World War 2 lasted from 1939 to 1945 and involved two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis powers. The war was fought across Europe, Russia, North Africa and Asia and resulted in over 60 million deaths, around half of which were civilians. Britain prepared for bombing raids by building air raid shelters and evacuating children from major cities. During the Blitz, many British cities suffered heavy bombing by German planes. By 1945, the Allies had defeated Germany and Japan, bringing the war to an end.

2. World War 2
• In the 20th century there were two
'world wars'. Many countries were
affected by the wars.
• The first war lasted from 1914 to
1918.
• Though it was fought mostly in
Europe, people called it the First
World War (World War 1).
• The Second World War (World War
2) lasted from 1939 to 1945.
• It was fought in Europe, in Russia,
North Africa and in Asia.
• 60 million people died in World War
2. About 40 million were civilians.
Children as well as adults were
affected by the war.

3. Fun fact
• In 1939 almost every man wore a hat when he went out. Most
schoolboys wore caps.

4. Who fought in WW2?
• World War 2 was fought between two groups
of countries. On one side were the Axis
Powers, including Germany, Italy and Japan.
• On the other side were the Allies. They
included Britain, France, Australia, Canada,
New Zealand, India, the Soviet Union, China
and the United States of America
• Germany was ruled by Adolf Hitler and the
Nazi Party. Hitler wanted Germany to control
Europe.
• Japan wanted to control Asia and the Pacific.
In 1937 Japan attacked China.
• In 1939 Germany invaded Poland. This is how
World War 2 began.
• Some countries did not join the war, but
stayed neutral (on neither side). Spain,
Sweden and Switzerland were neutral
countries. So was Ireland, though many Irish
people helped the Allies.

5. The war spreads
• Britain and France went to war with Germany in
September 1939.They wanted to help Poland after it
was invaded, but they were too late.
• Poland was occupied by the Nazis. By the summer
of 1940 they had conquered Holland, Belgium,
France, Denmark and Norway.
• Enemy planes dropped bombs on cities in Britain.
Allied ships were sunk by submarines.
• In July 1940, German planes started bombing British
coastal towns, defences and ships in the English
Channel in order to gain control of the skies in the
South of England. By mid-September 1940, after
many battles, Germany postponed their planned
land invasion of Britain as the RAF effectively fought
off the German Luftwaffe. This period is known as
The Battle of Britain.
• Commonwealth nations, such as Canada and
Australia, helped Britain. In 1941 the Soviet
Union (Russia) was attacked by Germany. In 1941
America also joined the war, after Japan attacked
the American naval base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii.
Use the timeline to find the important events and
battles of the war.

6. How did the war end?
• By 1943 the Allies were winning. One
reason was that Allied factories were
building thousands of tanks, ships and
planes. In 1944, a huge Allied army
crossed from Britain to liberate (free)
France. Then Allied armies invaded
Germany.
• By May 1945 the war in Europe was over.
• The Pacific war went on until August 1945.
There was fierce fighting on Pacific islands
and big naval battles at sea.
• Finally, the Allies dropped atomic
bombs on two Japanese cities, Hiroshima
and Nagasaki. The damage was so terrible
that Japan surrendered. World War 2 had
ended.

7. The Holocaust
• In 1945 Allied troops freed
prisoners from Nazi concentration
camps. In these camps, millions of
Jews and other prisoners had been
killed or had died from hunger,
disease and cruelty.
• This terrible war crime became
known as the Holocaust. It's
thought 6 million Jews were killed.
Among the victims were many
children. One young girl left a diary
of her life in hiding, before she was
captured. Her name was Anne
Frank . She died, aged 15, in 1945 at
the Bergen-Belsen prison camp.

8. Evacuation
• People expected cities to be bombed,
as enemy planes tried to destroy
factories. But bombs would hit homes
and schools too, so children would be
in danger.
• The government tried at the start of
the war to 'empty the cities' of children
and mothers, This was 'evacuation', to
protect them from air raids.
• The plan was put into action in
September 1939. About 800,000
children left their homes. However,
many returned home after a few
weeks. Others stayed in the
countryside for the rest of the war.

