Tuesday, 13 August
Today we had a lie-in and a relaxing day in Dieppe. We have been sailing every day recently and we need to be fresh for our early start tomorrow morning.
Dieppe is a very pleasant town with dramatic cliffs surrounding the Normandy town houses which in turn surround the huge harbour. It’s very nice to be in the middle of town instead of down an industrial backwater.
Unfortunately the fantastic looking chateau / fortress / art gallery is only open Wednesday to Sunday
But Alex and I found 2 enormous churches. The Saint Jérôme and the Saint Rémy – both very impressive.
It was in the first that we had the first intimations of the close link between Dieppe and Canada.
In the 17th century, the Dieppoise were pioneers in settling ‘New France’ in modern day Quebec. They were initially attracted by the fishing opportunities but soon transferred to the beaver skin trade used to make hats.
This caused conflict with the native Americans and some were ‘martyred’, others used the local tribes to source the skins and caused fratricidal conflict among the tribes.
Many settled in Canada, and never forgot their Dieppe heritage.
In August 1942, the Allies mounted a disastrous raid on Dieppe as a test run for the eventual DDay landing and it was mainly Canadian troops who were sent into action.
It had been planned for June but there were delays due to bad weather. Despite this, and the potential of information leaks to the enemy, Lord Mountbatten decided to go ahead anyway in August because, he said, if the Germans had seen the plans, ‘the last thing they would expect is for us to be stupid enough to choose the exact same target again.’
The Germans were well prepared and decimated the Allies. Thus the brave Canadian regiments suffered a 68% casualty loss and only one group made their objective. Over 3000 were killed, woulnded or taken prisoner out of 5000.
Lessons were learned – such as the importance of preemptive artillery barrages, artificial harbours and not attacking a major well-defended town.
Both Churchill and Mountbatten claimed the losses were justified by the improvements that made DDay a success. The Canadians weren’t so sure.
Dieppe has a fine memorial garden to the fallen.
When Dieppe was finally liberated in September 1944 it was fittingly one of the same Canadian divisions that delivered the town to freedom.
David went to swim in the sea and we joined him for chips on the beach.
However David fell asleep and Alex went swimming instead.
We had to visit the ferry port to get our passports stamped and after walking there (half hour) we were told by a kind lady to come back in an hour (9pm) when the night shift would be on. She looked sorry for the sad non-EU citizens that we now tragically are.
We found a friendly restaurant back in town, all the closer ones were full, and then trudged back to the ferry port. They were very quick to sort us out the second time and we can now sail to England in the morning!
We have sailed well over 1000 miles!