Heritage says it has no list of the original foot soldiers and is seeking surviving participants.

The restoration gives those families something tangible to revisit, while preserving a record of how their town brought history to life.