I was born in the working-class district of Liverpool known as Walton, and the street where I lived was right beside the Everton Football Club ground. Being quite close to the Liverpool Docks, the area was considered (rightly) to become a prime target for Hitler's bombers in the event of war. In September 1939 I was fortunate enough to be evacuated to 'The Town in the Orchard'- Tenbury Wells in Worcestershire. Looking back on it all now, I don't regret my experience of evacuation. I'm one of two million children who were sent off to the safety of the countryside to avoid the German bombing. On the 1st of September 1939, there was a huge exodus of children from London, Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool etc., which went like clockwork. Throughout the entire war approx. three and a half million children were evacuees. One and a half million children were transported on the first day. Other, perhaps luckier, children, usually from better off homes, were sent abroad: to America, Canada, South Africa or other parts of the world.
                        ( Statistical Information by courtesy of Jean Slattery of The Evacuees Reunion Association.)