I've been re-reading Pied Piper by Nevil Shute, set and written during and immediately after the fall of France, and it is interesting both in terms of what they know, what they don't know, and what they are able to do.

It feels like a sharp lesson in how different a country the past can be without being all that much past.

(Travelling from Britain to France in April 1940 is possible on grounds of health)

Also distances being buck wild.