Evacuation - source related work.

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The government’s aim of evacuation was to move children, teachers, blind and disabled people and pregnant women out of the major cities at risk from bombing, to reception areas, mostly in the countryside, so they would be safe, away from the bombing. On the 1st September 1939 the first evacuation began. 827,000 schoolchildren and 524,000 mothers and pre-school children moved in the following three days. 13,000 pregnant women, 7000 blind and disabled people and 103,000 teachers were also evacuated. The main cause of it was because British people witnessed the bombing of Spain in 1936 – 1939 on cinema screens and they were very fearful. It was first time for everyone so it was a step into the unknown.

Source B shows a photograph of evacuees walking to the station in London on September 1939. The date is wage so we don’t know if this was the first or the last of evacuees of 1939. The photograph shows most of the people waving and looking very confident and excited. We can see what kind of luggage they are carrying and what kind of clothes they are wearing.

 The photograph has its limitations. First of all we don’t know who took the picture. In 1940 cameras were not available for everyone, so it was probably a picture taken by a professional photographer. We don’t know the purpose of it being taken. As it looks like a contrived picture, because the quality is very good, everyone is smiling at the camera and it is taken from height, so there is a probability that its intention was to advertise, persuade and put a certain view on the evacuation which brings in the arguments of propaganda and censorship. It could be made for publicity in a newspaper to encourage parents to send their children to evacuation because only about 50% of the parents agreed to send their children in September 1939 in which case it wouldn’t reflect the true emotions of the people. Using my background information on evacuation, I think it is unlikely the picture is posed because during the start of the journey they thought it was just another trip with their class, with their friends. The problem with evidence like this is that a picture only captures one split second of one particular situation so it might not be true interpretation of people’s feelings. The people in the photograph look too orderly, organised, regimented, calm and confident which brings out the question whether the children would be this happy if they were on their way to an unknown place, to be taken to someone they don’t know. The picture only portrays one group of evacuees out of a million of other evacuees so the picture, even if it was reliable, would still not be as useful as the situation would be different in other groups of evacuees. It doesn’t seem to be a panic situation. Many people living in London during this time did so in poverty and couldn't afford a holiday. This is how most parents chose to describe evacuation to their children that weren't old enough to understand exactly what was going on. So it was described as a holiday, an adventure, this would have put a smile on the kids faces as they are going on holiday with friends in their school class. Some of the kids would have been happy to go on a train for the first time as well. Many children would be tired of the smog filled towns and factories. It gave them a chance to see another aspect of life and new scenery.

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However, despite the disadvantages, there are some useful points about this type of evidence. We can see what is going on, what the evacuees looked like and how they travelled. An arguable point is that the photographer couldn’t set up the clothes, the scene and the luggage they were carrying which means the source is quite useful. All children have light bags as they were probably encouraged to take the essentials or simply they didn’t have enough time to pack too much. The fact that everyone is smiling and waving could mean that the children were excited at the start ...

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