1st Tyneside Scottish May 1940
In view of the complexity of the War Diary for this crucial month in the Brigade's existence it is recommended that the Diaries for each of the Units concerned are read alongside each other, so as to form as accurate a picture as possible of what was a confusing few weeks. The entries are kept in date order and, where clarity would be helped, the reader is referred to parallel entries from other Units. It is suggested that the Diary for the 23rd Division is read first, followed by that for the Brigade HQ and then the Infantry Battalions and Engineer Companies. There is a considerable amount of material to cover, especially as Units were in many cases broken into small parties and served as part of temporary groupings, such as Petreforce. The author has tried to be as faithful as possible to the original documents.
The War Diary of 1st Tyneside Scottish presents particular problems in terms of its presentation.
As far as the author can judge, and with the passage of time none of those involved are still living to confirm these points, Captain BURR produced a report on the traumatic events of May 1940 which was submitted to 23rd (Northumbrian) Division effectively as the Battalion's War Diary.
Subsequently, and one can only assume post-war, Lt.Col. SWINBURNE, the Battalion Commander, critiqued Captain BURR's report and annotated the document with his "corrections" and additional information. The original report seems not to have survived in its unedited form, and no explanation has been forthcoming for that. The reader will have to judge the nature of the comments made by Lt. Col. SWINBURNE, coloured as they are, perhaps, by the understandable frustrations of five years of captivity.
There is then a second lengthy document, described as a "Narrative" of the period 17 - 20 May 1940 in respect of the Battalion, which was produced post-war - and is acknowledged as such. Neither of the documents is signed and no indication is given in the Divisional files as to how they were received. It is assumed that this second document was produced by Lt. Col. SWINBURNE.
The one fact which is clear is that well-known authors have had access to the War Diary files, and in some cases to Swinburne family papers. The result is that the dominant perception of the events of this tragic period in recent histories of the Dunkirk campaign has been that of Lt. Col.SWINBURNE. When those authors have been approached, by me, about their use of this material they have, generously, acknowledged that the background to the events, and the command decisions made at the time, especially by the Brigade Commander, Brigadier Philip KIRKUP, may not always have been as described by Lt. Col. SWINBURNE. In his defence, this is not surprising - communication was almost entirely absent, Brigadier KIRKUP had been, for whatever reason, misled about the development of events (as perhaps also had the 23rd Division), and the French troops expected to be holding forward defence lines were not in position.
The testimony of my late father added a modest, but unique element, to this story. He stood by, as the Brigadier's driver, as some of these decisions on deploying the Brigade were made, overheard some of the conversations, and was acutely aware of the difficulties the Brigadier faced in obeying the orders he was given, in the face of a fluid battle dominated by a fast-moving enemy, and not knowing that the briefings he was being given on which to base his deployment decisions were inaccurate.
I would like to formally acknowledge the generosity and courtesy of Hugh Sebag-Montefiore, General Julian Thompson and Tim Lynch in responding to my queries and comments. Their work has helped the understanding of the campaign and added enormously to my knowledge of the events. I hope that my small additional pieces of information have caused them to take cognisance of a perhaps different interpretation of some events.
The first document set out below is Captain BURR's report, with the annotations by Lt.Col. SWINBURNE identified as carefully as possible.
