Source C is an extract from a novel about evacuees by Nina Bowden in 1973. The novel is called Carrie’s War and was written for children. In the extract the character of the foster mum assumed that the evacuees were too poor to afford slippers. The children laughed about this afterwards. One attitude of this source is that there was often a lot of confusion between evacuees and foster parents which is arguably one of the failures of evacuation. From my own knowledge I know that there was sometimes confusion and lack of communication. Many country families were unaware of how city children lived. Evacuees were assumed to have lice and diseases. Some children had no experience of using a knife or fork to eat with. Also a lot of evacuees, like the characters in the source, found that the homes they stayed in were much cleaner than their own. Some found this odd and scary.
Another attitude of the source is that children had fun when they were evacuated. From my own knowledge, I know that some children did have fun in the countryside so the source is reliable but then again some children hated evacuation.
This source is reliable because from my own knowledge I know that the author was evacuated when she was a child so the book could have been produced from the author’s own experiences of evacuation. Many parts of the story are similar to the author’s evacuation. She was evacuated to South Wales with her two brothers during the war as was the main character of the book. Also the author had many years before writing the book in which to research about evacuation. The author may have enjoyed her experience of evacuation and then decided to write about it, however the source could be unreliable as the author might not have enjoyed evacuation so wrote about what she imagined evacuation was like for other children.
Also, as the book is fictional, some parts of the author’s experience might have been exaggerated or not included, making the source unreliable. The source is also unreliable because it is a novel for children. Therefore it is unlikely that the author would write as many bad points about evacuation because it might upset children. If children were upset by the book then not as many copies would sell. The author would not want this as the purpose of the book is probably to make money and inform. Therefore the author would not have included any bad experiences of evacuation and would possibly have added in more pleasant experiences of evacuation.
As the book was written 34 years after evacuation took place, the author might have forgotten some details of her experience. The source is also only an extract and the rest of the story might be about negative things that happened to the characters during their evacuation.
This source is an unreliable representation of attitudes to evacuation because it is only one person’s opinion of evacuation. Other evacuees would have had different experiences from the author or the characters.
This source is similar to source A as it shows a positive attitude to the evacuation of children but it differs from source A in that it shows the misunderstanding between children and foster parents. It is also different from source A as source A was encouraging evacuation at the time of the first evacuation whereas source C is informing people about evacuation years after it happened. Both source A and C are unreliable because they might not be showing true attitudes to evacuation. However the audience of source A might not have realised that the source was possibly staged whereas readers of the book that source C is extracted from would know that the book was only a novel and that the views of evacuation were not necessarily meant to be thought of as fact.
Source D is an advertisement issued in 1940 encouraging people in Scotland to provide homes for evacuee children. The use of propaganda is very evident in this source as it shows two children smiling, putting forward the attitude that the evacuees in Scotland were enjoying their evacuation. The advert is showing how grateful the evacuees are for their foster parents. The source’s view of evacuation is that it is safer for the children and that the children enjoyed being evacuated. The source also explains how the foster parents have done ‘the right thing’ and the how the government are grateful to all of the volunteers in Scotland. The advert is supposed to guilt trip people into volunteering by letting them know that if the children are not evacuated then they may die.
Source D is quite similar to source A as both sources show a positive attitude to evacuation. Both the sources show happy smiling children giving the impression that children had fun when they were evacuated. The sources are also similar because they both show children being evacuated with friends or family. Source A shows the children being evacuated with their class so their evacuation was not just filled with strangers. This would make parents feel happier about evacuation as they would know that the children would be less upset. Source D would also have this affect as it shows two children who are probably brother and sister showing parents that their children would not be separated from each other. Also as source D is an appeal by the government and as it is probable that source A was taken by the government, both sources have the same author. Also, both these sources were probably encouraging evacuation by showing the public how happy the children were who were already evacuated. These sources are also similar in terms of their reliability. Both sources are likely to be staged though source D is probably staged using actors who might not even have been evacuated while source A is probably staged with evacuees. Also, both sources are reliable because they were taken or issued at the time of evacuation. This means that both the authors were around at the time of evacuation so details were not forgotten since.
However, these sources differ because while a possible purpose of both sources is to encourage parents to evacuate their children, source D’s main purpose is to encourage families to look after evacuees.
Source D is also reliable because from my own knowledge I know that there was bombing in London at the time and the government desperately needed to save more lives. The source is also unreliable as I know that not all children were happy being evacuated and some were home sick or were abused. I also know that not all brothers and sisters were evacuated together.
