Ordered to hold Calais, troops from Queen Victoria’s Rifles along with assorted troops from the French garrison had responsibility for blocking the main roads into the city. A motorcycle battalion, the Queen Victoria’s Rifles did not actually have any rifles (they carried pistols instead), and had to scrounge weapons upon their hurried arrival from England (the motorcycles never made it across the Channel). They spent the night digging in, building a roadblock from a double line of railway trucks and gathering more troops from scattered small British units. At dawn, some figures approached carefully along the railway tracks. The British opened fire and the attackers fell to the ground.

As mortar bombs came whistling down and German infantry advanced, the forward British platoons withdrew to strengthen the line held along the town’s old ramparts. Both sides deployed snipers; the well-trained sharpshooters of the 60th Fusiliers killed a dozen Germans. Making good use of the abandoned railway wagons, the British blocked the level crossings and bridges to defend the embankment.

Tenth Panzer Division’s staff expressed surprise at the hot reception; one German company had six men killed and the same number seriously wounded in the fighting in front of the bastions. Several light tanks were lost, with two of them burned.