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Wormhoudt is an area of France just south of Dunkirk which was being held by the British Expeditionary Force as a part of the safe corridor for retreat to Dunkirk’s beaches and harbour. Several different battalions of British soldiers were in charge of defending the town by delaying the German advance, including battalions from the Royal Warwickshire Regiment, the Cheshire Regiment and gunners from the Royal Artillery. They were greatly outnumbered and outgunned.

German aircraft were flying over Wormhoudt on their way to Dunkirk and therefore it came as no surprise when they bombed Wormhoudt’s town centre. Enemy tanks soon approached on the 27th May. Major Cecil Hugh Joseph Chichester-Constable MC, of the 2nd Battalion Royal Warwickshire Regiment, was one of the men killed on this day. Having held their position for some time and allowed the safe evacuation of thousands of British troops, he ordered the remainder of his men to make their way to Dunkirk to evacuate themselves. He stayed and is said to have been last seen walking towards the enemy tanks alone with a pistol in his hand. He died in the company of a German SS Soldier, Gefreiter (Lance Corporal) Alfons Dhalhoff, who mercifully, like Cecil, was also a Roman Catholic and promised to send home Cecil’s letters. Alfons died the following day, but after the war in 1946, an article was posted in the Daily Telegraph asking for Cecil’s next-of-kin to get in contact with them. Alfon’s father had kept the package of letters, as well as Cecil’s crucifix, and forwarded them to Cecil’s uncle alongside a photograph of Alfons. They are now on display in Burton Constable Hall in Yorkshire, England.

The German’s made their attack on the morning of Tuesday the 28th May 1940. There were around 3000 troops, mostly from the 1st SS Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler. They used a Chateau in Esquelbecq, just west of Wormhoudt, as their HQ. The SS requested that the owner on the chateau brought out paintings from its walls and proceeded to shoot them, destroying numerous works of art.

Despite the German advance, the British were said to be well trained and accurate with their guns, and were able to hold their positions in Wormhoudt for all of the morning. The SS were becoming desperate and suffering many casualties with little progress. Some are said to have charged forward shouting “Heil Hitler” and were shot dead by a Cheshire Regiment’s battalion. Others were said to have dressed up in captured allied forces uniforms to try to trick the British. Eventually, some attacks in Wormhoudt proved successful and small groups of Germans started to enter the town.

By the afternoon of the 28th May, the Germans had taken charge of the area. Some of the BEF were able to escape to Dunkirk and some were captured and treated fairly. Others were not so lucky. Upon surrender to the Germans, British troops thought that they were protected by the Geneva Convention of 1929, officially named the Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War, Geneva July 27, 1929, which covered prisoners of war during WW2. The Convention states:
 
"It is strictly forbidden to kill or injure an enemy who has laid down his arms or has no remaining means of defence and has surrendered."
 
Private Alf Tombs had been making his way through a ditch when he and two others were captured by around 5 or 6 SS soldiers. They took away their identity discs as well as their jackets and helmets. One of the SS spoke perfect English and asked the men for information about their unit, where their HQ was and where the other troops were. One of the British refused to answer anything but his name, rank and number. The SS then hit them, pulled them to the ground by their hair and spat in their faces.
 
A British truck arrived and stopped where they were. Two men got out of the car and put their hands up to surrender. Without a single order, one of the SS Soldiers machine gunned the men. The SS proceeded to cheer, then one of them went around the back of the truck, took out a can of petrol and poured it over their bodies and the truck before setting them on fire.  Another British truck came up behind it and the driver was shot immediately, the truck stopping with a wheel stuck in the ditch. The SS surrounded the car and made a passenger get out. One of the SS made a grab for some kind of watch chain, but the British soldier wasn’t willing to be robbed and ended up with a pistol to his chest and killed. Tombs says the murderer then took the watch, held it to his ear and began to laugh as he danced around the corpse. Two other men from the car, soldiers from the Warwickshire Regiment, were then taken to the line of captured soldiers including Tombs.

A soldier called Private Gould had been accidentally wounded earlier in the day when one of his comrades caught his trigger and fired at him. Prior to the end of fighting and his comrades’ capture, they took him to a bench to wait for medical help. An SS Soldier shot him dead in front of his captured comrades, including Tombs.
 
The SS participated in a number of indiscriminate killings in the lead up to the massacre. Just south of Wormhoudt is an area called le Rietveld, where five surrendered British soldiers were forced to dig their own graves before they were shot dead.

Burt Evans was fighting under command of Captain Lynn-Allen. He was just 19 years old and had only joined his battalion a few days before they were sent to Wormhoudt. They were eventually surrounded and had ran out of ammunition supplies. Lynn-Allen ordered his men to surrender and said “Don't be disappointed, you fought well.” Some of the men weren’t ready to give up to the Germans however, and so they tried to escape. They fled towards the Peene Becque River, and some of Evans’ comrades were able to cross it and escaped. Evans couldn’t swim and so he couldn’t go any further. He waited to be taken prisoner and was found by some SS Soldiers. He then joined the 50 or so men who had already been taken prisoner, including Captain Lynn-Allen and Alf Tombs.

