THE film Dunkirk is truly excellent and I cannot recommend it highly enough. Although, as an aside, the failure to portray any Commonwealth soldiers is disappointing.
Much has been made of the Dunkirk “miracle”, the rescue of 300,000 fighting men from French beaches. Less well known, however, is the fact that on June 4, 1940, the day after the evacuation from Dunkirk was completed, 10,000 Scots in Normandy launched an attack on the Germans.
The offensive by the 51st Highland Division on the Somme was only partially successful and the Argyll and Sutherland battalions in particular suffered heavy casualties. Under its leader, General Fortune, the Highland Division re-grouped.
The only sensible military option for the Division was evacuation back to Britain. Fortune recommended an immediate retreat to Le Havre, the evacuation from which would have been a relatively simple matter.
However, Churchill refused Fortune's request and ordered the Highlanders to continue to fight, hoping the presence of the Highland Division would stiffen the military resistance of the French.
The French were already starting to blame the British for the disaster befalling their country. The British Expeditionary Force, they argued, was a half-hearted effort and, at the first opportunity, it had retreated. For Churchill, the continued presence of the Highland Division in France countered such accusations. So he took the action to abandon them.
After a week of further retreat Fortune was finally given permission to evacuate his Division. By then, Le Havre had been cut off and a desperate plan to evacuate the Highlanders from the small fishing port of St Valery failed. Fortune surrendered and 10,000 Scotsmen ended up in German Prisoner of War camps, often forced to labour in mines, quarries and factories.
We should remember the valour of the Fighting 51st in France. Ill-equipped and out-gunned, they fought with outstanding discipline and bravery in the face of overwhelming odds.
The least we can do as Dunkirk takes to the big screens is to use this opportunity to honour their memory.
Alex Orr,
Flat 2, 77 Leamington Terrace, Edinburgh.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel