Although many thousands of British evacuees were evacuated by steam train during the Second World War, others travelled to their new homes by steam ship. George Osborn recalled the excitement of his journey from Portsmouth to the Isle of Wight: The great engines, powered by steam from the coal-fired boiler, slowly turned the […]
Port Towns & Urban Cultures contributor Gillian Mawson is organising a Channel Islands Evacuee’ church service at St Mary’s, Stockport Market Place on Sunday 23 August at 10.30am. The event will mark the 70th anniversary of the time when thousands of Channel Island evacuees left Stockport, and the surrounding area, to return home in 1945. […]
In June 1940, 17,000 people were evacuated from Guernsey, to Weymouth, just days before their island was occupied by Germany – see http://porttowns.port.ac.uk/1940-evacuation-st-peter-port-guernsey-england/ The evacuation ships reached Weymouth where the evacuees sat for hours, waiting for permission to disembark. As Winifred Le Page stepped onto dry land, she was approached by French interpreters, “They didn’t […]
