A BACKGROUND OF THE WAR

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 226, 19 June 1940, Page 8

A BACKGROUND OF THE WAR

Evacuation Of Children From London SCENES NOW BEING RE-ENACTED Yesterday there were quoted in this column estimates of the British character by two American Journalists. One of them remarked on the Briton’s capacity for co-operation, a quality on which still more calls will now be made. One of the occasions on which this capacity was seen at its best was during the days when hundreds of thousands of children were transferred from London and other cities to the country just before the outoreak of war. Probably as these lines are being written trains are speeding westward from London carrying to new and unknown foster parents some of the 120,000 children who are being sent away from the metropolis in the second great child-evacuation it has seen in the space of a few months. Many are going to the west of England. There, in the beautiful counties of Devon and Cornwall which form the narrow peninsula pushing its way westward into the Atlantic, the youngsters will live in the peace of oldworld villages and country towns till it is safe for them to return home. Others are going to nearby Somerset and South Wales. In Totnes, on the banks of the Dart, most medieval of Devon towns the writer last September watched scenes such as may well have been re-enacted there in the past few days. It was the first* day of the month, the Germans had just fallen on Poland, and realization of the nearness of war was in the air. Arrival Of Children

On and outside the station there were drawn up some 500 or so children, just arrived from London’s suburb of Acton. They were from the younger classes, a little bewildered at their day of strange adventure and a little tired. Over the shoulders of each hung a gas mask, generally slung there with a piece of string (as, indeed, were manv of those carried by grown-ups in the early days of the war, till the appearance of a great variety of bags and satchels in the shops). In their hands they carried a few essential belongings in attache cases, some very small, sometimes in paper bags. The railway companies and those organizing the evacuation from the London cud had done their part well. In fact, this particular train slightly upset arrangements by being well ahead of time. Before long another, laden with children for farther afield, roared through the station. Townsfolk’s Help

Now came the time for the townsfolk to play their part and they did not fail. Theirs was a display of wholehearted helpfulness. The hearts of those London mothers who, we were told, had watched their children leave from the schools with tear-dimmed eyes but a complete absence of fuss, would have been gladdened by the care bestowed on their little ones. As the procession of children moved slowly along the road to two nearby schools, people from among those watching stepped into the ranks to carry the bags of those who seemed to have too heavy a load or to relieve teachers striving to carry several bags at once. At the schools tea awaited the new arrivals. It had a magical effect, and before long the helpers were handing round the eatables to the accompaniment of a volume of noise which told better than anything else that the children were feeling thoroughly at home in their new surroundings. At the door of the school where those not staying in the town itself were being cared for there was stacked a pile of food to be eaten on the next stage of the journey. Outside waited buses to take the children to the villages where they were to be billeted. Countryside Scenes

Two• or three days later the writer drove through a cluster of villages nestling along the fringes of Dartmoor to see how the children were faring in their new quarters. Walking down one quiet lane was an old man and two small boys. He was, he confessed, a grandfather himself, but nowauays he and his wife lived alone. His one interest at the moment seemed to be to put ills new charges at their ease and see they were well looked after. This old couple were setting to work to bring up a new family. Not far away was a story without words, a group of young Londoners witli hands and faces joyously bedaubed with blackberry juice and suffering by now, one suspected, from a conspicuous lack of appetite. Their mother was with these children. She explained that the man of the house where they were staying was that day leaving to join his army unit so, thinking her hosts would rather be alone, she had taken the children out for a walk for the afternoon.

A farmer’s daughter was likewise taking her two new charges for a wander along the quiet lanes. She told of how the children were making their first acquaintance with the farm animals and of how, so far, they were a little afraid of these strange- boasts. Unselfish Response

The man who had organized the billeting of the children allotted to these villages had nothing but praise for the unselfish manner in which the people hail met all demands. When one little Londoner had stoutly refused to be separated from her sister, a woman who had till then thought she could manage to take only one child, went away with both of them in her care. In another case where two children were living in next door houses it had been arranged that they should sleep together in one or other of the houses on alternate nights so they should not be lonely.

Lessons That Were Learnt Unhappily, in the long run the first evacuation scheme was only a partial success. For this there was a variety of weighty reasons, not Ute least of 'ltem being that there were no air raids on the big cities. But for all the difficulties ami disappointments that the scheme produced, it sowed seeds that will one day yield a harvest, of great national benefit. Many thousands of those children are still in the country, growing stronger as they live a healthier life, gaining a richer experience am! helping to forge, unconsciously as yet, a closer hour! between town and country. Even some of the unfortunate things that have happened have aroused in many minds a feeling that as soon as possible the conditions in which some of these children hat! been living in the cities must he emb d Now, under the spur of a sterner necessity, England launches another, if smaller evacuation scheme. With the lessons of the past for a guide and. we may be sure, a general delertniim lion on all sides to do all that, is needed, it should run far more smoothly than its predecessor.—G.L.lV.