A Belgian patrol boat carries gold to Britain

A4 sailed in May 1940 with roughly 40 to 50 tons of Belgian gold, accompanied by the patrol boat P16 carrying refugees. The ships skirted Dunkirk and headed for Britain, where authorities directed A4 between ports while looking for a secure unloading site. At Plymouth, the gold was unloaded two days before Belgium surrendered and deposited with the Bank of England against a receipt. Those reserves later allowed the Belgian government in exile to finance its operations independently. With no official government in exile yet established in Britain at the surrender, A4's crew took the ship to Bilbao to avoid return to occupied Belgium and becoming prisoners. The vessel spent the war interned in Spain, returned to Belgium in 1946 and was scrapped in 1948. Its escape depended on a ship capable of only about nine knots and armed with machine guns and a 47 mm cannon.