How can I trace a Second World War evacuee?
QI am trying to find out more about Victor, who was evacuated to my village – Abercanaid, near Merthyr Tydfil in South Wales – during the Second World War. He spent the war with w my grandparents and my dad, but b when he returned home to Deal in i Kent they lost touch. Sadly, my grandparents g and my dad have passed away, a and I never asked what Victor’s surname s was. I’ve joined the British Evacuees E Association ( evacuees.org. uk) u and contacted all of the obvious organisations, o but as yet to no avail!
Mr M CP Williams
ASearching birth records for Deal in the 1930s shows 22 boys named Victor born in the district. With few other records available digitally, I tried the local press. The Merthyr Express, available on the British Newspaper Archive ( british newspaperarchive.co.uk), has 21 articles specifically mentioning evacuees from
Deal and saying that the first arrived in May 1940. There are many other articles on local evacuees generally, including a few named ones. Allocation of receiving homes was done by local councils, which canvassed for volunteers to take them. There will probably have been many local-government reorganisations since 1940, but it’s possible that some records remain in Deal of its evacuees and where they were billeted.
Similarly, the Merthyr Tydfil Education Committee was responsible for placing the children in schools, and an article dated 22 June 1940 says that 198 evacuees came from Deal Boys’ Central School and 128 from Deal Junior Boys’ School plus 85 (sexunspecified) infants. Records of where they were sent may survive in council archives, and there may even be school registers.
One thing that searching the Kent newspapers shows is the very great gratitude the locals there felt for the care shown to their children in Wales.
Phil Tomaselli