The third Source I will be looking at is Source C; it is an extract from a novel called ‘Carrie’s War’ based on facts which is written for children about evacuees. Because it is a novel, this means it is a story based on knowledge of the evacuation and she has made it easier to understand, especially for children so it should be mainly true but could have been enhanced to make it more interesting and appealing to children. Source C gives an example of many successful evacuee experiences, ‘Not a speck of dust anywhere.’ From this, I can tell that many evacuees would have arrived into a house which was clean making it nice for them to live in. In the novel, the author mentions what the foster parents said to the evacuees ‘I’m sorry, how silly of me, why should you have slippers?’ This gives an insight into how many evacuees were perceived, Nina states that the foster parent was almost patronising them and making them feel low as they had an idea of most city children being poor. What makes this source reliable is that the author Nina Bowden was a former evacuee; therefore she had first hand experience and we expect her to have done research. It was written in the year of 1973 which means it is a benefit of hindsight so there is ability to research the facts. However, it is also unreliable as it was not taken from the time; it was written almost 40 years later. The source is also limited because this is a novel written for children so she would be using safe language and therefore may have taken important parts of the novel out or she may have changed it a slight bit. It is also an extract and not the entire novel so this makes it unreliable.
Source D shows a poster advertising and persuading people to foster children and also thanking foster parents who have fostered or are currently fostering children. The poster was issued by the government in 1940 and its aim was to appeal for more people to provide homes for evacuee children. Obviously, not enough people had volunteered to foster and they were still looking for more people. The poster includes a full sized image which consists of 2 young angelic smiling children who look innocent and the background is divided into two; One half is the countryside which looks like a safe and pleasant place to be and the other half represents the city which looks dark and very unsafe with a few aircraft hovering across. This suggests the 2 very different places where evacuees could be during the war-The Countryside being Scotland where it is safe and the City being where they are currently living in danger. Underneath the image, there is text underneath the image in large, bold font. The sentence states: ‘Thank You, Foster Parents... we want more like you!’ it is deliberately printed in bold to make it more eye catching and also to appeal to people about evacuation. Especially the words ‘Thank You’ appreciates and gives praise to them. Another reason why it is useful is because it is taken from the time. On the other hand, it is also limited because it is Government Propaganda persuading the nation to foster children and is biased because evacuation was a Government Project and therefore was just their opinion and not others. The language from the text underneath the image was also exaggerated and over the top, this would be unreliable for a historian.
Source E is an interview with a father of a seven year old; he discusses the subject of evacuation and also his own opinion of it. The source shows the parent’s fears of letting his son go; he says ‘They can’t be looked after there where they’re sending them.’ He is stating that the evacuees cannot be properly looked after at the place where the children are being sent to be evacuated. He also has an idea of the country life; he thinks it is ‘poor’ and he talks about his son getting looked after and decides it would better for his son to stay at home ‘They’ve nothing there; they were starving there before the war.’ He mentions that if the countryside were poor before the war then they would definitely be poor after the war is over. What makes the source useful is that it is taken from the time of May 1940; however, this interview may have been taken before the Blitz began and the parent may have changed his views when the actual bombings started. It is again useful because it provides a useful insight into a mind of a parent. However, what makes this source yet unreliable is that it is only an extract; it is not the whole interview, a historian would need to see more and the entire thing to be certain of parent’s points of views. The interview is also one person’s opinion which is the father’s therefore would make the novel biased and we have not heard the mother’s point of view.
Source F is a letter written by a young girl during her time in evacuation. It is very useful because it is taken from the time in the year 1939. She writes to her family about her life being an evacuee living with another family. In the letter, Esther writes talks about her day at the Mass and she describes the dress they wore for the occasion; ‘We had a brown frock on with green lines down, a green belt, green buttons and green ribbon.’ This suggests she is being well looked after with fine clothes to wear. She also comments on the fact that she was not short of money; ‘You need not send me a post order because I am not short of money.’ This again, shows that she is being well looked after with enough money to look after her. She quotes about her the food rations they received; ‘I ate up a four penny bar of chocolate.’ A four penny bar of chocolate at that time was approximately the equal size to a full 99p bar today, so the chocolate bar was quite a large size which suggests that she was well fed. Then again, we need to question the source’s reliability as from looking at the date, it seems to have only been written and taken at an early time of evacuation, she may have been happy then, but she might have not enjoyed her time and experience there after. Also, Esther may have altered the letter a little to make it sound so enjoyable to prevent her mother from worrying about her life as an evacuee, so it will make her mother think that she will be having a brilliant time with her foster parents. Another reason why this source could be limited is that the letter could be covered up by her Foster Parents leaving out various experiences. The letter is also written as one person’s opinion and only one sided which makes it a biased source, not all children who were evacuated were this happy.
Evacuation was a success because it had saved so many lives; Children were taken out of harms way and were taken to safer homes and families into the countryside, with the help from the government and foster parents.
Evacuation also allowed poor inner city children escape poverty and gave many children the chance to help improve their lives for the better. For many, it was also a great adventure for example, looking at source F; it gives an insight into how successful and exciting evacuation really was. After the war, social improvements were made in many cities as they had made new friends, this highlights an important reason which made evacuation successful as the children’s socialising had improved and brought people closer together. It was also proven how the lives of children were saved, out of the 70,000 deaths from air raids, 10% of them were children. Many children had tragically lost their lives but it was a low percentage and could have been much higher approximately even up to 90% if evacuation had not been introduced. The poverty in Britain was also pointed out during evacuation, the government then produced the Beveridge Report to help tackle the issues in poverty and to improve Britain’s society. One very important thing which made evacuation so successful was Government Propaganda; they produced various advertisements such as posters and leaflets to persuade parents to foster children from the danger of the cities. It also gave many people an insight to the lives of many inner city children. This did help an enormous amount of children which helped make evacuation a great success.
On the other hand, evacuation was also unsuccessful, many children did enjoy their experience during evacuation but for some, it was a nightmare. Many were bullied, neglected and even abused; some were treated as slaves resulting in, no food, old ragged clothes and lice in their hair. Basically, it was a dirty environment to live in. Their education was also disrupted; this hugely affected the children’s learning abilities. Families had been broken up because of evacuation making many evacuees’ experience horrifying and frightening. Many people also disagreed in evacuation; they felt that the money spent on evacuation should have been better spent on other things such as other parts of the city and on armaments for the war. The Blitz was not as bad as the government expected it to be, they were expecting 10,000 deaths per raid, with the government aware of this, which is why they introduced evacuation. After the war had ended 70,000 people were killed.
In conclusion, ‘Was Evacuation a Great Success?’ In my opinion: Yes.
I believe Evacuation was successful because it had saved many young lives; it took children out of and away from harm and danger. Even though a lot of money had been used from the government, it was all for a good cause and most importantly, it was worth it. It was also a great adventure for many evacuees as they had experienced loving and caring families, a nice and clean house with a comfortable bed to sleep, enough food to last them until the next month, new clothes for them to wear, made many new friends; it was definitely a wonderful and an incredible journey. Children were also known as the future generation of Britain, one of many major reasons why the government wanted to keep them safe and secure. If children had been killed this would have a huge affect on the moral of the country. Many men would not have wanted to leave the country to fight wanting to stay and protect their families. Mothers would not have wanted to work in the munitions industry and it may also have turned people against the war and the government could have lost their support. So if evacuation had not been established during World War II or not become as successful, Britain would not be as it is today.