Operation Dynamo
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Men from the French army disembark in England after evacuation of Dunkirk, France 1940. |
Operation Dynamo or the
Dunkirk Evacuation or simply
"Dunkirk" conducted from
May 26,
1940 to
June 4,
1940, was the name given to the mass
evacuation of
Allied soldiers during the
Battle of Dunkirk, a notable conflict during
World War II. It was conducted under the command of Vice-Admiral
Bertram Ramsay from
Dover. In nine days, 338,226
French and
British soldiers were taken from
Dunkirk, France and the surrounding beaches by a quickly assembled fleet of about seven hundred vessels. These craft included the
Little Ships of Dunkirk, a mixture of merchant marine vessels, fishing boats, pleasure craft and
RNLI lifeboats, whose civilian crews were called into service for the emergency. If the owners could not be contacted, some available ships were simply commandeered for use in the operation. These small craft ferried troops from the beaches to larger ships waiting offshore. Though the "Miracle of the Little Ships" is a major folk memory in Britain (at the time a useful propaganda tool too), over 80% of the troops evacuated embarked from the harbour's protective
mole onto the 42 destroyers and other larger ships participating in the operation.
The British admiral
Bertram Ramsay planned the operation in the Dynamo Room (a room in the naval headquarters below
Dover Castle that uses a
dynamo for electricity).The operation's name was chosen because it reflected the location in which Churchill was briefed on its detail (Holmes 2001:267).
Preparations for the evacuation began on
May 22. Vice-Admiral Ramsay called for as many naval vessels as possible, as well as every ship within reach capable of carrying 1,000 men. The evacuation effort immediately expanded to include shallow-draft civilian vessels from 30 to 100 feet (9 to 30 m) in length, as of
May 27. A large number of craft including fishing boats, fire ships, paddle steamers, private yachts and
Belgian barges, plus Merchant Marine and
Royal Navy vessels, departed from
Sheerness,
Chatham and Dover throughout the following days. Some of the vessels came from as far as the Isle of Man and the West Country.
On
May 24, German armour stopped its advance on Dunkirk leaving the operation to the slower infantry and the
Luftwaffe. This reprieve was partly due to the influence of
Hermann Göring, who promised
Adolf Hitler air power alone could destroy the surrounded Allied troops. This stop order for the armour was reversed
May 26 when the evacuation began.
Initial plans anticipated the recovery of 45,000 men from the
British Expeditionary Force within two days before German troops prevented further evacuation. Only 25,000 men escaped during this period, including 8,000 on the first day (
Liddell Hart 1970). Ten additional destroyers joined the rescue effort on
May 28 and attempted rescue operations in the early morning, but were unable to closely approach the beaches, although several thousand were rescued. However, the pace of evacuation from the shrinking Dunkirk pocket increased steadily.
On
May 29, 47,000 British troops were rescued (Keegan 1989:80) in spite of the first heavy air attack from the
Luftwaffe in the evening, and an additional 54,000 on
May 30 (Liddell Hart 1970:79), including the first French soldiers (Murray and Millett 2000:80). The commander of the BEF with an additional 68,000 men evacuated on
May 31 (Keegan 1989:81). A further 64,000 Allied soldiers departed on
June 1 (Murray and Millett 2000) before the increasing air attacks prevented daylight evacuation (Liddell Hart 1970). The remaining British rearguard departed the night of
June 2 along with 60,000 French soldiers (Murray and Millett 2000). An additional 26,000 French troops were retrieved the following night before the evacuation ended (Liddell Hart 1970).
Two French divisions were ordered to stay in France and protect the evacuation. The two divisions halted the German advance however were soon captured since the force was considered a sacrificial defense. The remainder of the rearguard, largely French, surrendered on
June 3,
1940. The next day, the
BBC reported, "Major-General
Harold Alexander [the commander of the rearguard] inspected the shores of Dunkirk from a motorboat this morning to make sure no-one was left behind before boarding the last ship back to Britain."
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British prisoners at Dunkerque, France, June 1940. |
Despite the success of this operation, all the heavy equipment and vehicles were abandoned and several thousand French troops captured in the Dunkirk pocket. Six British and three French destroyers were sunk, along with nine larger vessels, and 19 destroyers were damaged (Murray and Millett 2000). 200 of the smaller Allied craft were also sunk, with an equal number damaged (Holmes 2001).
