GWR Route: Banbury to Wolverhampton

GWR Route: North Warwickshire Line

Birmingham Snow Hill Station: gwrbsh2653

These Birmingham school children were evacuated from Snow Hill station on 1st and 2nd September 1939. Rehearsal evacuations had taken place during the Munich Crisis in 1938 and a year later with war imminent children living in potential target areas were evacuated to be rehoused in safer rural locations. Over these two days the Great Western Railway suspended most of their normal timetable and ran 64 special trains from Birmingham with 22,379 passengers to destinations in Wales and Gloucestershire, however with little activity happening in the early stages of the war many children returned, so further evacuations took place in 1940 when the threat from air-raids had increased. It was the practice to take whole school classes together to minimise the disruption to the children's education and provide a support structure. Parents of evacuated children were allowed to apply for vouchers for reduced railway fares from their child's school, in order to visit their child.

Robert Ferris

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