The siege of Lille, or Lille pocket, (28–31 May 1940) took place during the
Battle of France
The Battle of France (french: bataille de France) (10 May – 25 June 1940), also known as the Western Campaign ('), the French Campaign (german: Frankreichfeldzug, ) and the Fall of France, was the Nazi Germany, German invasion of French Third Rep ...
in the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. The siege around the city of
Lille
Lille ( , ; nl, Rijsel ; pcd, Lile; vls, Rysel) is a city in the northern part of France, in French Flanders. On the river Deûle, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France Regions of France, region, the Pref ...
took place between the French
IV Corps and
V Corps 5th Corps, Fifth Corps, or V Corps may refer to:
France
* 5th Army Corps (France)
* V Cavalry Corps (Grande Armée), a cavalry unit of the Imperial French Army during the Napoleonic Wars
* V Corps (Grande Armée), a unit of the Imperial French Ar ...
(about of the
First Army (General
René Prioux) and four German infantry
divisions supported by three ''panzer'' divisions.
The
III Corps of the First Army had managed to retreat to the
Lys river with the
British Expeditionary Force (BEF) divisions nearby. The two surrounded French corps resisted German attacks until forced to surrender at midnight on 31 May/1 June. The defence of the Lille Pocket enabled more Allied troops to retreat into the Dunkirk perimeter and take part in the
Battle of Dunkirk
The Battle of Dunkirk (french: Bataille de Dunkerque, link=no) was fought around the French port of Dunkirk (Dunkerque) during the Second World War, between the Allies and Nazi Germany. As the Allies were losing the Battle of France on ...
.
Prelude
During the morning of 27 May, the
1st Panzer Division attacked
Gravelines
Gravelines (, ; ; ) is a commune in the Nord department in Northern France. It lies at the mouth of the river Aa southwest of Dunkirk. It was formed in the 12th century around the mouth of a canal built to connect Saint-Omer with the sea. As ...
on the western side of the Dunkirk perimeter and cut off the garrison and its commander,
Bertrand Fagalde
Marie Bertrand Alfred Fagalde (22 July 1878, Boghar, Algeria - 6 February 1966, Garches, Paris) was a French Army officer.
Life
He studied at the École de guerre between 1905 and 1907, graduating top of his class. He was promoted to captain on 2 ...
was captured; the remaining French fought on. To the south, German panzers crossed the river
Aa and other German troops advanced on
Wormhoudt
Wormhout (; before 1975: ''Wormhoudt''; vls, Wormout) is a commune in the Nord department in northern France. Several people in Wormhout still speak West Flemish, a local dialect of Dutch and the traditional language of the region, while Frenc ...
. Two panzer divisions crossed
La Bassée Canal and overran the British
2nd Division. The
7th Panzer Division rushed the gap and reached the
X ''Armeekorps'', cutting off the Allied troops in Lille. On the night of the BEF divisions near Lille were able to retreat over the
Lys but only the three infantry divisions of the
III Corps (
Léon de la Laurencie) of the French
First Army (General
René Prioux) managed to get away. Many of the French units that had retreated from much further south were still in the salient around Lille when the
6th Army (
Walther von Reichenau
Walter Karl Ernst August von Reichenau (8 October 1884 – 17 January 1942) was a field marshal in the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany during World War II. Reichenau commanded the 6th Army, during the invasions of Belgium and France. During Ope ...
) surrounded the city.
Siege
The forces in Lille, commanded by
Jean-Baptiste Molinié, were fortunate that a patrol captured (Lieutenant-General)
Fritz Kühne, commander of the 253rd Infantry Division and recovered documents showing the positions of the German troops surrounding the city. Molinié used the information to plan a breakout for 28 May.
At the
IV Corps ( André Boris) and
V Corps 5th Corps, Fifth Corps, or V Corps may refer to:
France
* 5th Army Corps (France)
* V Cavalry Corps (Grande Armée), a cavalry unit of the Imperial French Army during the Napoleonic Wars
* V Corps (Grande Armée), a unit of the Imperial French Ar ...
