76 years ago, after the German Panzer units swept the British Expeditionary Force into a pocket around the Channel ports, more than 800 ‘little ships’ including Thames sailing barges, gaff-rigged fishing smacks, yachts, motor-boats and lifeboats, were pressed into service to rescue the armies in retreat. The amateur ‘navy’ of vessels lifted soldiers from the shallow beaches and carried them out to awaiting warships; others ferried them directly back across the Channel to Ramsgate and Dover.

Now another flotilla of little ships and sailors is heading to the French coast to act as ‘extras’ in the latest project of film director Christopher Nolan, of The Dark Knight, Batman Begins and Interstellar fame. Earlier in the year, at Nolan’s request, Ian Gilbert, commodore of the Association of Dunkirk Little Ships, invited members to take part in some pre-production filming and also asked for a list of members who are taking their boats across to join actors Tom Hardy, Mark Rylance and Kenneth Branagh.

‘There are issues surrounding insurance and costs that will of course need to be resolved. However we are simply trying to get an idea of how many Little Ships might be available to support the production,’ said Gilbert.

Of the small ports heavily involved with Operation Dynamo was my home, Leigh-on- Sea in Essex. From this Domesday Book town went a flotilla of six gaff cutters, used to rake the cockles from the Maplin Sands, their shoal draught hulls ideal to glide in over the shallow French beaches to collect Tommies. They were Defender, Letitia, Renown, Reliance, Resolute and Endeavour.