Recovered Journal Entry #2:
I thought this battle would have been fought but I found myself abandoning all will to fight and escaping into the English Channel toward Britain from my own, familiar harbor of Dunkirk.
Our evacuation was finally ordered on May 26. Ordered by Winston Churchill calling our attempt "a colossal military disaster", and saying that "the whole root and core and brain of the British Army had been stranded at Dunkirk and seemed about to perish or be captured."
called our rescue a "miracle of deliverance," I believe it. I did not think I was going to survive. I-I didn't know, while on that harbor watching British destroyers bank on our shore, that I would have been evacuated. Surely I thought I would not make it.
During the long days of May 28 to the 31 the British saved every man of the once-formidable French First Army in our delaying action against seven German divisions. Three were armoured divisions! If it wasn't for Britain's Siege of Lille we; my men and I would have been gone.
Churchill announced after our rescue, "These Frenchmen, under the gallant leadership of General Molinie, had for four critical days contained no less than seven German divisions which otherwise could have joined the assaults on the Dunkirk perimeter. This was a splendid contribution to the escape of their more fortunate comrades of the BEF."
The British successfully saved us, for that I thank them.
Girard De Lorme
French Soldier of the 4th Infantry
Date -- Troops evacuated from beaches -- Troops evacuated from Dunkirk Harbor -- Total
May 28 - 5,930 ------------------------------ 11,874 ---------------------------------------- 17,804
May 29 - 13,930 ---------------------------- 33,558 ----------------------------------------- 47, 310
May 30 - 29, 512 --------------------------- 24,311 ----------------------------------------- 53,823
May 31 - 22,942 ---------------------------- 45,072 ------------------------------------------ 68,014
June 1 - 17,348 ------------------------------ 47,081 ------------------------------------------ 64,429
June 2 - 6,695 --------------------------------19,561 ------------------------------------------- 26,256
June 3 - 1,870 -------------------------------24,876 -------------------------------------------- 26,746
June 4 - 622 --------------------------------- 25,553 -------------------------------------------- 26,175
Totals --- 98,780 ------------------------- 239,446 ------------------------------------------- 338,226
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