The War of Nerves

British Civilians & The Threat of Invasion 1940-41

James Doing History 600

Prof. Ussishkin May 11, 2012

Home Guardsmen encounter a mock “fifth columnist” in Tain, Scotland, August 1941. Photograph: Imperial War Museum. Copied from S.P. MacKenzie’s The Home Guard

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In 2001, a Northumberland bookstore owner discovered a

remarkable vintage poster. The striking image – bold white lettering

on a bright red background – has since become an international

sensation. The previously unseen but now wildly famous Keep Calm

and Carry On poster was one of a three-part series created in 1939

by the Ministry of Information in an attempt to bolster morale

during the early and uncertain days of World War II.1 The Ministry

distributed two similar posters,2 but 2,500,000 copies of Keep Calm

and Carry On were never displayed. It is commonly believed that Keep Calm was reserved for the

critical event of a German invasion. The poster and its iconic slogan represent the fact that from

roughly May 1940 until December 1941, Britons were held captive by the threat of invasion,

which came from all corners and saturated the media in sensational cycles of rumor and

speculation. Though the main objective of Hitler’s aggressive rhetoric was to influence British

military operations in favor of Germany, his “war of nerves” had a profound effect on British

civilians, who, due to the government’s lack of public instruction and the difficulty of organizing

defense preparations at the local level, had no choice but to come to terms with the idea of

invasion on their own.

The private thoughts of hundreds of British civilians concerning the hair-raising notion of

invasion were recorded in the war diaries and file reports published by Mass Observation, a

massive sociological project begun in 1937 by a team of three young men who set out to found the

“anthropology of ourselves” – that is, the science of British life.3 Throughout the war, Mass

Observation regularly collected the writings of nearly 500 male and female volunteers of all ages

and occupations across Britain. In addition, so-called “Observers” conducted surveys, interviews,

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1 Lewis, R.M. “Planning, Design and Reception of British Home Front Propaganda Posters of the Second World War.” Southampton: University of Southampton, 2004, Ch. 4 “The First Posters”. 2 Your courage, your cheerfulness, your resolution will bring us victory and Freedom is in peril, defend it with all your might 3 Hinton, James. Nine Wartime Lives: Mass Observation and the Making of the Modern Self. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010, 2.

The original poster found by Stuart Manley, displayed at Barter Books.

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and opinion polls in the street concerning a broad range of topics, most significantly civilian

reactions to propaganda initiatives by the Ministry of Information. They synthesized their findings

into daily file reports that have been preserved along with the diaries in a special collection at the

University of Sussex. This treasury of wartime commentary provides invaluable insight into

civilian attitudes and experiences and will be cited extensively throughout the paper; the diaries

and file reports narrate the social and psychological phenomenon of “invasion” which, for all

intents and purposes, was discarded and forgotten along with the now famous Keep Calm and

Carry On posters. They present a panoramic view of a time when Britons, as one diarist noted, had

“never known such a panic”.4

Using these and other first-hand accounts as a foundation, I will explore the psychological

and emotional consequences of Hitler’s “war of nerves” on the civilian population (with a special

focus on the conduct of the popular press) and discuss how the specter of invasion shaped the role

of the civilian during wartime, examining the Home Guard and other local organizations in

particular. Most importantly, I will show how clumsy efforts by the Ministry of Information to

prepare Britons for an invasion scenario (the best they could do was “Keep Calm and Carry On”)

further frayed the public’s already shaky faith in an administration that was plagued by an

antagonistic relationship with the civilian population.5 In recent decades, revisionist historians

such as Angus Calder and Clive Ponting have reexamined the popular legend of Britain’s “Finest

Hour”, pointing out the public’s less than golden morale as well as its cynical view of government

incompetence and so-called “national unity”.6 In February 1942, Mass Observation reported a 59%

lack of confidence in “some or all members of government”;7 I will show how the threat of

invasion in particular induced public and private hysteria, tested (and exposed) the fractured nature

of national “unity”, and contributed to a weakening faith in the government’s ability to manage the

war – without a single German setting foot on English soil. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!4 M.O. D 5323: June 1, 1940. 5 McLaine, Ian. Ministry of Morale. London: Allen & Unwin, 1979, 2. 6 Angus Calder argues against the persistent “sentimentalisation of 1940” in The Myth of the Blitz (1991). 7 M.O. FR 1111, “Opinion on Cabinet Changes” (February 24, 1942).

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Operation Sea-Lion: Fantasy or Reality?

Hitler’s exact plans regarding Britain have long been the subject of debate for historians.

The extensive preparations for a sea-borne offensive against the British Isles are tempting

indications that Hitler may have had it in his mind from day one to invade. Indeed, all signs

pointed toward this outcome: As German troops swept through continental Europe in their

unstoppable 1940 Blitzkrieg, a similar attack on Britain seemed inevitable. But Hitler hesitated; it

was not until July that he issued an official order to prepare for an amphibious assault. Most

historians agree that Hitler never actually intended to cross the English Channel; the constant

threats of invasion coming out of Berlin functioned solely to weaken morale and coerce the British

into accepting a German compromise.8

Nevertheless, on July 16, 1940, perhaps emboldened by the smooth and swift occupation of

the Channel Islands earlier that month,9 Hitler drew up General Order No. 16: “I have decided to

prepare a landing operation against England, and if necessary to carry it out.”10 Accompanying the

declaration was a list of five preconditions to be met before an invasion could be attempted, the

most important of which were total air supremacy over the English Channel and sufficient

destruction of the British Royal Navy. These preconditions were to be met by mid-August, giving

the German military apparatus less than a month to prepare for a full-scale invasion. Not

surprisingly, most of the German high command dismissed the notion with a considerable amount

of cynicism, but Hitler pressed forward. On August 1 he issued a directive calling for

intensification of aerial attacks on British coastal defenses, and on August 17, “Operation Sea-

Lion”, a multi-phased, 39-division assault of epic proportions, was officially on the table.11

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!8 See DeWeerd (1948), Kent (1963), Michaelis (1972), Farguharson (1990), Schenk (1990), and others. 9 An examination of the invasion and occupation of the Channel Islands, and the implications thereof, was cut from this paper. Of note are the British government’s lackluster response to the attack, civilian actions (fleeing vs. “staying put”), and the relatively courteous behavior of the Germans toward British civilians – To what extent can the Channel Islands be considered a precedent to a general invasion of the British mainland? 10 DeWeerd, H.A. “Hitler’s Plans for Invading Britain”, Military Affairs 12, no. 3 (1948): 144 11 DeWeerd, 144

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For those who doubt the sincerity of Hitler’s threat to invade Britain, the focus of German

efforts over the next month remains a mystery. A substantial amount of time and resources went

into preparations for Sea-Lion: The navy assembled massive transport craft in harbors along the

