Being able to ship back that many tanks from France, along with their support tail is going to go a long way to staving off Invasion Panic. Being able to show in the Pathe News tanks being unloaded from ships coming back from France will also be useful as a propaganda measure.On 11 June, seeing that all the crews of 1st Armoured Division were back in Britain, all the surviving cruiser and light tanks that had been gathered at Louviers for repair were loaded onto to trains for Nantes, where they would be shipped back, along with their fitters and mechanics of the Armoured Corps. They could be repaired at leisure at home, and so by 18 June the entire First Armoured Division were back in England, the workshops filled almost 100 tanks, a mixture of Lights and Cruisers which had been loaded at Nantes and sailed to Southampton.
Two Companies, with no support, no respite and no relief, holding off two Divisions and a Brigade, for six days?The 11th Motorised Brigade, with the German 57th and 31st Infantry Divisions pushed forward from the east of the River Bresle, but they were delayed by D Company of the 4th Border Regiment and A Company of the 1st/5th Sherwood Foresters. Orders for the withdrawal failed to reach these two companies and in default of orders to move they stood fast. For six days they held on, denying for that week the passage of the river which they had been ordered to guard.
That's a long time to wait to be picked up, methinks there's been a slight error made.The British ships crossed the channel to Newhaven to unload their evacuees. Over two days and nights British and French ships collected first the supply troops who had fallen back first, then the engineers, signallers, artillery men who’d exhausted their ammunition and then spiked their guns. The infantry, whose pull back had been supported by the tanks, started being picked from the docks on 10 January.
They died with there boots on. It's a shame Kipling's dead because only a writer of his calibre could do them justice.Two Companies, with no support, no respite and no relief, holding off two Divisions and a Brigade, for six days?
That's the stuff of legend.
Yep, right up there with Thermopylae and Saragarhi.Two Companies, with no support, no respite and no relief, holding off two Divisions and a Brigade, for six days?
That's the stuff of legend.
Here that might be different.Actually a lot of the French forces that were evacuated returned to France otl as a lot of them apparently felt the war was nearly over and that the UK wouldn't keep fighting for long.
Peg Leg....the picture on the right is from Sahara with Humphrey Bogart...the tank is a M-3 Lee/Grant...small detachment of just all the Allies holding onto a watering hole, even had a Senagelese Free Frenchman!!!
Peg Leg....the picture on the right is from Sahara with Humphrey Bogart...the tank is a M-3 Lee/Grant...small detachment of just all the Allies holding onto a watering hole, even had a Senagelese Free Frenchman!!!
The post Dunkirk evacuations were significant. Between Le Havre, Cherbourg, Brest, St Nazaire and sundry other small ports the Royal Navy took almost 200,000 troops off and a large number of civilians. About 3/4 of the troops were British but there was a big contingent of Poles (their main training base was in Brittany). The big changes seem to be that the 51st Highland mostly escaped (as opposed to mostly captured) and the whole evacuation seems to have been slightly less frenetic and panicked so that more materiel was retrieved and less left behind undamaged for the Germans. That is going to hurt the German down the line as they were operating on wafer thin stocks already.Yeah the fate of the 51st division and the 1st armored are rather pointless losses and barely remembered compared to otl since they were after dunkirk and everyone seemed to forget them.
Also i imagine the armored guys will go to the desert rather earlier and this alone might change things enough that maybe they dont do the greece adventure thanks to more success altough the main issue against italians before rommel arrived was more about logistics rather than fighting. But more reliable tanks should help rather alot hopefully.
Very nice updates . Sofar the main changes are abit more casualties but rather alot less prisoners maybe for the brits and more belgians and french evacuated.About 50k more at dunkirk and probably some from calais that werent done in otl . Also how many troops were evacuated from the dieppe pocket cause in otl they also did surrender allan?
Im pretty sure the evacuated troops didnt go to POW camps and they are a base to recruit further free french forces.
Also please try to handle the french navy surrender better than otl . Probably sending it to west indies seems most realistic option . This was probably the main complaint of vichy french against the brits wich was also very legitimate wich didnt help . Id rather conquer the vichy north africa earlier without american help maybe but dont know if enough drivers for change are there for this . Probably as a sort of response to barbarossa and rommel or someone else arrives with a divison in tunisia maybe to perserve otl outline?
More equipment retrieved also means Britain's stocks are slightly less depleted.The post Dunkirk evacuations were significant. Between Le Havre, Cherbourg, Brest, St Nazaire and sundry other small ports the Royal Navy took almost 200,000 troops off and a large number of civilians. About 3/4 of the troops were British but there was a big contingent of Poles (their main training base was in Brittany). The big changes seem to be that the 51st Highland mostly escaped (as opposed to mostly captured) and the whole evacuation seems to have been slightly less frenetic and panicked so that more materiel was retrieved and less left behind undamaged for the Germans. That is going to hurt the German down the line as they were operating on wafer thin stocks already.
3 examples are currently maintained at BovingtonI get the feeling that unlike otl the Bovington Tank Museum will almost certainly have an intact A-11 as part of its collection since it will probably be in production for at least several months longer