Not all of the soldiers captured were those defending Wormhoudt –some were using the area as part of their path of retreat to Dunkirk when they were captured, including Gunner Parry. Parry was in one of a convoy of trucks travelling towards Wormhoudt when a German tank fired at them. He jumped out and ran across the road to escape. By this point Wormhoudt had been destroyed and many of the houses were burning. After hours of travelling by the river and being unsure of exactly where he was and where to go, he decided to enter a house to search for a map. He was unsuccessful at locating one, and when he left the front door he was seen by a group of SS soldiers and was made a prisoner.

The SS took away the prisoners ID discs and belongings and some were beaten. The prisoners were held near a church while some of the SS soldiers went to a Cafe called St. Hubert. They sat and drank alcohol while their prisoners were forced to stand and keep their hands in the air. Evans then witnessed the mass murder of more British soldiers further up the road. The Germans had lined them up and opened fire on them with machine guns. He described them as falling like rag dolls.

Later, they met with a further group of up to 60 prisoners, taking them to a total of more than 100. More SS soldiers joined them. Upon their continued march, they were sometimes forced to run, and those that fell and could travel no further were beaten and killed. There was said to be one prisoner crawling on his hands and knees in an attempt to keep up when he was killed.

Eventually, they arrived at the edge of a field called la Plaine au Bois near Wormhoudt and Esquelbecq. In the corner was a wooden barn used to milk cattle. There was a sudden downpour of rain, said to be the first since in over 2 weeks, and the prisoners were forced into the barn.

The whole ordeal that followed was witnessed by Private George Merry of the 2nd Warwickshire Regiment. He had been wounded in the arm during earlier fighting and had faked being dead to avoid being captured. He had crawled into some hedges nearby the barn and had remained undiscovered.

Driver John Borland and Gunner Nobby Clarke were two of the first to escape. They noticed a door in the corner of the barn which has been blocked with mud and cow manure. They kept pushing it a little until it opened, and they and 3 others made a run for it without being seen. The 5 managed to reach another barn before later being recaptured, however this time they were treated properly as prisoners of war.

Captain Lynn-Allen stepped forward to speak of his concerns about their treatment, but a SS Soldier became agitated and pulled out a stick grenade. He threw it into the barn and it exploded amongst the prisoners. Evans was one of the prisoners who was badly wounded in his arm. The SS soldiers had taken cover from the grenade and Lynn-Evans took the opportunity to pull Evans with him as they ran around the barn and attempted to escape. The SS opened fire on them but instead managed to hit one of their own. Captain Lynn-Allen and Evans kept running until they found a pond. They got into it and hid under the water. A SS soldier caught up with them, found them in the water and shot at them both. Captain Lynn-Allen was shot in the head and killed instantly, but Evans was shot in the neck and managed to survive. Captain Lynn-Allen’s body was never found and he is remembered on the Dunkirk memorial. Evans managed to crawl away and hide.

Inside the barn, the SS threw two more grenades, but they failed to kill everyone inside with thanks to the bravery of Sergeant Major Augustus Jennings and Sergeant Stanley Moore who hurled themselves onto them to save their comrades. 3 more grenades were thrown into the barn, and Alf Tombs found himself stuck and hidden under the dead bodies of two of his friends. Perhaps because they had run out of grenades, the SS Soldiers ordered that 5 soldiers come out of the barn. Eventually 5 men volunteered to leave. They were lined up and shot one-by-one. Miraculously, one of these men survived.

Straight afterwards, the SS asked for 5 more men and again shot them one-by-one. Whilst this was happening, two more soldiers attempted to flee through a hole in the back of the barn but were seen and shot at. One of them was left for dead but managed to survive.

Those who were left alive in the barn now refused to come outside, most of them because their injuries were so bad that they were unable to move if they wanted to. The SS Soldiers opened fire on those who remained. One man was heard shouting “kill me, kill me” until his cries were no longer heard. Another was said to be reciting the Lord’s Prayer but died before finishing it. Others were seen pulling out photos of their loved ones that they had manged to hide when their belongings were removed. Believing that none of the men could possibly be alive, the SS left the barn
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Merry, who had been watching from the hedges, saw as the SS walked towards him. A German stood over him with his rifle pointed at him. Merry collapsed and the German thought he was dead.

They were discovered by other German soldiers who were not a part of the SS and were looking for German casualties. These soldiers could not speak English, but were able to communicate with the British in French. They questioned why the men were lacking weapons and helmets, but soon realised the men had been captured by the SS. These German soldiers treated the men well – one British soldier recalls a German taking off his shirt to make a compress for his wounded chest. They were all given medical treatment.

Parry, who had become one of the prisoners after searching for a map in a house, woke up in a French farmhouse and found that a farmer and his wife had been looking after him. He remembered giving the woman a 100 franc note he had been carrying to thank her.

All of the men who survived the massacre were eventually re-captured and spent the remainder of the war in Prisoner of War camps, however one man, Reginald West, took over 5 months to be captured again. He dressed up as a civilian and helped French farmers with their crops until he made it to Marseilles and was caught.

The official number of British soldiers found to have died in Wormhoudt during this battle is recorded as 157.

Survivor Brian Fahey, who had been shot outside the barn in the line of 5, said:

If I were to meet this man, I would do nothing more today than show him my six children and my nine grandchildren.

I would play him the music that I have composed, and ask him: "Just imagine all the possibilities you destroyed when you killed those ninety youngsters" I think if I were to say all that he would surely feel remorse...

Future generations ought to know what happened, so that such a thing could never happen again."

With particular thanks to user Drew5233 on the WW2 Talk forums for his incredible research