Imagine being torn away from your family, your home, your community as a young child and being sent to a completely strange country where you didn’t even speak the same language.

This was the experience of thousands of children who were moved from some of England’s biggest cities to the Welsh countryside as evacuees during the Second World War.

 

Efaciwîs – a new and innovative series on S4C – looks at the experience of evacuees in Wales and the history of Wales as a place which has offered a refuge to those who have been forced to leave their homes due to war.

The series begins on Sunday, 23 January with the documentary programme Efaciwîs: Pobol y Rhyfel (Evacuees: People of the War) presented by BBC journalist Siân Lloyd.

One of the episodes will feature Samuel Lewis, better known as ‘Sammy Sports’ – The former owner of a popular sports shop in Bangor – who was evacuated from Liverpool to Anglesey during the second world war at the age of eleven. Despite his difficult start in life Sammy became a much loved figure in Bangor and the surrounding area.

As well as looking at the experiences of refugees in Wales, this programme looks at all sorts of people and organisations that came to Wales during the Second World War seeking refuge through looking at what was going on in Wales during the war and putting everything into context.

It wasn’t only children that were moved to Wales. The Government’s treasury department moved to the Imperial Hotel in Llandudno and the Ministry for Food to Colwyn Bay. The BBC’s entertainment department moved to a secret location in the Bangor area and it was from here that some of the BBC’s most popular programmes were broadcast throughout the war.

Well-known presenter Sean Fletcher will be joining Siân to present four living history programmes Efaciwîs: Plant y Rhyfel (Evacuees: Children of the War) which re-creates some of the evacuees experiences by bringing eight young people from Liverpool, Birmingham and London to the village of Llanuwchllyn in north Wales.

The series closes with a documentary in the DRYCH series – DRYCH: Lloches (DRYCH: Refuge) on 20 February which looks at Wales’s role in the effort to offer a safe place for refugees.

Siân Lloyd explains about the background of the plans to protect millions of children, mothers and vulnerable people in the late 30s.

“Before the beginning of the Second World War, the British Government knew that the Germans would bomb the big cities,” said Siân.

“They feared that half a million people could be killed by the Luftwaffe during the first months of the war. There was a plan in place to move the children, mothers and vulnerable people to safe places – places like Wales.”

In this programme, we hear from evacuees such as Jean Jones from London who stayed with a family at a farm in Ceredigion.

“I remember arriving in Carmarthen by train and then being taken in a car – I had never been in a car before. We arrived in Maesfelin, Rhydlewis that night. Unlike London, there was no electricity – it was really strange using oil lamps. But they made me feel very welcome.”

As most rural communities in Wales spoke only Welsh, the evacuees had to learn to speak Welsh.

Jean said: “Looking back, I must have picked Welsh up fairly quickly. Most of the time, I was happier speaking Welsh. Even now I sometimes remember a word in Welsh but not in English!”

We also hear how things were from for the Welsh-speaking people who lived in the areas where the evacuees were brought.

Sylvia Cracroft from Rhyd-y-foel, near Abergele, was a child at the beginning of the war and remembers the evacuees arriving.

“They all had cases and some had labels with their names on. Then people went to choose the children. I always thought this was unfair,” said Sylvia.

“A lot of poor children came from Liverpool. I remember one boy – his name was Desmond – he hadn’t had clean clothes for days – maybe a week. It was a sad time for them, really, wasn’t it?”

Efaciwis: Pobol y Rhyfel is full of stories that are happy, sad but also very interesting as people from the time look back on an extraordinary time in the history of Wales and Britain.

Efacîwis: Pobol y Rhyfel

Sunday 23 January 8.00, S4C

English subtitles available

On demand: S4C Clic, iPlayer and other platforms

The episode featuring Sammy Sports will be broadcast on 13 February.