In the early hours of 4 June “Operation Dynamo”, the evacuation of Allied forces from Dunkirk, finally ended as German forces finally overcame the mostly French troops defending the beachhead. Later that day Winston Churchill gave his famous, “We shall fight on the beaches” speech to Parliament, and, while celebrating the success of the operation, reminded the country that “wars are not won by evacuations”. On 3 June, Paris was bombed with the loss of 250 lives. On 7 June, the aircraft carrier HMS Glorious was sunk by the German battleships the Scharnhorst and the Gneisenau, and 1,500 sailors were killed.
In Caithness, the John O’Groat Journal reported that the Local Defence Volunteers (later renamed the Home Guard) already numbered 700: with invasion in everyone’s minds, observation posts had been set up around the county, and meetings were being held to organise the men.
Their commanding officer, Group Captain M’Hardy, who was also the County Director of Education and Welfare Officer wrote on the 4th June, “Life here is very hectic just now and for the last ten days I have been in the throes of getting the Defence Force under way in the county… Education plus Welfare plus Defence leave me little time, although I occasionally snatch a spare half hour after 2 a.m.!”
As part of the Women’s Volunteer Service for Caithness, which had previously been set up to act as a support unit for the local Air Raid Precautions, a Housewife’s Service was now organised in Wick and soon numbered over a hundred members. Members received training in ARP procedures and first aid.
Meanwhile the threat from the air continued, as German aircraft continued to drop bombs on Caithness. On 6 June the police at Lybster reported, “H.E. [high explosive] bomb dropped on grass land about 500 yards south of Limekilns, Upper Lybster at 23.40 hours 5th June. Large crater. No damage reported. Another dull explosion heard same locality, probably bomb dropped in sea.” So far these bombs had all fallen in rural areas, far from towns and villages, and had done little or no damage; tragically, within a month, that would change.
All through the winter and spring, Caithness families had had to endure the loss of loved ones serving in the Royal Navy and the merchant service; now the county suffered its first military casualty of the war this week, when Private Dougald Davidson of Helshedder, Reay, was killed while serving with the British Expeditionary Force in France.