Source D is also similar to source C as they both put forward a positive attitude to evacuation. Both of the sources show the evacuees as being evacuated with their siblings. This makes these sources both reliable and unreliable. The sources are reliable as I know that some children, like the author of source C, were lucky enough to be evacuated with their siblings. However from my own knowledge I know that many brothers and sisters were separated from each other making the sources unreliable.
Source D differs from source C because source C is a novel written many years after the war whereas source D is an advertisement during the war. These two sources both have different purposes, source C is to inform, entertain or to make money while source D’s purpose is to appeal for volunteers. Therefore, source C might have exaggerated evacuation to make it seem more fun for children to read and source D might have exaggerated the good parts of evacuation and the bombings of the war to encourage people living in Scotland to look after evacuees. Source D is giving the attitude that the foster parents and the evacuees always get on well but source C shows that there were misunderstandings between evacuees and foster parents which I know to be true from my own knowledge. The time that the sources were written and who they were written by also created differences between the sources. As source C was written after the war, the author would have had time to research the war to make the novel as reliable as possible also the fact that the author was also evacuated and the evacuation process in the book strongly resembles that of the author, the book would possibly have had a more realistic attitude to evacuation. However, as source D was written during the war, by the government, the source would probably be bias and only include the information that the government wanted it to include. For example, the government only briefly mentions that the evacuees are extra work for the foster parents but mainly points out how grateful the government and the children are for the foster parents. From my own knowledge I know that many children arrived into the countryside with lice and diseases. Many wet the bed or tried to run away from home. The government does not mention these facts as this would discourage people living in Scotland from taking in evacuees. If these facts were mentioned in the novel that source C is an extract from, it wouldn’t matter as the book is only to inform so lots of different attitudes could be shown.
Source E is an interview with a parent in May 1940. The interview is an extract from a mass observation survey. The source shows a parent from the Southend disagreeing with the idea of evacuating his seven-year-old son. The attitude of the source is that parents in the cities disliked the idea of evacuating their children. The source might have this view as the motive of the mass observation survey might have been to promote anti-evacuation. In which case the author might have selected this interview out of all the other interviews to represent public opinion. In my opinion the observer might have been asking loaded questions to get the negative answers they wanted. Both of these possibilities would make the source unreliable. The source might also have this view because of the purpose and date. The observer probably wanted to see if another evacuation would be popular by carrying out a survey because at this time, Germany had captured French airbases making Germany more of a threat to Britain. The interviewer might also have had their own opinion of evacuation so wanted to persuade the public to share his view. This would make the source unreliable.
Source E is reliable because it was written around the time of the first and second evacuations. Therefore the father being interviewed would not have to rely on memory to answer the questions. Also, the source is reliable because from my own knowledge I know that a lot of parents did not want to be separated from their children or thought that their children would be better off staying in the cities.
However, this source is not reliable because it is only an extract from the mass observation survey so does not show a variety of opinions and as this is just one man, his opinion could be very different from the majority of people living in Britain. Also the father in the interview is quite ignorant and is stereotyping The Shires. This makes the source unreliable because I know from my own knowledge that only a minority of The Shires were starving before the war.
This source is quite similar to source B as both the sources are interviews showing negative opinions of evacuation. Also they are both unreliable as the people being interviewed could have been asked loaded questions. Also I think the man being interviewed in source E might have been quite emotional or wound up about the subject of evacuation making his answers more definite and one sided.
However, source E is also different from source B as it was written at the time of the war, meaning that the father’s opinion was recent and he would not have forgotten any detail. Also, source E is describing the father’s opinions about the idea of evacuation whereas source B is describing a teacher’s views on what the experience of evacuation was like. This means that the attitudes of these sources are likely to be different as the father in source E has not experienced the evacuation process and just basing his opinion on what he assumes evacuation will be like.
Source E is quite different from source D as they have opposite attitudes to evacuation. Source D is showing how better off the evacuees are if they are evacuated to the countryside whereas source E is describing how better off the children are if they stay in the cities. The sources are also different as in source D the government is saying how grateful parents are that the foster parents in Scotland are looking after them but source E is giving the impression that parents would not be grateful as they would rather have their children stay at home with them.
Source E is also similar to source F. Source F is a scene from the film ‘Hope and Glory’ which was directed by John Boorman in 1987. The scene shows a mother’s refusal to allow her children to be evacuated. These sources are similar because they both show parents wanting to keep their children with them in the cities. However, the sources differ as they were written or made on different dates. The interview in source E was done in 1940 but source F was made in 987. This affects their attitudes towards evacuation because the director of source F would have had time to research evacuation whereas the father in source E did not. The father might have, in hindsight, had a different opinion of evacuation. For example, if his son was killed in the war during an air raid, he might have then thought that evacuation was a good idea after all, but he would not have known this at the time of the interview. However, this means that source E gives a more honest view of evacuation. If the director of source F had time to research evacuation, he might have shown what he thought should have been the view towards evacuation. Also as the source is an extract from a film, parts of the scene were probably exaggerated making the source a less reliable attitude than the attitude in source E.
