Source B of the source booklet also indicates success, showing children being evacuated with them waving and smiling. The source is quite reliable as it is primary evidence from 1939 and is therefore likely to be more accurate. You can make deductions from the picture that the children are excited and happy and that would indicate success. There are also sources that back up source B for example source 8 from the evacuation booklet shows many children hanging from a train waving and laughing and this also indicates success. However source B can be unreliable, as it doesn’t give the whole picture. It doesn’t show children who are frightened or unhappy and there is evidence that this was sometimes the case. This is shown in source 6 in the booklet on evacuation where a few young children are looking frightened and one of them is actually crying. There is also the fact that the picture could have been posed to make them look excited so the government could use it as propaganda to reassure or persuade mothers to evacuate their children. Overall I think that this source has too much that you can doubt in it for it to be very reliable but still can be used to gather useful information on children’s attitudes at the time.
Source H shows success for evacuation, as it is an article showing the positives of evacuation. Children are thanking their foster parents for looking after them and this shows how rewarding it was for some people. It could be reliable as the information in it comes from children and children are not likely to lie. However I don’t think it is very reliable as the government produced it at the height of the Blitz when they would have wanted more people to evacuate. Therefore it is very biased and doesn’t give any information on any of the problems experienced by children during their evacuation. The picture of two children smiling happily could have been posed (which is very likely) and therefore it isn’t that reliable.
There are a number of other sources that indicate success in getting parents to evacuate their children. Most of the people evacuated where moved inside the first weekend showing that the government had been successful in persuading many people that evacuation was a good idea. In total in that first weekend over one and a half million were evacuated. 827,000 of this number were made up of schoolchildren and this shows the government had been successful with campaigning directly to parents.
However there are also a number of sources that suggest the campaign was not a success. For example, Source I in the source booklet gives an interview for the observer where a father gives his opposition to evacuation. He has a very negative view on the idea and is unwilling to let his son go. This source is reliable as it is in the father’s own words and you can deduce his feelings from what he says. There is also another example of a parent feeling the same way in source 4 from the booklet
In which the child says that she was “daddies little gem” and that he would never send her away. This shows that the parents wouldn’t listen to the government’s advice, as their love for the children wouldn’t allow them to be parted. The source could also be unreliable though as you do not know the character of the person being interviewed. He may be a selfish person and that’s why he wants his son and therefore no government campaigning would be able to convince him. Also as it is an interview it could have been edited so that it was all negative and even if it had said something good about evacuation it might have been left out.
The evacuation was split into three waves. The first wave took place in September 1939 when war broke out but as no bombs fell for some time (the phoney war) many evacuees began to come home. However when the Blitz began in the summer of 1940 a second wave took place but this was not as successful as the first as many people had lost confidence in evacuation and wanted to stay with their families during this traumatic time. Also people knew what evacuation was like now and many didn’t like it and so didn’t want to go back. Four years later, in the second half of 1944, the Germans began to use flying bombs and massive V2 rockets. Once again people left for the countryside, the third wave, but most didn’t stay in the country for long. In the first phase one and a half million people decided to go, where as in the second wave this number dropped dramatically to 200,000 and then the in the third and last phase the numbers that went weren’t very high. Also it was planned that about 1.8 million should have been evacuated from London alone but only 36% of this number actually went, also of the 3.6 million that where from the Provinces only 33% went. This shows that the government’s campaign although successful to an extent and well planned out didn’t meet the expectations set by the government itself.
Another factor to consider when evaluating the overall success of evacuation is how organised everything was until the evacuees actually arrived at their destination. Again there are a number of sources that show this organisation to be a success. Referring back to source B, it shows success as nearly all the children are lined up orderly and all the children in the photo have arrived on time. They look happy and excited and seem to know what to do. I have evaluated this source already and it does have limitations as it shows only one side again and the previous worries, like it being posed need to be considered to decide whether it is reliable evidence.
Studying a leaflet in the source booklet, I have found out that the government decided on specific evacuation areas that were to be evacuated first. It gives a list of items that would be needed by each child. It says that posters were exhibited at schools giving transport times and plenty of information to help with organising people. This would have reassured parents and therefore the success of it would have been better. People had also been sent round the countryside to find potential hosts. You are also told that the children would be kept with their teachers and their schooling would continue. There is a source I found on the Internet about a boy named Jim Woods who says there were “literally hundreds of children all lined up with gas masks and name tags” which shows how organised the children were.
There are several sources however which indicate that government organisation wasn’t a success. For example, Source C, which says that you could only hear a murmur because the children were too afraid to talk. It also says that mothers weren’t allowed with them and that they had no idea where they were going. This shows disorganisation and shows that it caused distress for the children. This source is a reliable piece of evidence as it I written by a teacher who is less likely to have emotional attachments like a mother would and would have been less biased. The woman was actually there at the time and experienced it first hand and there wouldn’t seem to be a reason for her to lie 40 years later on unless she was still bitter. It can also be unreliable though as it is somebody’s memory and therefore all the information might not be remembered and she may have exaggerated on her story to make it more interesting.
