Messerschmitt ME 109: Tail Section Progress

Messerschmitt Tail Section

We have received an update and a new photograph of the tail section of our German fighter. The Babcock engineering apprentices have been making great progress on the aircraft parts, and rumour has it that this section has been the most challenging. The tail plane will be added next, along with the rudder, which will be fitted to the upright fin seen in this picture. 

More updates and photos will follow when we receive them!

Below are the previously published photos showing the other sections currently being fabricated by Babcock Marine.

 

70th Anniversary of the Plymouth Blitz - March & April 1941

In just seven nights of just one year the centres of Plymouth and Devonport were laid to ruin. The devastating German air raids of the nights of March 20th and 21st and April 21st, 22nd, 23rd, 28th and 29th have become termed the Plymouth Blitz.

Thursday March 20th/Friday March 21st 1941

Then, as now, a visit from Royalty can attract the wrong sort of attention and so it was on Thursday March 20th 1941. HRH King George VI and Queen Elizabeth arrived by Royal Train at 10.30am that morning at Millbay Station, where they were greeted by Lady Astor, deputising for her husband, and other high ranking service officers.  They visited the Royal Marine Barracks, the Royal Naval Barracks, the Royal Dockyard and Her Majesty even called in on the patients and staff of the Royal Naval Hospital, before taking tea with Lady Astor at No. 3 Elliot Terrace on the Hoe.  During this there was an air raid alert but it came to nothing.  After tea, the party visited the YMCA in Union Street before embarking on the Royal Train again, ready for departure at 5.45pm.

It had been a good day but rumours were apparently circulating around the Royal Air Force operational room at St Eval in Cornwall that 'Plymouth was due to catch a packet tonight'.  In preparation, according to Gerald Wasley in his book "Blitz", they made ready four Gloster Gladiator biplanes for the defence of Plymouth. 

At just after 8.30pm the alert was sounded and at 8.39pm the attack started. First came a group of Heinkel III bombers flying at between 9,900 and 11,500 feet.  Included in the load of bombs that they dropped were 34 delayed action high-explosive ones. The pathfinder force, who should have arrived first and dropped flares to light the target, arrived at 8.41pm, flying at an altitude of 19,000 feet. Their shower of flares was followed by 12,500 incendiaries and other high-explosive bombs. 

Once they had turned away to go back home to their airfields in France, two further squadrons dropped their bomb loads, which included 17 blockbusters, each weighing a ton. As well as this, a squadron that had been sent to bomb the Westland Aircraft factory at Yeovil, diverted to direct their bombs on Plymouth when bad weather prevented them from finding their original target.

To quote Gerald Wasley: 'There was no running away for those caught in this air raid, there was no escape, perhaps worst of all there was no way of retaliating'. 

During this raid the premises of Messrs Spooners, directly across from Saint Andrew's Church, was the first to suffer.  It so quickly spread that it became obvious within a very short space of time that Plymouth's own Fire Brigade could not cope. At 8.55pm the first and second stages of a Regional Reinforcement Scheme was put into operation and additional water pumps from Plympton, Saltash, Torpoint, Kingsbridge, Taviostock, Launcedston, Bodmin, Wadebridge, Fowey, Liskeard, Lostwithiel, Yelverton, Looe, Torquay, Exeter, Bridgewater, Barnstaple and Yeovil had arrived in the City by 11pm. Between 9.20pm and 11.47pm 21 pumps from the various naval and military establishments in the area were also at the Fie Service's disposal.

Soon numbers 1 to 13 Bedford Street were engulfed in flames, which then spread to the Municipal Offices, the Guildhall, and the General Post Office in Westwell Street. Properties in Union Street, The Octagon, Stonehouse and Millbay also suffered. 

The raid lasted until 12.20am in the early hours of March 21st. The centre of Plymouth was aflame. When the other fire brigades did arrive in Plymouth - their sole navigational aid being the bright orange glow in the night sky which indicated where Plymouth was - they found they could not assist in putting out the fires because their equipment was not compatible with that used in the City. Many of the fires were left to simply burn themselves out. 

