Ship at Sea

The last week of May in 1940, a colossal military defeat left hundreds of thousands of British, French and Belgian troops stranded on the shores at Dunkirk. On May 26 Operation Dynamo was launched to save them from certain death or capture. A rescue fleet was quickly assembled comprised of nearly 900 vessels: life boats, merchant marine boats, pleasure craft and fishing boats. Over the next nine days and nights their crews - military and civilian alike - risked their own lives to pull 338,226 soldiers to safety in what is now called “The Miracle of the Little Ships.”