21 March: We are half way through interviewing 30 former evacuees. I feel privileged and humbled to listen to their stories. I’m looking forward to the reaction from children at the schools we are working with, when they hear how happy the evacuees were, playing with so little.

Jean, aged 88 (name changed as a request) said about her experience of evacuation:

“I didn’t take any reminders of home. My mother had made me a pair of gloves and I took a red leather manicure set my father had given me – I still have it. I can’t remember whether I took any photos with me. I also took a pack of cards – everyone played cards. Four of us played together on the train to Taunton, Rummy I think it might have been.”