Tomorrow, sees the 75^th anniversary of the  decision to evacuate the British army from the beaches of Dunkirk following its retreat from an advancing German army that had hitherto conquered all before it.

On May 27^th, 1940 the evacuation, codenamed Operation Dynamo, began and lasted until June 4^th when over 300,000 British soldiers, along with several thousand of their French counterparts, were transported across the English Channel to safety.

Although they had to leave the vast majority of their weapons  behind them, the successful evacuation, by the Royal Navy and hundreds of small civilian boats, captured the imagination of the British public and proved an immeasurable boost to morale in what were undoubtedly Britain’s darkest days.

Of course, the respite was temporary and many major battles lay ahead, not least the Battle of Britain, just weeks later, when the RAF defied the might of the German Luftwaffe and safeguarded the British Isles from the grim fate that befell the rest of Europe. Dunkirk may well have been a retreat and a defeat but it felt like a victory.

Those little boats will live forever in the memory of this nation not least for the hope that they gave to a people who, prior to that successful evacuation, must have almost forgotten what the word meant.