Évacués

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A further two million or so more wealthy individuals evacuated 'privately', some settling in hotels for the duration and thousands travelling to Canada, the United States, South Africa, Australia and the Caribbean. What clothes did children take with them? Outcome: Approximately three million people were evacuated from towns and cities that were in danger of being bombed, in an operation codenamed Pied Piper. Under the name " Operation Pied Piper", the effort began on 1 September 1939 and officially relocated 1.5 million people. There were further waves of official evacuation and re-evacuation from the south and east coasts in June 1940, when a seaborne invasion was expected, and from affected cities after the Blitz began in September 1940. Official evacuations also took place from the UK to other parts of the British Empire, and many non-official evacuations within and from the UK. Other mass movements of civilians included British citizens arriving from the Channel Islands, and displaced people arriving from continental Europe. With the start of the Second World War came Operation Pied Piper. This was the plan to evacuate civilians from cities and other areas that were at high risk of being bombed or becoming a battlefield in the event of an invasion. The country was split into three types of areas: Evacuation, Neutral and Reception, with the first Evacuation areas including places like Greater London, Birmingham and Glasgow, and Reception areas being rural such as Kent, East Anglia and Wales. Neutral areas were places that would neither send nor receive evacuees. Even at the time, there were some that had grave concerns about the psychological effect on especially the younger children, and wondered whether they would be better off taking the risks with their parents. [17] [18]

Mawson, Gillian (2016). Britain's Wartime Evacuees. Frontline Books. p.112. ISBN 978-1-84832-441-1.

Activity 1: Children in the 1940s quiz

As there was such pressure on rural households to take evacuees, some children were billeted with childless couples and for many a lifelong relationship ensued. These are the good news stories that we don't hear enough about. World War 2 Evacuation was an incredible logistical exercise which required thousands of volunteer helpers. The first stage of the evacuation, in September 1939 involved teachers, local authority officers, railway staff, and 17,000 members of the Women’s Voluntary Service (WVS). The WVS provided practice assistance for getting the children to their destination, looking after evacuees and providing refreshments for the children. All the host families that took in children were also volunteers, they volunteered to take in as many children as they could afford to help the war effort. Leaving the cities There were no big bombing raids on Britain in the first months of the war (know as The Phoney War) as a result by early 1940 many children had returned home. The mass exodus of civilians in Britain during the Second World War was designed to protect people – especially children – from aerial bombing, by moving them to areas thought to be less at risk. In the summer of 1939, more than 3 million children were evacuated from London and other cities in ‘Operation Pied Piper’, while most parents stayed behind to work and help out with the war effort.

The UK Ministry of Health advertised the evacuation programme through posters, among other means. The poster depicted here was used in the London Underground. One evacuated school was sponsored by the FPP in Knutsford, Cheshire, with each child being financially supported by an American citizen. One female pupil, named Paulette, was sponsored by Mrs Eleanor Roosevelt. [11] Overseas evacuation [ edit ] Some strained areas took the children into local schools by adopting the First World War expedient of "double shift education"—taking twice as long but also doubling the number taught. The movement of teachers also meant that almost a million children staying home had no source of education. [ citation needed] Evacuation centres [ edit ] Marchant's Hill School was an evacuation camp of wooden buildings built at Hindhead in Surrey. This is the dining hall in use in 1944. It was codenamed Operation Pied Piper. Who on earth came up with that name? Not a mother, that is certain. After all, the piper leads the children of Hamelin away from the town, never to return. Over the six years of the war, more than two million children were sent away from their family homes. Most returned, but how they had changed and how the separation affected their relationships with their families is seldom considered. Evacuation Children Are Safer in The Country, 1939-1945, Central Office of Information, catalogue reference INF 13/171 (1)

What Places Were Evacuees Sent To?

Evacuation to Parents Important Notice1939-1945, Central Office of Information, catalogue reference INF 13/171 (4) Between 1939 - 1945 there were three major evacuations in preparation of the German Luftwaffe bombing Britain.