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My father, Arthur Colin Guest (from Smethwick in the West Midlands), was serving in France at the time of the German Blitz Kreig in 1940. His unit was despatched to Boulogne where, during the night of 22nd May, a ferocious battle began which very few people today have heard of.

Arthur’s unit, along with the Irish and Welsh Guards, formed a six-mile long defence line on the land side of the town as Royal Navy destroyers came into the dock to pick-up French civilians and wounded military personnel. Having being ordered to hold Boulogne at all costs, the Welsh Guards after only a day or so were ordered to leave and return to England. By now the Germans had reached the south of Boulogne and soon their tanks and artillery had gained the heights surrounding the harbour. They fired on the ships and the destroyers, who replied with their massive guns. With the defenders’ backs to the sea, with shells whistling over their heads and Stuka dive bombers directly above, men taking refuge in a warehouse were killed by thick plate-glass falling on them. The Germans were doing their best to block the harbour by sinking one of the rescue ships in order to cut off any possibility of escape. One vessel carrying stretcher cases of wounded on its decks was hit and many of those men died.

The last rescue ship arrived under cover of darkness and many of Arthur’s comrades escaped. Arthur had just got his foot onto the gangplank when, with no warning, the ship began to move out and he nearly fell into the sea (a non-swimmer). He, with many others, was left behind. On the 25th May they were forced to surrender, with food and ammunition running low, and Arthur was taken prisoner. On the 27th May began the evacuation of Dunkirk, just a few miles up the coast, and this event for-ever-more overshadowed what had transpired in Boulogne.

For the next five years Arthur was forced to dig for coal in the Polish mines. His courage, cheerful disposition and tenacity kept him going throughout this time (Ironically, when Arthur eventually returned to civilian life, he was offered work in a local coal mine. Needless to say, he declined the offer).

Nonetheless, as the war came to an end, the prisoners were forced to march many miles — at one point crossing the Carpathian Mountains. Many fell by the wayside. One Londoner could not walk any further and, so characteristic of that nature that would help anyone in need, my father (even in his weakened state) carried that man on his back for a long way so that he would not be left in the snow to freeze or to be shot.

The end of the march was beyond Regensburg in Germany. To get there, the long winding column of prisoners had to walk along a road with cliffs on one side and the River Danube on the other. A glint of an aircraft overhead shortly resulted in carnage when American B17’s, mistaking the column of prisoners for German troops, delivered their deadly cargo of bombs. Consequently, large lumps of rock fell from the mountain, with both German soldiers and prisoners being killed.

After the war, my father served for nearly 20 years in the Territorial Army in Smethwick and marched proudly with his comrades of the Royal Engineers’ Squadron of the T.A when they were given the Freedom of the Borough.

Like many of his generation my father rarely talked of his wartime experiences. Fortunately, we were able to record his vivid memories before his death in May, 2000.

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