My mum was one of 800,000 British children evacuated from cities to the countryside at the outbreak of WWII in September 1939. She spent the next four years in rural Wales.
Love this so much! The pictures, the letters, the packing list, even reading your own mother’s words about her violin. There is so much life in this post! Thank you for sharing with us 💛
Thank you, Paige. It’s amazing how much there was (is!) still to be discovered in the boxes I brought back from mum and dad’s. I was thrilled to find her own account of the violin which had meant so much to her.
My neighbour, Julia, is 92 and explains that she and her brother didn't grow fond of their parents ever after their return home but remain close still now to the children of the family they were evacuated to. It's hard to imagine such separations being the norm yet just recently I found a pile of aerogrammes sent between my mother at school in England and her mother in Shanghai, spanning several years.
Thank you, Cherry. That's so poignant what your neighbour Julia says. Where was she evacuated to, do you know?
I can't imagine what it was like for my grandparents. I know they would have been busy during the war and were doing important work, but what a wrench.
I loved the photos of Mum taking me and my brother to Newtown when we were little. I'm so touched that she stayed in contact with her foster families, as your neighbour did with hers.
I remember you mentioning your mother at school in England and her mother in Shanghai. Your mother sounded super-bright. I hope their letters are enlightening!
Lovely, sensitive telling if your mother's story. Frankly it doesn't matter whether the violin was a Strad or a not - it WAS to your mother and that's what makes this vignette of a story so real and touching. I was also interested in the Birkenhead mentions. I am from a Wirral family and my grandfather and an uncle worked in Birkenhead throughout the war. Popoff - that's what everybody called Grandad and now my own grandchildren use the same name for me - worked in the railway repair sheds. His son, also a joiner, was in a reserved occupation fitting out ships at Cammel Lairds. Popoff had been a fireman during the first War as well as working on the trains. In the 2nd - he spent many nights on the roof of the railsheds, fire-watching after his working day ended.
Thank you, Peter. The irony isn't lost on me that it's only because my mum kept everything that I'm able to tell this story now – and I know she wanted her evacuee memories to be recorded in some way.
Interesting, our Birkenhead overlaps. Maybe my grandad knew your grandfather, "Popoff"!
Maybe! That would be a nice coincidence. Popoff lived in Hoylake and his actual name was Arthur Ezard - my Mum's father. My other Grandfather was a postman in Birkenhead but he only worked in the sorting office as he lost a leg in WW1. He was Jim Harkness. You're doing a great job with your mother's memories.
I love this post Wendy. I’m so glad your mother was so lucky in the homes she was sent to in Wales. It must be very special to have the 1962 photos of Anne & Fred and your family. A beautiful nugget of a story. Thank you.
Thank you, Gillian. I love the 1962 photos, yes. So heartening that mum kept in touch with ‘her’ Welsh families. She stayed in touch with the Sawers’ daughter, too. She went to live in Kent and we stayed with her when I was 11. She was lovely.
This is lovely, I’m still amazed by what your mum kept. Lucky for us all , and what a great writer she was. Love the violin story.
My dad was also evacuated to Wales from London , at aged 2, until the end of the war, but sadly he was put in a children’s home and suffered abuse ! I’ve started to write a snippet about it (but it’s mainly about my dad being an artist and his thousands of painting). Love the pics 😊
Thanks, Francis. It is amazing what my mum kept, and what HER mum kept, too! The gorgeous hand-made kettle holder, for instance. And she must have hung on to the letters.
It was such a lottery where children ended up as evacuees. My heart is in my mouth just thinking about what your dad would have faced at age two, being placed in a children’s home. I was reading a couple of books on evacuees as background for this piece, and realised just how lucky my mum and aunt had been.
I know it’s so sad , and he only just opened up recently about it ! But I’m so glad it wasn’t all children, thank god. He came back with a Welsh accent ! Which soon return back to London accent apparently!
My mum and aunt returned to Birkenhead with Welsh accents, too! I’m glad your dad is opening up about his evacuee years. What heavy stories some of those children must have carried all their lives.