At 4.35am on the Friday morning the fires were declared to be under control. A total of 796 firemen, using 158 appliances, were then on duty. 

During this air raid, when the Synagogue was threatened with destruction like the rest of the City Centre, the sacred Torah scrolls were removed by the minister, the Reverend Wilfred Wolfson, and with the aid of a Mr Widdicombe, placed in an adjacent cellar for safety. 

The worst casualties were at the City Hospital Maternity Ward, which received a direct hit. Four nurses were killed during the raid: Emily Hellen Kelly, aged 37 years; Winifred May McGuirk, aged 19 years; Lydia Rebecca Walters, aged 16 years; and Probationary Nurse Monica White, aged 17 years. 

Nineteen children died in the Maternity Ward that night: Michael John Birdman, aged 21 months; Derek Blatchford, aged 2 years; John Blatchford, aged 3 years; Angela Earle, aged 4 months; Philip Eve, aged 2 years; Terence Michael Fox, aged 23 months; Peter Hamlyn, aged 4 months; Leslie Frank Hogg, aged 10 days; Alan John Jones-Burnell, aged 2 years; twins Maureen and Nicholas John Lowndes-Millward, aged 10 months; Albert Michael McManus, aged 21 months; Charles Burnard Matthews, aged 18 months; Susan Peacock, aged 3 months; Pauline May Sharland, aged 1 month; Winifred Valerie Shears, aged 23 months; Shirley Short, aged 2 years; and Phyllis Taylor, aged 11 months.  However, the saddest loss was that of one-week-old Harold Santilla, who died with his mother, 24-years-old Mrs Dorothy May Santilla.

Also destroyed was Hyde Park School. On March 25th 1941 some of the boys were transferred to Montpelier School, where they attended on a split-shift basis from 1.30pm until 5.15pm, and the girls were moved to Laira School. 

Friday March 21st/Saturday March 22nd 1941

If Plymothians thought that that was it, they were wrong. At 8.50pm the following night, Friday March 21st, it started all over again. Apparently there was no warning and the sudden appearance of the raiders coming in from the north-east caught the City by surprise. The target was the area adjoining the one hit the previous night and the pathfinder planes circled the City for some twenty minutes positioning themselves before dropping their flares on the chosen area. The bombers soon followed. They encountered no resistance from the Royal Air Force.

Fires raged over a wide area, from the timber yards and tar distillery at Coxside in the east to the Royal Naval Barracks at Keyham and the Royal William Victualling Yard in the west. One man was killed and two injured on Drake's Island. Saint Andrew's Church, spared the night before, was gutted, as were the Guildhall and the Municipal Offices.  The Westminster and Hacker's Hotels in the Crescent were destroyed, as also was the fate of the Plymouth Co-operative Society's emporium. Five servicemen were killed at Osborne Place, The Hoe, by an unexploded bomb. 

 

    

Only two buildings survived in the City Centre that night, the National Westminster Bank in Bedford Street and the office of the Western Morning News Company in Frankfort Street.  Neither received a direct hit and both were modern buildings constructed of more fire-resistant materials.  Unfortunately the newspaper's photographic department at the rear was destroyed and with it went pictures of old Plymouth. 

As there was no City Centre left for its buses to serve, the Western National Omnibus Company moved its terminus from Saint Andrew's Cross to Sherwell Arcade, just north of the City Museum in Tavistock Road. 

The only politician to visit the City after these two terrible nights was Mr Herbert Morrison, the Minister of Health. The rest, including the Home Secretary, stayed away.  The King and Queen sent a message of sympathy to Lady Astor. 

However, the Australian nation was unlikely to be left in any doubt how badly Plymouth was suffering during the War: the Australian Prime Minster, Mr Robert Gordon Menzies, was staying in the City that night.

