The Romantic Story of Margaret Catchpole

The Romantic Story of Margaret Catchpole
Lottie Lyell as Margaret Catchpole
Directed by	Raymond Longford
Produced by	Charles Cozens Spencer
Written by	Raymond Longford
Based on	the play An English Lass by Alfred Dampier & C.H. Krieger book The History Of Margaret Catchpole: A Suffolk Girl by Richard Cobbold
Starring	Lottie Lyell
Cinematography	Ernest Higgins
Edited by	Ernest Higgins
Production company	Spencer's Pictures
Distributed by	Sawyer Inc (USA)
Release date	7 August 1911 1913
Running time	3,000 feet (approx 50 mins)
Country	Australia
Language	Silent film English intertitles

The Romantic Story of Margaret Catchpole is a 1911 Australian silent film directed by Raymond Longford and starring Lottie Lyell. It is based on the true story of Margaret Catchpole, an adventuress and convict.

Only part of the movie survives today.

In the south coast of England, a young woman, Margaret Catchpole (Lottie Lyell), is pursued by two men, the smuggler Will Laud (Raymond Longford) and the coastguard officer Lieutenant Barry (Augustus Neville). Laud is killed in a fight with coast guards and Margaret is sentenced to Botany Bay for horse stealing. She later marries Barry, who has since moved to Sydney, and becomes well-regarded for her hospital work.

In 1845 Richard Cobbold's historical novel The History of Margaret Catchpole: A Suffolk Girl was published, which helped make Catchpole famous, even if it did distort history.

The novel was dramatised in the play An English Lass by Alfred Dampier and C. H. Krieger. The play was revived in 1893.

The structure of the play was as follows:

Laurence Irving also wrote a play on Catchpole which premiered in 1911.

Spencer had produced three films based on plays by Alfred Dampier under the direction of Alfred Rolfe and wanted to make a fourth. However Rolfe left Spencer to run the Australian Photo-Play Company so Raymond Longford, who had worked on the earlier films as an actor, stepped in as director.

The movie was shot in July 1911. No screenwriter was credited.

It enabled Lottie Lyell to demonstrate her skills as a horsewoman. Spencer's own horse "Arno", specially imported from England, appears.

The first half of the film, the section set in England, survives today. Comprising 1,596 feet at 24 minutes it is the earliest surviving example of the work of Lyell and Raymond Longford.