大象传媒

Jean's Wartime Memories

Before war had actually been declared, my three sisters and I were among the children from Whitehill School in Gravesend who were already being evacuated, sailing on the North Sea. At 5 am on 3rd September 1939 we gathered at the school and walked crocodile fashion for about two miles to West Street pier, where we boarded "The Queen of the Channel" (sunk at Dunkirk) and sailed down the Thames and round the coast to Great Yarmouth, where we disembarked at about 5 pm. Some children went on another paddle steamer "Royal Daffodil". Seasickness was suffered by the children and also the teachers. I saw one man
teacher with his head over the side of the boat.

We stayed overnight at a school in Yarmouth, sleeping on sacks filled with straw. Cold sausages were brought round for breakfast, but I don't think many were eaten. Then were taken by coach to Mundesley on the Norfolk coast - claimed to be the nearest point to Germany by sea. Whilst we were there - during the first three months of the war - German mines washed up on to the beach!! In Mundesley all the children stood outside the Coronation Hall, waiting to be picked out for billets. As we were four together my sisters and I were taken to the home of Mrs Earl (the nearest you can get to Ena Sharples, including hairnet) where we slept in the two double beds in the attic. We didn't like their food although we had to eat some of it but some disappeared up my knickerleg.

Mum, with Jill aged almost 2 , was evacuated on the same day by paddle steamer and spent the night at Yarmouth Race Course. When Mum awoke in the morning she found the blankets all wet. Apparently the air raid siren had sounded during the night and in fear of a gas attack, the mothers had soaked the blankets. Mum had been sleeping on her good ear and heard nothing of the commotion!

Eventually, through Dad who was at home, we made contact with Mum and she found a place in Mundesley where we could all stay together, renting rooms from Mrs Gotts who lived further down the road. We shared the school with the local children, one week mornings and the next week afternoons.

One night when we were in bed there was great panic. Mrs Gotts was shouting 鈥淪hip ashore at
Bacton鈥�. Her son was a lifeboatman, who went in his oilskins. Whether the crew were rescued I don鈥檛 know, but the next day the beach was littered with timber from the distressed
vessel. Mary and I shouldered a heavy plank and took it home, much to everyone鈥檚 amazement.

Whilst at Mundesley I learned to tap dance. Amanda, also evacuated from London, was staying in a flat right down on the beach., She held classes at sixpence a time and several evacuees went along. In the playground we were practicing 鈥淲ilhelmina is plump and round鈥︹�� .etc!

After three months, during the so-called "phoney" war, Dad decided we would be better off at home and so we returned to Gravesend. There was then a frantic time making of blackout frames with thin strips of wood filled in with black papaer to fit each window.

For a while all seemed fairly normal and then the war took on a new dimension with the evacuation of Dunkirk and the imminent fall of France. Wee all listened to the new avidly
hearing about the little boats going to rescue the troops from the beaches of France. Once
again the school evacuation plans went into operation. This time we were told we would be going to Totnes in Devon. So once again the hasty packing of little suitcases. This time it was just the four sisters - Mum and the baby staying at home with Dad.

We went by train to Totnes , which seemed a long tiring journey and then we were split up. Mary went to one billet, I to another with three of my school mates with a Mr and Mrs Moore, and the twins, Anne and Pam, then six years old, were kept with their own age group and taken to Dartington Hall, where they occupied a kind of dormitory.

Each morning we gathered at Dartington Hall where a large room had been set aside for the evacuees. At first there was no proper school and the teachers took it in turns to talk to us. Sometimes we sang, the favourite occupation of the war years, some did acrobats, showing off their skills. We had one teacher, Mr Rook, who knew a great deal about Africa and he was regularly lecturing to us about Bechuanaland (now called Botswana!).

Dartington Hall is an historic stately home with a large baronial hall, a cobblestone courtyard,
around which were living quarters and there was also the Barn Theatre, which we came to know so well. The grounds were beautifully maintained with an open air theatre. The place had been falling into ruin and in 1935 a Mr and Mrs Elmhirst, from America, had the whole building refurbished, retaining its medieval artifacts and atmosphere.

As a centre for arts and crafts, Dartington Hall had become the haven of intellectuals/artists seeking refuge, having escaped from the, or were conscientious objectors. The Ballet Jusse moved there and I remember peeping through a crack in the curtains to see a ballet dancer limbering up. To us, this was a great curiosity - this was a world we didn鈥檛 know about. We had never heard of ballet or classical music.

Although there were four of us billeted with Mr and Mrs Moore, I was privileged to stay for the first few weeks with the landlady's daughter and son-in-law in a bungalow close by. After about two days Barbara and David took me to Dartington Hall, where a crowd met in one of the beautifully decorated rooms, all very luxurious with red plush seats and candelabra. There we listened to the famous Churchill speech, following the fall of France, about "nothing to offer except blood, toil sweat and tears." Everyone left the place in a very sober frame of mind.

