Dunkirk

 city, seaport, commune - administrative division

Dunkirk was first mentioned in 1067 as Dunkerk (Dutch: “Church of the Dune”). The area was much disputed between Spain, England, the Netherlands and France. In the Eighty Years' War the port was the base of the infamous Dunkirkers: private shipping magnates (reders in Dutch) operated whole privateer fleets to intercept merchants from countries hostile to the Spanish Habsburgs. The Dunkirkers briefly lost their home port, as the city was conquered for Louis XIII of France in 1646 but recaptured by the Habsburgs in 1652. In 1657, as a result of war between Oliver Cromwell's Commonwealth and the Kingdom of Spain, it was captured by English forces, and was awarded to England in the peace the following year. It became definitively French when Charles II of England sold it to France for £320,000 on 17 October 1662. During the reign of Louis XIV, a large number of commerce raiders had again their base at Dunkirk; Jean Bart was the most famous, known for attacking Dutch ships. The Man in the Iron Mask was also arrested in Dunkirk.

In May 1940 during World War II, the British expeditionary forces in France aiding the French, fearful of the oncoming German troops, began to retreat until they reached the port of Dunkirk and, with their backs to the ocean, had no place else to retreat. The German forces could have easily destroyed the British expeditionary force, especially when many of the British troops, in their haste to withdraw, had left behind their heavy equipment. For some unexplained and still unknown reason, Adolf Hitler ordered the German army to stop the attack. Some say it was because Hitler was still hopeful of establishing diplomatic peace with Britain and was still trying to avoid a full-fledged war . This lull in the action gave the British a few days to escape by boat. Winston Churchill ordered any ship or boat available, large or small, to pick up the stranded soldiers, and 338,226 men were evacuated (the miracle of Dunkirk, as Winston Churchill called it). It took over 900 vessels to evacuate the British and French soldiers, and more than 40,000 vehicles were abandoned, as well as massive amounts of other military equipment and supplies. The British evacuation of Dunkirk through the English Channel was codenamed Operation Dynamo.