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My brother and I were very lucky. It must have been sometime during 1941 when we were evacuated to Devon. Very lucky because rather than attaching parcel labels to our lapels, our parents came with us down to Devon to a small village called Woodland Head, to ensure we were placed with kind respectable people. For the time being, we will call these people Mr and Mrs Smith, who became known to us as Auntie and Unc. Eventually, we moved with Auntie and Unc to Yeoford. Both of these villages are near Dartmoor.

Our parents were not religious and Auntie and Unc were Plymouth Bretheren. Not so much of a culture shock at that time as we were both so young.

Occasionally our parents came down from London to visit us but eventually these visits seemed fewer and far between. At the time of the evacuation I was three but as time progressed, I became more aware of our situation. Maybe it was partly genetic, maybe not but as I got older I had a feeling of “not belonging” to Auntie and Unc’s family and not belonging to that of my parents.

Although the Plymouth Brethren upbringing was very strict, Auntie and Unc were very kind but extremely poor people. I remember over hearing conversations on a couple of occasions that my parents had not sent money for our support. This I believe became a very big problem for them but in no way degraded the love and kindness that they gave us.

When the war was over, we returned to our parents in London. After for a short period, Auntie came up to London and took us back to Devon. I cannot remember the exact reason but suspect it was partly that our parents found it difficult to relate to us and partly that we considered Devon as home.

At this point time is limited but I am determined to “write a book” on our evacuation, how we learnt to live off the land and the adverse effect it had on my first marriage.

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