MASEFIELD’S DUNKIRK

I really enjoyed reading the recent aticle on John Masefield. His poems Tewkesbury Road and Cargoes were two that I learned at school in England. Not many people are aware that Masefield was commissioned by the Government to write an account of the evacuation of Dunkirk that was published in March 1941 under the title The Nine Days Wonder (The Operation Dynamo). The book was dedicated to Vice-Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsay KCB, MVO and “to the Officers, Warrant-Officers and Ratings and to all the others who bore a hand in Operation Dynamo”. It concludes with his poems, including To the Seamen and A Young English Airman.

David MacDougall, Regina, Saskatchewan