"Retreat of the Germans at Arras" was the second in a series of WWI documentaries, produced by the British Ministry of Information and screened privately for a gathering of the New York social set. The avowed purpose of the screening was to raise a great deal of money for the British war effort, and in this respect at least it succeeded without qualification. The Battle of Arras was a particularly brutal one, wherein the Germans incurred a great number of losses. Nor was the community itself spared, as witness the poignant shots of the ruined cathedral. These and other glimpses of devastated churches reportedly elicited the greatest amount of shocked reaction from the genteel opening-night audience, even more so than the painful medium close-ups of wounded and dying soldiers.