大象传媒

No one should ever underestimate the part fate plays in our lives or the emotional scars left when a young child is separated from their family and friends.

I was 5 years old when the second world war started and my brother Michael was 4. Today I am nearly 72 and Michael is 70. The emotional roller coaster that was our 鈥榚vacuee鈥� years haunts both of us still to this day.

Our fateful journey started the day a bomb fell on our school in Ealing. My father, who was an air raid warden, realised that the possibility of a German invasion was very real. Although my mother was a Gentile my father was a Jew and having heard the horror stories of what was happening to Jews in Germany he decided that we would be FAR safer evacuated to Canada and our passage was booked on the S.S. City of Benares. We all had to have a medical and it was found that my adenoids and tonsils were so inflamed we wouldn鈥檛 be able to take that crossing and would have to wait for another. On the 17th September 1940 the City of Benares was attacked by a German U-boat. 99 children lost their lives, some from my school, Michael can remember the empty chairs and tables at school where our friends used to sit. There but for the grace of God鈥︹�︹�︹��.

My father still wanted us out of London as the bombing was becoming so bad. As small children we thought it was wonderful to see all these planes in the sky 鈥� large German bombers surrounded by our Spitfires. Michael can still remember the shells falling. Every evening at 6 o鈥檆lock our mother would hustle us into the air raid shelter and we would spend every night there listening to the bombs dropping, getting very little sleep. I was 6 and Michael was 4 1/2 when our mother and father took us to the train station complete with large name labels round our necks and our gas masks to begin what would turn out to be about 3 1/2 years away from home living the life of an evacuee. Our baby brother David was only a few months old and would be staying with our parents in London.

I remember they were playing 鈥楻oll out the Barrel鈥� as we boarded the train to begin our journey to we knew not where, with my mother鈥檚 words 鈥測ou must look after Michael鈥� being the most important thing on my mind. The journey seemed endless and the packed lunch our mother had given us soon ran out. Eventually we reached our destination 鈥� Penzance - tired and hungry.

They say that your first experience of anything is often the one that stays with you the longest and certainly this is true with my memories of those 3 1/2 years.

When we arrived all the children were taken into a large building where we were sorted. Michael and I were taken off in a large black car with several other children. I remember the car stopping at the top of a hill where there were a few houses. A man with a loud hailer announced our arrival but it took a long time for the lady who was to take me in to come forward. Her reluctance to take in an evacuee soon became apparent. It was only then that I realised Michael was not going to be housed with me. When they parted us I became so distraught I screamed, kicked and hit out at the man who was trying to hold me while they took Michael away. 鈥淏ut I promised to look after him鈥� I cried. The experience of him being taken him has always stayed with me right up to today. I found out that they had in fact taken him not too far away. He was to live with a couple called Mr and Mrs Wallis just down the hill. The government offered five shillings a week per child for any families taking in evacuees. Mrs Wallis turned out to be a very cruel lady who obviously only took Michael in for the money and no compassionate reason. She constantly hit him, nearly starved him and sent him to school in the middle of winter without a coat or even a jumper. I used to hold him in my arms cuddling him to try and get him warm on the way to school. l remember this awful feeling that I had promised my mother I would look after him and I couldn鈥檛. I must have been feeling very guilty but not realising it. The thing I remember as if it were yesterday was screaming at her garden gate 鈥渄on鈥檛 hit my brother, don鈥檛 hit my brother鈥� as I heard his sobs coming from inside her house. I was terrified of her. The feeling of wanting to protect him and the frustration of not being able to haunts me still. She was finally reported to the authorities and Michael was taken away to live with a family in Newquay

The lady I lived with was little better. She made it very clear that she didn鈥檛 want me in her house. She had her own little girl to whom she gave everything including most of my rations. She would lock me in my room without any dinner. I was so hungry I would just cry. All I wanted was my mummy. In the end, to get rid of me she accused me of stealing and I was eventually moved to another family in the area, and although they were the complete opposite, very kind and loving it meant I was even further away from Michael.

How could people be so cruel to 2 little children who were little more than babies and who were frightened and confused.

Our time in Penzance was the start of 3 years of moving around, going next to Devon and onto Weston Super Mare. In the latter part of the war I went to live with my grandmother and Uncle Jack. I was 9 years old and spent what was to prove to be one of the happiest years of my life with them. By this time Michael had returned home.

Finally as the war ended we were reunited as a family. We all moved up to Stone in Stafford as our family home in London had been bombed but everything had changed for Michael and I. The bond I had shared with my mother before my evacuation had gone and Michael could not, and still cannot to this day, get close to anyone. At the age of seventeen he left home and migrated to Australia.

Our story may not be as drastic as some other young children that had to endure those grey war years but those critical impressionable years when a child needs to feel the love and care of their Mum and Dad were lost and have had a profound effect on the rest of our lives.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.