From my own knowledge I know that the film was a semi-autobiographical account of the director’s early childhood. This makes source F reliable because the director would have remembered details of his experiences of the war and as the film was made in 1987, he would also have had time to do extra research to add to his own experiences. The source is also reliable because from my own knowledge I know that many parents disliked being separated from their children and that evacuation was a hard and emotional decision. I also know that many children during World War Two wanted to stay in the cities to see the destruction of war as they saw it as fun.
However, the source is not reliable because the director may not have remembered all the details of his experience of the war. Also, as he was not evacuated he might not have known much about evacuation when he was a child. This particular scene might not have resembled a moment in the director’s childhood meaning that he would have had nothing but research to base this scene on. If the scene did resemble part of the director’s childhood, being a child, he might not have understood his mother’s emotions at the time. Also, the film uses emotive music to exaggerate the mother’s feelings on evacuating her children. This means that it is not a reliable representation of evacuation because there would not have been emotive music in real life; also the music affects the audience’s feelings making the evacuation process seem worse.
The source is also unreliable because actors are used to show the evacuation process. The actors probably did not experience evacuation themselves, therefore, parts of the scene could be exaggerated to make the story seem more interesting to the audience. The director would want to make the film interesting as although one purpose of the film was to inform, the main purposes were to entertain and to make money. The source is also unreliable because it is only one view of evacuation. From my own knowledge I know that many parents were happy about evacuation.
Source F is quite similar to source C as they are both fictional representations of evacuation. Both the sources show a fictional but reasonable view of evacuation. The sources are also similar in terms of reliability. They are both quite reliable as both the authors experienced the Second World War and would have had time to do extra research as both the sources were written or made years after the war.
However the sources differ as they have different views of evacuation. Source C shows a fairly positive view of evacuation whereas source F shows a very negative attitude towards evacuation. Sources C and F are also different types of sources. Source C is an extract from a children’s novel while source F is a scene from a film.
Source F is also similar to source A as they both show evacuees who are about to be evacuated. Both the sources show that lots of children were evacuated at once as source A shows whole classes walking down to the station and source F shows the family make their way through a crowded train station. They are also similar because source F is staged and there is a strong possibility that source A is staged as well.
However, the sources differ as source A would have been staged using evacuees while source F was staged using professional actors. Also, the sources show different attitudes towards evacuation. Source A is showing a positive view of evacuation as it shows children smiling and waving as they walk down to the station, while source F shows a mother wanting to keep her children with her in the city. The attitudes probably differ because source A is propaganda encouraging evacuation whereas source F is a film informing the public about evacuation whilst being entertaining.
Source F is also similar to source B as they both describe the atmosphere at the train station while evacuation took place. Both the sources portray the experiences in a negative way. Also, the sources are similar in terms of their reliability. Both the sources are unreliable because they were both written or made many years after the war. Therefore, the teacher in source B and the director of source F would have to rely on memory so details could have been forgotten and experiences could have been exaggerated.
However, the sources differ because source A is an interview where the teacher probably said the information as truthfully as she could but source F is a staged scene from a film. Also the sources describe the experiences differently. Source A says that the parents were not allowed to walk down to the station with the children but source F shows the mother taking her children to the train station. Source A also says that the parents and children had no idea where they were being evacuated to while in source F the mother knows that the children were going to be evacuated to Australia.
In conclusion, the attitude of each source is mainly affected by its purpose and its motives. For example, sources A and D are trying to encourage evacuation so they put forward a positive view of evacuation whereas sources B and C are trying to show a negative view of evacuation so might have asked loaded questions for the interviewers to get the negative answers they were looking for. Sources C and F however are very different from the other sources as they are fictional representations of evacuation and their purpose is to inform and entertain, therefore, the authors might exaggerate to make the audience more interested. The sources also differ because of the different experiences the authors or characters had. No two people had the same experience of evacuation; so inevitably, no two sources have the same attitude. None of the sources have mixed views of evacuation, all of the sources only illustrate either positive or negative views which itself suggests that the sources are trying to show a certain view and that the sources are not showing true attitudes. This shows that the attitudes of sources A to F partially depend on their reliability. A source could be reliable if it was written or made during the time of evacuation when it would have been fresh in the author’s mind or if the author experienced evacuation themselves so could give a valid opinion. A source could be unreliable if it was made after evacuation as details might have been lost or the author might have exaggerated their attitude towards evacuation.