9. Where did they go?
• Children were sent from cities to places
where there was less risk of air raids.
Many London children went to Devon,
Cornwall and Wales. Other children moved
to villages in the North, East Anglia and
Scotland.
• Evacuees went to live with host families.
Their new homes were called 'billets'.
'Billeting officers' arranged for people to
look after the children.
• Things did not always go to plan. Some
children ended up in the wrong places.
Sometimes evacuees just stood in a line,
and local people picked which children to
take.
• A smaller number of children (perhaps
10,000) went to other countries such as
Canada, Australia and the United States.

10. Life for Evacuees
• Though evacuees missed their
homes, many enjoyed the country.
• Country life was full of surprises.
Some city children had never seen a
cow, and were startled to see where
milk came from. Seeing carrots
growing in muddy fields, one child
said in disgust 'ours come in tins'.
• Locals and evacuees went to school
and played together. Most became
friends, though local children
sometimes said it was unfair when
the 'townies' were given sweets and
parties!

11. Fun fact
• Evacuee Norma Reeve from London stayed in a grand country house.
The butler served her meals at table.

12. The wartime kitchen
• In some kitchens people cooked on a
'stove' heated by a coal or wood fire. The
stove heated the room and cooked meals.
Most kitchens had a gas cooker though
some had electric cookers.
• Not many people had a refrigerator.
People went shopping to buy fresh food
most days. To keep flies away from meat,
they kept meat in a small cupboard called
a 'meat safe'. They kept bread in a bread
bin and biscuits in tins. Families ate some
tinned foods, such as tinned meat, peas
and baked beans, but hardly any frozen
foods.
• You could only buy fresh fruit grown in
Britain, such as apples or pears. Fruits that
had to come in ships, like bananas,
vanished from the shops. Many ships were
being sunk by enemy submarines, and
precious ship-space was needed for war
materials (such as oil or guns) not
bananas.

13. The radio
• Almost every home had a radio or 'wireless'.
• Most radios came in a case made of Bakelite,
a kind of plastic.
• In Britain, all the programmes came from the
BBC. People listened to the radio news, and
read newspapers, to find out what was
happening in the war.
• The BBC also broadcast war news in foreign
languages. People in France and other
occupied countries listened in secret, because
the Nazis punished anyone caught listening to
the BBC.
• Radio was not all news. There were comedy
shows, talks and plays, and sports broadcasts.
Lively music on the radio helped weary
factory workers keep working!

14. Letters
• Not every home had a phone (and
there were no mobile phones). Pay-
phones in red 'telephone boxes' did
not always work after air raids,
because of bombs. To keep in touch,
people wrote letters. Evacuees wrote
postcards and letters home. Men and
women in the Forces wrote home too
• The sight of a messenger hurrying to a
door with a telegram made people feel
anxious. Telegrams often brought sad
news - that someone had been killed
in an air raid or in a battle.

15. Friends and Neighbours
• With many parents away or at work,
children were often left to look after
themselves.
• They played in fields or in the street.
Street games were safer than they
would be today, because there were so
few cars.
• Children helped clear up after air raids.
They ran errands to the 'corner shop'.
• Older children looked after younger
ones. Often neighbours and
grandparents helped too.
• Many families were 'bombed out'
(their homes were damaged by
bombs). When this happened,
neighbours offered food and beds, and
lent clothes or furniture

16. Britain in 1939
• At school, children learned about the
British Empire, now the
Commonwealth.
• But in 1939 few British children had
ever travelled outside Britain. If they
had a holiday, most went to the
seaside or the country.
• In a typical family, dad worked while
mum looked after the home. Most
young people left school at 14, and
started work.
• Not many people had cars. Most
people travelled by bus, train or bike,
or walked. Television started in 1936,
but very few people had a TV set.
Instead families listened to the radio or
'wireless'.

17. Children at war
• Thousands of children left home for
the first time as evacuees.
• School lessons and exams went on
more or less as usual, though children
also learned 'air raid drill' and how to
put on a gas mask. At night, many
children slept in air raid shelters.
• There were fewer toys for Christmas or
birthdays, and not many sweets either.
• Many seaside beaches were closed.
However, children found new
playgrounds on 'bombsites' - waste
ground where buildings had been
flattened by bombs.

