THOUSANDS of children from east London were evacuated to the countryside during the Blitz and their experiences are a key part of the narrative of the conflict. But now a teacher at Wanstead High School during the war has shared her memories of when the children returned.
JAMES RANGER reports
IDA Gaskin, who celebrates her 90th birthday on December 9, taught at Wanstead High School as Miss Jacobs from 1941 to 1945.
She left the UK at the end of the war for a new life in New Zealand, but she still has fond memories of her days in wartime Wanstead.
Ida said: “By late 1941 the Blitz was effectively over. Apart from sporadic air raids at fairly long intervals, life went on in a reasonably normal manner.
“There were food shortages, of course, but one got used to queuing and going without things; even dried egg and spam could be dressed up to become bearable when one had nothing else.
“Almost everyone lived in a state of suppressed anxiety. There would have been very few people – pupils or teachers – who did not have close relatives or friends serving in one or other theatre of war.
“One teacher was widowed when her husband, a former colleague, was killed in Italy, another lost a fiancé.
“In 1944 the war came very close again with the arrival of Hitler’s first ‘victory weapon’, the V1s, or ‘doodlebugs’.
“Wanstead was on the direct route from the south east, and for the first time we suffered real disruption.
“The cloakrooms on the lower floor had been protected by blast walls outside the windows and reinforced concrete shelters had been built along the driveway.
“For most of the 1944 summer term, we taught in the shelters. Half the school attended in the morning and the other half in the afternoon.”
Ida said if a doodlebug landed near the school, a staff member would cycle to the scene to check if a pupil’s family had been injured or killed.
She said: “Fortunately no-one had to face the task of coming back with bad news, but before the V1s were stopped, one girl was the sole survivor when one landed near her home during the night.”
During the Christmas holidays of January 1945, a V2 landed near the school, and staff returned to find all the windows blown out. While repairs were made, some classes were sent to Aldersbrook School near Wanstead Park.
Ida left for her new life soon after the war ended, when male teachers began to return from overseas.
She said: “Remembering the bitter winter of 1945, I looked for warmer climes and went to New Zealand. But that’s another story.”
With thanks to Terry Joyes of the Old Heronian’s newsletter
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