In late May 1940, more than 300,000 British and French soldiers were trapped on the beaches at Dunkirk with the German army closing in. The beaches sloped so gently that big warships couldn’t get close, so the British Admiralty appealed to the owners of small boats for help. Small boats of all kinds crossed the Channel to ferry soldiers off the sand to the larger ships. Between May 26 and June 4, more than 338,000 men were rescued. Winston Churchill called it a miracle of deliverance. The rescue happened because ordinary people with ordinary boats answered the call.