Channel coast, thousands of assault troops received special training for an amphibious operation,

and a special set of maps was published for invading troops detailing transportation and

communication networks throughout Britain.12 By September 3, everything was in place for the

invasion of the century. The only element missing from the equation was the requisite air

superiority that would guarantee success for a landing operation. Winston Churchill famously

stated in a radio broadcast on August 20, 1940, “Never in the field of human conflict was so much

owed by so many to so few.”13 It would seem, if Hitler’s plan to invade is to be taken seriously,

that Churchill was entirely correct. Between July and September the Luftwaffe lost nearly 2000

planes in the Battle of Britain, failing to weaken the R.A.F. and making the proposed invasion far

too dangerous to attempt without proper air cover. On September 19, all German invasion craft

were dispersed to safer waters,14 and, on October 12, Hitler officially postponed Sea-Lion

indefinitely. A more subtle, yet decisive, directive was issued on December 3, 1940, instructing

munitions minister Georg Thomas to reorient armaments productions for land campaigns, since

there “would no longer be any mention of an invasion of Britain but only a siege”.15 With this

directive Hitler put the final nail in the coffin of Operation Sea-Lion.

Britons had thus escaped the ultimate nightmare of invasion, and, according to General

Bernard Montgomery, they should have thanked their lucky stars. Despite Hitler’s misgivings,

there would have been “no chance” of resisting a full-fledged German invasion, due to the

desperate state of the British army during the summer of 1940, which lacked equipment and

organization after the chaos at Dunkirk (this information was apparently lost on German

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!12 See Schenk, Peter. Invasion of England 1940. London: Conway Maritime Press, Ltd., 1990. 13 Churchill, Winston. A Man of Destiny: Winston S. Churchill. 1st ed. Waukesha, Wis.: Country Beautiful Foundation, 1965. 14 “German plans for invading Britain in 1940”, The Times: November 19, 1946. 15 DeWeerd, 147.

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intelligence, who over-counted British forces at an astoundingly high number).16 However, though

Hitler had permanently shelved his plans to invade Britain, he pursued an equally effective style of

warfare that kept the world guessing and his enemy at bay.

The War of Nerves: 1940-41

In the October 12 directive, Hitler ordered the carefully planned preparations for invasion

to be maintained until further notice, albeit to be used “purely as a military and political threat”. In

fact, Hitler did everything in his power to “give an impression that an attack on the British Isles is

planned for this year”, going so far as to sustain the illusion within German ranks. Until June 22,

1941, the entire planning of “Operation Barbarossa” was referred to as “Operation Sea-Lion” in a

deliberate attempt to deceive German soldiers.17 Nazi newspapers did their part to keep up this

farce among German civilians, who were reminded daily of the imminence of Britain’s invasion:

In August 1940, the Völkischer Beobachter predicted that Britain would “collapse beneath our

flag” while Der Montag reported “nervousness increasing every hour in the anticipation of

attack”.18 So effective was this campaign of deception that on September 5, 1940, a Luftwaffe

pilot, upon bailing out of his plane and landing in the coastal village of Whitby, politely asked to

be directed to the nearest invading German troops. The villagers escorted him to the police, where

he seemed genuinely startled to learn that the invasion had not yet begun!19 Although the

Germans’ constant harping on the nearness of invasion would have spoiled any element of surprise

in the event of an actual attack, the barrage of threats served an invaluable purpose in that it forced

the British to “reckon with the eventuality” of invasion.20 One had only to look across the Strait of

Dover to see long-range gun emplacements and convoys of assault barges looming in the mist.21

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!16 DeWeerd, 146. 17 Farguharson, John. “After Sealion: A German Channel Tunnel?”, Journal of Contemporary History 25, no. 4

(1990): 423. 18 “Calm Before Invasion?”, The Times: August 6, 1940. 19 Phipps, Katherine. The Diary of Katherine M. Phipps, 1939-45: September 5, 1940. Accessed through “British

and Irish Women’s Letters and Diaries”, Alexander Street Press (2004). 20 Farguharson, 424. 21 “Watching and Waiting”, The Times: August 27, 1941.

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Just how effective was Hitler’s war of nerves on the British? The statistical data compiled

by Mass Observation provides insight into the salience of invasion fear among civilians, whose

expectation of an attack waxed and waned throughout the first two years of the war and was

characterized by fleeting and sensational scares. The spring and summer of 1940 experienced an

initial and intense “invasion fever”: In May and June, 22% of those polled accepted the

“likelihood” of invasion, accompanied by a massive media discussion of the possibility and a

flurry of diary entries riddled with the fear of, for example, waking up to the sound of jackboots in

the street. In July, only 17% expected invasion, but as a topic of conversation it made up 58% of

all war talk, reflected in numerous Mass Observation diaries. The number of people who believed

in invasion dropped to 10% in August and almost zero in September, and it would seem that the

war of nerves had cooled off. However, starting in January 1941, these figures sky-rocketed to a

point when at the end of February no fewer than 53% of those polled believed Hitler would

attempt an invasion. By June the number had dropped to 38% and steadily declined until Mass

Observation stopped taking “invasion expectation” polls in September.22 However, as late as

August 1943, families on the coast were making detailed plans in the event of an attack, and as late

as January 1944 coastal communities staged full-fledged mock invasions in preparation.23 It was

not until D-Day in June 1944 that the idea became absolutely unthinkable. The fear of invasion

melted away as the once heavily-fortified beaches finally opened to eager vacationers.24

The most important factor shaping civilians’ attitudes toward invasion was the ebb and

flow of international events. Until May 1940, people had accustomed themselves to the so-called

“phony war”, and “the only over-heards about invasion were in joking or drunk conversations”.25

The invasion and occupation of Belgium and Holland caused the first wave of serious fear among

Britons, who suddenly found the enemy on their doorstep. One woman in Norfolk wished she did

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!22 For polling data: M.O. FR 349, 438, 568, 576, and 745. 23 M.O. D 5201: August 23, 1943 and M.O. D 5399: January 11, 1944. 24 See “The seaside takes off its war-paint”, Hulton’s National Weekly Picture Post 24, no. 8 (August 1944): 16-18. 25 M.O. FR 19, “US 15: Weekly Intelligence” (May 10, 1940).

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not live on the coast, as “it seems only a stone’s throw from Holland.”26 One Londoner envisioned,

“The circle is almost complete.”27 The spectacular Fall of France on June 17 and the occupation of

the Channel Islands two weeks later convinced many that invasion of Britain was just around the

corner, but as the summer wore on and no attack came, the ambiguous threat faded into the

background as the stark reality of air raids consumed people’s lives. However, the successful

invasion of Crete by German paratroopers in May 1941 had a profound impact on the British;

many saw it as the “rehearsal for England”.28 The invasion of the Soviet Union in June had the

opposite effect; though the British were acutely aware of the importance of the Soviet campaign,

and some hinged their fear of invasion on it (“If he gets Russia, it’ll be poor do’s for us!”29), the

overwhelming feeling throughout the country was one of relief. Operation Barbarossa was “the

greatest stroke of luck we’ve had”,30 as Hitler turned his sights away from Britain and pursued war

in the East. After this point, the likelihood of an invasion of Britain became more and more

remote, until at last the entry of the United States into the war in December turned the tide of the

conflict and seemed to herald salvation.

