The little ships crews returning to the miracle of Dunkirk

Under the cover of darkness, hundreds of civilian sailors took their small boats into the shelling and gunfire of a warzone, and helped rescue more than 330,000 soldiers. Eighty-five years later, 67 of these surviving little ships are making their return to Dunkirk, to mark arguably the most miraculous feat in military history.

Pudge, the wooden Thames sailing barge, was moored up in London at night in May 1940 when her unremarkable life as a cargo carrier was interrupted in spectacular fashion.

She was one of about 850 little ships that were requisitioned by the government to help rescue Allied forces stranded on the beach in northern France.

Pudge was towed to Dunkirk with two other barges, but they both sunk.

An estimated 160 troops - wounded, soaked through and traumatised - clambered aboard Pudge and were taken back to Ramsgate in Kent.

Pudge now enjoys a peaceful retirement in Maldon, Essex, as a charter boat.

Just as she did 85 years ago, the barge will set sail before sunrise on Monday - this time with 16 local people on board.

Tim Kenney used to captain oil tankers but said nothing in his career would compare with sailing on Pudge to Dunkirk.

"It's something that I never thought I would ever be able to do," said the 66-year-old.

"There's going to be mixed emotions.

"Thousands of people were killed, thousands were saved - it's hard to believe that, less than 100 years ago, people were still fighting like that, and there is still [fighting] going on nowadays, and you think why?

"It's mixed emotions, you're proud, but also sad."

Alan Coday, another of the crew, said the trip would help him understand the trauma his grandfather experienced.

Ted Coday was not at Dunkirk, but his grandson said he would never talk with family about what he saw while serving as a radio operator as a teenager in World War One and as a fire warden in World War Two.

"For me going to Dunkirk is the closest thing I can get to understanding the enormity of the whole exercise - it's just huge," he explained.

The Endeavour is another Essex little ship making the trip across the Channel.

The 10m-long (33ft) vessel was one of six cockle boats from Leigh-on-Sea that were together credited with squeezing 180 soldiers onboard and bringing them home.

It featured in the 2017 blockbuster Dunkirk, starring actors including Kenneth Branagh, Cillian Murphy, Tom Hardy and Harry Styles - and in the movie it could be seen crewed by real local fishermen.

Cameron McGregor, 64, secretary of the Leigh-on-Sea Endeavour Trust, is one of nine people braving the elements on deck next week.

He joined the last anniversary trip in 2015, although the 2020 return to Dunkirk was cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

"You can't go back to these places without having a bit of an emotion because of the sacrifices of people, both civilian and military - particularly military - the destruction of lives, property and everything else - you just can't forget it, and if you do, you'll curse to repeat it."

Alan Barttram, skipper of the Endeavour, said it would be "very, very emotional".

"What a wonderful job they did to get the soldiers off the beach, but to go back and commemorate will be something very special in my mind; something I will never forget."

The two boats from Essex will be joined by at least one other from the East of England: the Maid Marion, which is a 39ft (12m) Cornish lugger moored in Woodbridge, Suffolk.

The ships and their crews will gather in Ramsgate on Monday before making the eight-hour Channel crossing as a flotilla to Dunkirk on Wednesday.

Crews will attend a series of ceremonies in northern France over the course of a week.

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