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  • Evacuees 1945

    Hi all

    This may be a bit of an out-there question, but we have a copy of a Welsh school register for evacuees in April-May 1945. From April 23rd-May 11th the children's attendance records are marked with an O with a cross in the middle - unusual because every time else an absence is just marked with an O. Underneath the teacher has drawn a red line and written what looks like " Meetings disregarded Ad. Memo 51 pp 15 (1)." VE was the 8th May. School seems to have resumed normally again on the 14th May.

    We were wondering whether there were special holidays for the children at that time? Maybe because the dads serving in the forces were starting to come home?

    Thanks :o
    Last edited by Felix; 02-10-13, 10:09.

  • #2
    Felix

    I don't think any men came home that early. Demobilisation took quite a long time. My own father didn't come home until mid-1946.

    Not sure what the hieroglyphics in your register signify, sorry!

    OC

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    • #3
      Felix,

      I do not remember any extra holiday at this time!! There were street parties, although many of these were delayed until VJ day.

      However, many evacuees would have returned voluntarily to their own homes in London or elsewhere VE day or soon after, leaving many schools, paticularly in Wales, with much lower class numbers and so back to some normality.

      The evacuation of children 1939 to Wales/Devon/Cornwall was arranged methodically but it was a phony war at this time, and most children drifted back home. So when the Blitzes came in earnest 1940 onwards evacuation procedures were much more haphazard, some arranged by school, parents and similarly when the war ended children just went home. There was no organised reunification! When this happened the children just left, they did not always tell the school what they were doing!! So my observation would be o for normal absence and 0 with a diagonal line might mean absent but no clue where he/she is! Then noted 8 May VE Day so draw your own conclusions!

      In my case I was at a school which had been evacuated to Teignmouth and which returned to Plymouth August 1945.

      Demobs started for service men June 1945, with those older service men who should have have gone earlier, but for the war years, being the first to be demobbed and as my own father was in this category, he was demobbed from the Navy June 1945.

      Janet
      Last edited by Janet; 02-10-13, 11:41.

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      • #4
        Thanks OC. I thought it was a bit early for demobilisation too. Though I'm not sure yet whether my particular evacuees' dad might have been invalided out early.

        Over here in Oz, my grandad didn't make it home from New Guinea till late in 1946 either. :o

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        • #5
          This is really great Janet - thanks! I love first hand background material.

          The register I'm looking at is for the Infants section of the school. By 1945 there were only 4 evacuees left at the school - my two born in 1939 and 1940 and two other little girls born in 1938 and 1939. My two were evacuated as babies and stayed there with relatives till 1947. They're on the register later in July as "transferred" - to the boys' and girls' C of E schools in the area. One of the other girls is marked as "left" so obviously gone home. The other one has the same symbols -the cross in the circle - beside her name as my two evacuees, returns to school for a couple of weeks and then is "left" too. It piqued my curiosity.

          I'm not sure my two liked going to live in the city after being brought up in the country and rather spoiled when they were little.

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          • #6
            Felix

            They were very interesting times with many mixed experiences. I was evacuated from Plymouth to Cornwall to Teignmouth and then back to Plymouth, and had a few foster parents along the way. I did not get back to my family until 1947, by which time I did wonder what a family was, and my Navy father was a stranger, as were my siblings!!

            Throughout my life I have had to have one foot in the country, and one foot in the City and if I am honest I do prefer the country, especially as I am getting older, and even now the nostalgia of haymaking, stooking, rabbits running scared from the Binders is very strong in my mind.

            Do you know about the Evacuees Reunion Association?

            Second World War evacuation, operation pied piper, non profit making registered charity, The Evacuee, reunion, lost touch, membership, send them to safety, evacuate children during the war


            Have you ever read any evacuees stories? They are worth reading, to be able to understand what evacuees went through. The BBC has a good coverage of stories written by evacuees in 2005. (60 years after the end of the war) Nina Bawden's "Carrie's War", although a children's book, is a very powerful story and is all about Wales.

            Janet
            Last edited by Janet; 02-10-13, 12:34.

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            • #7
              Janet, thanks for the lovely reply and all the info. I'll go take a look now.

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              • #8
                This is from the school logbook for May 1945 at the school where I work in Sussex:

                "On Tuesday May 8th and Wednesday May 9th the school was closed on the occasion of the cessation of hostilities between the Allies and Germany and Victory in Europe. On Thursday May 10th the school closed for the Ascension Day holiday the children meeting at 9am to attend church."

                We don't have registers from that period, so I cannot comment on the style of recording.

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                • #9
                  Thank you so much for taking the time to do this. It' great. :o

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                  • #10
                    Originally posted by Jill on the A272 View Post
                    This is from the school logbook for May 1945 at the school where I work in Sussex:

                    "On Tuesday May 8th and Wednesday May 9th the school was closed on the occasion of the cessation of hostilities between the Allies and Germany and Victory in Europe. On Thursday May 10th the school closed for the Ascension Day holiday the children meeting at 9am to attend church."

                    We don't have registers from that period, so I cannot comment on the style of recording.
                    Ah that is interesting. Was the school a Catholic or other Church School? Ascension Day in Catholic Schools was always what was called a "Holiday of Obligation", and was always a day off school to attend Church Services!

                    Janet

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                    • #11
                      It think it may have be the original version of "authorised" absence - i.e denoted as not present should there be a reason for evacuating the building and doing a headcount, but an agreed absence, of which the school attendance officer need take no account.

                      Jay
                      Janet in Yorkshire



                      Genealogists never die - they just swap places in the family tree

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                      • #12
                        Originally posted by Janet View Post
                        Ah that is interesting. Was the school a Catholic or other Church School? Ascension Day in Catholic Schools was always what was called a "Holiday of Obligation", and was always a day off school to attend Church Services!

                        Janet
                        C of E, Janet. When I attended a C of E school in the 1960s it was a half day, we went to church then were allowed to go home. These days we go back to lessons after a church service.

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                        • #13
                          Originally posted by Jill on the A272 View Post
                          C of E, Janet. When I attended a C of E school in the 1960s it was a half day, we went to church then were allowed to go home. These days we go back to lessons after a church service.

                          Yes, it is a different world today! Most, if not all, of these "Holidays of Obligation" have also disappeared within the Catholic Schools!

                          Janet
                          Last edited by Janet; 02-10-13, 14:55.

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                          • #14
                            Excellent, thanks! :o

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