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Q

Remember 51st Highland Division at St Valéry-en-Caux?

From: "Iain Laird" <Iain.Laird@btinternet.com>
Date: Thu, 1 Jun 2000 21:00:49 +0100

There was a revealing comment from a Dunkirk veteran yesterday. Could we have done more? What about the ones we left behind? While we remember the miracle of Dunkirk and the heroism of the "little boats" we should not forget that it was not only Goering's boast that his Luftwaffe could destroy the British Army at Dunkirk that held back the German land forces: Not all the British Expeditionary Force were due to be evacuated. 51st Highland Division (Seaforth Highlanders, Cameron Highlanders, Gordon Highlanders and the Black Watch) fought on while the main force was evacuated until completely surrounded and overwhelmed by Rommel at St Valéry-en-Caux on 12th June 1940. Some 8,000 were taken prisoner.

Their valour is recalled in the pipe tune "The Heroes of St Valery" and even better in the Scottish Dance "The Reel of the 51st" in which the dancers recreate the Saltire, the badge of the 51st Division. The dance was created by the officers of 51st Highland in their prison camp at Laufen during the long dark days of captivity following 1940.

As at Athelstaneford in 832 AD, and Roslin in 1303 the Saltire was an inspiration against apparently overwhelming odds.

Yours aye

Iain

References:
www.virtual-pc.com/journal/honours1.htm
www.gbc86.dial.pipex.com/1940western.htm
wae.com/messages/msgs16071.html
www.iain.laird.btinternet.com/Saltire.htm

Dunkirk, 1940, 26 May to 3 June

From: "Privateers" <Privateers@privateers.org>
Date: Sun, 28 May 2000 11:00:18 +0100

The nine days of Dunkirk was a withdrawal of land forces less all their equipment across the English Channel, following many military disasters in France. The German conquest of France was complete. The evacuation owed much to the unstinting bravery of the French troops fighting at the Dunkirk perimeter and to seven hundred brave small craft almost a hundred of which were lost in the evacuation of 385,000 troops, more than 100,000 of them French, were ferried to the waiting ships or taken direct to England to fight again another day.

Boats not built for war, which came from rivers and coastal waters of England and some who came to England as refugees - 49 sturdy schuyts from the Netherlands. There were river launches, old sailing and rowing lifeboats, yachts, pleasure steamers, fishing boats, working sailing barges; fireboats without so much as a compass, many of which had not been to sea before. Some chartered in the name of the King, some were commandeered without notice and given hand written slips for a receipt by the Naval crews.

Everything that could float in England some boats making three or more journeys on their own amid dive bombing and strafing by the Luftwaffe. Unlit and unable to comprehend, or respond to naval signals by night, they risked being sunk by their own side. The small boats negotiated the shallow waters off La Panne on the French-Belgian border, where no deep draught ships could approached and extracted the brave exhausted British Expeditionary Force, the French Army and a few thousand troops of the Belgian Army from the beaches of Dunkirk. We should not forget the debts we owe to those who have gone before us.

Regards
Sinclair


Last changed: 00/06/01 16:36:11 [Clan Sinclair]