*EX LIBRIS :"FIVE DAYS IN LONDON MAY 1940"

Amazing what goes on when you are in the cot!

There I was just 1 month and fifteen days old, all comfy and being fussed over in my Cot, and on the other side of the World the British  Cabinet was meeting to discuss what should be done about the encircled British Expeditionary Force at Dunkirk, more than 300,000 men.

In this excellent Book of 236 pages, the Professor of History at Chestnut Hill College, Philadelphia at the time he wrote, John Lukacs explores the five days history of that War Cabinet Meeting.

It is an eye opener. He reveals how delicately the Cabinet was balanced between those who wanted to extract the BEF in order to be able to fight on, and those German sympathisers who wanted to come to terms with Hitler.Winston Churchill had been Prime Minister for 18 days when the crucial point of decision was reached during meeting commencing on 24th May, 1940 and concluding on 28th May, 1940 which just happened to be my Mother's 35th Birthday.

Churchill had himself briefly considered what might be the result of negotiations with "THAT MAN" - the loss of the Fleet, the Army , a puppet Government , possibly under Moseley, and decided it was intolerable and ultimately unthinkable. He believed that at best they might be able to rescue 50,000 of the BEF's men.

At 5.00pm he adjourned the War Cabinet and summoned a meeting of the full Cabinet of 29 and announced his intention that England should proceed to retrieve the BEF and fight on.No one demurred and at 7.00 pm he returned to the War Cabinet ( 5 persons) and told them what he had done. The "opposition"especially Lord Halifax was silent. The issue was resolved - the fight continued. As we now know, not 50,000 were saved but 338,626 were saved in the most extraordinary effort in defeat in the whole War. So extraordinary, saving the British Army and very many French soldiers as well, by the greatest muddling through ever, that it came to have the same morale boosting effect as many victories and has been remembered as a triumph.

Meanwhile, in far away Berala I slept on! And grew up to think it IMPOSSIBLE that we would do anything but WIN the War!

DUNKIRK -ABANDONED MILITARY EQUIPMENT

DUNKIRK - CHAOTIC BUT SUCCESSFUL EVACUATION

DUNKIRK - POSTAGE STAMPS - DEFEAT INTO TRIUMPH

This is an exceptional book, which will reward any reader and give them pause, to think what might have been.