Uncovering shameful acts .... the story of British Home Children 1869-1970

We watched the film Oranges and Sunshine last night and like all good films it continues to be a topic of conversation this morning.

It is based on the work of Margaret Humphreys who uncovered the extent and degree of suffering undergone by children sent to Australia from 1947 till the early 1970s.

It is a stark and harrowing story of what can be done to people who have no voice by authorities acting in what they judged were the best of intentions and sat all but forgotten by almost everyone save the children and families caught up in the policy.

These were children who it was thought were being saved from parents who at best were unfit to have control* and at worst in the words of an official in the film just “degenerates”.

Some of the children were told their parents no longer wanted them and in other cases that they were dead.

The film is based on Margaret’s book Empty Cradles which to date has sold 75,000 copies since it was published in 1994 has helped fund the work of the Child Migrants Trust  http://www.childmigrantstrust.com/our-work/about-us which was established in 1987 to addresses the issues surrounding the deportation of children from Britain in the post-war period, some of whom were as young as three and part of its work remains the simple one of providing the answer to the question Who am I? posed by so many of those who were sent to Australia, and also New Zealand and Rhodesia.

“The Child Migrants Trust, a registered charity in both Australia and Britain, and provides a range of social work services, including counselling and support for family reunions. The Trust's offices in Nottingham, UK as well as Perth and Melbourne in Australia also offer information, advice and family research to former child migrants and their families”.**

It is a story which through the work of Margaret, her husband and the trust has become much better known.

But sadly the story of the 100,000 who left these shores for Canada is less well known.  Theirs are equally tragic accounts of separation from siblings and of lives lived out in harsh environments at the mercy of employers who could be cruel and in some cases abusive.

But their stories are now coming to light through the hard work of historians and their descendants.  It is, as many who read these posts know a personal thing as one of my own went over in 1914.

Opposite; Manchester boys leaving for Canada, 1908

I remain proud of the work undertaken by my Canadian colleagues who continue to beaver away at “the great project”  and reflect that their work and that of the Child Migrant Trust is a vital contribution in keeping this piece of history alive as well as reuniting families be they those who went to Canada in the years after 1870 or those in the post war period to Australia, New Zealand and Rhodesia.

*the phrase used by the authorities when my grandfather, and his siblings were taken into care in the May of 1913.
**from the official site of the Child Migrants Trust

Picture; cover from the book Empty Cradles, and courtesy of the Together Trust