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This story was submitted to the People's War website by Dhimati Acharya, of East Sussex Library and Information Services, on behalf of Mrs Iris Charos and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

I came from a family of six. I was evacuated from London to Eastbourne on 3rd September 1939 with my two brothers and a sister. We were billeted with two households in the same road. I was happy to spend time at the beach on my own when no building could be found for teaching my age group. In early December 1939 my mother came and took us all home.

In June 1940, I was evacuated to Devon along with others from my school, Hazelrigge Road School, Clapham. My sister aged eight and younger brother aged six were also evacuated. For the first few days we were sent to Vognacott Farm in Chilsworthy. We were looked after by the gentle housekeeper to widower Mr John Hicks and his adult son. It was shortly explained to us that she was not able to look after us as she wished and that we were to be moved on.

We were moved to Canal Farm and spent three happy years with the Kivell family, Uncle Jack, Auntie Eunice, daughter Elizabeth (Betty), who was only a few years older that myself, and their son Murray.

Betty was a beautiful girl with a happy nature. When we visit her now, I never see her as an old lady but as she was then.

Auntie Eunice taught me milking and to take care of calves, hens and ducks. She taught me how to cook, and even now we eat many of the meals and cakes we had on the farm. We tasted duck for the very first time on the farm.

We all went to the Chilsworthy Methodist Chapel because it would not have been possible for us to walk to the C of E in Holsworthy (two miles away). There were never any difficulties in our relationship with local children.

Many of the teachers from our London school had come with us. We three children were divided up into infant, junior and senior schools. We were happy in our schools and were encouraged to help the war effort. We were offered paid work picking potatoes (dug by machine). One boring job we were given was snipping up old stockings into small pieces with very blunt scissors — we never did learn what these piles of snipping were for.

There were dances at the Drill Hall in Holsworthy and, when I was twelve, Betty took me along as a treat. Betty always looked so lovely in spite of the clothes rationing. Quite simply we children adored her, and still do.

Auntie worked so hard, it still astonishes me how she achieved everything. She cooked, cleaned, and salted down our allowed ration of two pigs a year. We used a milk separator to produce cream and skimmed milk. The skimmed milk was used to wean older calves and the cream was clotted. Auntie also made butter. She also baked bread, sold surplus eggs and had holidaymakers to stay on the farm. Auntie shared the (hand) milking of the herd of cows.

Every year there was an anniversary of the Chapel Sunday School. We all learned a hymn or a piece of poetry and were dressed in our best. My mother sent us matching dresses which had been made either by her or my eldest sister, and Auntie wanted us to have straw bonnets to wear with them. The one I liked had a wide brim with flowers round the crown. It was only years later that I learned that she had paid for it and that it was very expensive.

There were no sweets around that time, except at Christmas. With our earnings at school and occasional postal orders we would buy paragoric lozenges from the chemist and thought them delicious.

In late 1942 my mother arrived and took us back to London. There were still occasional air raids — an incendiary came through our kitchen roof and nestled near the gas pipe on the floor. Fortunately the man next door was a gas board official and shut off the gas and fished it out with tongs and took it up the garden to put itself out.

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