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General => Armed Forces => World War Two => Topic started by: Rosezi on Sunday 25 February 24 15:21 GMT (UK)
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Apologies if I have asked this question previously.
My father often said on many occasions that his father was rescued from Dunkirk. My grandfather would have been 35 in 1940 and came from Caithness, Scotland. We have no idea what his regiment may have been. How would I find out more information about soldiers who were at Dunkirk?
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The vast majority of soldiers who came back through Dunkirk were in the Regular army, which means that your grandfather would have joined up some time before the war started. Obviously you know his name and his date of birth, so I would suggest applying for his service record from the MOD.
https://www.gov.uk/get-copy-military-records-of-service/apply-for-the-records-of-a-deceased-serviceperson
Attacking the problem from the angle of trying to work out what unit he was in could be very difficult. There were around 390,000 men in the British Expeditionary Force. Of these 11,014 were killed or died of wounds, and 41,338 men were missing or taken prisoner, making a total of 52,352 who did not come back with the BEF. Thus roughly 337,000 men including 14,074 wounded had to be evacuated, mostly via Dunkirk.