Evacuation was a scheme that was to move people from highly populated areas to areas that are less populated. This occurred at the beginning of the Second World War. Children were sent from large cities: such as London: Birmingham and others south east areas of Britain, to the country side considering that the country side would be safer.
The government of Britain introduced this scheme because they were worried about a war arriving when Hitler came to power in 1933. The government were afraid that cities and towns would be targets for bombing raids by German aircrafts. The evacuation project included, school children with teacher’s, pregnant women, disabled people, woman with children under 5yrs, all had to be evacuated from large cities and towns. These people had to be transported mainly by trains (some were transported by cars). There were 3 different places of evacuation:
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Neutral areas - where people weren’t evacuated from or to. People living in these places had a 50/50 chance of getting bombed.
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Evacuation areas - people were evacuated from this area because heavy bombing raids could be expected.
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Reception areas - People were evacuated to these places because it was thought it would be safe.
The first announcement that was made by the government to evacuate was on 31st august 1939, 1 day before Poland was invaded. Around 1.5 million people were evacuated within 3 days. Some children began to come back home because of the phoney war and suddenly in the autumn of 1940 heavy bombing raids started so children were evacuated again. Later in 1944 when Germany begins a new wave of bombing tactics, V1 bombs and V2 rockets were introduced. The change of tactics by Germany caused the British government to decide that another evacuation should take place and it does. This was the last of the evacuation in Britain and this scheme saved thousands of civilian’s lives.
The government had been over exaggerating about the consequences of the war or what they should do about the war. They were especially exaggerating about the bombing raids by Germany. The British government had planned to have evacuated 3 million people within the first 4 days of the Second World War. However, the British government only managed to evacuate half the amount of they had planned, only 1.5 million in 3 days. This was a huge difference between the estimate and the amount of people that were actually evacuated. From this it can be seen that the British government was under suspicion of getting bombed heavily within the first few days of the Second World War. The British government was also afraid of gas attacks so every citizen had to have been given a gas mask in order to be protected by this attack. The government had supplied over 38million gas masks all round he country. Most of these were supplied to the people that lived in highly populated areas such as London and Birmingham and also the evacuees even though they were going to a safe area where it was less likely to get bombed or gassed. But the government thought it would be safe than sorry.
The blackout was enforced by the government to protect the populations of cities from air attacks. This came into action on 1st September. The blackout was a scheme where lights were unable to be seen by anyone, especially the aircraft that were flying above the skies of Britain. This made it harder for the bombers to find their target. In order to do this people had to hang thick black materials in front of any part of the house that would let out light. Mostly the light would have been able to be seen through the windows so curtains were used. Street lights had to be turned off, traffic lights and car headlights also had to be blacked out during the night time of every day of the Second World War. Blacking out traffic lights and car headlights meant that there was a higher chance of an accident. No bombs would have been dropped because the enemy bombers won’t be able to find the places where the population of people are high. If any bombs were dropped hey would have been dropped at random. For the pilots all the places looked the same so it was very difficult. However, if lights were able to be seen then street air raid wardens would go o the house and tell them to cover it or just to switch the light off. Street wardens would also warn the people that air attacks are about to start.
The blitz was the bombing of the British cities after the Germans had failed to beat Britain in the battle of Britain. In the battle of Britain Hitler tried to control the skies above Britain (Luftwaffe). Hitler got very close to defeating the British air force. The purpose of the blitz was to break the morale of the British people and to make Churchill (the prime minister) to surrender. This change tactic by Hitler was partly because of the British bombing raids over Berlin. During the bombing raids, Coventry had been stroke by the German bombers in November 1940. Industrial targets, such as motor works and aero-engine factories got destroyed. The bombers also destroyed the city’s cathedral which shows the hard heartiness of Germany. This gave a chance to the British government to use this as an example of propaganda at the beginning of the war the government was expecting to get attacked from the air and then took precautions to protect its people. Air raid wardens were appointed to make sure the black out was being followed properly and to prepare people for air raids. When air raids occurred the air raid wardens would let the people know it was coming air raid sirens would go off. When they heard the siren they would go outside the house into another shelter. Anderson shelters were most common but some preferred other places. An Anderson shelter was big enough to fit a whole family in. at the end of the blitz, the summer of 1941, about 43 000 people had died and millions left homeless.
To conclude, I think that the government chose the right scheme at the right time to save tens of thousands of lives. Evacuation was introduced by the government because they thought it would be safe for the civilians of Britain. Also, because they thought that Germany would attack Britain by bombs and gas attacks. This meant that the people of Britain were in danger if evacuation wasn’t established. So the children, teachers, mothers and disabled people were evacuated to safer places all around Britain.