The Success of the Evacuation

The Success of the Evacuation

When evacuation started in September 1939 it was very popular. Many

people in Britain thought that the German's would bomb the large

cities such as London and Birmingham without a second thought.

These thoughts were due to newsreels at cinemas showing German planes

bombing cities in the Spanish civil war. So people were relieved that

children and mothers of young children were evacuated. However the

German's didn't start bombing British cities until the autumn of 1940

and it got worse through the winter of 1940-1941. This was called the

blitz. Before this thousands of children had gone home, having to be

evacuated again.

Evacuation was generally a success and certainly helped save the lives

of thousands of ordinary children from bombing. It involved hundreds

and thousands of children, mothers and teachers being moved. It

affected thousands of families who became hosts to the children.

Considering the numbers of people and the distances and organisation

needed it was a great success. Some arrangements were very nasty and

bothers and sisters became parted.

Some areas had too many evacuees and some areas didn't have enough

children for the area. A lot of rural schools were too small to cope

with the extra children, which meant that many children enjoyed a lot

of 'holiday' time, which was often spent farming this is also shown in

Source H as it shows problems and limitations. Many evacuees or

children evacuated had a fantastic time, met new friends and saw areas

that they had never seen before. A lot of them had not been on holiday

before and had no experience of farming or living in the countryside.

It was an experience most of them enjoyed. However it wasn't all like

that. It was proved that for a small minority of evacuees it was an

unpleasant adventure. They were bullied in the rural schools, they

lived with people they didn't know and sometimes they were with

families that were a lot richer or poorer than their own.

Unfortunately some children were exposed to physical, verbal and