Overseas British Evacuation of Children: Special Groups


Figure 1.--This is group of overseas evacuees from Oxford, the children of Oxford professors. They havejust landed in Montreal and are boarding a train to New Haven, Connecuticut where they will be taken in by Yale Unversity professors. The press caption read, "Children from Oxford to be guess at Yale: Children of Oxford University, England, professors arriving in a Montreal railroad station. The youngsters are enroute to New Haven, Conn. where they will be guests of professors at Yale Univrsity for the duration of the war. They were in charge of Mrs. H. Duthie, Mrs. A.R. Clapham and Mrs. Hume Rothery." The photograph was dated July 21, 1940. Put your cursor on the image for a fuller discussion.

We note some special groups evacuated overseas. We don not yet have a list of these groups. One was a group of children from Oxford. They were the children of university professors. The British were well aware thatv the NAZIs were a ruthless group. Presumably university professors were somewhat better informed than the average person. But even they could not fully understand what the SS Einstazgruppen being organized was plannibng for them. The Einsatzgruppen and Gernman securuity police in Poland especially sought out university professors to shoot beginning with Aktion A-B. Complaints arose in the British press that the children being evacuated overseas were from well-to-do families. This may have been an example of just that, although we are not sure yet just who was financing it. The Oxford children here were to be hosted by the faculty of Yale University. We do not know if they or other special groups were organized through CORB or if the British Government under wrote the cost like the CORB evcuations. The Yale group crossed the Atlantic at the beginning of the Batte of Britain. They landed at Montreal abnfd then traveled by train to New Haven, Connecticut where they woud spend the rest of the War. A press photograph shows what looks like 11 children. We do not know if that was the entire group. They look to be about 5-11 year of age. One boy is wearing his prep-school uniform.







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Created: 7:12 AM 7/12/2013
Last updated: 10:46 PM 7/13/2013