Miles From Home: Evacuees in Timberscombe During the Second World War by Alan Hines
On the first weekend of September 1939, just before Britain declared war on Germany, 1.5 million British schoolchildren and mothers with children under the age of five were evacuated by train from the large cities most likely to be attacked. They were billeted in private homes in rural villages across England. That first weekend, 40 of them were placed in Timberscombe.
Some are in their nineties, yet they remember: separating from their parents, not knowing if they would see them again, boarding trains at Paddington Station in London, no one sure about where they were being taken. They remember: the young boy from the East End who was run down by a lorry on a country road, and being a boy scout under the tutelage of an elegant lady from the noble ranks, and the German plane that crashed in a nearby field. They remember the smartly-tailored villager who made an impression on each of them with his knowledge of birds and insects and the names of plants and constellations – sights in the natural world a boy from the East End of London could have never imagined.
More than 175 evacuees were brought to Timberscombe over the course of the war. Only a few are still living. In this book by Alan Hines, their first-hand accounts create an intimate portrait of a small Somerset village during wartime, its people and the evacuees who lived among them.
Ebook and paperback available on Amazon
Visit Alan’s website at: https://alanhines.com
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Police Notice
A major supplier of home meal deliveries has had their computer system damaged in a cyber attack, which means it is unable to provide food to residents across the area.
Because of this, we are asking our Watch members to check on any elderly or vulnerable neighbours to see if they have been affected and need help getting food, especially as it may take several days for the company to return to normal.
More information can be found at:
Timberscombe 