18. Change
• Many families were split up. Fathers,
uncles and brothers left home to join the
Forces (army, navy or air force). People
travelled more, to do war work and to
fight overseas.
• Mothers and older sisters went to work
in factories.
• There was rationing of food, clothes and
other goods.
• Air raids made it hard to get a good night's
sleep. Bomb damage often meant no gas
or electricity.
• Train and bus journeys took longer. Going
to school or work often meant walking
over bricks and broken glass in the streets.
At night, the blackout made towns and
cities dark.

19. Fun fact
• Milk, meat and groceries were often delivered - by bike, by van or by
horse and cart.

20. Civilians
• The government expected civilians to
face air attacks from enemy planes.
So air raid shelters were built.
• Plans were made to evacuate women
and children to the countryside.
• Gas masks were given out, to protect
people from poison gas. Fortunately,
poison gas bombs were not dropped
on Britain.
• During World War 2 more than 60,000
people in Britain were killed in
bombing raids. Houses, factories and
schools were destroyed. Many people
lost homes and possessions. However,
people were thankful that Britain was
not occupied like other countries - such
as France, Norway, China and the
Philippines.

21. Air Raids
• An air raid was an attack by enemy
planes dropping bombs. Warning of
enemy planes was given by sirens.
When people heard the sirens' wailing
sound, they went into air raid shelters.
• Big bombs exploded with a loud bang
and blew buildings apart. Small bombs
called 'incendiaries' started fires.
• Firefighters worked bravely to put out
the flames. Rescue teams pulled
people from fallen buildings.
Ambulances took the injured to
hospital. When the planes had gone,
the sirens sounded the 'All Clear'.

22. The Blitz
• Air raids on London began in
September 1940. This was the start of
the Blitz.
• Lots of other places were bombed,
including industrial cities and ports
such as Birmingham, Coventry,
Southampton, Sheffield, Manchester,
Liverpool, Hull and Glasgow.
• There were air raids on seaside towns,
such as Eastbourne, and on cathedral
cities such as Canterbury.
• n 1944, Britain faced attacks from new
weapons. First came the V-1, a robot
'flying bomb'. Then there was the V-2,
a rocket which flew so fast no-one
could see or hear it coming. London
was the main target for V-1 and V-2
attacks.

23. Where did people shelter?
• Many people had their own air raid
shelter. Called an Anderson Shelter, it
could be built in a small garden. It was
made of steel panels. The panels were
'corrugated' (made wavy), which made
the shelter strong, especially with soil
spread over the top. There was an
entrance at one end. Inside was a
bench-seat, which could become a bed
at night.
• Public shelters were made of brick and
concrete. No-one liked them much.
They were dark, smelly and not as
strong as they looked. In London, more
than 150,000 people went into
Underground stations every night for
shelter. They slept on the platforms.

24. The home shelter
• To put up an Anderson shelter, you
had to have a garden. From 1941,
• People could have an indoor shelter,
called a Morrison shelter. It looked
like a steel table with wire mesh
around the sides.
• You could play table tennis on top,
and crawl inside to play. People
slept inside too, though it was a bit
squashed and you felt like monkeys
in a cage!
• The Morrison shelter was very
strong. People inside were usually
safe even if the ceiling of the room
fell down on top of them

25. Civil defence
• Civil Defence was like a civilian army of
volunteers. 'Observers' watched for enemy
planes, and sounded the air raid alarm
with sirens. Fire-watchers on high buildings
looked for fire-bombs. They put out small fires
using stirrup pumps and buckets of sand.
• Air Raid Precautions (ARP) wardens hurried
along the streets, checking the blackout. It was
important not to show lights at night, in case
enemy planes used the lights as guides to their
targets.
• ARP wardens organized rescue efforts. It was
very dangerous for firefighters, ambulance
crews and rescuers, with bombs, fires and
buildings collapsing. Sometimes after a raid,
unexploded bombs lay around, and had to be
made safe.
• After an air raid, everyone was tired. Rescuers
and helpers were glad of a cup of tea made in
mobile canteens by the Women's Voluntary
Service (WVS).

