Limitations must be taken into consider. Although this photograph could be used to suggest evacuation was a well-organised event, it may have been staged. Perhaps it was used as propaganda to encourage the people of Britain that evacuation is a good thing. The government would need the British public to be confident about evacuation and using propaganda would convince them. ‘We hadn’t the slightest idea where we were going’ this quote is taken from an interview from a teacher in 1988. Bearing in mind this is a first hand experience; this source’s reliability is high. Ultimately this source suggest evacuation was not very organised, furthermore source B, a staged photograph is not reliable in portraying evacuation is well organised. The photograph will have been staged to disguise what evacuation was really like and therefore it can be said to be un-organised.
The evacuation experience proved quite dramatic to the children involved, many suffered bed wetting as a result of the move. Even more so many children even planned to return home on their own. The majority of children complained about the selection process and felt they were being picked out like slaves almost. ‘Many evacuees could not settle in the countryside.’ This statement is taken from an interpretation of the relations between evacuees and host families, source A. If evacuees find themselves not settling in with host families then it is stating that they may not have a good experience during evacuation. The source goes on to say that the host families also did not get on with evacuees, ‘not to mention their bad manners. There were reports of children fouling gardens.’ Finally at the end of the statement it tells us that there were reports of children bed-wetting. Ultimately this tells us that evacuation was a difficult experience for evacuees.
Source A was written by a historian for schools, perhaps a limit could have been set for the allowance of what could be said in this statement, because of the children that would be reading it he may limit what he tells us. The statement was not a first hand experience written by the historian, however it will have been researched. Overall the limitations of this source are not great enough to restrict the fact that source A evidently shows that evacuation was a stressful and difficult experience for evacuees.
Source D is a photograph of evacuees at bath time, issued by the government during the war. The photograph shows evacuees smiling and looking happy. Another point to make is they look as if they are well looked after. They appear to be clean and healthy and as though evacuation is an enjoyable experience.
As the photograph is taken and issued by the government, there is a high possibility of the photograph being propaganda. Possibly a staged photograph, used to encourage evacuation. This would have been done by the government to keep people in favour of evacuation. As the government took a lot of criticism over evacuation, they may have done this to benefit them. In addition, this is just one picture and we cannot be sure that it is the same for every other evacuee in the country. This source therefore is not enough evidence to prove that evacuation was an enjoyable experience, as there are too many limitations.
‘The children went round the house urinating on the walls.’ This quote was taken from an interview in 1988 with the mother of a ‘host family.’ It tells us that the children that stayed with the family had filthy habits and did not care about basic hygiene. In result evacuation was a bad experience for the host families.
However this is just one point of view. Others may think the complete opposite of the evacuees and also it may have just been this particular family of evacuees that were bad mannered. We furthermore have no idea what the rest of the interview was about and what the mother said about the evacuees. She may have said positive things about the evacuees that weren’t included in this source. As we don’t know what the questions to the mother were, they may have been set up so she almost had to give a negative response. For example she may have been asked what the evacuees did wrong. All these points limit the sources reliability greatly.
Source F is another interview taken also from 1988 however from someone who was an evacuee in 1939. It tells us that not all evacuees were poor and some middle class kids were evacuated. ‘It is just as upsetting for a clean and well-educated child to find itself in a grubby semi-slum as the other way round.’ This quote is evidence that some children from wealthy families were evacuated. It tells us that this particular evacuee disliked evacuation.
As the evacuee didn’t enjoy evacuation, he may give off a negative view to show how much he hated his experience, however it may not be the same for every evacuee in the country. His memory maybe slightly effected as the interview was in 1988 and he was an evacuee in 1933. Furthermore this was a first hand experience and overall the statement may be bias. In result the evacuee tells us how he felt about his experience and it is a negative experience. It is not that limited and it boldly states it was not an enjoyable experience for them.
Ultimately after looking at all the sources, it is clear that the majority disliked evacuation and it was a bad and difficult experience for them. It is not the same for everyone however a big limitation is the government using propaganda to encourage people about evacuation.
Source H is an appeal for more people in Scotland to provide homes for evacuee children. It states that the government needed more families in Scotland to provide homes. Furthermore it tells us that there was a shortage of volunteers and people willing to accept evacuees, and it suggests that the kids would benefit from evacuation. Overall it suggests evacuation wasn’t very popular.
This source also has its limitations, it may be bias and perhaps the article only said the positives of evacuation, this would be to encourage people to like evacuation. Furthermore it is only one example of advertisement. Ultimately the limitations are not too strong and the appeal is sent out by the government because evacuation is not very popular.
Overall evacuation was not very good for the government at the time. As it became less popular, the government received a lot of criticism about how evacuation was organised.
Evacuation did help during the wartime; it saved lives by getting children out of the urban areas and into the countryside. However it was very un-popular. The evacuation experience proved quite dramatic to the children involved. Those who were host families gave out negative opinions also. The evacuation process brought the problem of inner city poverty to the government’s attention. It was clear that evacuation was not very successful. This was proved by the government using methods such as propaganda and sending out appeals to try and make evacuation more successful and encourage it.
During 1940 the German air force attacked British cities. This killed over 143,000 people. However those who were evacuated, only 23 were hurt. This shows that despite evacuation being un-popular, it did save lives.