There are other sources that back up source C, for example, Angus Calder writes about how the children were picked by their hosts and says it was like
“Scenes reminiscent of a cross between an early Roman slave market and Selfridge's bargain basement ensued.” He says that many children were left behind and this would have been crushing for them and the school teachers would probably not have known what to do with them. Source 11 tells how many children who were in awkward combinations like a brother or sister were left until the very last also.
Overall the government did quite a good job at organising the mass operation with just a few slip-ups but again forgot the feelings of the people involved and they needed to evaluate the way in which the children were picked out by the hosts.
The actual experience of evacuation itself, for the evacuees and the hosts, is probably what decided peoples view on whether it was successful or not. This includes the attitudes of the people the adjustments they had to go through and the feelings between hosts and evacuees. Source D indicates that some children’s experiences where good and they were happy as they are all in the bath and smiling and laughing. This can show a negative however as there are so many children in the baths that it looks as if there isn’t enough room for them all. There is also the fact that it could have been posed to use as propaganda as it was poster issued by the government at the time. However, the idea of success is backed up by source G, which is an extract from a novel about evacuees. It shows that there was compassion between the host and evacuees and the host is being careful not to act like a snob. The children sound giggly, unafraid and the atmosphere is light. You have to question the reliability of the piece as it is a novel and not necessarily written by someone who experienced evacuation. However, if she has interviewed evacuees this would make it more reliable. There is also the fact that it’s aim is to sell books and so what she has written could be purely fictitious so that the story would work in the book.
Again, Source H also indicates success as the children in the picture are actually thanking their hosts and it says that they are healthier and happier from being evacuated. However, the source isn’t very reliable as it was issued by the government at the time as propaganda to persuade parents to evacuate their children and so would be very biased to the positives of evacuation.
There are other sources, which show success. One source says that a young boy has been staying at the farm for six months and enjoyed every minute of it. There is also a poster from Punch, which shows two happy children running and skipping in the countryside. They are pleased and are telling their mother how nice it is. The magazine is not that reliable, as it would have been used to make parents feel better abut sending their children away.
There are a number of sources that disagree with the above. Source A doesn’t show success as it tells us that some of the children were obviously poor and had exceptionally “bad manners.” Some of the even had lice and “fouled” in the garden. This shows the differences in how many lived in the countryside and how people behaved in the city. I expect many country folk abhorred the actions and behaviour of many of the evacuees. I have evaluated the reliability of this source in the first section and I still find it to be quite reliable considering what it was written for.
Source E also shows a lack of success and again, highlights the children’s bad hygiene, they even urinated on the walls. When the children’s mother was told she did not care at all. The source is reliable as someone who had first hand experience writes it and there would be no reason for her to lie years on unless she was exaggerating because she was still bitter. It can be unreliable though because it was so long ago and she may have exaggerated certain details to make her account more interesting
Source F shows how the attitudes towards evacuees were often derogatory and he said they were treated like dirt even though many were educated and had come from good homes. The source highlights how there were problems with mixing classes and how attitudes between host and evacuee were often resentful. It is a reliable source as it was written by someone from that time yet he seems bitter and biased towards the negatives and that makes you question its reliability
There are a number of other sources, which show that there was brutality, homesickness and examples of evacuees being used as cheap labour. In source 1, you are told about how evacuees were only taken in so the host family could have the government funding for them. It says how they were treated badly and not fed properly. It also says that their presents from family were stolen from them and that the host family pretended that everything was ok when their mother came to visit.
Source 2 indicates how they were used as cheap labour, and how they had to work like “Trojans.” The hosts were so mercenary that when their father came to pick them up they had to provide proof of ownership otherwise they wouldn’t be allowed to leave.
Source 3 indicates how hosts felt when they were treated badly by evacuees and evacuee mothers. When the hosts tried to help children with lice or dirty clothes then the mothers were very abusive and ungrateful. Incidents like this affected people’s views of all evacuees and so tension grew and the successes became fewer.
Overall, I think that it was pretty even between people who had bad experiences and who had good experiences. I think it depended on the attitudes of the particular people involved.
In conclusion I think it is hard to tell whether evacuation was a success or not. People have different opinions based on their own experiences and so you can’t really draw a firm conclusion just from people’s experiences. My study of the sources gives a mixed view and it depends on what aspect of evacuation you are looking at. In my own personal opinion, every life that was saved due to evacuation means that it was success. I mean, it if it had been more successful more people would have lived of course but that doesn’t take away the fact that many lives were saved and so I agree with the statement taking into account how it affected people’s lives. Some people didn’t enjoy it, but without it they might not have lived to tell us that.