26. Fun fact
• The Disney films Pinocchio (1940), Dumbo (1941) and Bambi (1942)
became children's favourites.

27. Homes in the 1940’s
• Many children in the 1940s lived in
small houses or flats. In towns, many
people lived in small terraced houses.
• There were blocks of flats too, though
not as tall as the 'tower blocks' built
after the war.
• A typical family house had a sitting
room and kitchen, with two or three
bedrooms upstairs. Not all houses had
bathrooms or indoor toilets.
• Many houses had windows stuck over
with paper tape. In an air raid, the
blast-force of a bomb exploding could
shatter windows along a street. Tape
across the windows stopped the glass
shattering into thousands of pieces,
and causing injuries.

28. The sitting room
• In many homes, people sat to relax in
the sitting room (also called the
lounge, parlour or simply the 'front
room'). Here they would read, listen to
the radio or chat. They ate meals in
the kitchen, or the dining room if there
was one. The sitting room was often
the 'best room', kept for visitors.
• In most homes a coal fire warmed the
sitting room. There were gas and
electric fires too, but few homes had
central heating. In cold weather,
people sat around the fire.
• It was a good idea to keep a candle in
every room. During air raids, bombs
often hit power cables and gas pipes.
Then people were left in the dark,
without electricity or gas to light their
homes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhdxmKcmVzw

29. The Blackout
• Some homes had gas lamps, but by the
1940s gas lights were a bit old
fashioned. Many homes had electric
light.
• Every window had 'blackout curtains',
which were drawn at night. If not, the
ARP warden came along, shouting 'put
that light out'.
• Blackout curtains' stopped light from
rooms showing from outside. There
were no street lights either. The idea
was to stop lights from towns guiding
enemy planes to drop bombs.
• Coal fires kept people warm in winter.
Coal was a very important fuel. It kept
people warm. More important, it kept
factories and trains working.

30. Children’s rooms
• In families, children often shared
bedrooms. In bed, they snuggled down
under blankets and eiderdowns - very
few people used duvets. Some
bedrooms had a jug and basin for
washing your face and hands in the
morning. Not every home had a
bathroom. Children kept books and
toys in their bedrooms, but there were
no TVs, and no computer games of
course.
• Some homes had only an outside
toilet, and in many homes it was chilly
going to the bathroom at night. So
small children often used a 'chamber
pot' (potty). The pot was made of
china and was kept out of sight under
the bed.

31. Baths and toilets
• Not every 1940s home had a
bathroom. Many poor families
washed in the kitchen, and had baths
in front of the fire. The metal bath
was filled with hot water from pans
and kettles. In bathrooms, hot water
often came from a gas heater.
• The wartime ration for a bath was 5
inches (12.5 cm) of water once a
week. The idea was to save water. In
some families, it meant several
people used the same bathwater,
one after the other!
• Not all homes had an inside toilet.
You used an outside toilet in the
backyard or garden. To avoid a chilly
walk in the night, you could use a pot
kept under the bed.

32. Doing the washing
• Washday meant hand washing or
boiling dirty towels and sheets in a
'copper' or 'boiler'. This was a metal
tank filled with water heated by gas.
Few people had washing machines. A
washboard made scrubbing easier.
• After rinsing (in clean water), wet
clothes were squeezed through a
'mangle'. The mangle had two rollers,
turned by a handle. As you turned the
handle, the rollers squeezed water out
of the wet washing. The clothes were
then hung on a line over the fire or
outside to dry. They were 'aired' on a
fold-up wooden 'clothes horse'.

33. Fun fact
• In January 1946 the first shipload of bananas after the war landed in
Britain.

34. Wartime shopping
• There were no supermarkets. You
went to different shops for different
items. For fruit and vegetables, you
went to the greengrocer. For meat,
to the butcher. For fish, to the
fishmonger. For bread and cakes, to
the baker. For groceries such as jam,
tea, biscuits and cheese you went
to the grocer. Other shops sold
clothes, shoes, medicines,
newspapers and all the other things
people needed to buy.
• In most shops, the shopkeeper or
shop assistants served customers
from behind a counter. Many shops
were small family businesses. Most
big towns had department stores.

