My life as an Evacuee

I was 10 years old and I was a pupil at Lister Street School when War was announced on Sunday 3rd September 1939. I was sitting on the settee with my mam and dad listening to the radio when the Prime Minister came on to tell us that England was at war with germany. Before this, I had asked my mam if I could be evacuated with our Olive who was 7 years old and she had said yes-I had asked because it meant you went on holiday with your school friends and teachers.

On Friday I got all dressed up in my new clothes- coatg,beret,and strappy shoes.
My Mam packed my case and put my gas mask over my shoulder,fastened a brown label to my coat(on which was written my name and school) .
We set off to the railway station and met all our friends and teachers- it was a very exciting time because you had to be rich to afford to go on holiday,and so not many people went.

The train set off and we were all very excited and talking all of the time,wondering where we were going.

At last the train stopped and we all got out and got into coaches which took us to a big hall, where they shouted your name out and you went to your teacher in the corner of the room. As we were all leaving, We were given 2 carrier bags of food to give to the lady at the house where you were going to live.

Olive and myself went to a café in Sandsend where the lady was called Mrs Puckrin-she gave us a drink of orange juice and said we could chose a big cream cake- it was lovely I had my own bedroom,but Olive had 2 beds in her room. She had 1 and the other was taken by a girl from our school called jean Rumble. Over the road from the café was the beach,and after a rough sea, Mrs Puckring used to take us to the beach to collect driftwood for the fire-we loved doing this as it was totally new to us

Our school was nearly 2 miles away up a steep hill and sometimes a lady who had three wheeler car used to give 6 of us a lift to school! We all use to wonder how the car got us all up the hill with all of our weight! It was just a small village school and we had two classes in the hall, one class facing one way and the other class facing the other way I sat on the back row as I liked two of the boys who were 11 yrs old.

On a Sunday we used to get a lift to church in the milk float pulled by a big horse who used to pass wind all of the time! As I sat behind his bum, I was nearly green by the time we reached church!

We had so much fun playing on the sledge when it was snowing. The little stream over the road used to freeze in the winter and on one special day we decided to take the sledge onto the stream. As we sat on the sledge,the ice began to crack and before we could get of it the sledge ( and all of us) had gone through the ice and had got all wet- it was a good job the water was only shallow!

On a Saturday we used to get our 6d pocket money( which was worth ½ nowadays) and go off to the shops. We got 6 fruit drops and a liquorice for our money. After we would sit in the garden and take our sweets out of the packet and place them in a line. That was a sweet a day, and the liquorice for Sunday, but we would eat Mondays sweet first and then Tuesday sweet until we had eaten them all up within an hour! We had to then wait a full week before the next pocket money day!

Somedays we used to go to Whitby on the bus and look around the shops. At Christmas I got some nail varnish and wrote a letter to santa asking him for a new dress because I had a brown velvet dress which I did not like. At Christmas we went to a big party at Mulgrave castle that had a real Marchioness living there. She was a very old lady when she had supper she had 12 different foods and after every course a little bell was rang after we had lived at the café with Mrs Puckring for about 8 months her husband had an accident and we had to go to Mulgrave Castle to live. We didn’t like it there as you had to get into the bath with somebody else,Olive and I used to get in together, then on a Sunday we used to go to the teachers bedroom and have cocoa and a piece of toast for our supper.

The snow was very thick in the winter and one of the little boys was hanging over the wall when he suddenly fell over into the snow. The teacher had to go round to dig him out it was that deep! When we lived in the castle it was very cold and we didn’t like it after about 6 weeks we came home. Our Mams used to visit every month when we were away and used to bring all sorts of sweets- that was the good bit.

While we were at Sandsend, a ships mine was washed up on the beach and blew the window out of the hotel and also blew the 2 boys out of bed in our house. We all had a good laugh! We had to go to bed as soon as the 7.30 train went past- if the train didn’t go past we could stay up until 8.00. Mrs Puckring had a lovely fur coat with big fur buttons on it and I used to wear that as a dressing gown as we waited for the train to pass.

Altogether we enjoyed our time being an evacuee as it was a lot of fun,it was all new living in a café then a real castle, but we loved our home the best.
Mrs Puckering had a son who was in forces and a daughter in the Police force . she had parties for our birthdays, and really looked after as if we were her own . She decided we needed new shoes so off we went to ,Whitby on the bus all 5of us ,she had lots of patience because the lads were always up to mischief. We had a party at the xmas and one of the lads decided to try and get in the fridge now at that time the top hole was only small and john was a big lad , It was panic station because Mrs Puckering could not get him out ,Mischief was his second name. By this time a neighbour had to called and after a lot of pulling and tugging he was released and promised that he would not do it again. It had frightened him and he kept his word While we there the police called and told us that a german prisoner of war had escaped from the train and the doors had to be kept closed till he was caught, After a couple of hours he was found ,he was only 16yrs old and he said he wanted to stop in England and not go back to Germany. There was a lot of excitement and special events happening all the time while we at Sandsend, we enjoyed our time there we did not have that sort of life at home , I don’t think I would have come home again to Hartlepool to live it was such a different life ,but it was not to be. At Hartleoool they had not had any bombs dropped ,We had more things happening with the mine blowing up and the prisoner escaping ,going to school in a 3 wheeler car ,church in a milk float, fresh cream cakes which we didn’t get at home, I wish I had been able to keep in touch with Mrs Puckering but of course with me being young and the war starting I would love to be able to get in touch again but I think I have left it to late .Maybe Mrs Puckerings grandchildren may have been told about the evacuees that their grand mother kindly looked after, she was a wonderful person. We loved her very much.Joan

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