A WOMEN living in Australia has appealed for help tracing families and friends she remembers from her time as an evacuee in Okehampton 65 years ago. Suzanne Phillips, formerly Pudney, who now lives in Victoria, Australia, was evacuated to Okehampton from Battersea in London as a three-year-old in September 1939. Suzanne says her first memory of arriving in Devon was the Rev Compton taking her to 10 Railway Cottages, Meldon to stay with Jack ? and she believes ? Alice Pellow. Jack was a foreman at the quarry. Suzanne said: ?Auntie and I walked a lot, sometimes across the viaduct to Okehampton. We picked whortleberries and blackberries that she made into jelly.? At 5, Suzanne moved to Okehampton to attend the primary school. There, she stayed with Jack?s sister, Enid Gale, and her husband John in the bungalow he built ?Oaklea? in Crediton Road. Suzanne stayed there until she returned to London aged 11, in 1947. She said she had fond memories of wartime in Devon: ?Sundays was church and roast beef. Then walks to Ball Hill with a kettle . . . to make a fire for a cup of tea. On birthdays, we had a picnic by the paddling pool in the park.? She also remembers another highlight of the year being May Day celebrations in Fore Street. ?The maypole, the May Queen and the dancers with the colourful ribbons were all watched with awe from the pavement outside the ?Okement Tearooms? and the band would play the floral dance.? The egg-packing shed was in the field behind the bungalow, Suzanne remembers. ?I used to ever so gently stamp the ?lion? on the eggs before they were packed and my payment would be a double yolker. I could never work out how they knew it had two yolks. ?My best friend was Yvonne who also lived in Crediton Road above the boot shop.? She said she was still in touch with her friend, Yvonne Rendle, and she enjoyed returning to Okehampton to visit her when she was able to come over. Suzanne said among the family names she remembered from that time were: Tolley, Voaden, Webb, Weavers the tobacconist, Phears the Cinema, Mr Pike, the grocer in Crediton Road, Uncle George Gale, the blacksmith and Mr Slee ?Galeleka? who was Auntie Enid?s second husband ? Uncle John died young in 1949. Suzanne reluctantly returned to London after the end of the war. She married in 1956 and four children later, she made an exciting journey with her husband following the Marco Polo route overland to Australia. Suzanne is a widow now and although settled in Victoria near Melbourne, she says Okehampton is still ?never far from her mind?. She wonders if there are any family or members of a family who could contact the Times if they remember those days and remember any of her family. Their names were Josephine, Michael, Malcolm, Alan and, of course, Suzanne. Each of the Pudney brothers and sisters lived with different families around the town. Suzanne said: ?I would be very happy if anyone has any memoribilia or pictures of that time. In this year when there is so much being researched and written about the evacuation, I would like some recognition to be given to the people who took in the evacuees and gave them secure and loving childhoods. ?I was so very lucky and I will never forget those wonderful people, who became my Aunties and Uncles.?