If for some reason a British civilian were indifferent to international events, plenty of other

voices warned of the nearness of invasion. A schoolteacher in Sussex recorded in February 1941,

“From all sides – papers, B.B.C., talk – the likelihood of invasion is suggested”,31 and a store clerk

in Yorkshire observed, “The subject certainly gets no rest in this country”.32 Winston Churchill’s

forewarnings of invasion were taken very seriously by those who heard them; one couple in the

coastal town of Worthing made the decision to evacuate their children based on a single speech of

Churchill’s in September 1940.33 Churchill single-handedly threw the whole country into one of

the war’s most potent invasion scares in the summer of 1941 when in a radio broadcast he alluded !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!26 M.O. D 5324: May 10, 1940. 27 M.O. D 5163: June 3, 1940. 28 M.O. D 5425: May 20, 1941. 29 M.O. D 5039.5: July 19, 1941. 30 M.O. D 5039.1: September 9, 1941. 31 M.O. D 5376: February 4, 1941. 32 M.O. D 5039.1: September 30, 1940. 33 Strange, Joan. War Diaries of Joan C. Strange: 1939-45: September 10, 1940. Accessed through “British

and Irish Women’s Letters and Diaries”, Alexander Street Press (2004).

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to an attack on September 1. Churchill was not the only man on the radio with the power to cause a

stir; Civil Defence chief Hugh Elles made several incendiary broadcasts, and special programs like

“What to do if the invader comes” in July 1940 did nothing to alleviate public anxiety.34 News

bulletins could be taken out of context or only half-listened to, resulting in misinformed invasion

scares with justifications like, “They as good as said on the wireless he was coming”.35 A group of

schoolteachers in Kent mistook an overzealous air raid report for the long-awaited invasion in

August 1942; one wrote, “My heart missed a good few beats between the 7 and 8 o’clock

broadcast”.36 False alarms like this one characterized the essence of Hitler’s scheme.

The role of the press in fueling these invasion scares cannot be overstated. Though most

newspapers retained the obligatory patriotic tone (lest they be labeled “defeatist”), writers almost

universally gravitated towards sensational topics like invasion and enemy sabotage. The public

demand for these titillating themes is reflected in the sheer number of stories published concerning

parachutists, attempted landings, and possible German attacks. However, the press seems to have

gone above and beyond the call of duty; not only did they meet the public appetite for lurid stories,

they exceeded it, and, as a result, played a

major role in initiating and perpetuating bouts

of invasion paranoia. As early as October 1939,

an article called “Get Ready” appeared in

several London papers and caused a minor

panic despite condemnation of its “hysterical,

flamboyant tone”.37 Starting in May 1940, a

relentless stream of invasion stories filled the popular press and often leaked onto the pages of

more respectable papers like The Times and The Economist. On May 13, 1940, no fewer than eight

popular newspapers ran front-page articles warning of invasion by parachutists, invasion by sea, !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!34 M.O. D 5163: July 4, 1940. 35 M.O. D 5419: May 31, 1940. 36 M.O. D 5412: August 1942. 37 M.O. D 5425: October 30, 1939.

“Factors Governing Invasion”, Illustrated London News: June 29, 1940

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and sabotage by fifth-columnists. During the summer of 1940, at the height of the initial invasion

craze, the Illustrated London News published full-length feature articles concerning invasion

virtually weekly, accompanied by vivid two-page pictorial spreads. These illustrations took the

form of artists’ renditions of enemy landings, maps showing possible invasion routes, and

photographs of German parachutists and soldiers. It was, as one diarist noted, “Enough to scare

anybody”.38 Take, for example, an article that appeared in the Illustrated on June 29 called

“Factors Governing Invasion” (above), complete with a map highlighting all likely landing spots

and a diagram showing the amassed number of German ships and troop divisions that would

comprise an invading force.39 Though the paper patriotically professed its belief in Britain’s

ultimate victory, this and other visually shocking news items could have a damaging effect on

morale. A Norfolk woman noted how adversely invasion stories in The Daily Mail affected her

employer, who came to work throughout June 1940 wringing his hands in despair after reading

merely the headlines.40

The newspapers latched onto and proliferated rumors of failed invasion operations and

eagerly made dark predictions about the time, location, and manner of future attempts.

Speculations about Germany’s technological innovations were rampant. The Nazis were supposed

to be in possession of tanks that could float on water or be dropped from a plane and assembled in

five minutes, and in November 1941 the media was gripped by an “invasion glider” craze. The

bulk of all invasion gossip can be attributed to the sensationalized treatment of otherwise mundane

news in the popular press; one Londoner mused, “How Jerry’s work can be exaggerated.”41 To

read the popular press and listen to gossip, it would seem that Britain was invaded anew every day

by a massive force of Germans, all of whom were massacred or driven into the sea. Wales was said

to have been attacked by 300,000 Germans on September 14, and later that day “the sea was full of

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!38 Strange, Joan: January 26, 1941. 38 “Factors Governing Invasion”, Illustrated London News: June 29, 1940.!40 M.O. D 5324: June 18, 1940. 41 M.O. D 5098: May 12, 1941.

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dead Huns”.42 Similar tales abounded throughout Britain, passed from mouth to mouth after

appearing first in the press. Not surprisingly, these flashy and alarmist invasion stories practically

disappeared from the newspapers after the autumn of 1941, when the nation as a whole

collectively lost interest in the topic; Mass Observation noted in June 1941, “The press invasion

scares have exhausted themselves by over-repetition.”43 In addition to a decreased expectation of

invasion, readers had become tired of and cynical about the “perpetual harping on the theme of

future horrors”44 and were annoyed by the repeated warnings to prepare for an invasion that

ultimately ended in anti-climax. A London housewife decided as early as June 1940 to give up the

Picture Post, because “it has been nothing but pictures of corpses and the most detailed

instructions for how to defend a village”.45

Despite widespread criticism of the media and the “exhaustion” of invasion scares, until

September 1941 at least one third of the British public continued to profess a belief in the

probability of a German invasion.46 However, the only means of truly gauging a person’s

expectation of such a cataclysmic event is to consider behavior that would betray a serious fear of

it. Several examples are to be found in the diaries of people living on the coast, who considered the

invasion threat a matter of life and death. An elderly woman in Norfolk gave her entire life savings

to grandchildren in May 1940 because “you never know when you might get killed nowadays”;

her granddaughter considered writing a will at the age of 21.47 A woman in the same town spent a

considerable amount of time sewing £5 notes into her corset, lest the Nazis get their hands on

them! A tragic example of someone taking the invasion all too seriously is Mrs. Fleischmann, a

Jewish refugee in Worthing who burned precious books and family documents in June 1940,

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!42 M.O. D 5282: September 14, 1940. 43 M.O. FR 745, “Third Invasion Leaflet” (June 16, 1941). 44 M.O. D 5427: February 1, 1941. 45 M.O. D 5427: June 26, 1940. 46 M.O. FR 1111, “Opinion on Cabinet Changes” (February 24, 1942). 47 M.O. D 5324: May 16, 1940.