This was the second night of the Blitz that the Hurricane's of number 247 Squadron were safely tucked up for the night when the raid came, the last two, Flight-Sergeant Makins in 7016 and Sergeant Fowler in 7020 being the last to land at Roborough at 7.10pm after completing a one-hour convoy patrol. 

In the lull that followed those two nights, Plymouth buried its dead. Naval ratings from HMS Raleigh, across the water at Torpoint, were given the task of recovering bodies from the ruins. Many of the 292 civilians killed during the raids were buried in mass graves at Efford Cemetery, each wooden coffin draped with a Union Flag. Plymothians thought that their Blitz was over, that further destruction was impossible. Unfortunately, they were wrong. 

 

The night of April 22nd/23rd 1941 saw the worst disaster of the blitz, an air raid shelter in Portland area had a direct hit, 72 people died. The city centre was completely destroyed. Shops and houses, all that was left of the guild hall and the St Andrews church were empty shells.

Children were affected in that their schooling and night time was disrupted. People heard the raid warning and went straight to a shelter until they got the all clear. Mr Roy Lidiard who lived and worked in Plymouth at the time said: "My most vivid recollections of these nightmarish times was one of the six nights between April 21st and 29th 1941 when Luftwaffe unleashed probably the most ferocious, hideous sustained attacks during the Plymouth bombardments".

Plymouth was affected so badly because most of the blitz was at night. The war came and no-one seemed to believe it had really happened and that it would not last long, but in the first few months a substantial amount of shipping was sunk and quite a few people knew someone or lost someone, this brought the reality of the situation to the surface quickly. 

The first bomb to drop on Plymouth dropped on the North Prospect area. It was a shock to everyone and no-one could really believe it, crowds of people turned up outside the bombed houses, but it was a forerunner of what was to come. It was really surprising how people can cope in times of trouble.

The Anderson Shelters were earthy and damp but whether they liked it or not, people had to leave their beds and stay in the shelter for as long as it lasted. They got quite used to the gunfire and the planes above. The morning after the raid you would see a lot of people wandering around, but help was always at hand - community centres were set up with rows of beds and hot drinks and refreshments were offered.

The night that Milehouse Cemetery got bombed there was no warning; just an explosion that put a lot of people into a state of confusion. The worst time for Stoke and Devonport was 1941, this was when Fore Street was bombed, houses were left abandoned, the people who lived in them had had enough, some houses that were standing had been damaged by blast from the high explosives, but in Stoke and Devonport some families left for good. The dockyard had taken on women workers to do men’s jobs, a lot of them really enjoyed their work, you would see them with head scarves and turbans. There was something very lively about it all, even today those that are around will tell you about their stint in the dockyard, and they are very proud to have done their part.

Although many buildings were lost during the Blitz, some are still there, and these deserve a mention, so that the future generations will take more than simply a passing interest in the past history of Plymouth. To begin with Devonport Column was built in 1842 to commemorate the new name of Devonport which was formally dock, the Guildhall, and St Andrews church stand, as do many buildings on the Barbican, which can be noted as the "oldest" part of Plymouth and still the most historic. 

 

An unexploded bomb being recovered by members of a bomb disposal team. 

A downed twin-engined Heinkel III bomber.

70 Years On; Memories of the Plymouth Blitz

This interesting report appeared in 'The Herald' on Thursday, March 24, 2011.

Jessie Can Vividly Recall the Bombing

RESILIENT is a word which blitz survivor Jessie Durant thinks best describes the people of Plymouth during the punishing German bombing. Despite her years, the 99-year-old remembers the time as clear as day.
And one aspect of the time which stands out for Jessie is the determination and perseverance of Plymothians, whether it was the children who didn't miss a single day at school, or the shopkeepers who stayed open despite their shops suffering bomb damage.

"Life went on," said Jessie with a smile. "It had to. Times were hard and we all lived as we could. I had a coat made out of two old Army blankets. Gypsies on horse and carts would also come by selling bits and pieces. We never asked where they got their stuff but I remember buying three rolls of lino. I remember we all read the newspapers to look at the adverts for recipes."

