大象传媒

This account was told by Pamela to her daughter, and is contributed to the website with her permission.

During the summer before war broke out, it was obvious that trouble was brewing. Plans were made to evacuate schools from the cities. My own school, King Edward VI High School for Girls, Edgbaston, was to go to Cheltenham to share the premises of Pates Grammar School. Pates school would have lessons in the mornings only, and our school have the afternoons.

My parents weren't keen that my sister and I should go, so when the school evacuated during the summer holidays, we stayed at home. Before long it was clear that they had made the wrong choice, and we were sent off to stay with a friend's aunt in Malvern instead. She was a a retired teacher, unmarried, and very strict with us. My sister and I were there with our friend, Betty. But we were not happy there and it was obvious that she didn't like having us three girls in her house.We didn't stay more than a week or two.

Soon after school started in the September my parents arranged for us to go to Cheltenham. We stayed, with our friend Mary, with a vicar's widow in a vicarage.She lived with her daughter, a librarian at Cheltenham Ladies' College. Also living with them was an old woman they called 'nurse' who must have once been the childrens' nanny. She was very kind to us. We would often go up to her room for company.

The vicarage was opposite the church, which used to hold a service for deaf and dumb people on a Sunday. It used to amuse us to watch them 'chatting' with hands and gestures after the morning service.

I had taken my school certificate the previous year and was embarking on the sixth form. But the war was unsettling and I felt there was no future for me at school. So I left after half a term, and went back to Birmingham.

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