One Man's Escape

BEGUN AT SEA, June 24, 1940
DEAREST,
You must excuse this writing and this paper. But the freighter is rolling violently as we pass in sight of Lisbon. And I can’t write to you with a pen or pencil of my own, as I lost them with everything else I possessed. If our voyage ends successfully, I’ll mail this letter at Casablanca and hope it will reach you quickly.
Along with the horrible tragedy of our douce France, I have lived through a succession of frightful and wonderful adventures. Throughout all this, the thought of you has guided and sustained me a dozen times when I had to make decisions on which my life and my liberty depended. The future is uncertain.
During my days of active fighting from May 30 to June 10, I wrote to you frequently. I do not know whether a single one of these letters reached you, but I am certain at any rate that my last two letters, which were in my pocket on June 12 when I threw off my uniform and began swimming, will never do so. I am sorry, for these letters, foreshadowing what I was about to lose, were full of our love for the French countryside, our happy memories of Dieppe, of Normandy, of our country walks.
Here, briefly, is the account of what happened.
After exhausting but rather splendid work up to June 5, during which time I cherished the hope that I’d done my bit towards a first Allied success, the retreat became increasingly hurried as the results of the battle of Amiens, on our right, became worse. My Scotchmen were wonderful, and I learned plenty of lessons from them. I can shamelessly admit, too, that I held the confidence and friendship of all those about me. One evening I was ordered to Dieppe. I found amidst the ruins there, and with feelings you can well imagine, that grand little restaurant of ours and our movie theatre (Do you remember La Bandera, with Gabin?), which had become the town major’s headquarters. Hourly the news got worse. We were cut off from the road to Rouen, with the road to Le Havre (a possible embarkation point) also threatened. Finally, when we got to Saint-Valery-en-Caux, a little port between Dieppe and Fécamp, it was impossible for our division to retreat any farther. Embarkation was the only alternative. I took part in the organization of a defense line, in the midst of un calme général which was marvelous, even though everyone knew that another little Dunkirk was in the making. Until noon all went well. At that time I left on a liaison mission to the French artillery, with orders to return to the English headquarters at the SaintValery town hall.
Imagine a seaport tucked in between two steep hills one hundred and fifty feet high, and about half as big as Cassis. As I was driving out, the shelling started. The town began to burn. I left my car and picked my way from house to house towards the road which led out to the French positions. Then eighteen German bombers flew over, and I spent miserable moments flat on the ground. Eventually I walked the two miles, delivered my message, and started back towards the town. It was three o’clock in the afternoon. No way of getting directly down to the town hall — it was in flames and had already collapsed — and what was the use, anyway?
I made a detour and found a road absolutely blocked by frightened mules. With the help of my French comrade Marchand (to whom I later owed my life, and of whom I now know nothing) I tried to straighten things out. The Alpine mule drivers were unruly because the firing was so close; we kept at them, and the road was cleared. Just then a shell struck a house at the side of the road. I felt a sharp pain in my left thigh; I was bleeding quite a bit — I was wounded.
We set out again for Saint-Valery in a car which we hailed. There I reported to my chief. I was receiving first aid for my wound when another bombardment destroyed the house next door, ripped up the street, and made me, for the first time, terribly afraid. Doubtless because of the physical shock I had just undergone, I turned very hot, then very pale, and felt very miserable. But what was there to do but wait in silence?
The shells stopped falling. The machine guns were crackling close by, barricades were being thrown up, groups of Scotchmen went past, shooting all the while. The Germans had come down on the village. Helped by Marchand, I set out again. My leg didn’t bother me too much. We made our way through the town, getting protection from the houses. There was firing on all sides; bullets whistled in all directions. Unable to locate a single one of our staff, we took a narrow little street which led to the waterfront and the jetty, walking between blazing houses, and finally got to the beach. There in the Casino we found twenty or so English soldiers, fairly well protected and firing towards the other side of the harbor. We stayed with them two hours helping them fire; I picked up a gun left by a wounded man and miraculously shot dowm two Germans who were firing upon us from the other end of the jetty about three hundred yards away.
Then things quieted down again. The Germans were driven back to the hills. We congratulated each other, and I went to get my wound dressed a little better. I was given a drink, a smoke, and food in a room full of poor bleeding fellows. The situation remained critical. No boat could come in before nightfall, and the Germans were close at hand. It was still impossible to find a single one of my superiors — they were probably in the other part of the town and separated from us by a screen of blazing houses. I was told that the wounded would be evacuated at eleven o’clock that evening. Night fell.
Suddenly the bombardment was resumed, more terrible than ever. Not a cellar in these fishermen’s houses, I dozed off in one house after another — before they caught fire Marchand would come and lead me out and into another. The spectacle was grandiose — the barricades of trucks were flaming, rockets were going up in all directions, the whole town was afire. Some Scots were crouching near me, waiting for the end of the bombardment in order to jump in and defend the barricades. They were singing in chorus some old songs from their highlands, and in spite of my fever of fatigue and fright I tried to sing with them.
They sent me back to the dressing station and left me in a house which was still intact. Marchand couldn’t stay there, not being wounded — I have not seen him since. We wounded waited for a problematical embarkation. I had the impression that the bombardment was going to bring down the house on my head. I went alone down into the cellar of the Casino, now in ruins, and dropped to sleep from sheer exhaustion. That was the beginning of my complete moral solitude. From that moment on, and except for an hour at La Rochelle, I was to find no friend to sustain me. Since that moment — and for how much longer? — I have had only the thought of you to help me in numberless life-ordeath decisions.
