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And so, away again. Part 3.

Stories of an evacuee.

I am now eleven, so old enough to be evacuated on my own and Mum stayed at home.
At the start of the autumn term in September, special trains took all the pupils to Brokenhurst. Older boys returned to their previous places in the New Forest, and first years were dispersed to various towns around. Some went to Lyndhurst, some to Lymington and some to New Milton. I arrived at New Milton in a church hall with probably 12 other boys. The W.V.S. looked after us while different ladies came to collect the boy that they had agreed to look after. When all had gone, there was one boy left, and you can guess who that was ! Eventually a lady took me in a little car, to a house. We went up the path and she knocked on the door. When the lady of the house came to the door she said that she had changed her mind and that she didn’t want anybody. After a bit of an argument the W.V.S. lady said that I obviously wouldn’t be happy here and we returned to the car. She then drove to Milford on Sea where there was a small temporary hostel for boys and girls. It was good here, and we all had a nice time exploring through the salt marsh and tall reeds between us and the sea. Even going along to the Hurst Castle spit and to the little deserted harbour of Keyhaven. There was an empty shell of a house on the harbour wall with some painting on the wall. We thought or pretended that it was haunted. Us boys in one room could sometimes invade the girl’s room and have a pillow fight.
After several weeks I was moved back to New Milton to go to stay with a Mrs. Instrall. Her husband was away working near Southampton on aircraft design. The bungalow had lots of photos of Schnider Trophy seaplanes on the walls. She had a lodger, who I remember always wrapped his chest up with a Thermogene vest. Some evenings when Mrs. Instrall went out, a young girl used to come to stay. She was about 13 or so and we used to lark about sometimes. Being 11 and she 13 it was just teasing and chasing around the furniture which caused Mrs Instrall’s fat smelly Scotty dog to go frantic.
I was reasonably happy here; but after experiencing the temporary hostel I felt that I would like to go to one of the larger hostels which were run by teachers and their wives. I didn’t know, but Mrs Instrall was opening the letters that I was receiving from my mother, and when she read that my mother was making some inquiries about hostels she immediately had me collected and taken away. Once again I returned to Milford on Sea, and again after a few weeks was sent to another billeter in New Milton.

One of my main happiness at being able to go to Portsmouth Southern Secondary was that there would be no more caning or other punishment. Unfortunately after a few weeks at school, several older boys were caught in possession of explosives and other stolen goods. They had broken into an army store, taken some explosives, other things and a large number of pencils. They had sold these pencils, ( which were all painted and decorated and not like standard plain wartime wood pencils ), to at lot of us in the school. We all had to return these to a schoolmaster, and lose our pennies. The boys had exploded some of their stolen goods in a sandpit near Lyndhurst. Because of this they were expelled and had to have a public caning in front of the school. Being a first year I was right at the front and of course had full view of all this. They had to stand on a sheet of paper and then bend over for several hard whacks with the cane.

I remember that while I was at Milford this time, there were quite a few Americans living in tents in a field near to the house, and there were several girls from “ out of town “ generally hanging around the village.

This time at New Milton I shared a small bedroom with another boy from the Southern Secondary. Mrs. Goddard had a daughter Peggy, the same age as me and a small son of about 2 years. The boy I shared with was 2 years ahead of me at school, and being 13 to 14 and in puberty, quite often masturbated at night. He always got out of bed after and said his prayers. He wanted me to join in these activities; but being still 11, and not being particularly religious I didn’t participate in either. Mr Goddard was a member of the Home Guard and kept his rifle in the broom cupboard.
This other boy used to try to get Peggy and me to kiss when we all went upstairs to bed. We did sometimes have a peck and I was so lucky that Mrs Goddard never found out, otherwise I would have been back at the reserve hostel again.
At the end of the road was a general store where some local boys and girls lived. The boys made a crystal set and we used to sit around twiddling the cat’s whisker to pick up a radio station. I must have said at some time to the girls, that I missed the extra things to eat that I might have got at home. This would be perhaps Marmite or extra jam made from the sugar ration. This got back to Mrs. Goddard, and from then on, we each had our own pot of jam for the month; and that was it until the next ration. This was emphasised by Mrs. Goddard’s little son who was given a biscuit tin which he picked into to eat a biscuit, or a bit of a biscuit before dropping it back in. We didn’t ever get the biscuit tin past on to us.
To get to school was quite a long walk to the railway station, a train journey to Brokenhurst, and then a 300 to 400 yard walk to the school. I think that we didn’t start until about 10 a.m.. Then there was lunch break of 2 hours, because every boy had school dinners and the cooking facilities were limited. School finished early so that everyone could get back to their billet; so school time was very restricted. For science we had to walk to the other side of Brokenhurst to the main school where they had laboratories. There were no facilities for woodwork or metalwork. Though of course, I don’t think that the school was too concerned about that.

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