The British Government's Decision to Evacuate Children During World War II

The British Government's Decision to Evacuate Children During World War II

The evacuation of children during the Second World War (1939-1941) was

named operation ‘Pied-Piper’, Masses of children were moved from urban

areas to the rural countryside.

The British government took measures of evacuation in the early years

of the Second World War for many different reasons. The reasons can be

split up into two sections. One of the sections is ‘phase one’ of the

evacuation process and the other is ‘phase two’. Phase one of the

evacuation process began on the 31st of august, three days before war

was formally declared. This shows that the war had been ‘seen’ to be

coming. Evacuating millions of children was no easy task, much

planning and thinking needed to be done in order to make it

successful. Plans for evacuation had been going on since the Munich

crisis (1938) when Britain had been on the brink of war with Germany.

About one and a half million children (in the first few days of

evacuation) were sent from cities to countryside homes where they were

believed to be safe. Towards the end of 1938 no German military action

or bombing had taken place, people began to see it as the ‘phoney’

war, parents felt it unnecessary for their children to be sent away

and so children began returning back home for Christmas, by January

1939 it was estimated that over one million children were back home in

the cities. ‘Phase two’ of the evacuation process came in April/May

1940; this was the second wave of evacuation which began due to the

successful gains of Germany in Western Europe. The Luftwaffe had

invaded Denmark, Sweden, Norway and now even Dunkirk (France). Theses

gains now played an important part in the evacuation process, unlike

during ‘phase one’ where Britain ‘expected’ an German attack, it was

now different, and Hitler provided a much greater threat to invade

Britain. The threat was more direct and it was much easier for Hitler

to attack Britain as his successful recent gains allowed him to be