How amazing you have these little written notes! It's so wonderful, Wendy! My mother and my uncle weren't sent away during the war as they lived in a little village in Lancashire in the countryside. But I do know that my nana gave birth in Liverpool during an air-raid and was left alone to give birth, the doctors and nurses only returning in the morning. She got very sick after this. But my uncle was fine. These stories have always hit hard, but maybe even a little harder at the moment, with everything that's going on. I will share this story, as I think everyone needs reminding, or telling. Sending you love, Cesca xx
I had missed this piece and I'm so glad you posted a note about it so I could find my way to it. This was so heartwarming to read and you're doing such a great job as the storyteller of your family's stories. I'm honestly fascinated by the incredible lives your relatives have led and I always learn something about British history and the people who lived through significant events through your posts. Thanks so much for this, Wendy!
Thanks so much for this lovely comment, Cristina, and for the share. I think all families have fascinating stories, but I’ve been lucky that the thing that most irritated me about mum - her inability to throw things away - has also been the key to unlocking those histories.
Oh, this is gorgeous! I'm so pleased for your mum and your aunt that they had such affectionate and caring foster parents. And that they had such a wonderful time in Wales!
My stepgran was evacuated from Dagenham, and kept coming home because she was treated so badly. She was so little and wasn't evacuated with siblings as her sisters were much older than her - one of them was a Land Girl.
She often talked about it. When the pandemic began, my dad and stepmum went to Essex to pick Sheila up and bring her to Somerset, where they were living at the time. Sadly, Sheila died a few months later (not from Covid, but sadly all the non-Covid cases were banished to a windowless basement and she lost hope). My stepmum read her diary after she passed away, and in the entry Sheila wrote the day before she was picked up by my dad and stepmum, she'd written, "I'm being evacuated to Somerset." That experience from her childhood never left her.
Thank you, Helen. That’s sad that your step gran had such a tough time of it. It must have been so hard for her. There were some real horror stories, lots of home sickness, and no wonder. I find it hard to imagine how painful it must have been for both children and parents to be separated.
My mum and aunt were lucky to have lived with such kind people, and they both seemed stoical and accepting of it - they knew it was ‘for the best’ - but still, I well up thinking about it. And about the way they had to leave just as abruptly, with no chance to say goodbye to their Welsh foster families.
My aunt died in 2020 during Covid, too, and my parents the following year. A gruelling time. It’s cathartic to explore family history through all the things mum couldn’t bear to part with and find these treasures.
The families she stayed with helped themselves to her ration book to feed their own family and left her hungry. At one place, the son pinched her until she'd cry, then she'd get told off. At one point - travelling to or from a placement - she was on the train alone and a young soldier took pity on her and decided to look after her. They stopped at a station and he got off to buy her a drink, but the train left before he'd got back on and he'd left his kitbag on the train! She felt guilty about that for the rest of her life, with the child's view. "Did he get told off?" I like to think he spent the rest of his life telling people his version of that story! Maybe he worried about her getting to wherever she was going.
Covid was an extremely tough time, and losing family then was awful. I suppose in some respects it gave us an insight into the strength they needed then, to be parted from loved ones "for the best". But how hard it was for children.
How awful, Helen. No-one would wish that on a child. And poor Sheila, feeling guilty about that soldier and his backpack. No wonder those experiences left a legacy. Did she have a happy/stable life as an adult?
Yes, that resilience everyone had to have during the pandemic did make me think of that. I felt like my aunt in particular had as tough an end to her life as she had had at the start. She was such an an active, independent woman (following divorce in mid-life) but had a devastating stroke in 2018 so was in a nursing home near me when everything locked down. Grim times.
Yes, fortunately after all that, she did have a stable, happy life. Although life was hard after the war - at one point she lived in an old railway carriage with her parents. Then they moved to Jaywick, which seemed like paradise in comparison, only to be flooded out and nearly killed in the 1953 North Sea Flood. My stepgrandad was staying over that night, fortunately, and punced holes in the ceiling so they could climb into the loft and up onto the roof to be rescued. Honestly, what a life!!
It must've been very hard, as you say, for your mum and aunt to cope with leaving such a caring foster home without saying goodbye, but I loved the photos of your family going to visit. Such happy photos, and they really show how loving those families were to other people's children!
Gosh, that really shows what a huge impact it had on your aunt and the relationship she had with parents she grew up far away from!
When I was a kid, there was a woman in my village who'd been there ever since the evacuation and had been adopted by her foster family. She'd returned to her birth family in London after the war, but they all felt like strangers to each other, so she came back to the village! She was one of my Guide leaders and I knew her from church as well, and she was friends with my grandparents as they lived over the road from her. She was so much a part of the village.
Thank you, Eliza. It was amazing to find those original wartime letters and artefacts, and mum’s own writing about the violin. You know so well the revelations that come from exploring our parents’ histories.
