England’s Entry Into World War 2

In The Charmed Children of Rookskill Castle, Kat Bateson faces change in the early days of World War 2:

The pieces that made up Katherine Bateson’s world were scattered across the landscape and over the ocean, far and wide, blown about by the winds of war. Kat herself felt like one of the clocks in Father’s workshop, all wheels and plates and springs and pins strewn across the table, waiting.

 But she squared her shoulders and told herself to hold her wits together. That’s what her father would want, and what her brother and sister needed. Especially given the urgency in Father’s letter to Mum, the letter sending the children away.

war map

England’s entry into World War 2 was forced by the non-stop aggression of Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany. England formed the western front line against the German offensive; if not for English bravery and the entry of the United States into the European campaign, Germany might have taken Great Britain.

 war dunkirk

The evacuation of Dunkirk was hasty and dreadful.

In late 1938 Great Britain was led by Neville Chamberlain as Prime Minister. He was anxious to avoid another World War, and when Adolf Hitler’s Germany began an aggressive campaign in eastern Europe he cosigned the Munich Pact, giving Germany the go-ahead to invade Sudentenland in Czechoslovakia. Unfortunately, this Pact didn’t halt German aggression into the rest of Czechoslovakia, followed by the German invasion of Poland.

The British had pledged support for Poland, and on September 3, 1939, Britain declared war on Germany.

Winston Churchill replaced Chamberlain as Prime Minister in May 1940, and Churchill proved to be a charismatic as well as more aggressive leader. Later that same month the Germans staged a massive offensive, and the British Expeditionary Force had to evacuate Dunkirk in haste. Belgium and France fell to the Germans and the war gained terrible momentum.

war

In the summer and fall of 1940 Nazi Germany, with its deadly Luftwaffe (air force), engaged the British in the Battle of Britain. German pilots assailed Britain with almost nightly bombings, especially over the city of London. These bombings were known as the Blitzkrieg (German for “lightning war), or Blitz.

Nazi Germany was determined to rule all of Europe.

2 Responses to “England’s Entry Into World War 2”

  1. Linda W

    Such an awful time. It must have been horribly scary for children (not to mention adults).

    Reply
    • Janet

      It was, Linda. I’ll be talking about the Blitz in an upcoming post. The British really do have a “stiff upper lip”!

      Reply

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