The Battle of Britain Five Months That Changed History, May—October 1940 by James Holland (z-lib.org).epub

The last line of defence south of Dunkirk held by 50th and 3rd Divisions
had suffered heavily but the line had held. Throughout the afternoon, they
began falling back across the River Yser, still held by the 42nd and 5th
Divisions, and then, as evening came, it was time for them to fall back too.
Also now at Bray Dunes was Gunner Stan Fraser. The battalion colonel had
not arrived during the night. The men had waited until 11 a.m. the following
morning, then gave up and decided to head for the sea without him. The
trek seemed to last for ever. It was bad enough trudging along with their kit,
and taking turns with the Bren and Boys – the Bren weighed more than ten
kilos – but with waves of German bombers flying over they were
continually diving into the side of the road to take cover. And the sun was
hot on their backs. At one point Stan found a cart horse in a field, so gave it
some biscuits in the hope of befriending it. Managing to lead it back to the
road, he then spent ten minutes trying to get on its back. Eventually, he got
himself on, exhausted, but the beast was hard to ride bareback and after a
mile or so he slipped off and continued on foot.
It was about four in the afternoon when they eventually reached Bray
Dunes, only for another wave of bombers to drone over. They all flopped
down into ditches and holes in the dunes whilst bombs whistled and
exploded and naval guns and any artillery still functioning pounded away.
When the raiders eventually passed, they stumbled on to the beach. Stan
was also astonished by the vast numbers of men there. More bombers came
over. Stan watched the bombs fall, and then the resulting spout of sand or
water. ‘When the bombs dropped close,’ he noted, ‘when we could hear the
long whine as they descended, then we pressed down flat waiting – waiting
for the explosion which sometimes lifted us off the ground.’
As dusk fell, a ship out at sea was ablaze, casting a flickering orange
glow across the sky. Stan still had his sleeping bag, a piece of kit he’d not
thrown away, and now was thankful for his foresight. Scooping out a hole
in the sand, he laid it out and clambered in. Already he had written up his
diary. ‘I will never forget that day,’ he wrote, ‘as long as I live.’