World War Two - Evacuation

[NikkiNoodles]

Why did the government decide to evacuate children from Britains major cities in the early years of World War Two?

[spudqueen]

So that when those cities were bombed the children would not be killed or injured.

[smudge]

Because Britains major towns, cities & people were targets for the bombs to be dropped on. Evacuation was a means of safety for the children & they probably ate better too - although it must have been absolutely heartbreaking being parted from one's family.

Thankfully, I was born in '47 & missed it all.

[Dusky]

The above answers are correct but, as it so tragically happens, there was another by-product of evacuation.

In both world wars, many young men would sign up together from a single village, town or region; these were often known as "pals".  You will hear of the "so-and-so (town name) pals".  It's not to make light of it that Private Baldrick in Blackadder Goes Fourth signed up with a group of "Workhouse Pals".  There's much significant accuracy and very moving poignency in that series.

Consequently they would often be trained and shipped out together, which meant they were each other's moral support at the time.  Unfortunately it also meant that, being in the same place, they would often be wiped out together and many villages and towns would lose an entire generation of young men who would otherwise have been party to bringing in the next generation.

Evacuation sometimes meant that the generation after them wasn't doomed as well.  If the children had stayed at home in towns and cities that might have been bombing targets like Coventry and London, for example, far more children might have died and entire communities might have lost both their young men abroad and their children at home.

[acw]

Surely that by-product is a positive by-product?  The loss of the pals brigades was a tragic oversite by the military planners, but at least the kids from those communities were safe.  Perhaps I'm being too simplistic!

[Dusky]

No, that's exactly what I meant - I just mis-spoke myself.

Thanks.

[Peter Pedant]

It was to avoid their asses getting bombed off.

Remember that in 1939 no-one knew what the new War was gonna be like. The money was on trench warfare - every general tries to fight the previous war - they thought, "the bomber will always get through". So the cities were going to get it. Bombing was a problem towards the end of the First World War. Psychological casualties they thought would be high (hundreds of thousands) from bombing.

The children were evacuated and also sent abroad to Canada. YThe latter was stopped when one of the transpors was torpedoed and all the kids drowned.