Thanks for the book suggestion. I'll try to get it. I have a cousin born in England at the end of WWII who was sent to Australia along with his brothers, as orphans. When a law change allowed him access to his records, he found out that his parents had not died until much later when he would have been able to meet them had he known. I guess it was his parents economic conditions during and after the war that led to the circumstances. Dawn ----- Original Message ----- From: "Lyn Whelan" <johnwhelan@xtra.co.nz> To: <nir-down@rootsweb.com> Sent: Saturday, January 19, 2008 11:49 PM Subject: Re: [NIR-DOWN] Children 'sent away' during WWII > As a child, my former mother-in-law lived in Glasgow. She was evacuated > to > Blair Athol during the war. She did return to her family home afterwards. > > It appears this did not just happen in time of war and often the move was > more permanent. I have a book by Margaret Humphreys (1997) called Empty > Cradles. (Corgi Books, London). This book is about an estimated 150,00 > children who were "deported from children's homes in Britain and shipped > off > to a "new life" in distant parts of the Empire" - the last as recent as > 1967. Many children were told their parents were deceased. > > Margaret Humphreys was a Nottingham social worker. She investigated the > case of a woman who claimed that at the age of 4, she had been put on a > boat > to Australia by the British government. > > This is well worth a read for those interested such a topic. Warning > though - some of the content could be considered sensitive - it is an > emotional account of life for these children.