Child evacuation during the second world war.

Authors Avatar

Ed Sloan

History Coursework

Evacuation is when the government want to preserve the future of Britain by sending out the children, pregnant mothers, the disabled and teachers to the countryside. To get away from the cities, that are likely to bombarded by air. Which happened in late September 1939. The government also were well prepared for the war by issuing gas masks out to the evacuees, to be worn in case of gas attacks.

Evacuation is portrayed in source A to be a failure. This source is taken from a textbook which is written for British schools. It says in the source ‘ that things did not go smoothly for the evacuees’ and ‘the local people were shocked with the deprivation and bad manners’. The source is likely to be reliable because it is written for a textbook that needs to be fair. Also the author of the textbook will probably be in his mid 40’s because about the usual age when you have experience. I think he will have experienced evacuation, making the source reliable. This source clearly shows the failure of evacuation.

Join now!

Source B seems to be reliable because it’s a picture and it was taken in the time of evacuation. Its sole purpose is to show Evacuation as a success. It shows evacuees smiling and being happy, which is a sign of success. It shows the evacuees going to the station, which is probably why they are so excited. Source B was taken in 1939 so it might have been used as propaganda to encourage other evacuees to be excited.

Source C is taken from an interview in 1988 with someone who was a teacher around evacuation, describing what ...

This is a preview of the whole essay