When I woke up, it was light — it must have been four o’clock. Up the coast, about five miles away, I could see tiny boats which were waiting for us, perhaps, without daring to approach. I got up and followed some French and English soldiers who were running towards the right-hand end of the promenade. I saw some of them go down a fifty-foot ladder and then along the cliff toward the distant boats. I hesitated to follow them, with my wounded leg which was beginning to hurt a great deal. The Germans fired their cannon towards the boats, but couldn’t begin to reach them. It was raining.
Suddenly the Germans, who had got hold of the end of the jetty, began to fire on the far end of the promenade where the soldiers were leaving and where I was wavering. We took shelter on the ground behind a low wall. The machine guns kept firing; from time to time there were luminous tracer bullets. They were aiming at those who were leaving the promenade, and at those, farther off, who were running over the shingle beach along the cliff towards the boats. In the distance I saw two boats which were already heading out to sea. Exhausted, I decided to give up, go back to the dressing station, lie down there, and wait for the Germans with the other wounded. But, when I came out from behind my wall, machine guns fired on me. So, as there was nothing more to lose, I tried my luck. As soon as a volley was fired, I ran to the end of the promenade. I lay flat during the next volley, and as soon as this was over I went down the rope ladder on to the beach and began a mad dash, dragging my game leg, running a hundred yards, then crouching against the cliff, then starting off again, as the machine-gun bullets whistled about me and bounced on the shingle. Every fifty yards or so there was a dead or dying man who had been hit by a bullet, and who would be buried by the sea in a few hours when the tide came in, for the cliff is a sheer wall a hundred and fifty feet high and the tide covers the beach up to its base.
At last I flopped down behind a jutting rock, and there found four men, one of whom was my major and intimate friend. He told me that the general had assembled the officers and men to release them so that they could try to escape from the Germans. As he was speaking, he broke off to shout at me, ‘Pull in your foot, you damned idiot!’ A bullet had just grazed the sole of my shoe! I was ready to start out again. He wanted to wait for a quiet spell. I agreed to meet him farther along, and left. I have never seen him since, and, as I took the last boat, he must have been taken prisoner, or worse. . . .
After a couple of miles, walking became easier, for the machine guns stopped firing at us. They were getting more efficient results with the steady stream of those who were a mile or so behind. I was tired and my leg hurt me. But the boats were getting nearer. I wasn’t falling too far behind the others. New hope was returning to me. I thought of you more calmly and less feverishly.
The really serious part of it was that only two ships were left, and a tiny boat already outward bound. I could see that one of the two ships had run aground in the sand. No hope of her leaving before high tide, which meant in four or five hours’ time. Most of the soldiers were heading towards this ship, already covered with men. It was aground, easy to reach (for the cannon, too), and was very tempting, but I realized that I’d have to fight for a place with my fists or even perhaps with my revolver. I shrank from that, and abandoned the idea. (I forgot to tell you that I had previously had to give up my big revolver when I went into the dressing station the day before; I still had a pocket revolver, which gave me courage during my flight along the beach, for I knew I could shoot myself if I was hopelessly wounded and on the point of being drowned by the tide.)
On the beach, about a thousand soldiers, French and English, were waiting for — what? A miracle in the shape of a host of boats, or death by a shell, or being taken prisoner? I can’t, say. Without slowing down for a second, I walked straight into the water. As I went forward I took off and threw away everything I had left: my helmet, my field glasses, my coat containing the last six letters from you, — the only ones I still hoped to save, — my breeches, my leggings, my shoes. (For the past two days I have been living in a bathing suit under a pair of trousers, which reminds me of our happy days and impromptu swims in Sicily. In a tobacco pouch tied to my belt I have my billfold containing some identification papers, a few photographs, eight one-hundred-franc notes.) And then, still perspiring, I started swimming.
What bliss — my leg still worked and the breast stroke didn’t hurt me! I thought of you, tried to remain calm, for this, I thought, was the last tossup for life and liberty. I reached the ship. I shouted. They answered that the ship was aground and there was no more room! I asked if there wasn’t a place on one of the two fishing smacks alongside. They pulled me on. The captain, from his bridge, ordered them to put us ashore. We begged to be allowed to try to reach another little boat farther out; they told us we could try. I was shivering from the cold, for the wind was chilling and I was naked.
The little boat, a trawler, was already on its way out. We shouted. It came back, although crowded (Ah, les braves types!), and we climbed aboard. Two sailors pounced on me, rubbed my back raw, made me drink a pint of rum and whiskey and Pernod mixed (I must have been purple), wrapped me, still naked, in a blanket, and put me to bed next to the engines. I wept with joy and fell asleep. It was eleven in the morning. Next day we touched at Cherbourg, after spending the night in the roadstead. We had to wait there until the end of an aerial bombardment.

CASABLANCA, June 27
I wrote you several days ago a long letter telling you of my mad adventures — during which I have been sustained up to now by constant thought of you and the hope of seeing you again some day. I have no news from my mother, nor of my two young nephews who are at the front — I’ve heard nothing of them for a month. You send them news of me if you can. As you can well imagine, I am very much upset and very much alone. My wound is not serious, though it makes a pretty big hole in my left thigh. Up to now it’s been only hastily treated, but there have been no complications. The doctors think it will take only a month for the flesh to heal.
The thought of a military hospital, where I’ll be idle and alone with my thoughts, terrifies me, but I’ll stick it out. In a few weeks I’ll try to serve again if it’s possible, or do my utmost to join you, somewhere. . . .