The Evacuation was a great success Free Essay Example

I think that the evacuation was a success as it saved many children’s lives. However, some children were not evacuated and were killed in the bombings. This shows that the evacuation had its faults and was not a complete success. Some children had a great time while at their foster homes in the countryside, which can be used as evidence for why the evacuation was a success. But in some cases, children had a terrible time in the foster homes and were possibly abused by their carers.

Hope and Glory is a film which is about a mother with her husband at war who refused evacuation and it shows the children were allowed to roam the London streets of rubble unsupervised. This showing that evacuation was not a complete success as it shows kids were allowed to stay and be in danger.

Source A is a picture showing that the evacuation was a great success. It shows a large line of children going to the station looking very happy.

This would show that they were not worried about leaving their parents and looking forward to going to the countryside. This photo was taken September 1939, this making it a very reliable source. But I believe that this be used as propaganda to convince people that evacuation was a great thing that there kids would enjoy. This would also be a way of keeping up morale of Britain as they were going into war. And if father’s been joining the war or were conscripted, they would know that their children were safe from this source, evacuation was a great success but this source is not completely reliable.

Source B is an interview with a teacher. As teachers were evacuated with the children they would have been good, reliable sources for how good evacuation was. It is writing in first person and it tells how the children were alone and what they were going through. The time this account was created was 1988. This is many decades after the Second World War. Because they did this so many years after, she might have forgotten some of the things that occurred at the time. However, after so many years she would have no reason not to tell the truth so that overall, I think that this source is probably reliable. It shows the point that evacuation was not such a success as it tells of the children as scared.

Source C is an extract from the novel ‘Carrie’s War’. This was written in 1973. This was also written by an evacuee of the war but it is a fictional book. This source gives us a story how the children were made to feel embarrassed. Source C, although not very reliable us giving evacuation a bad name and shows that some people did not enjoy their evacuation.

Source D is an advertisement issued by the government in 1940. This was just a year after the first children group were evacuated; it is a propaganda poster which is showing the countryside out to be much better place for the children to be than the city. It also gives a good piece of writing below the picture displaying many facts that would comfort the parents. This is showing the importance of evacuation and how good it can be. This is another example of how evacuation was good. But if the government needed to advertise for foster parents then the scheme can’t have been a complete success. Also, because it’s propaganda of the happy children can’t be trusted.

One source that’s shows that evacuation was not the right option for some was source E. This is an interview with a parent in May 1940. It is a survey where a father of one boy tells of how he will never evacuate his son. I believe this source is quite useful as it is from the times of the evacuation and it also gives detail of the evacuation and it also gives details on why evacuation was not a good idea. But the source is limited because if it’s the view of only one person.

There are many other pieces of evidence that agree and disagree with this statement. One that we have seen which would turn more to evacuation being a success is the film “Hope and Glory” letting her children away but her children turn bad as they have under age sex and join gangs. As they go unsupervised in the day, they roam across the rubble of destroyed houses and come across dangerous thing like unexploded ammunition.

In conclusion, I believe that evacuation had many pros when helping Britain. It helped the death toll of Britain’s next generation. It also helped the countryside which was short of co workers they needed and it was a good thing to happen for them. And finally, I think that many evacuees will look back and remember goods times in the countryside and the parents will be happy that they were safe and there were many who offered a lot.

Most Children had their education disrupted because there were not enough classrooms so they only attended school half day rather than the full day. Most children were home sick and there parents. A lot of them had nightmares and wet the bed because they were so unhappy. Also if was hard for the foster parents, some of them had to put up with the badly behaved children who swore and did not have good table manners. However, it was healthier living in the country with fresh air and fresh food. So overall, there were some successes and some failures in evacuation.

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