On September 1, 1939, the British government launched Operation Pied Piper — a massive plan to move children out of cities before German bombs could fall on them. London, Manchester, and Liverpool were considered the most likely targets, so millions of children were sent to rural areas in Wales, Devon, and East Anglia. Each child arrived at a train station carrying a small suitcase and a gas mask in a square cardboard box. A brown paper tag pinned to their coat listed their name, school, and home address so they wouldn’t get lost along the way.
These nursery school children were evacuated from Kentish Town in North London, circa 1939 – and you can see their labels attached to their coats. In some cases, teachers were evacuated along with their students, and some were even responsible for finding the children a place to stay once they got to their destination.
Teachers led their classes onto trains with no clear picture of where they were headed or for how long. Many of these city children had never seen the countryside before — farm animals and open fields were entirely foreign to them. When they arrived in small villages, children gathered in local halls or churches. Foster parents, called “billet-parents,” walked through the rows and chose who would come home with them. Farmers often picked older boys who could help with fieldwork. Younger children and siblings were frequently harder to place.
Approximately three million British children were evacuated from their city homes and sent to the countryside during World War II. The first of these mass evacuations took place in early September 1939 and saw children carrying boxes containing their gas masks. A paper label attached to each child identified who they were and their journey details. While in the country, the children continued their education in settings ranging from church halls to pubs – basically, wherever there was room.
Schooling in the host villages was far from normal. Local children attended classes in the morning, and the evacuated city children used the same building in the afternoon. When space ran out entirely, lessons moved into church basements, private living rooms, or whatever rooms could be found. Children from wealthier private schools had a different experience — entire schools sometimes relocated together to manor houses, where classes continued with little interruption. But for most evacuees, education became something that happened wherever there was room.
Schooling was disrupted not only by the evacuations and frequent moves, but also by the threat of bombs. Here, students and teachers from a school in Bermondsey in South London strive for a sense of normalcy. The photo, taken on March 29, 1941, shows students participating in a reading and discussion group.
Gas masks were a constant presence in every child’s day. Students carried them at all times — during lessons, lunch, and play. Teachers drilled their classes until every child could seal the mask to their face in under thirty seconds. These drills weren’t just practice exercises. A real gas attack was a genuine fear, and speed mattered.
These children in Kingston, Greater London can be seen filing out of their school during a practice gas test. A canister of tear gas was set off so that the students could test their reactions, put on their gas masks and leave the premises. The photograph was taken in June 1941.The nursery children pictured above are wearing their masks during recess, adding playful fun to the seriousness of the situation and the discomfort of wearing the devices, circa 1940.
When air raid sirens sounded, children moved fast into trenches or brick shelters built directly on the school grounds. Inside, they sang songs and played games while waiting for the all-clear signal. These shelters were cramped and often dark, but they were a routine part of the school day.
Schoolchildren learned how to operate gas masks and were schooled huddled together in underground air raid shelters. Understandably, education sometimes took a backseat to simple survival.These children are pictured emerging from an air raid shelter on November 10, 1939, having successfully completed an air raid exercise. This particular shelter was built in a field next to the local school in the town of Gresford in northeast Wales.
Because no bombs dropped during the early months of the war, more than half of all evacuees had returned to their city families by January 1940. Many city schools, however, remained closed. Children drifted through the streets during the day with no classes to attend. The London Board of Education, worried about children being caught in the open during a raid, instructed them to shelter in the middle of rooms — away from windows, under desks, with their hands covering the backs of their necks.
Because there was a long period at the beginning of the war during which no bombs were dropped, more than half the evacuees had already returned to their families by January 1940. However, this had never been part of the government’s plan, and as a result, many city schools remained closed, and the children themselves were left to drift through the streets during the day. The London Board of Education feared that students wouldn’t have enough time to get to an air raid shelter in the case of an attack and therefore instructed children to take shelter in the middle of the room. The children were to get away from windows, hide under their desks and cover the backs of their necks.The children pictured above (circa 1940-1941) are crouching in a crude makeshift air raid shelter in the middle of World War II. Looks of shock and fear mingle with a kind of awe as they gaze towards the heavens. Many schoolchildren experienced close brushes with death during the war.
Beyond surviving raids, children also contributed directly to the war effort. Salvage drives sent them through neighborhoods collecting scrap metal, old newspapers, and animal bones — all recycled into fighter planes and explosives. They also gathered rosehips from hedges. The government turned these into rosehip syrup, which replaced the Vitamin C that fresh fruit would normally provide. Shipping blockades had made imported fruit scarce, so rosehips filled a critical nutritional gap. Children also grew vegetables through the “Dig for Victory” campaign, turning gardens and school plots into food sources.
Even in the midst of war, there was still time for some simple pleasures – such as imported American cheese. These three school children can be seen enjoying a light snack in the playground of a ruined school in Farringdon in the London borough of Islington (in a picture likely taken in August or September 1941).
By late 1941, some routine had returned to school life in the cities. Bomb damage was now part of the landscape children moved through every day — broken windows, missing roof tiles, rubble where walls once stood. Yet classes continued, gas masks in hand, on playgrounds scarred by the same bombs that had reshaped everything else around them.
By late 1941, some degree of routine had been reestablished. These children from Moorside Road School in Grove Park, London can be seen sketching the damage caused to their school – including missing roof tiles, broken windowpanes and concrete reduced to rubble. The students carried their gas masks when they walked around the school. And the children still used the playground, despite the fact that it had been severely damaged by falling bombs.
Sarah Johnson is a freelance writer and photographer with a passion for exploring the world. Her writing is both informative and engaging, offering unique perspectives on travel, food, and lifestyle.
