Why did the British government decide to evacuate children from Britain’s major cities in the early years of the Second World War?
Before the war in 1939 the British government evacuated 1½ million children, mothers and teachers, pregnant women and some disabled from the cities and big towns due to the fear of air raids. School children were mainly evacuated to smaller towns and villages in the country as it was a safer area to be in.
However it didn’t all go smoothly as Hitler didn’t bomb as expected for around 9 months many mothers decided to bring their children home and because of this had to be re evacuated which the government had to then persuade them.
I’d say that a long-term reason for the evacuations was the panic that the Germans caused when they bombed Britain back in WW1. They used zeppelins and Gotha bombers. Gotha bombers were the first bombers. They managed to cause a lot of fear after 498 people died. Not only that but the war between Italy and Abyssinia (Ethiopia) in 1935 where Italy bombed the Abyssinians. Then Hitler ordered the Luftwaffe to bomb the city of Gerurnica, testing out his new bombers. He basically raised it to the ground to show how strong his air force was, he destroyed ¾ of it.