"Food was short and we lived on rations. One recipe I remember was pastry made with liquid paraffin.
Surprisingly, it was really good. I'm not sure why it didn't really take off."

And Jessie knew just how hard life could be. Her husband, Walter, was a watchmaker and jeweller and ran his shop 'Durant's Watchmaker and Jeweller' on Union Street opposite the Palace Theatre.
During one of the Blitz raids a German bomb hit the next door property – which was also where the couple and their four-year-old daughter Anne lived – and blew off their roof.
Instead of closing up the shop Walter – who was also an air raid warden in the city – kept working at the site.
"He would stand in the shop working while holding an umbrella over his head because the rain would pour down," said Jessie, who lives in Roborough.
"There were often buckets and pots and pans everywhere to try and catch the rain. Others who weren't as fortunate would sell their wares from Nissen huts in the street."

Following one particular raid, when Walter was on warden duty, he feared Jessie and Anne had been killed after seeing flames in the direction of Union Street. Fortunately the two were safe in the air raid shelter at the bottom of the garden but Walter ordered them to evacuate from Plymouth for their own safety. They moved to Salcombe temporarily.

But the sights and sounds of the war were – and are to this day – still with Jessie.
"You didn't hear much when a bomb dropped," she said. "You just heard a 'shhhhhhhh' sound. When they did go off it was so loud you didn't really hear it. It's difficult to describe. Everything just shudders."

Jessie said she felt "sad" at the destruction of Plymouth and said she hopes no-one will ever see such a time again.
"I'm glad it's not on now but it was such a long time ago, I just hope lessons have been learned," she added.
"I was very sad Plymouth was devastated. I don't think the new Plymouth is anything like the old Plymouth."

 

 

With the top of St Andrew's Cross in the foreground, this was the scene at Spooner's Corner the morning after a German air raid. Spooner's is on the left, Old Town Street in the centre and Whimple Street on the right.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The fires raging at Drake Circus.

 

The scene as firemen try to put out the fires in Old Town Street, just up from Spooner's Corner.

 

Fabricating Elburton's 'Battle of Britain' Feature

The Battle of Britain 

 

For three months, the German Messerschmitt Bf 109 engaged the Hurricanes and Spitfires of the RAF in a momentous struggle for air superiority over the Great Britain. 

The airplane performed as required, but the distances from bases and the need to use the Messerschmitt in a bomber escort role took their toll. Many aircraft were shot down during the daily air battles that took place during the long, hot summer of 1940, and aircraft remains could be seen strewn over the English countryside where they had crashed. Often, aircraft would crash land in farmer's fields, close to residential areas, and even on allotments. Downed German pilots who parachuted safely, nonetheless, were lost for the duration of the war as POWs; British pilots who parachuted out of their aircraft promptly returned to their squadrons to fight another day.

By the end of October 1940, the British had lost 1,149 airplanes, mostly fighters. The German Luftwaffe lost almost 1,800 aircraft, one third of them Bf 109s. 

For the first time, Hitler's airforce had been defeated, and a few months later he turned East, with devastating consequences. 

Duxford's Hangar 4 has a downed Messerschmitt Bf 109 as part of its Battle of Britain display.

This photograph shows a 109 that has crash landed in a field during the Battle of Britain in the summer of 1940.

At Elburton's 'Dig for Victory' garden,we are planning to bring a little of the 'Battle of Britain' spirit to life by incorporating our very own downed German fighter into the garden display. 

As part of an annual community project, the apprentices at Babcock Marine, Plymouth have very kindly offered their assistance with this. They are currently fabricating parts to represent a crashed German Bf 109 fighter which will take pride of place later in the summer. 

The pieces of the fighter being constructed consist of a 2-metre section of wing, a similarly-sized tail section and a twisted propeller and nose cone, all of which will be placed into the ground to simulate an aircraft that has been shot down.