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anticipating the Nazis’ inevitable arrival.48 She and others who took such drastic measures

represent the “casualties” of Hitler’s manipulative war of nerves.

Ministry of Information: The Boy Who Cried “Invasion”

The British government played a surprisingly active role in the propagation of these

invasion scares during the first two years of the war. Rather than reassuring Britons of the high

improbability of invasion (which, they believed, would lead to complacency and apathy), the

Ministry of Information pursued a policy of directly instigating invasion rumors in an effort to

produce an atmosphere of “healthy anticipation”.49 The reason for this was two-fold: First, a

heightened sense of danger among civilians served to combat apathy; if people were made to

expect a horde of invading Germans raining down from the sky at any moment, perhaps they

would be more motivated to “do their bit” for the war effort. Second, in the event of an actual

attack, Britons would not be caught unprepared, having “evaporate[d] fear by intellectualizing

it”.50 British authorities imagined scenes of chaos and hysteria if the reality of invasion fell upon

an unsuspecting populace, as in France.51 Mass Observation reported that studies of communities

hit by the Blitz showed “the effect of unexpected violent attack is far greater than where people

have been conditioned to accept and expect the possibility or probability of violent attack”.52 Thus,

an “occasional dose of bad news” – as Tom Clarke, Deputy Director of the News Division,

described it – would ensure “psychological healthiness” among civilians, preventing panic and

disorganization should the invasion materialize.53

For these reasons, the Ministry of Information was advised to “get the public keyed up to a

proper state of preparedness”.54 Their strategy involved the periodical publication of invasion

warnings in the newspapers, by leaflets distributed across the country, and by transmission over !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!48 Strange, Joan: August 28, 1941. 49 M.O. FR 544, “Attitudes to Invasion” (January 14, 1941). 50 McLaine, 28. 51 The logistical nightmare and humanitarian plight of the millions of refugees who fled Northern France in June 1940 made an indelible impression on the British. 52 M.O. FR 544. 53 McLaine, 62. 54 Nicholl, A.N. (War Cabinet). Memo to Norman Brook: March 5, 1941. The National Archives, INF 1/887.

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the radio. A brief experiment with loudspeakers carried by van ended in disaster: In July 1940 the

Ministry drove a small van through the coastal town of Lowestoft in Suffolk announcing

instructions in the event of invasion. Local authorities were immediately besieged by frantic

inquiries and several families packed up and fled town, mistaking the “awareness campaign” for

the real thing.55 The British government’s effort to convince its own people that invasion was a

credible threat oddly complimented both Hitler’s deceptive ploy and the salacious whirlwind of

newspaper invasion scares, and partly explains why the percentages of people expecting invasion

were so high throughout the winter and spring of 1941. Already by autumn 1940, Mass

Observation noted the development of a “November toughness” as people grew accustomed to,

and even callous about, the idea of invasion.56

However, civilians did not accept the government’s demand to stay vigilant without

making demands of their own: If invasion was really on the way, Britons wanted clear instructions

for what to do when it came. As early as 1939 the Ministry of Information acknowledged the

public need “to rely on something bigger than yourself”; Ministry chief Duff Cooper advised his

colleagues quite plainly, “people want to be ordered about”.57 To this effect, the Ministry advanced

its own agenda of spreading somewhat phony vigilance while meeting the public craving for

instruction by drawing up a standard set of rules for invasion to be printed and reprinted

throughout the war, echoing the typical wartime slogan “Carry On”: Stay in your home. Do not

block the roads. Take orders from local authorities. Outside of these basic principles, each new

version of the instructions included various bits of advice (Do not listen to gossip, Do not hoard

food, Put your car out of commission, etc.).

Three official invasion leaflets were published and distributed to every household in

Britain: “If The Invader Comes” (June 1940), “Stay Where You Are” (July 1940), and “Beating

the Invader” (June 1941). These leaflets were not well received, and actually back-fired by

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!55 M.O. FR 331, “A Misunderstanding” (August 6, 1940). 56 M.O. FR 438, “World News” (October 3, 1940). 57 McLaine, 71.

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creating resentment against the government. The leaflets were deliberately written in simple

language to communicate the Ministry’s message clearly, but civilians by and large found them

childish and patronizing, as one explained, “Those things get my wick. They treat you as though

you’re kids.”58 Being told to stay calm, stay put and ignore rumors was akin to a pat on the head by

one’s parents. Some readers even detected a note of upper-class

condescension while “talking down” to the stupid mass.59

However, what frustrated civilians most was not the tone of the

leaflets, but the emptiness and irrelevance of the instructions. They

were described by interviewees as “totally ridiculous,” a “joke”,

and “a waste of paper”. The leaflets focused on one thing and one

thing only: Not interfering with military operations. “Stay Put” was

the catch phrase; the second leaflet stated very plainly, If you do not

stay put you will stand a very good chance of being killed. But civilians craved knowledge of

official preparations for invasion, or, worse, a prolonged occupation: What if the military couldn’t

stop the Germans? What if the government fell? Where would they send their children? What

would happen to their money? Their homes? Their jobs? British men and women of all ages and

stations took the menace of German conquest quite seriously and had no qualms about asking the

seemingly impossible question: What if Britain lost?

The disparity between the Ministry of Information’s rhetoric of vigilance and the

government’s apparent lack of actual plans for invasion became increasingly clear as the war

dragged on. Not surprisingly, doubts about whether or not the government actually believed in

invasion at all created growing cynicism; for many people, the Ministry’s work was “irritating

rather than reassuring”,60 and they began to see through the transparent tactic of promoting

“healthy expectation”. A Wembley man noted, “Although the authorities continue to warn us

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!58 M.O. FR 216, “Report on June 4th Invasion Leaflet” (June 20, 1940). 59 M.O. FR 216. 60 McLaine, 1.

Third invasion leaflet, June 1941

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against invasion, we all think the warnings are given to keep us on our toes”.61 A skeptical

Scotsman wrote of Churchill’s September 1 scare, “He just said that because he knew that people

were getting slack during this lull”.62 Mass Observation reported on June 16, 1941, that the

majority of people surveyed were “irritated at having to discuss the subject at all”, and conceded

that “intellectual preparation of the civilian population for invasion is still far from complete”;63

one week later Hitler invaded the Soviet Union, and the threat of a German attack on Britain was

all but swept away before Britons really had the chance to “prepare” themselves for it.

