I CAN assure Russell Vallance (Letters, January 27) that the information regarding the 51st Highland Division ( Letters, January 26,)was not based on propaganda from Lord Haw Haw but on testimony by relations and neighbours who had fought at Dunkirk.
As a youngster in Lewis I remember seamen coming home on leave and being quizzed why their brothers and cousins serving with the 51st had been abandoned at St Valery.
With so many Scots serving on the rescue vessels some naval commanders ignored orders and sailed for St Valery to evacuate the Highland Division. However, they were too late and had to abandon their mission due to strong enemy fire from the land and from the air.
Two of these ships had many Western islanders in their complements; HMS Laird's Isle and HMS Winchester. Many Western Isles seamen were killed on ships at Dunkirk and others were decorated for bravery: Petty Officer Allan Morrison, took charge of his ship, HMD Jenny MacKintosh, after the skipper was killed and was awarded the DSM "For courage and seamanship in navigating the ship to safety with great skill and daring during a heavy bombing attack". After rescuing many English soldiers he must have been appalled when he learned the 51st had to be abandoned as two of his brothers were serving with the division: they spent five years in German prison camps.
The 51st were the victims of questionable military and political manoeuvres by Churchill and the French Government - 110,000 French soldiers were evacuate,d but not the Scots. Many of the Scottish soldiers blamed Churchill and felt he had abandoned them to spite the people of Dundee who had not voted for him when he stood as an MP for that city.
Lacking air cover, anti-tank weapons, armour and modern communications the Highland Division was doomed from the start.
Many Scots died in German prison camps and on the horrendous march west in 1945 ahead of the advancing Russians. The final insult to the 51st prisoners was that they had been totally forgotten by the War Office, resulting in many not even receiving their war campaign medals.
It is a sad reflection on war historians that the Scots know little of the heroic contribution played by the Highland Division in the success of Dunkirk. Scots should read their local newspapers for June, July and August, 1940, to view the long lists of their kith and kin missing and killed. The rest of Britain was celebrating Dunkirk but the Scots were mourning their dead and missing at St Valery.
Donald J MacLeod,
49 Woodcroft Avenue, Bridge of Don, Aberdeen.
I HAVE been reminded by recent correspondence of my own childhood memory of the death of Winston Churchill . Scheduled television programmes were cancelled and, for some reason, John Ford's movie The Horse Soldiers was shown on the BBC. As a young Western fanatic this was heaven. In my mind ever since, Winston Churchill has been coupled with John Wayne .
James Mills,
29 Armour Square,
Johnstone.
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