The Channel Islands At War Read Online Free Page A

brought war to the Islands. The notice referred to schoolchildren, their teachers and helpers, mothers with children under school age, expectant mothers, and men of military age between 20 and 33. To these categories were soon added unmarried women and widows, women with children up to 17 years of age and 'other persons than the above'. It was not clear if everyone was intended to leave, or if shipping would be available.
     
    Evacuation began in confusion and near panic, but ended successfully four days later. By that time about 11,000 had left Jersey, and about twice that number, Guernsey. All but 20 of Alderney's population had left, and all but 15 of Sark's had stayed. So in total about 30,000 left, and some 60,000 remained. Those were days of fearful partings and administrative chaos. The first to go were the children. AH over the Islands anxious and white-faced parents gathered in schoolrooms to hear details of evacuation. Mrs Cortvriend in Guernsey recalled she had last sat in the schoolroom to watch a Nativity play in 1939. She wrote: 'Our own children were rather pale and subdued at the last breakfast time we spent together, and kept saying "But what about you, Mummy? You and Daddy will come afterwards won't you?" ' Three weeks after the evacuation, the schoolroom became a billet for German troops.
     
    On 20 June, shiploads of children pulled away from the Islands, although it was a ten-and-a-half hour wait for some on Guernsey. The crossing in slow boats was pleasant enough for some, but others found it less pleasing. "We are all taking it in turns to rush to the side of the boat and be violently sick,' said Daphne Martel.
    The Tonbridge arrived at Weymouth to find there was no pilot, and had to wait 30 hours before docking with only one nursing sister on board. Mothers fainted or became hysterical, but eventually at midnight food was brought on board, and the children bedded down for the night in cattle stalls. A child of eleven who was already ill died during the evacuation, and a woman gave birth crossing the Channel. Parents left behind had to wait until March 1941 before Red Cross letter forms arrived assuring them of their children's safety or otherwise in the blitz then taking place in British cities.
    People registered at constables' offices in the towns, and in the countryside at the Douzaine rooms. In St Helier crowds surrounded the town hall, besieged the shipping offices, and offered motor cars in exchange for seats on the last flights out. Banks found themselves transacting so much business they had to restrict withdrawals to £25 each, and two couriers came in with £30,000 to steady the banks' reserves against possible panic. But after strong statements from Edgar Dorey on his return, and by Alexander Coutanche, things had calmed down by the evening of 20 June. In Guerns ey, Victor Carey and Ambrose She rwill handled matters less effectively first saying all could go, then saying shipping would not be available for all, and trying to urge restraint following signs of panic. Ralph Durand described how, 'Some farmers killed cattle that in the months to come could ill be spared. Some people before abandoning their homes turned their pet animals out of doors to fend for themselves; some with still less humanity left fowls and rabbits shut up without food or water. Some houses were left open, beds unmade and the remains of a hurried morning meal on the table.'
    After the departure of the evacuees the Island governments passed a law vesting control of all goods and property left behind in the hands of the state, but it was not long before houses were broken into, robbed or occupied as billets by the Ge rmans, and Todt workers. In Alde rney some of the early looting was done by Islanders from Guernsey sent to carry out salvage work, and a number were imprisoned. One man returned to Guernsey with 77 carpets, 76 curtains, 13 clocks, and quantities of food and cigarettes.
    Many of the craft involved in