I finally sat down to read this, and so enjoyed it. How incredible that you found all these notes and memorabilia - I loved the kettle holder with the little note! And finding the notes with the details of the violin! I can appreciate your mum’s hoarding when it comes to memories like this :)
Great to hear your mum had such a positive evacuation experience - it’s left me thinking that I can’t imagine what it must have been like for her parents to let them leave.
Thank you! Mum didn’t discriminate in what she hung on to and it was pretty extreme, but fortunately she wrapped up “precious” items quite carefully, so they’ve remained intact.
Mum and her sister were really lucky to be looked after so well. But like you, I can’t imagine what it was like waving children that young off, not knowing when they’d return or what would happen at home in the meantime.
Just horrendous and I remember the history lessons as a child where we focused on the experience of the children - I appreciate the parents’ perspective more now. It’s very touching what you say about your aunt too, and how she missed those formative years of connection with her mother.
Wow this is just so beautiful and moving, on many levels but I was particularly captivated by your mother's description of her beloved violin (which sounds like it was a genuine Stradivarius) by her description). She had such a way with words. That description is worthy of a post in its own right. My mother was an evacuee aged 2 but she went with her mother to Scotland, and can't remember too much. So she was very fortunate to not have to go alone. Thank you for this post.
What a wonderful tribute to your clearly splendid mother, Wendy. It’s such a rich seam of personal history colliding with major world events. I love her hand written list. Beautiful, clear, confident hand writing 😊
Thank you, Emma. She was super bright. It was such a shame that rheumatic fever set her health back after she returned home. And she never went to university. Her parents wouldn’t hear of it!
Love this so much! The pictures, the letters, the packing list, even reading your own mother’s words about her violin. There is so much life in this post! Thank you for sharing with us 💛
Thank you, Paige. It’s amazing how much there was (is!) still to be discovered in the boxes I brought back from mum and dad’s. I was thrilled to find her own account of the violin which had meant so much to her.
My neighbour, Julia, is 92 and explains that she and her brother didn't grow fond of their parents ever after their return home but remain close still now to the children of the family they were evacuated to. It's hard to imagine such separations being the norm yet just recently I found a pile of aerogrammes sent between my mother at school in England and her mother in Shanghai, spanning several years.
Great work Wendy. Proper memoir. Fabulous.
Thank you, Cherry. That's so poignant what your neighbour Julia says. Where was she evacuated to, do you know?
I can't imagine what it was like for my grandparents. I know they would have been busy during the war and were doing important work, but what a wrench.
I loved the photos of Mum taking me and my brother to Newtown when we were little. I'm so touched that she stayed in contact with her foster families, as your neighbour did with hers.
I remember you mentioning your mother at school in England and her mother in Shanghai. Your mother sounded super-bright. I hope their letters are enlightening!
Lovely, sensitive telling if your mother's story. Frankly it doesn't matter whether the violin was a Strad or a not - it WAS to your mother and that's what makes this vignette of a story so real and touching. I was also interested in the Birkenhead mentions. I am from a Wirral family and my grandfather and an uncle worked in Birkenhead throughout the war. Popoff - that's what everybody called Grandad and now my own grandchildren use the same name for me - worked in the railway repair sheds. His son, also a joiner, was in a reserved occupation fitting out ships at Cammel Lairds. Popoff had been a fireman during the first War as well as working on the trains. In the 2nd - he spent many nights on the roof of the railsheds, fire-watching after his working day ended.
Thank you, Peter. The irony isn't lost on me that it's only because my mum kept everything that I'm able to tell this story now – and I know she wanted her evacuee memories to be recorded in some way.
Interesting, our Birkenhead overlaps. Maybe my grandad knew your grandfather, "Popoff"!
Maybe! That would be a nice coincidence. Popoff lived in Hoylake and his actual name was Arthur Ezard - my Mum's father. My other Grandfather was a postman in Birkenhead but he only worked in the sorting office as he lost a leg in WW1. He was Jim Harkness. You're doing a great job with your mother's memories.
I love this post Wendy. I’m so glad your mother was so lucky in the homes she was sent to in Wales. It must be very special to have the 1962 photos of Anne & Fred and your family. A beautiful nugget of a story. Thank you.
Thank you, Gillian. I love the 1962 photos, yes. So heartening that mum kept in touch with ‘her’ Welsh families. She stayed in touch with the Sawers’ daughter, too. She went to live in Kent and we stayed with her when I was 11. She was lovely.
