大象传媒

My father joined the Territorial Army in 1939 and, in due course was sent to France with the BEF. After being harried across France and Belgium, his motorised unit, part of the Lancashire Fusiliers, was ordered to support a defence of the Dunkirk perimeter by the Guards. His role was to ferry fuel and ammunition to Bren-carriers in a 3 ton lorry. Returning from one such duty, well into the evacuation of the beaches, his vehicle was mortar bombed and destroyed on the coast road to the North east of Dunkirk. Trying to walk, back to Dunkirk, he and his friend "Cooper" were forced onto the beach at La Panne by the attentions of the Germans. A motor boat was some way off the beach and my father and Cooper waded out but the motor boat sailed off leaving them up to their chins in the sea. Cooper could not swim and my father found himself supporting his friend. My father remembers being in the sea for hours until they were spotted by a "converted gentleman's yacht". By now, Cooper was unconcious and my father was unable to even raise a hand to lift himself from the sea. A deckhand hoisted him with a boathook under the collar! They were landed, 12 hours later, on the Isle of Sheppey. The boat still exists, one of the "Dunkirk Little Ships" and is called "Chico".

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