On 25 May 1940, large numbers of Allied troops on the northern coast of France, including the British Expeditionary Force and the remaining French troops, found themselves surrounded by an advancing German army under General von Manstein. Over 370,000 allied troops found themselves in imminent danger.
The next day, without the aid of social media or cell phones, Operation Dynamo began. Despite initial skepticism, the following eight days would prove to be one of the most successful evacuations in military history.
The German high command was divided on whether to advance on Dunkirk or conserve their forces for the advance on Paris. General Gerd von Rundstedt, Commander-in-Chief of Army Group A, called a 48-hour halt to troop movement in the field on May 14th. Hitler endorsed the decision, making a grave mistake.
With mild weather, and the break in fighting, Vice Admiral Bertram Ramsey appealed for civilian help to provide vessels of any kind capable of crossing the English Channel and then ferrying the stranded soldiers from the Dunkirk beaches to larger ships offshore or even taking them all the way back to Dover. Ramsey considered that the evacuation of around 45,000 men might be possible if a big enough rescue fleet could be assembled.
Somewhere between 850 and 950 vessels of all kinds were involved in the volunteer armada that performed the Dunkirk evacuation. From 26 May to 4 June, tugboats, fishing boats (British, French, and Belgian), lifeboats, barges (including Dutch ones), ferry boats, and pleasure craft of all descriptions crossed the English Channel. Some of them made dozens of trips.
Most of the vessels were requisitioned by the government, some were taken without the owners’ knowledge. The Boats were towed by tugs to Sheerness in Kent, where they were fueled and checked over then taken to Ramsgate where Naval Officers, enlisted sailors, and volunteers were boarded and directed to Dunkirk. It’s a myth that countless individual civilians all sailed out on their own, but a small percentage of boats were taken out by their owners themselves as they volunteered for the rescue mission.
Ramsey coordinated the volunteer effort from a base in the cliffs of Dover. Ramsey’s operations room had once housed a dynamo, and this gave the evacuation its official code name: Operation Dynamo. The armada of ‘little ships’ was coordinated by Admiral Wake-Walker.
The Allies abandoned much of their equipment including 880 field guns, 310 guns of large caliber, about 500 anti-aircraft, 850 anti-tank guns, 11,000 machine guns, nearly 700 tanks, 20,000 motorcycles, and 45,000 motor cars or lorries. Officers told troops falling back from Dunkirk to burn or otherwise disable their vehicles.
Over the nine days of Operation Dynamo, the RAF flew 2,739 fighter sorties, 651 bombing raids and 171 reconnaissance flights. Fighter Command claimed 262 enemy aircraft downed while losing 106 of their own.
The French army commanders hesitated about whether they should even allow French troops to be evacuated. It was only in the last two days of the operation, when most of the British had gone, that a concerted effort was made to evacuate French troops as well.
In the end, around 220,000 British and 120,000 French soldiers were evacuated from Dunkirk. The Admiralty figure for the total number evacuated from Dunkirk was 338,226. This was an extraordinary escape, and it allowed Britain to continue the war. As Prime Minister Winston Churchill noted on June 4th, “there was a victory inside this deliverance”. But there were tremendous losses.
The Operation caused friction between Brittain and France since it left such a large area of France unprotected.