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Our exit from the old school in Southfields was carried out in the
traditions of the Elliott. Everything went like clockwork and nothing in
the school became it like the leaving it. Our journey down to Woking was a
crush, admittedly, but not the less an orderly crush, and the presence of
mothers and helpers lent an air of gaiety to a scene which, but for
Hitler’s hesitation, might have been exciting in another way.
But our arrival at Woking! There is no denying the disappointment which
many of us felt in realizing that the Southern Railway had carried us so
short a distance down the line. Perhaps the majority of us had hoped to
take the air in Devonshire or Cornwall. Young Smithers, in Form 1., had
fancied himself walking off Lands End in the direction of America – at
least the size of his bag seemed to indicate this.
Well, with stout hearts we made our way in orderly files off the Woking
platform and emerged into the forecourt of the station. Here, hope
revived, for facing us was a phalanx of motor buses. Judge of our dismay,
then, when the clockwork precision of our movements was suddenly and
irretrievably broken! For we were divided into sections, without rhyme or
reason, and invited to board buses which carried us to the homes of the
four winds. One party of us was taken to Maidenhead, another to Byfleet,
another to Old Woking, while a fourth was bid walk into the town of Woking
itself! The clock had been dismembered: wheels, springs, hands had been
flung off in different directions, at varying distances from the main
axle.
The task of reassembling the machine seemed hopeless and efforts are still
being made to bring the school together in one place. Long walks, urgent
messages, tried tempers, have all made themselves evident. It only remains
to say that, considering the seriousness of the separation, the school has
done wonders. Maidenhead and West Byfleet have been lively and
self-sufficient branches of the main school, and Old Woking has tramped or
cycled daily to its labour with inexhaustible zest. We hear that there is
a scheme afoot to bring us all together in a school of our own in Woking,
but we must not begin counting unhatched chickens.
H.B.B.
Note: this is a transcription of a
document at the London Metropolitan Archives researched and copied by June Broomer
(Austin).
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