We're very excited about this project, and can't wait to see it on display in the garden. 

We'll post more photos as the project progresses.

Evacuees in World War Two - The True Story

As bombing raids attacking Britain's cities increased during World War Two, thousands of children were uprooted from their families and sent to the safety of the countryside. Many found, however, that life away from home was no picnic.

Operation Pied Piper

The evacuation of Britain's cities at the start of World War Two was the biggest and most concentrated mass movement of people in Britain's history. In the first four days of September 1939, nearly 3,000,000 people were transported from towns and cities in danger from enemy bombers to places of safety in the countryside.

Most were schoolchildren, who had been labelled like pieces of luggage, separated from their parents and accompanied instead by a small army of guardians - 100,000 teachers. By any measure it was an astonishing event, a logistical nightmare of co-ordination and control beginning with the terse order to 'Evacuate forthwith,' issued at 11.07am on Thursday, 31 August 1939. Few realised that within a week, a quarter of the population of Britain would have a new address.

Talking to evacuees now about the events of those days in 1939 recalls painful memories that have been deeply hidden for 60 years, exposing the trauma of separation and isolation and the tensions of fear and anger. Most were unaware of where they were going, what they would be doing and all were wholly ignorant of when they would be coming back.

The fear of air attack from German bombers at the start of hostilities encouraged parents to send their children to safety. There were predictions of 4,000,000 civilian casualties in London alone, and, as early as 1922 - after the air threat from Zeppelins - Lord Balfour had spoken of 'unremitting bombardment of a kind that no other city has ever had to endure'.

The Government had stockpiled coffins, erected masses of barrage balloons and planned, at least in outline, for the mass evacuation of British cities before 1939. But it is now revealed that these plans were hopelessly flawed.

In the first place, the estimates of casualties were grossly over-exaggerated and the subsequent Government propaganda caused near panic rather than controlled movement. In addition, the man in charge of evacuation, Sir John Anderson, was a cold, inhuman character with little understanding of the emotional upheaval that might be created by evacuation.

 

 

The Day of Evacuation

For some children used to city life, the countryside proved to be a revelation. Most evacuees have a vivid recall of events on the day of their evacuation. The images are of busy train stations, shouting officials and sobbing mothers.
In London, the schoolchildren sang 'The Lambeth Walk'. Elsewhere there were choruses of 'Wish Me Luck as You Wave Me Goodbye'. For most it was 'like going on an adventure': a phrase that is still uppermost in the minds of evacuees 60 years on.

'We marched to Waterloo Station behind our head teacher carrying a banner with our school's name on it,' says James Roffey, founder of the Evacuees Reunion Association. 'We all thought it was a holiday, but the only thing we couldn't work out was why the women and girls were crying.'
For the newspapers the evacuation represented an irresistible human story. An upper-class Englishwoman, Mollie Panter-Downes, described the scene in her fortnightly piece for the New Yorker and remarked on the 'cheerful little cockneys who could hardly believe the luck that was sending them to the countryside'.

The stereotypical images were already forming in people's minds.
Parents gave instructions to their children: 'Don't complain,' 'Grin and bear it,' 'Look after your sister,' 'Write home as soon as you can.'
Broadly speaking the four-day official exodus worked surprisingly well. The real problems came in the reception areas where the Government had left arrangements for the children's arrival and care to local authorities, with little more than an injunction to do their best.

The result can only be described as a typically British wartime shamble. Hundreds of children arrived in the wrong area with insufficient rations. And, more worryingly, there were not enough homes in which to put them.
Twelve months earlier, the Government had surveyed available housing, but what they had not taken into account was the extent to which middle-class and well-to-do families would be making their own private arrangements. Consequently, those households who had previously offered to take in evacuees were now full.
Keeping control of the whole thing became a joyless task. 'The trains were coming in thick and fast,' says Geoffrey Barfoot who had been seconded from the town hall to act as a billeting officer in Weston Super Mare. 'It was soon obvious that we just didn't have the bed space.'