(General
Darius Bloch
Darius may refer to:
Persian royalty
;Kings of the Achaemenid Empire
* Darius I (the Great, 550 to 487 BC)
* Darius II (423 to 404 BC)
* Darius III (Codomannus, 380 to 330 BC)
;Crown princes
* Darius (son of Xerxes I), crown prince of Persia ...
) attempted to break out on the west side of Lille and retreat towards the Lys. The (2e DINA, Major-General Pierre Dame) tried to cross the Deûle river over the bridge to Sequedin (just south of Lomme). The (5e DINA, Major-General Augustin Agliany) tried to escape over the Moulin Rouge bridge on the Santes road, south of Haubourdin. Another attempt was made during the morning of 29 May; the Germans had mined the bridge but two French tanks and two companies of infantry got across but were then forced back.
Molinié and five divisions of the First Army fought from house to house in the suburbs of Lille, German troops trying to infiltrate the French defences through gaps and among the many civilian refugees stranded in the city. On 29 May, the 15e DIM surrendered; with food and ammunition dwindling, Molinié and Colonel Aizier negotiated a surrender and hostilities ended at midnight on Friday 31 May/Saturday 1 June. Molinié, another troops surrendered to the Germans at the Grand Place. The German commander, General
Alfred Wäger, allowed the French the
honours of war
The honours of war are a set of privileges that are granted to a defeated army during the surrender ceremony. The honours symbolise the valour of the defeated army, and grew into a custom during the age of early modern warfare. Typically a surren ...
; the garrison paraded through the Grand Place, as German troops stood to attention, a compliment for which Wäger was reprimanded.
Aftermath
Some parties of French troops managed to get out of the pocket; Capitaine
Philippe de Hauteclocque
Philippe François Marie Leclerc de Hauteclocque (22 November 1902 – 28 November 1947) was a Free-French general during the Second World War. He became Marshal of France posthumously in 1952, and is known in France simply as le maréchal ...
, the chief of staff of the 4e DI escaped and reached the 7e Armée on the Somme. By the time of the surrender,
Operation Dynamo
Operation or Operations may refer to:
Arts, entertainment and media
* ''Operation'' (game), a battery-operated board game that challenges dexterity
* Operation (music), a term used in musical set theory
* ''Operations'' (magazine), Multi-Man ...
, the Dunkirk evacuation had been running for a week. In ''
The Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
'' (1949),
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill in the Second World War, dur ...
described the Allied defence of Lille as a "splendid contribution" that delayed the German advance for four days and allowed the escape of the
British Expeditionary Force from
Dunkirk
Dunkirk (french: Dunkerque ; vls, label=French Flemish, Duunkerke; nl, Duinkerke(n) ; , ;) is a commune in the department of Nord in northern France.[William L. Shirer
William Lawrence Shirer (; February 23, 1904 – December 28, 1993) was an American journalist and war correspondent. He wrote ''The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich'', a history of Nazi Germany that has been read by many and cited in scholarly w ...]
wrote in 1969 that the "gallant" defence of Lille "helped the beleaguered Anglo-French forces around the port to hold out for an additional two to three days and thus save at least 100,000 more troops". The defenders of Lille were the only garrison accorded honours of war during the campaign of 1940 and with the defenders of
Fort Vaux
Fort Vaux (french: Fort de Vaux), in Vaux-Devant-Damloup, Meuse, France, was a polygonal fort forming part of the ring of 19 large defensive works intended to protect the city of Verdun. Built from 1881 to 1884 for 1,500,000 francs, it housed ...
during the
Battle of Verdun
The Battle of Verdun (french: Bataille de Verdun ; german: Schlacht um Verdun ) was fought from 21 February to 18 December 1916 on the Western Front in France. The battle was the longest of the First World War and took place on the hills north ...
in 1916, one of only two French garrisons to receive this distinction by Germany in both world wars.
