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You have asked for memories about the evacuation of Dunkirk. I was 11 years of age
when the evacuation of Dunkirk took place. My father was one of those engaged in the retreat and evacuation. A few weeks prior to this event he had been called from fighting in the Maginot Line because my Mother was thought to be dying, she had in fact been given the last rights. He came home on compassionate leave, he was home a few days before returning to France where he was immediately sent to the front line again, only to find that the forces were retreating.

During the retreat he found a little girl of about two years of age sitting at the side of a dead woman who he presumed to be her mother. There was no one else there to look after her, he put her on his shoulder and ran with her for as far as possible until he found some French people to take care of her. He was then joined by two soldiers, a French cook and a British officer. They ran down a road with lots of other soldiers, the German fighters came overhead and started to machine gun them, they jumped into a ditch at the side of the road, he was in the middle - when the fighters had passed over he started to climb out and turned to speak to the two men, both were dead - yet he survived, he had felt a terrific thud at the back of his neck which knocked him off his feet, but it was not until he got home to England that he was able to look at his tunic, he found a piece of shrapnel embedded in the neckband. When he eventually arrived at the Dunkirk beaches German fighters were machine gunning them, officers were shouting to them to leave everything they possessed and get into the water. My Father could not swim and was terrified of getting out of depth. They waded or swam out to the boats that could not get any nearer, all the while the Germans were firing at them I heard him telling my Uncle that they were packed so tight on the boats that when they were being machine gunned some of the men started to panic, the boats were in danger of overturning - he could not believe it but he saw one man shot by an officer.

I well remember seeing my Father come down the road where we lived, he stumbled and fell, he had nothing, no possessions whatsoever. This was very upsetting to me because prior to the war my Father was always so well dressed when he went socialising, he wore a grey pin stripe suit, grey trilby hat and grey spats, with a light oatmeal coloured overcoat and brown leather gloves.

He came home with Scabies which my Mother, Sister and myself all caught from him, my sister had Scabies so bad all the skin came of the back of her hands leaving them red raw. Scabies was a disease caught by many soldiers because of the terrible living conditions they endured, they were not able to wash for days on end and once one man got it the disease quickly spread. He was home about ten days and then went back to camp, he was then sent to Italy and took part in the Battle of Monte Cassino and the River Po, they later made their way into Germany. Can any of the young men of today imagine what it was like to survive a terrible tragedy and then be sent to another country to engage in yet more bloody battles. Those young men and women gave everything so that we could live the life we have today. Many of them had never been further than their own home town or village and a holiday was something they could only dream about. What a different generation to what we have today, now it is all ME, ME, ME,— a life they could never have dreamed of in the 1930\40`s.
Sincerely,
Pat Richards

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