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with refugees and their luggage, whose engines wheezed as they struggled to transport their loads. In the town of Avesnes British soldiers were shocked when the strangest of all refugee vehicles appeared. It was the lumbering hulk of a steamroller. Pulled behind it were two large farm carts carrying around thirty people. Behind that were two cows, tied to the wagons by rope.
    In some towns and villages the soldiers watched as the pitiful columns arrived. As they passed through, their numbers were swelled by locals who decided they too should join the rush to escape to safety. Once the columns had departed, the local tradesmen finally shut up shop and joined the exodus.
    Although many of the refugees came from rural communities, there were few animals among them. There were the ever-present horses pulling carts, and a few dogs trotting faithfully beside their masters, but little else. Some families had birdcages tied to the top of their possessions but most pets had been left behind. Everywhere, farm animals stood dejectedly in their pens, as if expecting to be let out into the fields. Livestock seemed to stare at the retreating soldiers, their eyes pleading for the feed their owners had neglected to leave for them. Dogs barked desperately for food as they strained at the chains that restricted their movements and prevented their joining the hordes fleeing the front. The most wretched among the animals were executed by retreating soldiers unable to endure the miserable sight of the abandoned creatures starving to death.
    For the refugees, there was a sense of hopelessness and confusion. They had left their homes far behind them but had no idea when they might reach safety. Exhausted people collapsed at the roadsides and burst into tears. Babies screamed, children cried and mothers wept – but everyone kept moving westwards. When asked where they were going, the people simply shrugged their shoulders and kept shuffling aimlessly towards the horizon.
    The true nature of warfare was most brutally exposed, not by the sad sight of civilians trudging away from the front lines, but by the carnage inflicted upon them by the Luftwaffe. The sight of German fighters and bombers sweeping down to attack refugee columns became a regular feature of the retreat. Many soldiers avoided any contact with the slow-moving columns that were such an easy target. Instead they hurried past them or took detours across fields. Some among the troops experienced a strange sense of calm as they sheltered beneath trees and watched as the exposed refugees were attacked by German warplanes.
    For Bill Holmes, his introduction to war came when the enemy bombed a bridge across the Albert Canal:The noise was terrifying. It was hell. The Stukas came right down at us. It was the first time I was really shaken. The planes blew up the bridge along with all the refugees who were on it. That horrified me, it was a terrible thing to see. There were women pushing prams along and they were all blown up. We saw bits and pieces of bodies everywhere. It really takes a toll on you. Especially when it’s the bodies of little kiddies. It was something you can’t forget – people really are worse than animals.
     
    For all the horrors and hardship he endured in the days, then years, that followed, this one image haunted Holmes for the rest of his life.
    Despite the horrors, the soldiers had no choice but to keep moving. One observer attempted to explain why he was able to watch the slaughter of civilians without being troubled by the scenes: ‘It was not that we were callous, we were not horrified nor indignant, it simply was we were disinterested . . . Did we feel it and know it? We could not. We were living in a continuous present and our consciousness was not registering.’
    Amid the crowds fleeing westwards were gangs of French, Belgian and Dutch soldiers. Some were disciplined, still fully armed and carrying their kit. Dutch soldiers on bicycles weaved in and out of the