Preparing for Invasion at the National Level

Despite increasing suspicion of the government’s belief in

invasion, no one could ignore the changes that had taken place in

Britain to meet the threat of a German attack. Almost overnight the

entire eastern coast of England was transformed into a battlefront

popularly dubbed the “Churchill Line”. Barbwire, mines, trenches,

and tank traps littered the beaches where vacationers had just

recently gone for strolls, while further inland, barricades and

checkpoints popped up along country roads. Starting in May 1940,

soldiers routinely stopped cars and bicyclists to ask for

identification, and for over two years signposts revealing the names

of towns across England were blacked out in order to prevent parachutists, fifth columnists, and

invading troops from easily finding their way around the country (this tactic only proved

frustrating for Britons themselves).64

The internment of aliens within Britain presents perhaps the most compelling evidence of

the government having taken Hitler’s threat at least somewhat seriously. The numbers of

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!61 M.O. D 5150: March 31, 1941. 62 M.O. D 5390: July 29, 1941. 63 M.O. FR 745, “Third Invasion Leaflet” (June 16, 1941). 64 See M.O. D 5163: Jan. 1943; D 5098: May 22, 1941; D 5163: June 6, 1940 and August 5, 1942 for specific examples.

The tank traps that were never used, Hulton’s National Weekly Picture Post: August 19, 1944

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incarcerated aliens correlated closely to the initial ebb and flow of invasion fear among the

public.65 During the summer of 1940, as Britons lived in daily expectation of invasion, as many as

40,000 German and Austrian aliens, most of them Jewish refugees, were crowded into internment

camps hastily set up in crumbling mansions, gymnasiums, and half-complete housing

developments.66 The government’s actions against aliens found resonance among British civilians,

many of whom supported “roping in those Germans”, potential “fifth columnists”, as a means of

preventing or at least hindering an invasion attempt. A Suffolk man was overheard to remark, “I’m

glad they’ve rounded up those aliens. They never ought to have let so many of them loose.”67 A

Jewish woman in Whitby worried that her friend’s Austrian maid could be manipulated by the

Nazis into denouncing her.68 As the public’s fear of invasion began to cool off in August (and

substandard conditions in the camps became a matter of national embarrassment), the government

relaxed its internment policy and steadily released enemy aliens until by April 1941 the number of

internees had decreased to 9,000.69 It is important to note that internment did not balloon up in the

spring of 1941 along with public invasion hysteria, but rather continued to decline after the tense

summer of 1940. This can be taken as a further indication of how skeptical the British government

had really become about the invasion threat, while actively promoting “healthy” fear among the

public (and, to judge from the February 1941 statistics, quite successfully).70

There still existed within the British government, however, no centralized authority set up

specifically to prepare the country for a possible German attack. Consequently, the defense of local

communities was left to the people, who took the threat of invasion into their own hands – with

varying degrees of success – through the grassroots organization of a variety of institutions and

activities, most importantly the Local Defence Volunteers, or Home Guard. The reason for this

decentralized arrangement was two-fold: First, the armed forces needed every soldier it could

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!65 “Position of Aliens in Great Britain in Wartime”, Social Service Review 16, no. 2 (June 1942): 327-332. 66 Rose, Sonja. Which People’s War? Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003, 94. 67 M.O. FR 170, “Suffolk Village Reports” (June 6, 1940). 68 Phipps, Katherine: June 13, 1940. 69 “Position of Aliens in Great Britain in Wartime”, 330. 70 M.O. FR 576, “Invasion Feelings” (February 17, 1941), 53% of those interviewed “expected invasion”.

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muster up, and the maintenance of local garrisons became a very last priority when battling the

Germans in North Africa and the Mediterranean. If able-bodied soldiers could be replaced by a

homegrown army of non-combatants, the Army would be able to focus its efforts abroad, and

soldiers had expressed an interest in the formation of local armies to ensure the safety of their

families while they were overseas. More importantly, British leaders realized that giving non-

combatant civilians the responsibility of defending their own communities would fulfill the deep

desire felt by many to contribute to the war effort in a substantial way. This would, in turn, boost

morale and fight public apathy.71

“Dad’s Army” & The Invasion Committees

In a radio broadcast on May 14, 1940, War Secretary Anthony Eden called on male

volunteers aged 17 to 65 to register at their local police station to form bands of Local Defence

Volunteers (L.D.V.).72 The result of his broadcast was electrifying: Within six days, over 250,000

men had signed up. After just two months there were 1,300,000 eager volunteers, and by

November 1940, the L.D.V., or Home Guard, as it became known, numbered 1,700,000. At the

end of the war, 20% of British men not otherwise involved in defense had served in its ranks.73

This was truly an improvised army: A typical Guardsman remained unarmed for the duration of

the war, and an armband worn over civilian clothes constituted his official uniform. His work

might involve assisting Air Raid Precautions (A.R.P.) activities, watching for parachutists,

manning military checkpoints, and providing physical labor for anti-invasion measures such as

trench-digging and booby-trap setting. When not performing these services, a Guardsman would

attend military exercises and invasion training. Local garrisons often paraded in formation. About

once a year they helped stage a mock invasion that involved the entire community and tested their

preparedness for the actual event. Most importantly, involvement in the Home Guard provided

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!71 Yelton, David. “British Public Opinion, the Home Guard, and the Defense of Great Britain, 1940-1944”, The

Journal of Military History 58, no. 3 (1994): 469. 72 Yelton, 465-66. 73 MacKenzie, S.P. The Home Guard. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995, 175.

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male civilians, especially older ones, with a sense of contributing to the war effort; while their sons

were off fighting the Nazis face-to-face, they could do their bit at home to keep the country safe.74

However, despite its fairly romanticized popular legacy, “Dad’s Army” was not all roses.

Rather than provide inspiration through the noble example of leadership and sacrifice, the

activities of the Home Guard more often than not created conflict and consternation within the

community. Even a small sampling of Mass Observation diaries reveals quite a pessimistic civilian

attitude toward the Home Guard, which was described as “a bunch of old Rajahs”, “third-rate

security guards”, and “tragically ill-equipped” to meet the Nazis. Members of the Guard were

notorious for bad attendance at meetings, which resulted in poor training and muddled operations.