Winston Churchill revealed in his volumes on WW2 that the
Royal Air Force played a most important role guarding the retreating troops from the
Luftwaffe. The RAF lost 177 planes during Operation Dynamo, compared to 240 for the
Luftwaffe (Murray and Millett 2000). However, the retreating troops were largely unaware of this vital assistance because the weather was too foggy to see them, and many bitterly accused the airmen of doing nothing to help.
Major ships lost
The
Royal Navy's most significant losses in the operation were six destroyers:
*
Grafton, sunk by
U-62 on
29 May;
*
Grenade, sunk by air attack off the east pier at Dunkirk on
29 May;
*
Wakeful, sunk by a
torpedo from the
E-boat S-30 on
29 May;
*
Basilisk,
Havant, and
Keith, sunk by air attack off the beaches on
1 June.The
French Navy lost three destroyers:
*
Bourrasque, mined off
Nieuport on
30 May;
*
Sirocco, sunk by the E-boats
S-23 and
S-26 on
31 May;
*
Le Foudroyant, sunk by air attack off the beaches on
1 June.
Until the operation was complete the British prognosis had been gloomy, with
Winston Churchill warning the
House of Commons to expect "hard and heavy tidings". Subsequently Churchill referred to the outcome as a "miracle" and exhortations to the "
Dunkirk spirit" — of triumphing in the face of adversity — are still (occasionally) heard in Britain today. The British press presented the evacuation as a "Disaster Turned To Triumph" so successfully that Churchill had to remind the country, in a speech to the
House of Commons on
4 June, that "we must be very careful not to assign to this deliverance the attributes of a victory. Wars are not won by evacuations."
The rescue of the British troops at Dunkirk provided a psychological boost to British morale which ended any possibility that the British would seek peace terms from Germany, since they retained the ability to defend themselves against a possible German invasion. Most of the rescued British troops were assigned to the
defence of Britain. Once the threat of invasion declined they were transferred overseas to the Middle East and other theatres, and also provided the nucleus for the expanded British army which returned to France in 1944.
Some of the evacuated troops, both French and British, returned to the
Battle of France through ports in
Normandy and
Brittany, where most were killed or captured. After the French surrender, a majority of the rescued French troops returned to their homeland, but a few chose to join the
Free French and continue to fight.
In France, the perceived preference of the British Navy for evacuating British forces at the expense of French forces led to some bitter resentment.
The
St George's Cross flown from the
jack staff is known as the Dunkirk jack, and is only flown by civilian ships and boats of all sizes which took part in the Dunkirk rescue operation in 1940. The only other ships permitted to fly this flag at the bow are those with an Admiral of the Fleet on board.
Charles Lightoller, second officer on the
RMS Titanic, distinguished himself commanding one of the "Little Ships" during the Dunkirk evacuation.
*
Battle of Dunkirk â€" the struggle to hold the perimeter around Dunkirk
*
Operation Cycle â€" the simultaneous evacuation from
Le Havre*
Operation Ariel â€" the later evacuation from Normandy and Brittany
*
Battle of France*
World War II*Holmes, Richard, ed. (2001). "Dunkirk evacuation".
The Oxford Companion to Military History, New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0198662092.
*Keegan, John. (1989).
The Second World War, New York: Viking Penguin. ISBN 0670823597.
*Liddell Hart, B.H. (1970).
History of the Second World War, New York: G.P. Putnam.
*Murray, Williamson and Millett, Allan R.
A War to Be Won, Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press. ISBN 067400163X.
*Sebag-Montefiore, Hugh.
Dunkirk: Fight to the Last Man. New York: Viking, 2005 (paperback, ISBN 067091083X); 2006 (hardcover, ISBN 0670910821).
**
Reviewed by Max Hastings in the
Telegraph, May 28, 2006.
**
Reviewed by Richard Overy in the
Telegraph, May 28, 2006.
*Weinberg, Gerhard L. (1994).
A World at Arms, New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521443172.
*Wilmot, Chester. (1952).
The Struggle for Europe, Old Saybrook, Conn.: Konecky & Konecky. ISBN 1568525257.
*
Association of Dunkirk Little Ships*
BBC report, on 4 June, 1940