I'll Take That One

As a result of the mismatches, selection was made according to rudimentary principles. Billeting officers simply lined the children up against a wall or on a stage in the village hall, and invited potential hosts to take their pick. Thus the phrase 'I'll take that one' became etched on the memory of our evacuees.
Steve Davis, a clinical psychologist specialising in the study of war trauma, says this was the first of many moments that caused upset and humiliation for the evacuees and put their welfare under serious threat. For him the current anniversary marks a watershed. 'Surveys show that childhood memories lie dormant for a period of around 60 years and now they are returning to haunt people in a big way.'

Understandably perhaps, those with only good evacuations cherish their memories, and are irritated by those who seem only to recall the gloomier side. The unhappiness of others somehow besmirches their own idyllic picture.
However, contrasting experiences have stayed with the evacuees and what is left can only be described as the best of times and the worst of times.
Rita Glenister, from North London, stayed with a working-class family in Somerset and was treated like a member of the family, given love and affection and secured friendships to last a lifetime. Norma Reeve, from a lowly background in the East End, was taken in by a titled lady with servants and a butler who served Norma her meals.
Little things, like going to the pictures, learning to bake bread, walks in the woods and the generosity of those who took evacuated children into their homes, have remained constant in the minds of evacuees. For many it was a life-enhancing, mind-broadening experience, leaving them with memories they treasure to this day.
Others, however, were beaten and mistreated by families who didn't want them and didn't care about them. Of course, it would be wrong to suppose that evacuation under the government scheme was one long misery for most of those involved. Clearly it was only a minority that were ill-treated, but it did happen.

Extracts taken from an article originally written by David Prest.

The Daily Mirror's Coverage of The Evacuation of Britain's Cities

Saturday, 2 September 1939

No Hitch on Great Adventure

Evacuation of schoolchildren from London went without a hitch. The children, smiling and cheerful, left their parents and entrained for unknown destinations in the spirit of going on a great adventure.
'I wish all our passengers were as easy to manage,' a railway official said. 'The children were very well behaved.'
At Waterloo, 80 per cent of the normal travellers saw nothing of the schoolchildren. After Earl de la Warr, President of the Board of Education, had toured a number of schools in West London, he said, 'If the arrangements at the other end for receiving the children are as good as at this end, it bodes well for the scheme.'
Waiting rooms, turned into first-aid posts at various stations for the children, were rarely if ever used.

First School to Start

Earliest school to start evacuation was Myrdle Street School, Commercial Road, E. Two hundred children, aged from three to 13, assembled before dawn. Each child carried a gas mask, food and change of clothing and bore three labels. 'Don't suck or eat your labels,' the head teacher, Miss DL Herbert, told them.
Freda Skrzypee, nine, who arrived with her parents and brother from Danzig on Sunday was among them. She speaks no English, but has a companion in Ruth Rosenzweig, Jewish refugee from Berlin. 'The Germans have taken away our nationality,' she said, 'But I am happy here.'
While waiting to be taken away - they did not know where they were going, except 'to the country for a holiday' - the children had community singing. As dawn was breaking the children marched to Aldgate Metropolitan Station, where they entrained.
At the Ben Johnson School, Mile End, E, mothers were allowed into the playground where 300 boys and girls said a bright 'cheerio' to their mothers. Then Mr HC Cawsey told the parents: 'Your children will be safe. Remember Mr Morrison's message and smile!'

