The premise of this book is that childhoods do matter.
It relates the personal story of a child who attended two boarding schools for evacuee children before her fifth birthday. Four former teachers and students from Linton Residential School helped to fill the memories of her lost childhood. The octogenarian educators, Mr. Frank Newbould, Winifred Lowcock, Ailsa Williams, and Jessie Robson had not seen one another since German bombs were falling on Britain, ration books were required and they were in their 20s. Despite their ages, they recalled vivid memories of leaving comfortable homes to start a school for WWII child evacuees on the beautiful, isolated and harsh Yorkshire Moors. They made light of the hardships they and the children endured. As one former student remarked, “There were definitely no home comforts.”
The second part of this book takes the broader view that 1939 was not the first time the British government had separated children from their parents.
Child migration had been part of the culture from the 17th century until 1967 when the last children left Britain, the majority falsely labeled as “orphans.” In 1939, Dr. John Bowlby, and Dr. Donald Winnicott eminent psychotherapists at the Tavistock Clinic in London, told the British government that the mass evacuation of unaccompanied children was a bad idea for their mental health.
In 2008, Dr. Jay Belsky, Professor of Psychology at the University of London said, “What happens early in life matters to how children turn out, not just in early childhood, or middle childhood, or even adolescence but well beyond.” An October 2009 Center for Disease Control Report concludes that children who suffer childhood trauma live 20 years less than those who did not suffer such trauma – strongly supporting the premise that childhoods do indeed matter.
Doreen Drewry Lehr
will discuss and sign copies of
A Girl’s War: A Childhood Lost
in Britain’s WWII Evacuation
on the following dates and at the following locations:
*June 30 at Borders Friendship Heights 7-9 p.m.
5333 Wisconsin Ave. NW, Washington DC
*July 7 Books A Million Dupont Circle 7-9 p.m.
11 Dupont Circle NW, Washington DC
*July 14 Borders White Flint Mall 7-9 p.m.
11301 Rockville Pike, Kensington MD
*Pentagon – 14 September 2010
For more information, contact Sherry Moeller of MoKi Media
at sherry.moeller@mokimedia.com
Doreen Drewry Lehr
“A Girl’s War: A Childhood Lost in Britain’s WWII Evacuation”
Discussion and Book Signing
Thursday, July 29, 2010
at 7 p.m. at
The Harvard Coop
1400 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02138
www.harvard.bkstore.com
Regarding the contest at AuthorBuzz.com:
Doreen would be happy to talk in person or by phone to any groups interested in the issues addressed in the book.