TNA MT 40 36 Pt 2

DEXOS
OF
-3-
sleep with my crew, the first since Sunday night so far as I
was concerned.
We turned out on the morning of the 30th May and by09.30
were lying in tow to H.M.S. "Jutland" with & navy whaler and cutter. Jutland was one of the Dutch diesel engine cargo boats taken over by the Navy and flying the white ensign and would carry about 450 men, H.M.S. "Laudania" was a similar ship. Both these ships carried Lewis guns fore and aft for A.A.Defence.
I do not know what delayed our start, probably alterations in the mine fields, but we lay on tow to Jutland until 15.30
outside Remsgate Harbour with occasional intervals of casting off In order to carry officers from one ship to another lying outside the Harbour. At about 15.30 we got going and, with our own engines running at about 6 knots, westowed to Dunicirk in about six hours (an average of about 12 knots). This was a very uncomfortable trip as destroyers kept crossing and passing at high speeds making a heavy wash and we had to try and keep my boat sheered off to port while the cutter and whaler were sheered off to starboard. Sometimes we came together in spite of all our efforts but no damage was done and the only injury sustained by anyone was when one of my crew was at the wheel for a few minutes and a destroyer passed very close and made such a wash that my boat was nearly put on its beam ends and I bumped my shin badly on my deck cargo of petrol cans.
We arrived at Dunkirk about dusk and turned along the beach eastwards for a few miles before "Jutland" dropped anchor. We cast off tow at once and I took the whaler and
We did not know cutter in tow myself and dug out for the beach. It was whether Jerry over slightly misty as well as dark but it was not really a troops would be on dark night and visibility was not too bad. At first we the beach, as it was could find no life on the beach but after a short time a long way East of were hailed by Frenchmen and for a little while found about 20 wellowe ship
Frenchmen only and made one or two full journeys back to the cammy hading the alone.
boat with them. The procedure was to tow the whaler and cutter to the beach and swing them round and cast off tow in about 3'6" (my draught being 2'6"). The whaler then dropped his grapnel and went in as close as he dared without ounding the cutter and troops waded out to board them.
As soon as the two boats were full they called for the motor boat and pulled up on the whaler' S graphel, I would come past and take the whaler's buoy rope in passing and swing out towards the ship which had to lie about threequarters of a mile out.
While the whaler and cutter were loading I patrolled parallel with the beach, keeping as close as I dared without grounding, 1t being essential that the motor boat should not take ground as 1t was the only motor boat in that area and the cutter and whaler had only four men apiece aboard so that they were not in a position to row out to the ship, except at great loss of time.
While patrolling my job was to pick up any swimmers or waders and any odd craft which had put out from the shore, there were seve al of these. After the first few loads had been taken to the ship, all Frenchmen, a British officer waded out and was picked up by me and reported that a whole
Division of British were waiting to be taken off a little nearer Dunkirk town than we had been working.

Uson
I took him aboard, went back and picked up the full cutter and whaler, and took them all back to the ship, reported to the Captain of Jutland that the British were further up the beach and that I was going there, a big fire just in-shore was my leading mark as the British were just to the east of this. From then on we worked to this point and the French came down the beach and mingled with the
British; Jutland was filled roughly half and half British and French.
39.
After we had been going to this point for about three or four trips, a German bomber most inconsiderately dropped a large bomb on our large fire and blew it out like a candle, this did not matter very much then as I had other leading marks and the mass of troops had increased so that they were quite visible on the beach.
By about03.00, 31st May, Jutland was full and she sailed at once to avoid the dawn bombing, Jerry was trying to bomb the ships as they left loaded and thus get the ships and the men, but his efforts throughout the 10 - 11 hours that I was working on the beach were very poorly rewarded.
Jerry also had some big guns for which aeroplanes were spotting, and they dropped verey lights over the ships, but here again Jerry wasted ammunition without hitting anything that I saw. One of the crumps came as a nasty shock as the at least two bombs explosion actually stopped my boat for a split second, and I
shook the boatbut thought I had grounded as she quivered all over but in the none stopped it.
next moment she went on again and the noise of the crump followed the air push so that I know it was nothing serious.
On Jutland leaving about03.00 on the 31st May I turned over with the cutter and whaler to Laudania and by about08. she handania wasfolled too was full, making a total of about 900 men brought off. By about 3/4 British this time I had used up all my deck cargo of petrol and the engine wanted more oil and the grease cups refilled, also
+1/4 Tranch there was a certain amount of rotten rope round the propeller shaft, this I had not been able to cut in time. My two crew were both stoker ratings of four months' service in the Navy only and being stokers were not issued with clasp knives, on my stern-man shouting to me that an odd rope was getting round our propeller, I had to leave the wheel and out it with my own sheadknife, if he had had a clasp knife he could have done it in time, I was a moment too late.
The cutter had gone aground under a stranded lighter on the windward side of same, a W.wind having got up a bit in the morning, and as I could not get near enough to get the cutter Off and the crew, also their young sailors, did not% how to get off, I rescued the crew and brought them off to Laudania had probably Engine due to sope, been statting in accordance with the Captain's instructions. My boat only just managed to Laudania with the last whaler load that she could take and the Captain ordered me off with my self starter now crew and the crew of the whaler, the crew of the outter being refused service already on board, and turned over my boat and the whaler to &
Naval drifter which was said to have petrol and mechanies on board so that they could be of use further.
The whole of us who had been on the beach work then had our first stand-bysy since 21.30 the day before and my crew and myself had not had anything to eat since 17.30 the day before and nothing to drink since 15.30, and had been continuously employed, as had the two Naval ratings who remained on each of the naval rowing boats during the tow across.
Jerry started his usual effort when the ship left at
08.30 to09.00 on the S1st, but with no results and plenty of hot tea and bread and butter and Jam and a chance to light a pipe had made me perfectly indifferent to anything Jerry did.