Operation Pied Piper: the wartime evacuation of schoolchildren from London and Berlin 1938-46: a comparative policy study in history of education

摘要

In the advent of air raids, the authorities in London and Berlin operated schemes for theudevacuation of children into billets and camps in rural reception areas. The children'sudexodus either happened orderly and followed years of planning and discussion amongstudpolicy makers (London), or haphazardly following the sudden realisation that the warudwould not be fought exclusively elsewhere (Berlin). As policies, the governmentudevacuation schemes were bold, controversial and - considering their distinct politicaludcontexts - surprisingly similar; as were some of their consequences: the recipients did notudaccept them uncritically, the municipalities failed to evacuate the majority of childrenudfrom the cities under attack, and private provision catered for a lot more children than theudofficial schemes.udBoth, the British evacuation and Third Reich Kinderlandverschickung have since been theudsubject of major academic and popular interest, but this study introduces two originaludangles. One is that it stays in the cities (rather than leaving with the evacuees) in anudattempt not only to show the geneses of the schemes, but also to appreciate changes madeudto them in the face of the stray children, closed schools and rebellious parents in town. Theudother claim to originality comes from the comparison. Despite their obvious similaritiesudand intriguing differences, the events in the warring capitals have not yet been subject toudsystematic comparison. This policy study thus traces local developments, from the earliestudplans contemplated in London during the 1930s to the collapse of the Third Reich anduddelayed return of Berlin children in 1946. It covers operational aspects and exploresudthemes of agency, citizenship, childhood, schooling and the relationship between state andudindividual.udThis study's foundations are documents from the evacuations' executives and conclusionsudbased on the comparative source analyses include a reassessment of the evacuations'udlevels of compulsion, explanations for the different and changing roles of teachers in theudschemes, changes in the state-citizen relationship, and diverging concepts of childhoodudand expectations of children. The principal - if slightly predictable - conclusion has to beudthat the evacuation schemes had as much and as little in common as the states operatingudthem. They reflected London and Berlin's unique and shared political and social realities.