Wynn Wheldon

More stirring stories of little ships

Julia Jones celebrates the sailors involved in Dunkirk, St Nazaire and other heroic operations of the second world war

‘The Little Ships at Dunkirk: June 1940’ by Norman Wilkinson. [Getty Images]
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  • Uncommon Courage: The Yachtsmen Volunteers of World War II

    Julia Jones

    Adlard Coles, pp. 320, £20

‘I found this story by accident,’ begins Julia Jones’s Uncommon Courage, referring to documents belonging to her late father that she discovered in a far corner of her attic. True, but also false. This is not one story: it is a tsunami of stories. Sometimes it’s hard going, as you try to shelve the curiosity aroused by each tale.

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