Many pregnant women were evacuated during the war, as they were not physically fit to stay in the endangered areas. Some graduations were re- established to deal with different stages of pregnancy. Generally the pregnant women were taken to ‘neutral’ areas, to be near major medical facilities. These mothers did not want to leave their homes as it would have meant them up rooting from the surrounding support of friends and family that would have been needed in the stressful time. Host families were less inclined to take them on, as the young new borns needed extra attention and need.
Children under 5 years made up 36% of the evacuable total. These children had no exposure to evacuation drills and were most susceptible to disorganisation and even bedlam. A female relative was encouraged to accompany these children because as well as growing up in safety they would also have some kind of familiarity of home. Also as the mother would not want to leave their young children this made them slightly happier as they needed not to separate.
School children between the ages of 5 and 15 years old were also evacuated; this turned to be just over 60% of all evacuated children. Some went with the schools and teachers or children from a particular area. The main advantages of this meant that the children did not have to make new friendships as their present classmates from school surrounded them. It was also reassuring for the parents, as they knew that their children would be travelling with responsible adults who knew their children well. Also the fact that the children were able to continue their education while away all helped to keep the child’s life running as normal as possible in a time of chaos.
Problems laid in whether it was best to evacuated schools or families, and which would be the best for the child. Scotland mixed these, but the remainder of the British Isles maintained grouping.
There was a great disadvantage to children not being evacuated as a community or a school since it made the experience that more daunting. As a result of the mis-matches in reception areas, selection was made according to rudimentary principles. Billeting officers simply lined the children up and invited the potential hosts to take their pick. Thus the phrase ‘I’ll take that one’ became etched on the memory of evacuees. This was a traumatic experience for the minors as those that looked unhealthy, poor or dirty were left until the very last. A man remembers him and his sister going through this ordeal ‘we were left until the very last. The room was almost empty. I sat on my rucksack and cried.’ These children would have felt isolated and lonely, as they did not know their fellow evacuees or their new hosts. They also had the added pressure of making new friendships.
However, friendships did form- not only amongst the evacuees from the urban areas but new bonds between the urban and rural children. Each child learnt a new way of life, the city children learnt the ways of the countryside, one child wrote back to his mother ‘They call this Spring, Mum, and they have one down here every year.’ Very soon all children became accustomed to their new ways of life, even though it was practically forced upon them through government pressure.
The government played a huge part in the process of evacuation; the main problem was encouraging mothers to give up their children to the safety of the countryside. Propaganda Posters appeared through the city showing a soldier in combat gear saying to a young boy, ‘Leave this to me, sonny. You ought to be out of London.’ All this propaganda tried to convince parents to send their children to the countryside and they stated on the amount of carnage that they thought would be caused by German bombings in order to underline the importance of evacuation. These estimates of casualties were grossly exaggerated and the subsequent government propaganda cause near panic rather than controlled movement. The extent of the propaganda produced by the government showed that civilians weren’t persuaded enough by the factor of safety to give up much loved children.
The real problems came in the reception areas where the government had left arrangements for the children’s arrival and care to the local authorities, with little more than an injunction to do their best. The result can only be described as a typical British wartime shamble. Hundreds of children arrived in the wrong area with insufficient rations, and more worryingly, there were not enough homes in which to put them in.
Consequently, social classes were mixed, a working class boy remembers being evacuated to an upper class family and felt treated like a member of the family, given love and affection and secured friendships ‘to last a lifetime.’ All children in this situation experienced a new way of life ‘we were even given flannels and toothbrushes. We’d never cleaned our teeth up till then…all very odd.’ For evacuees like him, it was a life-enhancing experience, leaving them with memories they still treasure to this day. However the host that received these children that lacked basic living standards, had to tolerate children that were going to the toilet in the corner of rooms, small wonder that there was friction, with hosts paid only a meagre sum for a child’s board and lodging. Complaints of thieving, swearing, bed-wetting and uncleanness were made time and time again.
However, there were the unfortunate children who were beaten, mistreated and abused by families who didn’t want or care about them. The higher class evacuees reflect on their experience of living in lower standards as there being ‘No indoor toilet, no bathroom…. we never imagined people could live like that.’ Religious problems also crept up with Roman Catholic and Protestant families mixed-up in numerous problems and many objections were placed.
For the families left back in the urban cities that had already endured separation from their men as a result of the war, but their pain had been doubled as they waved goodbye to their children. These are the people that were exposed to the trauma of separation, isolation, the tensions of fear and anger. Most mothers were unaware of where their children were going, what they would be doing and all were wholly ignorant of when they would be coming back.
The policy of evacuation also had a long-term effect on the country’s development. As most evacuees were children from poor areas taken in by middle- class families, the huge gulf between the social classes was bought into focus and highlighted. Evacuation seems to have played a significant part in shaping the deep- felt desire to create a fairer society when the war was over. The problems that were raised by the evacuations pointed out weaknesses in public conditions and the urban working- classes own living conditions. This provided the incentive for post-war reforms in areas such as national health, housing and adequate supplies of nutritional food. Today as a result of these reforms there is the National Health Service (NHS), new housing full of modern amenities, and today there are excessive amounts of food available for all civilians.
