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This story was submitted to the Peoples War site by a volunteer from Hastings Library on behalf of Joy Millbourn and has been added to this site with her permission..

Escape from Dunkirk

My father was 34 when the Second World War started, working as a sorter for the G.P.O. in London. Prior to this the Post Office offered a scheme whereby their employees could go into the Army and be consigned to the postal section, plus their family would continue to receive post office pay. My father signed. As the weeks went by he was sent to France. He was then a Sergeant. As the conflict heightened he moved up to Holland, delivering post to the front line. Although on the return journey they had empty lorries, picking up fleeing refugees was strictly forbidden. One day on a return journey they were stopped by our forces guarding a road and told, 鈥淣ot that way mate, - the Germans are a quarter of a mile down鈥�. They took an alternative route, came to a nunnery that had just been bombed and saw many elderly nuns, some very frail and walking with sticks. This was too much for my father and crew. They stopped and asked where the nuns were heading 鈥� it was to the next town where another nunnery would give them sanctuary. The nuns were helped into the lorry and driven to the said town. As they were alighting the Mother Superior thanked them and said they would all go in and straight away pray for their safe deliverance, adding, 鈥淎nd I promise you will safely return to England鈥�. Back at their base, retreat was underway. Vehicles and equipment was destroyed as it couldn鈥檛 be available for the advancing Germans. The roads were clogged up by refugees and their possessions. The postal section personnel were each handed a bag of mail with instructions to guard it with their life as it could contain the last letters to families. Together with kit bags the journey was even more difficult. (We never heard much about the actual walk- the death and destruction of innocent people and animals and possessions too horrific to recall.) Arriving at Dunkirk the situation looked bleak. Thousands of men filling available small boats immediately. German bombers putting in disastrous appearances. When a fairly substantial boat anchored as near to the shore as it could, my father and two of his colleagues decided to join the queue. They were soon up to their waists in water and holding mailbags aloft was very difficult. Soon a man in a rowing boat appeared. He called out, 鈥淚 can take three鈥�. To my father this was music to his ears. They were 鈥榯hree鈥� and he could never stand queues. Aboard he asked their benefactor if he was taking them all the way and was told he was ferrying them to a large Dutch vessel. About half way they saw the vessel they were hoping to board recieve a direct hit from German bombers. On boarding the Dutch vessell they were directed into the hold and, exhausted, they immediately fell asleep, although my father recalled a sensation of the boat constantly changing course. When he awoke he went up on deck and a crew member confirmed the 鈥榗hanging course鈥�, was in fact the captain successfully steering the ship through a mine field, adding 鈥� we all owe our lives to his expertise鈥�. They finally arrived at Ramsgate, shocked to find hoards of cheering crowds, when they鈥檇 expected derision. Those with mailbags had first to go to Ramsgate Post Office to sort the letters they contained. (That I find hard to understand; surely P.O. personnel in Ramsgate could have managed that.) Duty completed they were sent to Rhyll in Wales, to be cleaned up and made presentable for the world. Meanwhile, back at the ranch we had received a visit from a member of the Post Office, offering sympathy, as all personnel who had returned safely had been listed/ confirmed. Two days later my mother sat on the bed, tears streaming down her face; she was holding an envelope postmarked Wales, addressed to her in my father鈥檚 handwriting. No friends or relations in our walk of life owned a telephone.

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