Stibbington Home Front Memories Project – Part 1 Arrival and Settling In Stibbington Home Front Memories Project [Write up of information from local newspapers (Peterborough Advertiser, Peterborough Standard and Stamford Mercury) along with some data and information from the school’s log book and registers.] ARRIVAL The first group of ‘Stibbington evacuees’ arrived in the village on Friday September 1st 1939 as part of ‘Operation Pied Piper’. They had arrived at Peterborough North Station at about 11am, most of the 900 teachers and children on board originating from the Tottenham area. The Peterborough Standard describes them as: ‘having nothing frail about them. They looked well fed and sturdy and as clean as one could expect children to be who had just finished a two hour train journey, packed, sometimes 16 to a compartment and that on a hot day. In dress they were up to the average of elementary school children, and the girls looked natty and bright’. The evacuees were clearly in good spirits, and arrangements for their dispersal ‘were better than we had a right to expect’. ‘The party marched off, and the boys started up some of the old marching songs, including “Tipperary”. They swung their respirators and bags of small belongings and the labels fluttered in the breeze. Their first march was to Bishop’s Road. Here they were loaded up on ‘buses. Asked “Have you got your fare ready?” a boy replied, “No, the King is paying the fare for us.” Some of these children went to Stanground, Norman Cross villages and outlying parts. They all went amid cheers and laughter in the course of half-an-hour or so.’ [PS 8/9/39] [1] Stibbington Home Front Memories Project – Part 1 Arrival and Settling In For Fletton Urban and Norman Cross Rural, the reception officer was Mr G R Rumsey, headmaster of Fletton Secondary School ‘and he did most efficient service with the help of the teachers in seeing the children on to their ‘buses’. Mr T H Peach was the chief billeting officer for Norman Cross, with the help of Mr P Lockyer, chairman of the Council. At the station, trains continued to arrive: at 2 o’clock, from Islington, when ‘again there was a hearty welcome’. They were met by a number of local dignitaries – the Mayor and councillors, billeting officers, a nursing contingent, members of the Women’s Voluntary Services, the Vicar of Peterborough and a Salvation Army officer, wondering ‘what sort’ he was going to get for Newborough. ‘One noted the good humour of the receptionists. School teachers were kindness itself; one could not say too much in praise of the pleasing way they handled their guests’. This train load was mainly for the Peterborough and Barnack Rural districts (100 went to Castor.) ‘Again the march started and the visitors were delighted with two little Peterborough boys, dressed one as a Red Indian and the other a Policeman.’ A further train arrived in the afternoon, carrying 800 from Crouch End, most of whom went to Fletton Urban district and some to Peterborough Rural. On Saturday 2nd September, arrivals continued, starting at 11am with a ‘big load’ from Stoke Newington, two large schools with many secondary children. These were taken in a long line of single decker buses, 300 to Barnack rural district, 60 to villages to the east of Peterborough, some to Norman Cross district, and the remaining 240 to Walton, the first group to be billeted in the City itself. ‘These London boys were intensely interested in the country they were coming to, especially the really rural parts. They rather hoped they would not have to go to school, but they swallowed that and wanted to know “what else?” We suggested that they would help with the harvest. That sounded good, especially the prospect of rabbits, but one youth fervently hoped that harvesting did not include pea- picking: he’d “had some”. We reassured him and offered the alternative of sugar beet and potatoes, which, curiously enough, had no terrors for him. He hoped there would be fishing. We assured him that the fish in the fen dykes simply came to the surface begging to be caught.’ Mrs Bryant, Peterborough’s Mayor, met every train. Along with Mr Frank Smith, (City Treasurer) as chief billeting officer, and Mr Hankin, the reception officer, she was constantly on duty. They were ‘quite the highlights of the disembarkation’. ‘We saw her put out a hand to a small girl who dried her tears and capitulated. She clung to the Mayor and very soon Mrs Bryant would have collected a following like the Pied Piper. Later we saw her nursing a baby who ‘goo-gooed’ with intense satisfaction. The Mayor said she had too many grandchildren to lose her cunning.’ [2] Stibbington Home Front Memories Project – Part 1 Arrival and Settling In During that Saturday afternoon, there was a change in atmosphere at the station, as arriving trains brought mothers and young children, rather than school parties. At 2pm a half empty train arrived carrying some 150 mothers and children. ‘The scene was more affecting than that afforded by the earlier arrivals. These children were tired and fretful from the long hot journey. The mothers were much the same; and some of them had three and four children. They found plenty to help them with their baggage, living and otherwise. Could anyone handle a baby with greater tenderness and skill than did some of those big railway men?’ Two further similar trains brought the total of mothers and infants combined to something like 800. They were sent on mainly to Fulbridge and Brooke-Street schools. Here the Chief Billeting Officer faced a difficult task – many who had offered spaces for school children were not so keen to have ‘another woman’ in the house. Eventually, though, all were accommodated (though some had to be sent for their first night to ‘licensed houses’). At 11am on Sunday 3rd September, just as Hitler was throwing away the last chance of peace, the last train arrived. ‘This was a very heavy train, loaded in London in an immense rush and a large proportion were of the Jewish race. Faces, speech and the names on the luggage proclaimed it, even if the chief man of the Salvation Army in charge had not told us the same. “They were loaded in a panic,” he said, “and many have not yet had their names and addresses registered. It was a trying sight,” he adds,” when they left and said goodbye to their menfolk.” When noon came, not one of the great party was left on the dock. Buses and private cars, streams of them, had taken them to their depots. The large gang of men and women who had been helping wiped the perspiration from their brows. For carrying suitcases and kitbags was no light work. But what a repayment was the look of gratitude on the faces of the tired women as they got into their seats for the last stage of their journey.’ Three more trains should have followed, but they were apparently requisitioned for troop movements. Further evacuations, if any, would have to wait. On the Monday morning, the Mayor thanked those people who had offered billets to mothers with young children. It is clear that this had not been achieved totally voluntarily, as she expressed regret that she had had to use her compulsory powers. ‘The trouble was that whereas the city (as distinct from the rural districts) was told to expect 3,400 unaccompanied children, they actually received only 220. The difference in numbers was made up in part by adults and children. They had to dispose of the people sent, and she knew that some were disappointed not to get the school children.’ The rural districts had absorbed the bulk of school age children, including Glinton which took the whole of Hanover LCC School, Islington, accompanied by the headmistress and staff (70 being sent on to Helpston). [3] Stibbington Home Front Memories Project – Part 1 Arrival and Settling In Mr Smith, chief billeting officer, told the Standard that there were now 1,496 evacuees in Peterborough City, including 230 of school age. On Tuesday 4th September, it was announced that evacuation was complete. 650,000 evacuees (school children, children under school age with their mothers, expectant mothers and blind people) had left London. This was fewer than had been anticipated, and explains why smaller numbers had been received in Peterborough. SETTLING IN There are no accounts relating specifically to the evacuees billeted in Stibbington and Wansford, but two detailed accounts from the Peterborough Advertiser about life in local villages (mainly Farcet, Yaxley, Stilton and Holme) will be typical of their experiences. There were clearly two different sides to the story: ‘On the one hand it means the bringing of sunshine, laughter and happiness into small, perhaps childless households; interesting companionships for the only child and newcomers to whom brothers and sisters are vying with each other in showing kindliness and generosity. On the other hand it is no exaggeration to say that certain homes have been broken up by the exacting demands of some of the mothers who look upon their stay in the country as a respite from work; while from the farmers and smallholders come stories of raids upon orchards by the children, horseplay, the chasing and worrying of pigs, the climbing and tumblings of haystacks and fights with local boys and girls.’ There were reports of mothers declining to help out with cooking or housework – even “You don’t expect me to do my own shopping, do you?” Payments were being received for providing billets and some parents felt that as the Government was paying, they shouldn’t have to.