35. Rationing
• Food rationing began in 1940. This
meant each person could buy only a
fixed amount of certain foods each
week.
• Much of Britain's food came from other
countries in ships. Enemy submarines
sank so many ships that there was a
shortage of some foods.
• Rationing made sure everyone got a
fair share. You had to hand over
coupons from your ration book, as well
as money, when you went shopping.
• When you had used up your ration of
one food (say, cheese or meat), you
could not buy any more that
week. Vegetarians could swap meat
coupons for other foods.

36. What could people buy?
• People had to register with local shops
to use their ration books. Often long
queues formed as soon as people heard
that shops had more supplies.
• The first foods rationed were bacon,
sugar, tea, butter and meat. Lots more
foods were rationed later, including
sweets! One egg a week was the ration
in 1941.
• There were no bananas, so younger
children did not see their first banana
until the war ended.
• Clothes were rationed too, so clothing
factories could switch to war work.
Paper, petrol and other things, such as
soap (one bar a month) and washing
powder, were also rationed.

37. Grow your own food
• Many people grew vegetables at
home or on allotments. Children
helped 'Dig for Victory' by digging,
planting and weeding. Some
children worked on farms picking
potatoes and fruit.
• Some families kept chickens, ducks
and rabbits (to eat). People started
'Pig Clubs', collecting food leftovers
in pig bins to feed the pigs.
• There were plenty of potatoes and
carrots, and lots of suggestions for
new ways to cook them! 'Potato
Pete' and 'Doctor Carrot' advertised
these foods, to encourage people to
eat more of them.

38. Fun fact
• No icing on birthday cakes, after the government said no more icing
sugar (1942).

39. The war effort
• Everyone was asked to help win the war,
by making extra efforts and working
harder on the 'home front'. Children saved
pennies, collected scrap metal and food
waste, and knitted woolly hats for soldiers
and refugees. BBC Children's Hour ran a
scrap-collecting competition. The winners
collected 9 tons of scrap.
• With so many men away in the Forces,
millions of women worked in factories, on
buses and trains, and in hospitals and
schools. Around 80,000 women joined the
Women's Land Army to work on farms. By
1942, 400,000 British women were serving
in the army, navy and air force. Women
pilots flew planes from factories to RAF
bases.

40. Posters and propaganda
• Posters showed people how to put on
a gas mask, how to plant vegetables,
and how to collect scrap metal. A
government information campaign told
people what to do - and what not to
do. 'Don'ts' included: don't burn too
much coal on the fire, don't take a bus
when you could walk, and don't gossip
about work, because 'Careless Talk
Costs Lives'. A spy might be listening!
• Posters, radio, films and newspapers
were used to keep up people's spirits,
make the most of victories and make
fun of the enemy. This was
propaganda. Governments controlled
what was written in newspapers and
said on the radio. This was censorship.

41. Planes
• Scrap metal such as old cooking
pans could be melted down and
used again. Children with push-carts
and old prams collected scrap metal
from people's homes. They hoped
old pots and pans would soon roar
into the sky as a Spitfire plane!
• Iron railings from parks and gardens
were also melted down. In places,
you may still see stumps of metal on
old walls where railings were cut
off. Paper, glass bottles, tins and
silver wrapping paper were all
'salvaged' (saved) to be recycled.

42. Make do
• This wartime slogan encouraged
people not to waste anything. With
clothes rationed, it was a good idea to
reuse old clothes or make new ones
yourself. Sewing classes and leaflets
showed people how to make coats
from blankets, or baby clothes from old
pillowcases. A tip for making shoes last
longer was to paint the soles with
varnish.
• If a chair broke, you mended it. If your
sock had a hole, you got a needle and
wool to 'darn' (repair) it. Clothes
rationing lasted from 1941 until 1949.

43. Oversea help
• Wartime Britain was one huge
military base, full of soldiers from
many countries. There were
Americans, Canadians, Australians,
New Zealanders, Africans, Indians
and West Indians. There were also
people from occupied countries:
French, Poles, Czechs, Norwegians
and others. City streets were
crowded with people in military
uniforms. There were overseas
civilian workers too, in factories.
• American planes flew from British
airfields. The American airmen
arranged children's parties, and
many children got to like chewing
gum and American 'candy' (sweets).

44. Fun fact
• More than 2 million soldiers of the Indian Army served in World War
2