大象传媒

I was told this storey in the earley 1970s one afternoon when I was was with my uncle having a cup of tea. His name was Sidney Glyde he was born in Plaistow the East End London and he passed away in the late 1970s.
In 1939 he volenteered to go into the army as many of his colleagues did and as a result he was dispatched after his initial training to France to join the BEF. He was placed in the Royal Army Service Corps because before going into the forces he worked at Tate and Lyle Thames Refinery as an HGV driver and at that time there were not too many vehicles on our roads therefore not many people had the experence to drive HGVs.
He was in the group during the retreat through France which was just in front of the German advance. His job was to destroy as much of the British equipment that had been left behind as possible. This included vehicles, guns, pieces of artillery and aeroplanes. As he approached Dunkirk he had to abandon the lorry because the roads were so conjested and he walked the last few miles with other army personel with the Germans very close behind. He reached the beach to find the total chaos of the evacuation all round him. He made his way to the waters edge with a dreadful dilema, that of having to go into the water and swim for it or stay and take his chances with the oncoming German army. His problem was that he had never been in the sea or a swimming pool in his life an therefore could not swim a stroke.
He was told to take off heavy items of clothing and wade out as far as he could and then hang on to something that floated and just get to the rescue boats. The advice proved in the end very sound because he lived but some the men, including the person who advised him that were able to swim did not make it to the rescue boats. They lost their strength and went under. He, some how or other was picked up and was returned to Dover.
On his arrival, he together with many hundreds got off the boat at Dover. Nobody new who he was and he just walked to the railway station and boarded a train to Welling, Kent and walked home to his house at 28 Oakehamptton Cresent before reporting back to his unit some time later.
As a result of that period in his life he never fully recovered his health. He was 30 at the time of the retreat from Dunkirk. He left the army soon after not able to take any further part in the war. He retuned to a post in Tate and Lyle but had to take early retirement due to ill health which was the result of Dunkirk. He had never spoken of his recollections even to his own family because of the terrible fear of the experence.

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