Hugh Stewart (film editor)

Hugh St Clair Stewart MBE (14 December 1910 – 31 May 2011) was a British film editor and producer whose notable contributions included filming Bergen-Belsen concentration camp following its liberation in April 1945.

Born in Falmouth, England, Stewart was educated first at Clayesmore School and then at St John's College at Cambridge where was taught and influenced by F. R. Leavis. He entered the film industry in the early 1930s. He trained as a film editor at Gaumont-British, initially cutting together out-takes from Marry Me (1932) and working as assembly cutter on The Constant Nymph that same year. His first film as editor was Forbidden Territory (1934). Among the films he cut were Evergreen (1934), Alfred Hitchcock's original version of The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934), Dark Journey (1937), Action for Slander (1937), South Riding (1938), St. Martin's Lane (1938), and The Spy in Black (1939).

During World War II, Stewart was commissioned into the Army Film and Photographic Unit (AFPU) in 1940 and in 1942 led No. 2 AFPU during the Allied landings in Tunisia. The following year he edited film footage from the fighting into the documentary Desert Victory. In 1944 he co-directed Tunisian Victory with Frank Capra and John Houston, although much of that film was shot in the United States. Stewart went on to lead No. 5 AFPU, covering the D-Day landings, the Battle for Caen and the Rhine Crossing.

Perhaps Stewart's most notable contribution to film resulted from his insistence on filming Bergen-Belsen concentration camp following its liberation, with its piles of bodies being bulldozed into mass graves, its overcrowded barrack blocks and pitifully emaciated survivors.

He was awarded a military MBE and demobilized with the rank of lieutenant-colonel.

After World War II, Stewart became a film producer, beginning with Trottie True (1949). He began to produce the films of comedian Norman Wisdom, from Man of the Moment (1955) onwards, and the comedy duo of Morecambe and Wise. Although he went into semi-retirement in the late 1960s, he produced several films for the Children's Film Foundation, including All at Sea (1970), Mr. Horatio Knibbles (1971), and High Rise Donkey (1980).

He died on 31 May 2011, at the age of 100.

Selected filmography

 * Forbidden Territory (1934)
 * Soft Lights and Sweet Music (1936)
 * Action for Slander (1937)
 * Gaiety George (1946)