A dismayed London diarist noted, “One can only stare and gape at the incompetence”.75 The fact

that only 3% of Londoners interviewed in June 1941 would turn to a Guardsman for advice during

an invasion is telling evidence of the public’s lack of confidence in the Home Guard.76 The older,

more inept Guardsmen were often a source of embarrassment, while the younger, more eager ones

could be a source of anxiety: Overzealous volunteers set up unauthorized checkpoints, harassed

civilians unduly, virtually broke into homes to enforce blackout regulations, and, in a few extreme

cases, shot unarmed travelers who appeared suspicious.77 The antagonistic relationship between

the Home Guard and the A.R.P. became the stuff of legend, as the two volunteer organizations

competed to direct anti-invasion activities within each town and, consequently, bungled each

other’s operations. Upon witnessing an invasion exercise carried out by the Home Guard in July

1941, a Birmingham housewife wrote three words: “Lord help us.”78

Fortunately, the Home Guard was not the only organization civilians could turn to in a time

of crisis. While their husbands were off parading with the other “Rajahs”, many women devoted

their free time to anti-invasion activities arranged through various committees set up locally by

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!74 MacKenzie, S.P. The Home Guard. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995, 25. 75 M.O. D 5402: June 19, 1941. 76 M.O. FR 745, “Third Invasion Leaflet” (June 16, 1941). 77 Yelton, 468. 78 M.O. D 5420: July 6, 1941.

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concerned citizens. With names like “Invasion Committee”, “Invasion Organization”, “Invasion

Plans Committee”, and “Committee for Invasion”, the founding and management of these groups

highlighted the decentralized, ad hoc nature of the national response to the invasion threat. Their

activities included, but were not limited to, running anti-invasion watch posts, assembling and

inspecting emergency food supplies, and canvassing neighborhoods to recruit volunteers for

special invasion services – should the time come – like assisting with evacuation and billeting,

carrying messages via bicycle, and providing first aid. In coastal areas, these invasion committees

offered refreshments to soldiers guarding the beaches and ran bonfires for late-night trench-

digging operations.79 Like the men of the Home Guard, members of these committees felt they

were contributing to the war effort by doing their small part to prepare for invasion. They were, of

course, not without critics. A Trowbridge man described his local Invasion Committee as a bunch

of “doddering old fools” and “as helpless as a flock of sheep”.80

The biggest concern civilians had about all local provisions for invasion – military,

logistical, or otherwise – was the very thing that defined them: The lack of uniformity between

towns, and even within organizations, caused frustration for those involved in the planning of anti-

invasion activities. The A.R.P. Post Warden in Belmont lamented that, though his borough was

thoroughly outfitted to meet an invasion, arrangements throughout the rest of London were “not

even a muddle”, as the absence of government direction and aid left each district to its own

devices.81 Upon arriving at her new school in Sussex, one teacher was horrified to find zero

preparations in place for invasion, especially since her old school had made detailed plans to be

used as a rest center and makeshift hospital.82 The complete lack of an official hierarchy for these

kind of operations forced people into leadership positions they would never have dreamed of

taking: Our Belmont Post Warden suddenly found himself with the task of “acting entirely as I

think best to look after the civilian population. No instructions have come my way, yet residents !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!79 Phipps, Katherine: September 27, 1940. 80 M.O. D 5118: April 18, 1942. 81 M.O. D 5004: September 4, 1941. 82 M.O. D 5376: February 4, 1941.

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will look to me for every assistance and advice”.83 A schoolteacher in Kent complained of being

forced to “do the whole blinking show” by herself.84 Those who had grown cynical or complacent

about the invasion threat got in the way of preparations by refusing to cooperate: A mock invasion

in Wales was foiled by an obstinate woman who declined to lend her private property to the

exercise, despite warnings that her land left a gaping hole in Home Guard defenses. She said

sarcastically, “I’ll risk that!”85

Frequent false alarms exposed embarrassing disorganization and negligence; how can a

town defend itself when half the Home Guard fails to report for duty? Widespread anxiety about

the incompetence of local defense mechanisms and the obvious futility of ad hoc “invasion

committees” only compounded the public’s fear of invasion and further alienated civilians from

the government, which continued to propagate its alarmist message of vigilance while failing to

provide relevant instructions for how to cope with such an event. This confused and disoriented

state of affairs led many civilians to one conclusion: They would have to prepare for a German

invasion – mentally, logistically, and emotionally – on their own.

The Invasion at Home: To Flee or Not to Flee?

The first thought on everyone’s mind was evacuation: Despite the government’s

admonitions to “Stay Put” no matter what, many people, especially those living in coastal regions

along the English Channel, seriously considered fleeing inland or even emigrating to the

Dominion. Parents agonized about the decision to preemptively send their children away to

Canada or even New Zealand, and about 15,000 children eventually made their way overseas.86

Other families planned to evacuate at zero hour; it was common to see “invasion cases” packed

and ready to go in the hallway or in the trunk of the car. One Norfolk family “had our handbags

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!83 M.O. D 5004: September 4, 1941. 84 M.O. D 5412: August 1942. 85 M.O. D 5282: September 20, 1940. 86 Jackson, Carlton. Who Will Take Our Children? London: Methuen London Ltd., 1985, 88.

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ready with bankbooks in since the day war was declared”.87 The consequences of fleeing were all

too clear for this family: Leaving would mean the loss of the family business, and “we should have

to ask someone to shoot the dog”. But the impulse to flee was powerful and overwhelming; when

the news of Belgium’s capitulation came on the radio, “Mrs. B.” in Cornwall imagined herself

piling the car up with bedding, throwing her children on top, and escaping to the interior.88 Those

who decided to do the patriotic thing and “Stay Put” sometimes resorted to subversive measures to

make sure they would survive an invasion. Hoarding food was a common practice; the newspapers

suggested storing two weeks’ worth of supplies in the home, but some people took it to the

extreme and squirreled away whatever they could find for months. A Norfolk man was discovered

to be in possession of over 200 gallons of petrol tucked away in his basement.89

In addition to making domestic preparations, Britons premeditated their personal roles in

the invasion, letting their imaginations, like Mrs. B., run wild. The new teacher in Sussex decided

that if invasion were to take place during the day, she would take all the children who lived outside

town and drive them to her home for safe-keeping.90 One woman in Yorkshire resolved to join the

Home Guard, even if she had to dress up like a man to do it,91 and a group of men in Hertfordshire

organized a rather serious plan to attack the Germans with garden spades and forks.92 Employees

at a petrol station in Norfolk worked out a scheme to sabotage the invading troops by filling their

tanks with water instead of gas. Their less patriotic employer suggested painting a swastika under

the doorknocker.93 It is impossible to know whether these aspiring partisans would have followed

through in their plans to act during an invasion, but the fact that they thought them out, discussed

them with friends, and wrote them down is telling of the pervasive hysteria that racked the country.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!87 M.O. D 5324: June 18, 1940. 88 M.O. D 5396: June 6, 1940. 89 M.O. D 5324: June 1, 1940. 90 M.O. D 5376: February 4, 1941. 91 M.O. D 5333: June 17, 1940. 92 M.O. D 5240: July 15, 1940. 93 M.O. D 5323: May 14, 1940.