Dartington Hall was famous for being a progressive public school, mostly for ;the wealthy, but the evacuees took over one of the buildings which had been the Junior School, and had dormitory buildings close by. The caretaker was a bit overwhelmed when all these kids from London and Gravesend arrived at his school. By this time we had been joined by a crowd of children from Kennington, the Elephant and Castle area. The amenities got rather rough treatment and the beautifully polished parquet floor suffered a bit, as did the toilets with marble mosaic walls.

We older girls (10 and upwards) were allocated a beautiful room on the first floor with a window seat which looked out across the landscape to the rooftops of Totnes, about two miles away. We had an excellent teacher, Mrs Owen, who put the fear of God into some of the girls but got us doing things. Once a week we polished the classroom floor with dusters on our feet. I am so thankful to Mrs Owen who introduced me to music (she had been a 大象传媒 Singer) and poetry.

The twins stayed at Dartington Hall for a few weeks and then were billeted with an old lady named Mrs Gover. I rather think they teased the poor lady, getting up to childish mischief. One day they found a feather sticking out of a pillow and pulled it out. This seemed a good game and led to another and another until there were feathers everywhere!

To go to school we had to walk quite a distance up hill. The other girls with whom I shared, returned to Gravesend, one by one, until I was the only one left. Then the Moores moved house to a market garden not far away where they worked very hard producing food. There was a goat named Dainty whom I had to collect from the orchard each morning to be milked. Also there were chickens to feed, sometimes breaking the ice on their drinking trough. I had to walk about a mile away each morning to collect skimmed milk from a farm. The cream had been scooped off to make clotted cream. At the same time I had to take the dog 鈥淏icky鈥� for a walk and if the dog ran fast some of the milk spilled out of the container 鈥� an open enamel pot with a wire handle. Sometimes Mrs Moore would say "They've given you short measure today." Having done this each day, I then walked to school, about three miles.

Because I was busy before going to school, I was usually later than the rest of the children. By this time there were soldiers billeted at Dartingon Hall, in the building which the twins had first occupied. There was one soldier who took pity on me trudging along and he would stop and give me a lift to the top of the hill. He was a very kind young man who called me "his little girl鈥�.

Some months later my sister Mary and I were offered a billet where we could live together, so I left Mrs Moore and we stayed with Terry and Margaret Roper, who had a baby daughter named Judy. From their house which was modern but with a thatched roof we took a different route to school, for a while calling for the twins on the way. Then Dad took the twins back to Gravesend.

So Mary and I lived happily with the Ropers, cooking the Sunday roast and all sorts of things. Whilst we were there a Mrs Roper's sister came to live from London (I had to share a single bed with her, hanging on so as not to fall out!) and another couple who had been bombed out in Plymouth also moved in. From Dartington we could see the red sky when Plymouth was being bombed.

As I said, we shared the school with children from London (Mrs Owen came from London). I often wonder what happened to her and all the children. Where are they all now? I've never yet read in "The Evacuee" of anyone who went to school or stayed at Dartington. Are there any out there?

In 1941 our parents decided they wanted all their family together, so Mary and I returned to Gravesend. It broke my heart to leave the beauty of Devonshire and the interesting life we led. Mrs Owen tried to persuade Dad to leave us there, but he had made up his mind. So back to dingy bombed wartime Gravesend we went. At school I found my education was well in advance of the children who had stayed at Whitehill School. Of course, I had not experienced the Battle of Britain, although there was still bombing, doodlebugs and V2s to come.

I took an examination and transferred to Gravesend Technical School for Girls, where I learnt
shorthand, typing and book-keeping, among other subjects.

The first night of the doodle bugs (V1s) we went to the air raid shelter, and I stood with Dad
outside as we watched what he called these 鈥減ilotless planes鈥� flying over. Some of them landed in Swanscombe Woods, about four miles away from where we lived in Gravesend.
They were like noisy motorbikes riding across the sky with flames coming out of the back.
The V1s seemed to be coming fairly frequently 鈥� at least one every half hour. You knew you
were all right until you heard the engine cut out.

After this nightmare my father sent my four sisters to stay with his family in Scotland, at
Inverkeithing.

I had now left school in April 1944, and was working as a Junior Reporter for the 鈥淜ent Messenger鈥� 鈥� all the young men were being called up and so they decided to employ a girl. I enjoyed the work and found myself called upon to do duties which would not normally have fallen to a junior. It was an extension of my education and very interesting.

Jean Armour (nee Rankin)

evacuation2
5.11.03

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