Chapter 140: Dunkirk 26th
On the night of the 25th, there was a small quarrel in the headquarters of the British and French forces, and the French officers questioned why the British soldiers had been evacuated first, and not the French soldiers. What kind of explanation the British army gave was not what Li Guang cared about. He was concerned about the harvest of the Naval Resistance Army.
During the day on the 26th, the British rescue fleet had not yet arrived, and Calais was not occupied by the Germans. The Luftwaffe also did not bomb the beaches, everything was so beautiful that it was simply the best time to pick up the rags.
Li Guang has never understood why the British and French forces have left behind a large amount of equipment, and it is difficult for soldiers to take even rifles with them. Now he figured it out, the reason is simple, the port was damaged, and he could only ferrying people to the warship in small boats.
These personnel were still unable to get on board and had to climb into waist-deep water to get onto the boat.
The British were well equipped and costumed, from officers to soldiers, all woolen material. It was so heavy that it was difficult for a soldier to climb into a small boat, and even more so with a rifle
Crawl. This also shows the advantage of the eight landing craft of the Maritime Resistance Army, the landing craft are flat-bottomed boats, which can rush to the shore with very shallow water, and the British army can get on the boat only if they are wet.
Li Guang spoke highly of the Europeans during the day on the 26th. Europeans are really civilized enough, talk about rules. When I saw the sign on the beach, I didn't need to give an order at all, and obediently transported all the weapons to the designated area.
Artillery, light machine guns, anti-tank guns, and anti-tank guns and heavy machine gun tanks were once again piled up in the range of weapons designated by the Navy. Even the grenades were piled up into a hill.
During the day, some of the fighters of the Naval Resistance Army diligently collected weapons, ammunition and various supplies. The Anglo-French army was not only well armed, but also had a good marching backpack. The extremely thick and soft blankets and bedding made the soldiers of the Maritime Resistance Army blush. Since the Maritime Resistance Army has been on the Stone Statue Island, it has rarely had the opportunity to march long distances, and the economy of the Shanghai Resistance Army has not been well-off, so Li Guang's preparations for these materials have not been sufficient. But sooner or later, these fighters of the Naval Resistance Army will have to fight against the devils, and these materials are also indispensable.
The other part of the Navy's resistance fighters kept delivering supplies and ammunition to the landing craft, and the efficiency of the work of hundreds of people was not low, and the eight landing craft had little waiting time, and they were carrying huge supplies along the beach like an assembly line.
Among the large pile of weapons and equipment is a French Schneider cannon, this cannon Li Guang has never heard of at all, and he doesn't even know that there is such a caliber. M1927 Type 85 mm howitzer. And according to the comments of French soldiers and British soldiers, this is the best gun in France, and the French army is equipped with an extremely large number of this gun, more than the world's common three-inch guns.
Listening to people's advice to eat a full meal, you can't be too picky about picking up rags, although Li Guang doesn't think this cannon is good in his heart, but he still laughs at it all. This cannon is indeed enough, and more than 50 guns were collected in two days. Li Guang believes that with such a quantity, even a dedicated artillery shell production line is worth it.
In view of the fact that the ammunition was stacked in the open air, the entire munitions and personnel were in a very unsafe situation, and the Germans could cause heavy casualties if they hit the ammunition by sending out their warplanes. At present, the cement of the professional wharf built by the Maritime Resistance Army is still solidifying and cannot be put into use for the time being.
There was no way to transport heavy weapons, and Li Guang had no way to select the most valuable weapons, so he could only transport a large number of grenades and artillery shells.
Even if it is not the most valuable weapon, Li Guang is so happy on the free ship that he can't keep his mouth shut, and the arms of a random landing craft are 350,000 US dollars.
There are so many goodies on the beach that the fighters are almost all picky. Li Guang looked at so many and such good weapons, it was simply a long stream of saliva. Printing money is not so comfortable.
On the free wheel, Li Guang kindly touched the big crane on the ship. In this dispatch, the large crane on the free wheel was modified, and the original standard configuration was only two 10-ton cranes, but Li Guang changed to a 30-ton crane for this operation. Both heavy and small cannons can be easily hoisted onto a free wheel. (There is only one three-ton crane on the guano ship.) )
Everything is ready, only the east wind is missing, and a large number of light and heavy weapons have accumulated on the beach, waiting for the cement of the dock to solidify before they can be transported to the ship.
On the evening of 26 July, the British Navy's "Generator" rescue operation began. Three guano ships went to sea with British warships and some civilian ships.
The British Admiralty saw that the situation was critical, and did not keep the situation of the war secret from the people. On this day began the requisition of ships along the coast and along the Thames, and even through radio appeals to all those who owned boats to go to Dunkirk.
At this time, the British people could no longer be calm, knowing that the battlefield was a bad situation for the British and French forces. These shipowners understood very well what it meant for Britain to withdraw from the expeditionary force, so they responded to the Admiralty's call and began to assemble barges, tugboats, cargo ships, passenger ferries, fishing boats, motorboats and even private yachts in British ports. However, on the first day of the organization of transport in Britain, there were not many civilian vessels. The three guano ships and the British [***] ship are still the largest main forces.
The retreat on the night of the 26th was very smooth, but the number of people who retreated was not large. After all, the small boats on the British side could not carry many people. Moreover, the British considered that it would be beneficial for the later retreat to transport the logistics officers back first, and as a result, not only the guano ships but also the British civilian ships were also transporting British.
It was already one o'clock in the morning when the guano ship arrived in Dunkirk, and Li Guang naturally wouldn't let his ship leak under the daytime sky. Hurry up and hurry, and the guano boats will go to sea in turn at six o'clock in the morning.
On this day in history, the Anglo-French army only rescued 1,700 people, but due to the existence of three guano boats, the number of Anglo-French troops rescued on this day reached 9,000.
In the early morning of the 27th, Li Guang criticized the British soldiers in his heart. The British soldiers were very losers, brand-new rifles and machine guns were thrown all over the ground, and even beautiful pistols used by officers were picked up everywhere.
In short, the British soldiers who boarded the ship at night made Li Guang a little dissatisfied and very unruly. In particular, the British officers and soldiers who boarded the ship in the dock area littered and even threw grenades everywhere.
However, on the whole, in the first two days of the rescue, Li Guang was in a very happy mood, a large amount of supplies and ammunition were transported to the free wheel, and a considerable number of artillery pieces were waiting to be transported.
Li Guang had a fairly clear understanding of the Dunkirk retreat, knowing that Hitler's troops had stopped attacking for forty-eight hours. Seeing that forty-eight hours had passed in a flash, Li Guang began to be a little worried about the cannons piled up on the shore.
After 26 days and nights of rushing, the main harvest was ammunition. Although the value is not as good as that of the twenty-fifth night, the tonnage is definitely quite a lot, and it is also around 2,000 tons. Compared with materials and ammunition, those cannons are what Li Guang values more. You must know that there are even more than 20 75,76mm anti-aircraft guns there, which Li Guang is the most eye-catching, because of its heavy weight, it is difficult to transport it to the landing craft before the simple dock is put into use.