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“For tomorrow we die!”: The Psychology of Invasion

Although the much-anticipated German invasion never materialized, “it” had a marked

presence in people’s lives and affected their behavior and personalities in subtle yet profound

ways. A park keeper in London carefully observed throughout the summer of 1940 how people

changed under the threat of invasion: Men and women both developed anxious and jumpy

tendencies, constantly asking each other about invasion news, while mothers became more urgent

and overbearing, admonishing their children to come home earlier and more frequently.94 A

Birmingham woman wrote in May 1940, “We are so used to England being safe, we are not like

the French whose country has been invaded time and time again... The shock of a foreign people

invading England will be great”.95 Many other diarists echoed this sentiment, finding it “difficult

to visualize our land as a battlefield”.96

Invasion itself was a “terrible word”, it conjured up images of death and intense suffering,

and many people, especially women, felt unusually depressed after talking, hearing, or reading

about it. A Liverpool woman claimed that talk about the invasion “makes me feel ill”,97 and she

and other women recorded vivid nightmares in which the invading Germans separated them from

their husbands and children. For others, the lack of a clear future was the most frightening

consequence of invasion: “Air raids, yes, there’s the dawn to hope for, but invasion, no, the

thought is unbearable”.98 This uncertainty was for some “unbearable”, but others found it strangely

liberating. Take, for example, the family in Norfolk who, on the night of the most anticipated

invasion scare yet (June 19, 1940), cracked open a bottle of brandy and ate their fancy chocolates,

treating themselves to what could be their final moments together.99 Others used the imminent

invasion as an excuse to neglect their yard work (“Why slave over your garden when you may

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!94 M.O. D 5163: June 27 - August 10, 1940. 95 M.O. D 5419: May 27, 1940. 96 Strange, Joan: July 8, 1940. 97 M.O. D 5341: December 31, 1940. 98 M.O. D 5402: June 19, 1941. 99 M.O. D 5324: June 19, 1940.

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have to leave it to the Germans anytime?”100), while a nurse in Bristol consoled herself after a

patient’s death by admitting “he was spared suffering should invasion come”.101 At a London

dinner party on June 27, 1940, after a particularly harrowing false alarm, the hostess made a toast:

“Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die!”102

This last comment was most likely made in jest, which evokes the most important coping

mechanism the British people possessed: Humor. As early as May 1940, Mass Observation

reported that the most frequent reaction to the idea of invasion was a smile or a wisecrack, and this

“facetious and releasing treatment” appears as a common motif throughout the diaries.103 In

response to a newspaper article warning of invasion coming tomorrow, one man wrote, “Well, I’d

better make ’im [Hitler] a cup of tea!”,104 and when asked what she would do if the invading

Germans demanded petrol, the young petrol station employee said, “I’d tell them we’d make it

right about the coupons afterwards”.105 These sarcastic comments served to relax the tension of

anticipation and take the joker’s mind off a more sinister possibility. Some jokes, however,

betrayed a deeper, more serious fear of invasion, for example “Me and Mrs. Wilkins are going to

put our heads in the oven if they get here, aren’t we?”106 This and other jokes about suicide in

particular reveal an inability or unwillingness to imagine a future under German rule. One woman

noted, “There’s quite a lot of laughter about, though some folks are taking the possibility of

German victory in more matter of fact than I think is good”.107

Sometimes, though, musings about the possibility of a German victory were not made in

jest but were all too serious. “The war will be lost by us in a month. That is my secret thought,”

wrote one man in August 1940, “Not for the world would I tell it to anybody but Mass

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!100 M.O. D 5323: May 3, 1940. 101 M.O. D 5238: June 22, 1941. 102 M.O. D 5427: June 27, 1940. 103 M.O. FR 106, “Further Memo on Parachute Fear” (May 14, 1940). 104 M.O. D 5039.9: July 9, 1940. 105 M.O. D 5324: November 6, 1939. 106 M.O. D 5314: February 3, 1941. 107 M.O. D 5396: June 16, 1940.

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Observation”.108 The Jewish woman in Whitby found Quaker school where her children could hide

from the Nazis, and had a long and sober conversation with her neighbor about the possibility of

the Germans finding and arresting them.109 One girl in Norfolk consoled her friend by reminding

her, quite seriously, that the Germans were fond of sports, so they would still be able to play tennis

after an invasion.110 Fears of the Nazi racial agenda were a frequent topic of conversation among

women in particular: In a Glasgow shipping office, a group of female employees “took to studying

the colour of their hair” after discussing Hitler’s Aryan rhetoric,111 and a young woman in Norfolk

recounted, “Mrs. F. says she knows for sure that Hitler will make all English women have German

babies. Keeps saying she is glad she is too old but pities me.”112

Perhaps the most interesting psychological effect of the invasion threat on British civilians,

men as well as women, was the way it made them feel like children. The government’s simplistic

and condescending invasion leaflets seemed to read “as if they are written for a child”,113 and the

civilian’s constant reliance on government instruction and information further enhanced this

impression. One Londoner who attended a gas-mask training wrote, “It was just like being at

school again and reduced me to a state of dither”.114 For a Birmingham woman, living under the

cloud of invasion was similar to her childhood fear of the dentist: “I have been all morning…

carrying on but knowing that something nasty is going to happen”.115 To a Glasgow office worker,

the image of local men dressed up in uniforms while staging mock invasions was like “watching

children playing cowboys and red Indians.”116

These mock invasion were games in the purest sense, as neighbors fought neighbors

dressed up as Nazis, spies, and fifth columnists (see title photograph). Stories of successful

sabotage became the talk of the town, such as the one about a man who arrived at a convent !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!108 M.O. D 5212: August 2, 1940. 109 Phipps, Katherine: February 13, 1941. 110 M.O. D 5324: May 21, 1940. 111 M.O. D 5390: January 14, 1941. 112 M.O. D 5324: June 16, 1940. 113 M.O. FR 349, “Stay Where You Are” (August 12, 1940). 114 M.O. D 5401: July 14, 1940. 115 M.O. D 5419: May 31, 1940. 116 M.O. D 5390: October 5, 1941.

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Germans surveying the English coast, July 1940

carrying a bouquet of flowers; once allowed to enter he withdrew a gun from the bouquet and held

everyone inside “hostage” until the mock invasion was over.117 The invasion games even involved

toys: after throwing a muslin bag filled with chalk onto the back of a truck, which promptly drove

off, a Home Guardsman ran after it shouting, “Hey, I want my bomb back!” As long as they

finished “in time for dinner”, these practice invasions provided great fun for the participants;

during Birmingham’s July 1941 mock invasion (which lasted two whole days) apparently

“everyone thoroughly enjoyed themselves”.118 Fortunately for them, these games were the closest

that anyone in Britain came to experiencing the reality of a German invasion.

