King George VI talking to a member of the Home Guard during an inspection tour in Kent, England; 10 August 1940.


Royal Inspection Tour

British housewives donated their aluminum pots and pans to be melted down and made into airplanes. As this enormous pile of pots and pans shows, women in 1940 were more than generous with their contributions to the war effort. Scrap metal drives provided a source of aluminum, but they also created a sense of community on the home front and an opportunity for everyone to feel as though they were contributing to the war effort.  

Pile of "War Effort"

Two members of the Home Guard with a Vickers machine gun on a village green in Surrey, England. Originally known as the Local Defence Volunteers, the force was set up in 1940 as a precaution against enemy parachute landings behind the lines in the event of an invasion. By July the Home Guard numbered 500,000. 