TNA ADM 199 792

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D-51.
(Revised-June, 1933.)
FROM WHOM
DATE
4
ban
After we had delivered this message and embarked the women and
children we set our course for the northward route home. As we
steered N.E. we could see the town of Dunkirk brightly lit by the
flames of the 10 or 12 huge fires now raging. Against the smoke we
could see the flares of frequent Hu bomb explosions on the jetty and
along the beaches, and every now and then the glow of machine-gun
bullets. The coastline was like a street in peace-time, the flares
hanging at regular intervals like so many lamp-posts and hardly seeming
to fall at all for two or three minutes. These lights did not look
like parachute flares but seemed to keep a fixed position. There was
no wind at all. Always there was the whistle and roar of bombs and
the rattle of machine-guns, but we could no longer hear the boom of
the botors or the bark of the A.A.guns. There seemed to be no
opposition at all.
We finally left Dunkirk about 0230. On the journey home we were
approached by bombers, byd reached Dover without losts or injury to ship
or personnel at 1630.
We beg to submit that the conduct of Temp Skipper Lieut, Burgess,
the Mate, Chief Engineer and all the ship's company was exceeding
!raiseworthy in the face of multifarious dangers of navigation and
enemy action. Apart from this the cheerful and confident bearing of
was a great support to all our passengers, many of whom were in a
highly nervous state.
A note on the effects of prolonged and fierece bombing on a
limited area.
A frequent German technique was to send a fighter ahead which made
a smoke circle in the sky over the objective to glueathe bombers, which
followed; a variant was to draw lanes of approach, also in smoke. This
procedure could be largely carried out, owing to the absense of wind.
Otherwise they would first GIRCLE the town for as long as 45 minutes,
and then come down to bomb from different directions Their object at
Dunkirk seemed to be to put up a smoke screen to windward of the town
so that smoke would provide a shield for their approach. This
effectively prevented the A.A. guns from training on the planes until
just before their attack.
The accuracy of the bombing varied, H.Q. and Bastion were likes
ringed by bombs, but no damage was done to such solid structures.
The pier was a constant target, but the stone and concrete of which it
was made suffered to an astonishing small degree. Bombing of the town
itself was indiscriminate and callous.
Continuous bombardment seriously interrupts all form of work and
makes contact and communication very difficult. Psychologically
it is most serious as the noise gradually paralyses the mind and
instills a sense of defeat as it begins to seem impossible to strike
back.
It produces a bad nervous state if continued all night so that the
victimi seems to hear inethesmost ordinary sound the whistle of a bomb,
in the slap of the bow wave the noise of machine-gun fire, in the roar
of the wind down the ventilators the approach of bombers. But after
a good sleep all such hallucinations disappear, and little or no
memory of fear remains.
Throughout we were impressed by the small amount of damage an H.E.
bomb will do, if everybody takes cover, or failing that lies flat on
the ground.
01-0440