Cutting the link to France 1940

My father joined the Jersey Militia in 1937 when he was 17, so he was involved in guard duties before the arrival of the German |Forces in late June/early July 1940. One summer's day he was alone at Fliquet, a small rocky beach on the east coast of Jersey. This faces the Ecrihous, a small reef of rocks between Jersey and France, and the coast of France. At the top of the beach is a Martello Tower, a fortification built during the Napoleonic wars.There was also one of the two main links to places outside the island: a telegraph line under the sea to France. The other, on the northwest coast, went to England.
My father stood there, alone, guarding the telegraph line. During the day he noticed what he described as "a lot of activity" in the skies...planes flying low in formation. He wondered what was happening. Unexpectedly, someone came down the winding road in a van and stopped at the top of the beach. The driver jumped out with a hacksaw, and made for the telegraph line.
"What are you going to do with that?" asked my father>
"I'm going to cut the line".
"You can't do that!" he said. "I'm guarding it"
The other replied: "The Germans have issued an ultimatum. The last boats are leaving the harbour tonight. If you want to leave, you'd better get going. And help me with this">
Together they used the hacksaw to cut the line, the main telephone link to the continent.

Feeling like he'd been forgotten, my father got in his car and drove to the shop of his guardians.(Both his parents had died.)
"I'm going to England tonight; the last boats are leaving." They emptied their till, giving him all the cash they had, not knowing when they would see him again.
He went down to the harbour, joined the queues and got to England. The soldiers of the Jersey Militia became part of the Royal Hampshires and after training, he went to North Africa and then to Italy. During the war, and occupation of Jersey, he had a few Red Cross letters, with news of his family. He returned to Jersey to find the island very bare (trees had been cut for firewood) and full of German concrete. I can remember the island like that when I was a child, and sitting on Fliquet beach, listened to the story of how he cut the link with France.

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