And They Did Smile

A teacher cheerily told a father: 'We'll be back in a week. The weather's glorious for a nice holiday.'
Organisation was so good that a quarter of an hour after the assembly the children were ready to move.
Not one of the 250 children was late at Mandeville Street School, Lower Clapton. Once inside their buses they talked happily with their parents through the windows. 'Got your comics, Bert?' shouted a fond father. Bert had them all right, with his gas mask.
The evacuation went off with remarkable smoothness.
Within eleven minutes after the arrival by District Railway at Wimbledon, 500 children from Merton Road School (Southfields) and Wandsworth School were in a main line train station on their way to an undisclosed destination.
It was a brave little regiment, marching in step, which left Ashburnham School, Lots Road, Chelsea, for Walham Green Station where they entrained for Wimbledon. One thousand children are being evacuated from the Chelsea area.
The dexterity with which the children were shepherded through crowds of morning workers at Waterloo Station was a perfect piece of organisation. Police wearing armlets and LCC school officials saw that an avenue to their platform was kept entirely free for the children.
Little tots smiled gleefully and boys whistled and exchanged jokes. One boy, carrying a kitbag over his shoulder in true military style, kept humming to himself as he marched along.
'Cheer up. Your children are going to have a happy holiday and don't worry.' With these words of cheer Miss Violet Horseburgh, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health, comforted mothers outside the Vauxhall Central School, Lawn Lane, South Lambeth Road.
One little boy at Ealing Broadway Station, where 50,000 children entrained, had a bucket and spade with him. To cheer him up his mother had told him that he was going to the seaside. Actually, she did not know his destination.
Ten thousand children left New Cross Gate Southern Station.
Mr E Kingston of Vansittart Road, New Cross, who saw two of his children leave on the train said, 'It is the only sensible thing to do. I am not worrying.'
Hospital evacuation too, went off smoothly. Along the blue-windowed corridors of Saint Thomas's Hospital, past the carriage which Florence Nightingale used in the Crimea, teams of medical students wheeled patients (who still require medical treatment but are not seriously ill) in their beds to two centres, where they were transferred to stretchers.
Two fathers arrived and carried their newly born babies from the wards to the ambulance. Bernard Cooke (of Cornwall Street, Victoria), proud father of Patrick Joseph, who weighed 9lb, 14oz at his birth a week ago, said:
'I am sorry to lose my wife and boy. It's my first baby, you know, but I think it's wiser that they should go away.'
The bed patients - 70 in number - were evacuated from Charing Cross Hospital in an hour. 'Goodbye, nurse. I'll see you soon,' called one of the younger women. 'Of course you will. You will be back next week,' was the nurse's rejoinder. Many babies were among the first batch of patients removed from Guy's hospital.

Evacuation Plans Going Smoothly

Great progress has been made with the first part of the Government's evacuation arrangements in England, says a statement issued by the Minister of Health. The statement goes on: 'The railways, road transport organisations, local authorities and teachers and the voluntary workers in the reception areas are all playing their part splendidly.'
'Evacuation will continue. The time that it will take to complete will vary in different areas.'
'Evacuation of school children will continue in areas where it is not already completed.'
'This will be followed by evacuation of young children accompanied by their mothers or by some other responsible person, expectant mothers, blind and any cripples who have received instructions that they will be moved.'
'By this time all these persons in these special classes in the different areas ought to have been informed by their local authorities where to assemble and the day and time at which to be there.'
'If any of you in these classes are in doubt you should at once make inquiries at your local council office.'
'Arrangements for the first day were limited to those areas for which transport plans have been previously worked out. It has already been possible to extend the arrangements to a few other areas.'
'Evacuation form Grimsby and Cleethorpes will continue on Saturday and Sunday. Evacuation form Derby will take place on Saturday and Sunday; from Coventry on Sunday and Monday.'
'All persons included in the Government evacuation scheme who are in receipt of State pensions or allowances should take their pension and allowance books with them, even if the book has just expired.'
'They will be able to draw their pensions and allowances from the nearest Post Office if they present the book.'
'Pensioners who at present get their books from a pension officer and not a Post Office, should get from the Post Office in the new area the address of the local Pensions Officer.'
As a further precautionary measure the Minister of Health has sent instructions to hospitals in the casualty organisation to send home all patients who are fit to be sent home. Similar arrangements have been made in Scotland.
Orders for the transfer of stretcher cases from inner to outer hospitals were issued yesterday.