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Lots more English soldiers passed through. Some of them asked for my address. I hope they write to me. They behaved much better than yesterday’s lot! Besides, they didn’t have too bad a time. They offered me a cigarette, which I smoked in the street! If the people of Verneuil don’t like it, I don’t care. Another one asked for my address. I gave it to him. Will he write to me? Will he write to me? That is the question!

Page from Micheline’s notebook, 1939.

I love watching the English go by!…My one source of pleasure is talking to them. I think I’m going to get told off by the Latin teacher for missing my lesson last Tuesday, but I don’t care!

On 10 May, a week of good weather was forecast and Hitler launched ‘Operation Yellow’. One hundred and thirty-six German divisions attacked Holland and Belgium. Within days Holland capitulated and German troops made the first breach in the French defences. Flieger (Aircraftman) Herbert Veigel was serving as a radio operator with the staff of the Supreme Command of 2nd Army Corps behind the German lines. He wrote home to his family from an area already conquered by the front-line troops, just over a mile away from the French border.