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LIFE OF AN EVACUEE

My first memories of the impending war were around the end of 1938 I believe. I was nearly seven years old. At school, we made lists of clothing etc., and gas masks reared their ugly head. (I can still smell them). The year passed with nothing happening that I remember particularly but, once more, talk of war became the all- important topic.

My mother decided — and I later found out it was her decision not my father’s — to send my sister Joy and myself away with my sister’s school - Brondesbury and Kilburn High School for Girls, who I believe were evacuating the entire school. Joy was five and a half years older than I and my mother knew she was a responsible girl. During the week prior to the 3rd September we went to her school prepared to set off goodness knows where. Each night we came back and then on Saturday the 2nd we embarked on a period of four years of saying goodbye to family life, as we knew it. We arrived at Northampton Station; I was just 8 years old. My first words to Joy were, ‘I don’t like it here I want to go home’.

No such luck! We were billeted with a woman called Mrs Worsley who had a husband and an adopted son called Michael. We were never allowed in the house if she wasn’t there. She was a golfer and played golf in the mornings so we often had to wait outside for her to let us in. At the beginning I wet the bed quite often, obviously I was very disturbed by all the change. My sister was wonderful with me. looking after me like a mother, checking and brushing my hair and caring for me wonderfully. We lay in bed at night singing Bing Crosby songs to ourselves. But it was not like being at home. I, of course, had no friends of my own there and had to tag along as an afterthought with Joy and her friends. As there was another girl called Pam I was called Aggie (my second name being Agnes) a name at that time I hated with passion. My cousin Fred was also in Northampton but he was billeted in a rich family’s house and they even had a maid, — the luck of the draw I guess. School was only half a day mainly in the afternoon. I have only one memory of it and that was arriving late for my lessons. I have no recollection of learning anything there and can only think with hindsight that my mind was closed off from it all. After some months we moved from Mrs Worsley — she probably had had enough of us or we asked to go I cannot remember. She had taken us to see the sunset on a number of occasions in her car and this is the only kindness I recall.
We then stayed with Mrs Beasley a much younger woman with three children. Joy got on very well with her and I think she found Joy a good baby sitter as she used to go out quite a bit. It was fine staying there but then we had to go again and this time we went to Miss Hadden who lived with her niece. They were strict churchgoers and we used to go to Church on Sunday three times. We had many adventures: the ice breaking on a river as we crossed, cutting my head on an ice rink, all these had to be hushed up as we were frightened to tell. After six months and by the time Easter came around my mother came down to take us back for the holiday as it was quiet in London; the bombing not having started. When she arrived I had German Measles so could not go back with them. I waited a week and was then put on a train to London. To this day I can remember the eyes of a man who sat opposite me very scary. No one seemed to worry about children’s safety in those days. There was no way I wanted to go back to Northampton and Mum must have seen that I was very upset with it all so she let me stay at home and I went to the school down the road, Gibbons Road Junior School. Not for long. Suddenly, in June I was to go off again.
June 15th 1940 I was on a train with the other children of my class being told that I was now an experienced evacuee and must look after the others. I have no memory of how I felt. We arrived at a place called Caerau, near Maesteg in South Wales. I thought it was Africa. A mass of black faces greeted us at the station. They were, I found out later, miners from the coalmines around us. (No pit baths then) We were taken to a hall and gradually children were taken off, I believe I was the last one to go. After walking with the helper over a sort of small mound near a river (I had a funny feeling of deja vue) we arrived at a house and a lady was asked if she could possibly take one more evacuee. She agreed and I was installed (very tearfully I was told) at 43 Duffryn Road with Auntie Bessie together with another evacuee called Margaret Dewar. Auntie Bessie and Uncle Billie had two grown up children Peggy and Bernard. I had my first glimpse of Bernard as I walked down the stairs to the living room. He was 15 or 16 and had just had his bath after working in the pit. I thought he was lovely as I had no brothers of my own and we always got on well together. I sometimes clashed with Peggy but on the whole everything was fine and they were all very kind to me. I became part of the extended family grandparents, aunts, cousins. I am sure I must have been suffering from the loss of my own family. A picture taken at the time shows me looking thin and rather pathetic looking. On one visit to the Porthcawl seaside resort I hurt my foot with a spade and it started septic sores appearing on my skin a sure sign that I was under stress’, they eventually went although the scars are with me to this day. School was about a twenty-minute walk away across the river. Again I have no recollection of learning very much. I do remember singing quite a bit and learning Welsh but very little physical exercise. Margaret stayed for less than a year so I was the only evacuee in the house which faced the beginning of the mountains and was next to a Welsh church. I loved the mountains and still to this day find them absolutely wonderful. We sometimes walked miles and picked blueberries taking sandwiches in the same butty tin as the miners took to work. I often played a little way up making houses with stones and having a great time. My job was cleaning the brass candlesticks on the dresser and fetching chips from the chip shop also taking home made bread to be baked at the bakery, crossing the small river which ran through Caerau. There were two cinemas and films changed twice a week, so I saw many of the 1940 films which was a great treat. I cannot speak highly enough of the welcome I was given and how well I was looked after. Relations between the two families were good and Bernard eventually stayed with my parents working in London whilst I was in Wales. However things weren’t the same as at home. I am sure there was a shortage of books to read as I remember reading the bible a lot and being delighted when someone bought me a book. My Mum came down to see me and my Dad came one or twice. My sister I did not see for three years. I remember Dunkirk quite well as Auntie Bessie’s brother returned from there and had a big fuss made over him. I also remember the bombing of Cardiff and Swansea seeing the night sky ablaze with light; it was a great talking point. After two years I went back to London for a holiday with Auntie Bessie and on the return journey cried my eyes out the whole way. The final year I sat the 11plus on my own with a piece of gravestone for luck. It worked! (I must have learned something.) Despite the teacher telling the whole class that I had made many mistakes.
After three years I was to go home at last and start my schooling at Willesden County Grammar. Unfortunately my dear grandma had died during the last year and I could not see her again.
So I adjusted. My family had moved from one flat to a flat next door in Harlesden and my accent changed slowly from Welsh back to North West London; I began my new life with new friends; through the V1’s and 2’s and back to peacetime, secure within my family’s love again.

I was one of the lucky ones. No big dramas or terrible stories to tell. Affect me it must have done; shaping the character; coping with loneliness; becoming independent. Thinking back it seems incredible that young children were sent off to stay with complete strangers all in the name of safety. I doubt it would happen now. I kept in touch with Auntie Bessie and Bernard until they passed away. I went back for a visit with my husband and my two children and surprised Auntie Bessie who was delighted. My daughter was at that time the same age as I had been when I arrived at their house.

Memories are wonderful things even if they are not all pleasant.!

Pam Nash nee Mahan

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