- Jun 20, 2014
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Best wishes to all. How long have you guys been married?ufgator812;n17247 said:Happy Birthday Tally. It's also my anniversary.
Happy BDay and congrats!TallyGator;n17430 said:Thank you all...hoping for a pleasant day and a visit from my granddaughter this evening. I made it to 56 years old and the wife and I had our 25th wedding anniversary last month. Go Gators!
ufgator812;n17247 said:Happy Birthday Tally. It's also my anniversary.
oxrageous;n17364 said:Tally will be too drunk today to show up here! Happy Bday!
20 years.cover2 said:Best wishes to all. How long have you guys been married?ufgator812;n17247 said:Happy Birthday Tally. It's also my anniversary.
That book is in my collection. Thanks.crosscreekcooter said:ufgator812;n17247 said:Happy Birthday Tally. It's also my anniversary.
For your anniversary 812
from William Manchester's "Winston Churchill: The Last Lion":
THE French had collapsed. The Dutch had been overwhelmed. The Belgians had surrendered. The British army, trapped, fought free and fell back toward the Channel ports, converging on a fishing town whose name was then spelled Dunkerque.
Behind them lay the sea.
It was England’s greatest crisis since the Norman conquest, vaster than those precipitated by Philip II’s Spanish Armada, Louis XIV’s triumphant armies, or Napoleon’s invasion barges massed at Boulogne. This time Britain stood alone……
. Now the 220,000 Tommies at Dunkirk, Britain’s only hope, seemed doomed. On the Flanders beaches they stood around in angular, existential attitudes, like dim purgatorial souls awaiting disposition. There appeared to be no way to bring more than a handful of them home. The Royal Navy’s vessels were inadequate.
King George VI has been told that they would be lucky to save 17,000. The House of Commons was warned to prepare for “hard and heavy tidings.â€
Then, from the streams and estuaries of Kent and Dover, a strange fleet appeared: trawlers and tugs, scows and fishing sloops, lifeboats and pleasure craft, smacks and coasters; the island ferry Grade Fields; Tom Sopwith’s America’s Cup challenger Endeavour; even the London fire brigade’s fire-float Massey Shaw — all of them manned by civilian volunteers:
English fathers, sailing to rescue England’s exhausted, bleeding sons.
Even today what followed seems miraculous. Not only were Britain’s soldiers delivered; so were French support troops: a total of 338,682 men.............
The men and women of Britain heard the call from Dover CastleBy the night of the 27th a great tide of small vessels began to flow towards the sea, first to our Channel ports, and thence to the beaches of Dunkirk and the beloved Army. . .Everyone who had a boat of any kind, steam or sail, put out for Dunkirk. . . (Churchill, The Second World War).The little boats defied the incessant German air bombardment, while high above, Fighter Command fought German fighter and bomber squadrons. Guarding the bridgehead, several thousand British and French troops fought on to hold the perimeter so their comrades could be rescued to live and fight again. By June 4th, when Operation Dynamo ended, 338,682 British and Allied troops had been landed in Britain. It was a tremendous united effort.