Historical Legacy of the Invasion Threat

Chalk bombs, phony spies, lethal bouquets. For Britons, the idea of invasion lay in the

realm of morbid fantasy, informed only by what they knew had occurred on the Continent. At

night, they were terrorized by deadly air raids, and by day, there lingered a quiet anxiety, a sense

that the enemy was, in fact, very close. On July 1, 1940, a line of twenty Nazi officers stood

shoulder-to-shoulder on the beach at Cap

Gris-Nez, France, staring across the English

Channel toward the hazy white Cliffs of

Dover. A photographer captured the moment

just as Hermann Goering turned to his left,

binoculars in hand.119 This photograph (right),

housed in the Imperial War Museum, symbolizes a line that was never crossed; the occupation of

the Channel Islands a few days later was the closest Hitler would come to conquering Britain.

In retrospect, it is easy to forget that the seemingly unassailable “island fortress” teetered

on the brink of all-out invasion for almost two years, and that Britons were forced to consider the

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!117 M.O. D 5004: September 30, 1941. 118 M.O. D 5420: July 14, 1941. 119 “Germany’s Planned Invasion of Britain, 1940”. Imperial War Museum: HU 1185

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real possibility of a German attack – and life under Nazi rule – publicly and privately. If Goering

had been able to peer a little further through the mist and fog, he would have seen a nation torn by

wild speculation about the dark possibilities of invasion. While skeptics grew cynical and

dismissed the threat as a government propaganda tool, those who took the notion all too seriously

let their minds run wild imagining what the attack would be like, egged on by the newspaper

articles, radio warnings, instruction leaflets, and idle gossip to which they were subjected almost

daily. As local communities scrambled to organize clumsy defenses and individuals were left to

prepare for invasion by themselves, the already shaky connection between the civilian and the

government – sorely tested by the Blitz (“bombed out people confronted with inadequate post-raid

services, let down by the authorities”120), by evacuation (in some areas “a state of affairs

approaching chaos”121), and by the war in general (“There’s no sense of urgency”122) – became a

chasm. The Ministry of Information’s effort to promote “psychologically healthy” anticipation of

invasion backfired by instead creating resentment against the seemingly transparent attempt to

convince civilians of an impending, yet increasingly dubious, German attack.

Just as the first air raids in September 1940 exposed the government’s insufficient

provisions for bombing victims, shocking people in an “introspective, unaggressive and

disappointed way”,123 the unfulfilled threat of invasion further strained the relationship between

civilian and government, which was never more than tenuous at best. Moreover, because the

invasion ultimately failed to materialize and people’s lives were consumed by the extant terror of

air raids and a real war raging throughout the world, the idea of “Operation Sea-Lion” is often

dismissed as an exaggerated wartime fantasy. However, the iconic Keep Calm and Carry On

poster and testimonies collected by Mass Observation serve as lasting reminders of the panic – and

its social and political consequences – that gripped British civilians from 1940 to 1941.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!120 Calder, Angus. The Myth of the Blitz. London: Jonathan Cape, 1991, 119. 121 Johnson, B.S. The Evacuees. London: Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1968, 14. 122 M.O. D 5423: October 9, 1941. 123 M.O. FR 406, “Air Raids and Invasion” (September 17, 1940).!

Works Cited

1) Primary sources cited in the paper: Mass Observation Archive (University of Sussex) Diaries 5004, 5039.1, 5039.5, 5093.9, 5098, 5118, 5150, 5163, 5201, 5212, 5238, 5240, 5282, 5285, 5323, 5324, 5314, 5324, 5333, 5341, 5376, 5390, 5396, 5399, 5401, 5402, 5412, 5419, 5420, 5423, 5425, and 5427. File Reports 19 “US 15: Weekly Intelligence” (May 10, 1940) 106 “Further Memo on the Parachute Fear” (May 14, 1940) 170 “Suffolk Village Reports” (June 6, 1940) 216 “Report on June 4th Invasion Leaflet” (June 20, 1940) 331 “A Misunderstanding” (August 6, 1940) 349 “Stay Where You Are” (August 12, 1940) 406 “Air Raids and Invasion” (September 17, 1940) 438 “World News” (October 3, 1940) 544 “Attitudes to Invasion” (January 14, 1941) 576 “Invasion Feelings” (February 17, 1941) 745 “Third Invasion Leaflet” (June 16, 1941) 1111 “Opinion on Cabinet Changes” (February 24, 1942) Newspaper & Magazine Articles “Calm Before Invasion?”, The Times: August 6, 1940. “Factors Governing Invasion”, Illustrated London News: June 29, 1940. “The seaside takes off its war-paint”, Hulton’s National Weekly Picture Post 24, no. 8 (August 1994): 16-18. “Watching and Waiting”, The Times: August 27, 1941. Personal Diaries Phipps, Katherine. The Diary of Katherine M. Phipps, 1929-45. Accessed through “British and Irish Women’s Letters and Diaries”, Alexander Street Press: 2004. Strange, Joan. War Diaries of Joan C. Strange: 1939-45. Accessed through “British and Irish Women’s Letters and Diaries”, Alexander Street Press: 2004. Other Sources Churchill, Winston. A Man of Destiny: Winston S. Churchill. 1st ed. Waukesha, Wis: Country Beautiful Foundation, 1965 (Collection of Churchill’s speeches and writings). “Germany’s Planned Invasion of Britain, 1940”. Imperial War Museum, HU 1185. (Photograph) Nicholl, A.N. (War Cabinet). “Memo to Norman Brook”, March 5, 1941. The National Archives, INF 1/887. “Position of Aliens in Great Britain in Wartime”, Social Service Review 16, no. 2 (June 1942). “Tain Home Guard, Ross, preparing to meet the Fifth Column, August 1941”. Imperial War Museum (Photograph). Copied from S.P. MacKenzie’s The Home Guard.

2) Secondary sources cited in the paper: Books Calder, Angus. The Myth of the Blitz. London: Jonathan Cape, 1991. Hinton, James. Nine Wartime Lives: Mass Observation and the Making of the Modern Self. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010. Jackson, Carlton. Who Will Take Our Children? London: Methuen London Ltd., 1985. Johnson, B.S. The Evacuees. London: Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1968. MacKenzie, S.P. The Home Guard. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995. McLaine, Ian. Ministry of Morale: Home Front Morale and the Ministry of Information in WWII. London: Allen & Unwin, 1979. Rose, Sonja. Which People’s War? Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003. Schenk, Peter. Invasion of England 1940. London: Conway Maritime Press, Ltd., 1990. Newspaper Articles “German plans for invading Britain in 1940”, The Times: November 19, 1946. Scholarly Articles DeWeerd, H.A. “Hitler’s Plans for Invading Britain”, Military Affairs 12, no. 3 (1948). Farguharson, John. “After Sealion: A German Channel Tunnel?”, Journal of Contemporary History 25, no. 4 (1990). Lewis, R.M. “Planning, Design and Reception of British Home Front Propaganda Posters of the Second World War.” Southampton: University of Southampton, 2004. Yelton, David. “British Public Opinion, the Home Guard, and the Defense of Great Britain, 1940-1944”, The Journal of Military History 58, no. 3 (1994).