According to information in the 20th Century-Fox Records of the Legal Department at the UCLA Theater Arts Library, Fox bought the motion picture rights to the story in Nov 1931, when it was an unpublished, uncopyrighted story. The legal records also reveal that William Collier, Sr. was originally cast as "The Mayor," a role that Francis Ford took over; and that Esther Michelson was originally cast as "The Jewish Mother," which Rosa Rosanova played in the final film. Although Eugene Grossman is credited as sound recorder on the screen, W. W. Lindsay, Jr. is listed in studio records and in two reviews, and the film is listed in his filmography in Film Daily Year Book, but not in Grossman's. According to a Film Daily news item, Minna Gombell and Frank Craven were originally scheduled to be in the film. According to a Hollywood Reporter news item, Henrietta Crosman was transferred during pre-production from this film to Mommies, a film that was never made. Crosman appeared in person at the New York premiere.

According to information in the MPAA/PCA Collection at the AMPAS Library, Hays Office officials complained about two uses of the word "hell" and an action in the ship's stateroom in which Crosman pushes a button and the flushing of a toilet is heard. A Fox official subsequently wrote the Hays Office to report that the word "hell" and the toilet flush were eliminated from the soundtrack. Hays Office officials also were worried about a possible negative French reaction to a scene in which a girl explains that an old bewhiskered man who is pitching manure in front of his doorway is the mayor of the town. Because of this concern, Fox president Sidney Kent, on May 18, 1933, issued an order that the reference made to the French mayor working on a dung pile be eliminated from the negative. The Hays Office files for the film also include a letter dated Jan. 23, 1933 from Katherine M. Gallagher, Vice-President, American Gold Star Mothers, of Wayne, PA to Fox, which stated that she was the sole instigator of the movement to get a bill passed to enable the Mothers to go to France, which resulted in the pilgrimage that was the subject of Fox's film. Gallagher asked that the studio consult her organization because, "The pilgrimage was very sacred to us and we may not wish it to be commercialized." No information has been located concerning any subsequent input that the group may have had.