This is lovely, I’m still amazed by what your mum kept. Lucky for us all , and what a great writer she was. Love the violin story.
My dad was also evacuated to Wales from London , at aged 2, until the end of the war, but sadly he was put in a children’s home and suffered abuse ! I’ve started to write a snippet about it (but it’s mainly about my dad being an artist and his thousands of painting). Love the pics 😊
Thanks, Francis. It is amazing what my mum kept, and what HER mum kept, too! The gorgeous hand-made kettle holder, for instance. And she must have hung on to the letters.
It was such a lottery where children ended up as evacuees. My heart is in my mouth just thinking about what your dad would have faced at age two, being placed in a children’s home. I was reading a couple of books on evacuees as background for this piece, and realised just how lucky my mum and aunt had been.
I know it’s so sad , and he only just opened up recently about it ! But I’m so glad it wasn’t all children, thank god. He came back with a Welsh accent ! Which soon return back to London accent apparently!
My mum and aunt returned to Birkenhead with Welsh accents, too! I’m glad your dad is opening up about his evacuee years. What heavy stories some of those children must have carried all their lives.
Lovely story well told. Congratulations
Thank you. So glad you appreciated it and thank you for restacking it, too.
How amazing you have these little written notes! It's so wonderful, Wendy! My mother and my uncle weren't sent away during the war as they lived in a little village in Lancashire in the countryside. But I do know that my nana gave birth in Liverpool during an air-raid and was left alone to give birth, the doctors and nurses only returning in the morning. She got very sick after this. But my uncle was fine. These stories have always hit hard, but maybe even a little harder at the moment, with everything that's going on. I will share this story, as I think everyone needs reminding, or telling. Sending you love, Cesca xx
Thank you, Francesca. I'm glad that my mum's "collecting" habit means I am still discovering important bits of her history now.
Giving birth alone during an air raid. Your poor grandmother. That must have been so intense. Very glad your uncle was ok.
Thanks so much for restacking the post. xx
I had missed this piece and I'm so glad you posted a note about it so I could find my way to it. This was so heartwarming to read and you're doing such a great job as the storyteller of your family's stories. I'm honestly fascinated by the incredible lives your relatives have led and I always learn something about British history and the people who lived through significant events through your posts. Thanks so much for this, Wendy!
Thanks so much for this lovely comment, Cristina, and for the share. I think all families have fascinating stories, but I’ve been lucky that the thing that most irritated me about mum - her inability to throw things away - has also been the key to unlocking those histories.
Oh, this is gorgeous! I'm so pleased for your mum and your aunt that they had such affectionate and caring foster parents. And that they had such a wonderful time in Wales!
My stepgran was evacuated from Dagenham, and kept coming home because she was treated so badly. She was so little and wasn't evacuated with siblings as her sisters were much older than her - one of them was a Land Girl.
She often talked about it. When the pandemic began, my dad and stepmum went to Essex to pick Sheila up and bring her to Somerset, where they were living at the time. Sadly, Sheila died a few months later (not from Covid, but sadly all the non-Covid cases were banished to a windowless basement and she lost hope). My stepmum read her diary after she passed away, and in the entry Sheila wrote the day before she was picked up by my dad and stepmum, she'd written, "I'm being evacuated to Somerset." That experience from her childhood never left her.
Thank you, Helen. That’s sad that your step gran had such a tough time of it. It must have been so hard for her. There were some real horror stories, lots of home sickness, and no wonder. I find it hard to imagine how painful it must have been for both children and parents to be separated.
My mum and aunt were lucky to have lived with such kind people, and they both seemed stoical and accepting of it - they knew it was ‘for the best’ - but still, I well up thinking about it. And about the way they had to leave just as abruptly, with no chance to say goodbye to their Welsh foster families.
My aunt died in 2020 during Covid, too, and my parents the following year. A gruelling time. It’s cathartic to explore family history through all the things mum couldn’t bear to part with and find these treasures.
The families she stayed with helped themselves to her ration book to feed their own family and left her hungry. At one place, the son pinched her until she'd cry, then she'd get told off. At one point - travelling to or from a placement - she was on the train alone and a young soldier took pity on her and decided to look after her. They stopped at a station and he got off to buy her a drink, but the train left before he'd got back on and he'd left his kitbag on the train! She felt guilty about that for the rest of her life, with the child's view. "Did he get told off?" I like to think he spent the rest of his life telling people his version of that story! Maybe he worried about her getting to wherever she was going.
