大象传媒

My father, Alf Dines, was evacuated from the beaches of Dunkirk onto the cargo ship Clan Macalister on May 29th 1940. Such a large and obvious target was soon bombed and sunk but he was safely moved to a destroyer, HMS Malcolm. This too came under attack and he sheltered on deck under a companionway. Being almost six feet and three inches tall, his feet stuck out into the open and he took a small piece of shrapnel in his ankle - not a serious wound but one which prevented him walking for some weeks.

HMS Malcolm took him safely back to Dover and his thoughts were that, hailing from Ramsgate, only a few miles away, he would be home within an hour or two. But the Army medical service had other plans and he was taken to Cherryknowle Hospital at Ryhope, in County Durham.

There, some of the local girls were performing their civic duty by visiting the injured soldiers. One of them, Elizabeth Harrison, daughter of a local butcher and Home Guard officer, Nicholas Harrison, became his wife in 1946 and my mother in 1947.

They were happily married until my father died ten years ago. My Mother is stll alive. If it were not for my father's feet sticking out from under the companionway, I would not be here. I still have the shrapnel, wrapped in a small piece of army bandage.

Bob Dines
February 21st, 2004

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