Alistair Horne wrote in 1982 that the French defence of Lille enabled the BEF and the rest of the First Army to retreat into the Dunkirk perimeter and in 2013, Douglas Fermer wrote that the Battle of Lille diverted about seven German divisions during the evacuation of Dunkirk. In a 2016 publication, Lloyd Clark wrote that the French breakout attempts were doomed to fail but that the German besiegers had been held off for four days when the Dunkirk perimeter was being consolidated. (Field Marshal)
Walther von Brauchitsch
Walther Heinrich Alfred Hermann von Brauchitsch (4 October 1881 – 18 October 1948) was a German field marshal and the Commander-in-Chief (''Oberbefehlshaber'') of the German Army during World War II. Born into an aristocratic military family ...
blamed the halt order to the ''panzer'' divisions, issued by Hitler, for the delay; had the ''panzer'' forces been allowed to continue the pocket would have been sealed along the coast, preventing the Allied evacuation.
Casualties
Lloyd Clark wrote in his 2016 publication that the Germans took prisoner "seven generals, and and vehicles....".
Orders of battle
French
Commander: Jean-Baptiste Molinié Data from
Lloyd Clark (2016) unless specified.
* III Corps (
de La Laurencie)
**
1e Division d'Infanterie Motorisée
**
2e Division d'infanterie nord-africaine
* IV Corps (
André Boris)
**
1e division d'infanterie marocaine
**
15e Division d'Infanterie Motorisée (
Alphonse Juin
Alphonse Pierre Juin (16 December 1888 – 27 January 1967) was a senior French Army Army general (France), general who became Marshal of France. A graduate of the École Spéciale Militaire de Saint-Cyr, École Spéciale Militaire class of 1912, ...
)
* V Corps (
Darius Paul Bloch
Darius Paul Dassault ( Bloch; 13 January 1882 – 3 May 1969) was a French general who was in the French Résistance in World War II.
He was born in Paris. His alias Dassault developed when he was in the French Résistance. The name alludes to the ...
'Dassault''
**
5e Division d'infanterie nord-africaine
German
*
XXVII Corps (
Alfred Wäger)
**
4th Panzer Division
**
253rd Infantry Division
*
XV (Motorised) Corps (
Hermann Hoth
Hermann Hoth (12 April 1885 – 25 January 1971) was a German army commander, war criminal, and author. He served as a high-ranking panzer commander in the Wehrmacht during World War II, playing a prominent role in the Battle of France and on t ...
)
**
5th Panzer Division
**
7th Panzer Division
*
XI Corps 11 Corps, 11th Corps, Eleventh Corps, or XI Corps may refer to:
* 11th Army Corps (France)
* XI Corps (Grande Armée), a unit of the Imperial French Army during the Napoleonic Wars
* XI Corps (German Empire), a unit of the Imperial German Army
* ...
(
Joachim von Kortzfleisch
Joachim Otto August Achatius von Kortzfleisch (3 January 1890 – 20 April 1945) was a German general in the Wehrmacht during World War II. As the commander of the Military District III (Berlin), he played a role in the failure of the attempted ...
)
**
7th Infantry Division
*
217th Infantry Division
* Army Group A Reserve
**
267th Infantry Division
See also
*
List of French military equipment of World War II
Uniforms and Protective equipment
* Adrian helmet
* Combat uniform (go to France section)
Weapons
* List of World War II weapons of France
Utility vehicles
* P107
* Laffly S15
* Laffly V15
* SOMUA MCG
* Citroën U23
* Renault A ...
*
List of German military equipment of World War II
The following is a list of German military equipment of World War II which includes artillery, vehicles and vessels. World War II was a global war that was under way by 1939 and ended in 1945. Following political instability build-up in Europe from ...
Footnotes
References
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
**
*
*
Further reading
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
{{Subject bar
, portal1=World War II
, portal2=France
, portal3=Military of Germany
, portal4=United Kingdom
Battle of France
History of Lille
Lille 1940
1940 in France
Lille
Lille ( , ; nl, Rijsel ; pcd, Lile; vls, Rysel) is a city in the northern part of France, in French Flanders. On the river Deûle, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France Regions of France, region, the Pref ...
Lille (1940)
Lille (1940)
Lille
Lille ( , ; nl, Rijsel ; pcd, Lile; vls, Rysel) is a city in the northern part of France, in French Flanders. On the river Deûle, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France Regions of France, region, the Pref ...
Lille
Lille ( , ; nl, Rijsel ; pcd, Lile; vls, Rysel) is a city in the northern part of France, in French Flanders. On the river Deûle, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France Regions of France, region, the Pref ...
May 1940 events