Covid was an extremely tough time, and losing family then was awful. I suppose in some respects it gave us an insight into the strength they needed then, to be parted from loved ones "for the best". But how hard it was for children.
How awful, Helen. No-one would wish that on a child. And poor Sheila, feeling guilty about that soldier and his backpack. No wonder those experiences left a legacy. Did she have a happy/stable life as an adult?
Yes, that resilience everyone had to have during the pandemic did make me think of that. I felt like my aunt in particular had as tough an end to her life as she had had at the start. She was such an an active, independent woman (following divorce in mid-life) but had a devastating stroke in 2018 so was in a nursing home near me when everything locked down. Grim times.
Yes, fortunately after all that, she did have a stable, happy life. Although life was hard after the war - at one point she lived in an old railway carriage with her parents. Then they moved to Jaywick, which seemed like paradise in comparison, only to be flooded out and nearly killed in the 1953 North Sea Flood. My stepgrandad was staying over that night, fortunately, and punced holes in the ceiling so they could climb into the loft and up onto the roof to be rescued. Honestly, what a life!!
It must've been very hard, as you say, for your mum and aunt to cope with leaving such a caring foster home without saying goodbye, but I loved the photos of your family going to visit. Such happy photos, and they really show how loving those families were to other people's children!
That's so sad about your aunt. Poor lady!
Goodness. What a life she had!
Yes, I was too young to remember it, but was so touched to see I had been introduced to the Woollies and the Sawers when I was a tot.
Photos of Wales took pride of place in my aunt’s photo album, too, even before any photos of her own parents!
Gosh, that really shows what a huge impact it had on your aunt and the relationship she had with parents she grew up far away from!
When I was a kid, there was a woman in my village who'd been there ever since the evacuation and had been adopted by her foster family. She'd returned to her birth family in London after the war, but they all felt like strangers to each other, so she came back to the village! She was one of my Guide leaders and I knew her from church as well, and she was friends with my grandparents as they lived over the road from her. She was so much a part of the village.
Great news - a vivid personal history
A deeply touching piece Wendy. I do love your writing.
Thank you, Lisa.
Lovely history and reflection. And your mother’s violin, the love and separation and loss, a mirror to the foster family and community in Wales.
Thank you, Eliza. It was amazing to find those original wartime letters and artefacts, and mum’s own writing about the violin. You know so well the revelations that come from exploring our parents’ histories.
What a treasure trove of memories from your Mum! Her little packing list is the sweetest.
It brought a tear to my eye, finding that list, so neatly copied down. Thank you for reading, Ann Marie.
I finally sat down to read this, and so enjoyed it. How incredible that you found all these notes and memorabilia - I loved the kettle holder with the little note! And finding the notes with the details of the violin! I can appreciate your mum’s hoarding when it comes to memories like this :)
Great to hear your mum had such a positive evacuation experience - it’s left me thinking that I can’t imagine what it must have been like for her parents to let them leave.
Thank you! Mum didn’t discriminate in what she hung on to and it was pretty extreme, but fortunately she wrapped up “precious” items quite carefully, so they’ve remained intact.
Mum and her sister were really lucky to be looked after so well. But like you, I can’t imagine what it was like waving children that young off, not knowing when they’d return or what would happen at home in the meantime.
Just horrendous and I remember the history lessons as a child where we focused on the experience of the children - I appreciate the parents’ perspective more now. It’s very touching what you say about your aunt too, and how she missed those formative years of connection with her mother.
Wow this is just so beautiful and moving, on many levels but I was particularly captivated by your mother's description of her beloved violin (which sounds like it was a genuine Stradivarius) by her description). She had such a way with words. That description is worthy of a post in its own right. My mother was an evacuee aged 2 but she went with her mother to Scotland, and can't remember too much. So she was very fortunate to not have to go alone. Thank you for this post.
Gosh yes, your mother was lucky not to have gone alone, Siobhan. Two years old! The upheavals must have been so hard.
Thanks for such a thoughtful comment.
What a wonderful tribute to your clearly splendid mother, Wendy. It’s such a rich seam of personal history colliding with major world events. I love her hand written list. Beautiful, clear, confident hand writing 😊
Thank you, Emma. She was super bright. It was such a shame that rheumatic fever set her health back after she returned home. And she never went to university. Her parents wouldn’t hear of it!