Philip Bean - Lost Children of the Empire

ROUTLEDGE LIBRARY EDITIONS: THE BRITISH EMPIRE

Volume 1

LOST CHILDREN OF THE EMPIRE

First published in 1989 by Unwin Hyman Limited

This edition first published in 2018

by Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

and by Routledge

711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017

1989 Philip Bean and Joy Melville

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-0-8153-5278-5 (Set)

ISBN: 978-1-351-02850-9 (Set) (ebk)

ISBN: 978-0-8153-9818-9 (Volume 1) (hbk)

ISBN: 978-1-351-17200-4 (Volume 1) (ebk)

The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of this reprint but points out that some imperfections in the original copies may be apparent.

The publisher has made every effort to trace copyright holders and would welcome correspondence from those they have been unable to trace.

Philip Bean and Joy Melville

First published in Great Britain by the Trade Division of Unwin Hyman
Limited in 1989.

Philip Bean and Joy Melville

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of Unwin Hyman Limited.

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and printed at the University Press, Cambridge

Thanks are due, first and foremost, to all the child migrants who so willingly gave up their time to talk of their experiences. These include: in Australia, Margaret Attard, Nita Brassy, John Brookman, Dorothy Chernikov, Pat Carlson, Jennifer Churchill, Francis and Violet Davis, Eileen Evett, Nigel Fitzgibbon, John Glew, Maureen Holland, Harold Jones, Edward Lewis, Alex McDonald, John McGillion, Jacqueline McKechnie, Marlene Matthews, Margaret Penry, Len Phenna, Colin Reidy, Ron Sinclair, Pamela Smedley, Maureen Trewin, Denise Trowsdale, George Wilkins, Bridget Willers; in Canada, Florence Aulph, George Barrett, Sidney Coles, Albert Crump, Charles Devonport, Phyllis Dorey, Molly Harris, Joe Jessop, George Linsdell, John McKay, William Price, G. H. Rutherford, Annie Smith, Richard Speed, Ralph Thomas, Bert Wayling; in Zimbabwe, George Brown, Susan Close, Terry French, John Gibson, Bill Hatten, Bryan Jones, Norman Mumford, Jim Neal, Reg OLeary, Tom Paine, Ray Ponter, George Stuart, Craig Sutherland, Gilbert Walker, Francis Webster, Mike Wilkins.

Thanks, too, to those child migrants who provided information through their letters to the Child Migrants Trust, and to those who also helped, but wish to remain anonymous. Many other people provided useful information, including Maisie Wright, Mrs Robbie and Lyndall Eeg of Barnardos.

Particular acknowledgement is due to Margaret Humphreys, who founded the Child Migrants Trust and who, through her work, has made a fundamental contribution to the book. David Spicer, a trustee of the Trust, has also given invaluable help. Margaret Humphreys, in turn, gratefully acknowledges the support given by the members of the Social Services Committee for Nottinghamshire County Council for the year 1987-1988.

Thanks must also be given to Domino Films who commissioned the book to accompany the television programme in particular, to Joanna Mack for her continual support, Maggi Cook for picture research, Steve Humphries, Mary Pyke, Linda Stradling, Sue Hutton, Evelyn Denyer, Mike Fox, Fraser Barber, Nikki Clemens and Paola Ribeiro Boulting. Further thanks are due to Rod Caird, Commissioning Editor for Granada Television and Andrew Robinson, Publishing Liaison Officer; and above all to Bill Neill-Hall and Ginny Iliff at Unwin Hyman.

Philip Bean would especially like to acknowledge Harold Jones and Edward Lewis and their families and also the assistance of John Rivers and Ros Taylor.

And final thanks to Mervyn Humphries for all his help and advice, and to Harold Frayman for releasing the book from the computer!

Dorothy Chernikov has been trying to trace her family in Britain from Australia for nearly thirty years. She wrote this immediately after being told by the Child Migrants Trust that they had succeeded in doing so.

We seem to drift through life, wondering why we must put up with inferior products, inferiority complexes, and everyday problems and traumas.

Why is it that other families are well and happy? Everyone else has healthy relationships, lovely houses, win lotteries, have the best jobs. These thoughts, at times, dwell in my mind; that is until recently.

After years of working, playing, living and loving, even scraping at the bottom of the barrel to meet financial commitments, going without luxuries, with the isolated extravagance here and there, I come to the realisation that Im a member of one of those gifted fortunate families.

I will now be able to share my thoughts and feelings with a true and caring sister or brother which will outweigh anything materially gained.

Ecstasy is my family. There is more within my family than can be found in the world.

In 1618, a group of orphaned and destitute children left Britain for Richmond, Virginia in the United States. It was the start of an extraordinary era in British history, formally referred to as Britains child migration scheme a more acceptable phrase than child exportation and was to last almost 350 years. The final boatload left only some twenty years ago, in 1967, when ninety children left Southampton for Australia, but altogether about 150,000 children were exported to outposts of the British Empire to Canada, Australia, New Zealand and, to a lesser extent, South Africa, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and the Caribbean.