Thousands of residents of South Hams villages and farms around Slapton were forced to evacuate their homes from 1943 to enable D-Day preparations to take place.

Recently Kingsbridge Cookworthy Museum invited people who lived through the upheaval to come together.

These are their memories.

We moved down to Beeson so we weren’t far away.

We were the last family to leave.

I was walking around the village not knowing what to do with myself and there were some American soldiers taking photographs.

They asked me to walk in and our of houses so they could send the photos over to America.

I met an American soldier who said if it wasn’t for us there would be a lot more American casualties.

He thanked us very much for all that we did for them.

If it’s not written down now it’s going to be forgotten about.

She moved back to the same house which was the one in which she was born and still lives there.

Went to Dartmouth Grammar School with Pamela

During the war we had Yanks stationed in the village but of course I was a bit too young to really take it all in.

Everybody enjoyed their company and of course the sweets they brought.

I had a long walk from the village to the bus stop at Slapton then Pam would join the bus at Strete.

My grandparents, parents and us three children all lived in the same house.

Of course we had to find somewhere for the cows to go but luckily some farming friends helped out.

We had a flat in Dartmouth right opposite the Butterwalk and at Christmas that was where the treats went from.

My dad worked there at the butchery shop.

I also went to Slapton School with Amy Treeby.

CAROL PINK

I was born in Truro and when I was five we moved to Kingsbridge in what was Southfield.

We had four evacuees, not all at the same time.

One of them was a very naughty boy, one girl was very mischievous as well, the other girl was very good. They all came from Acton in London but they didn’t have any bombs at first.

Winnie, that was the quiet one, her mother came and fetched her back to London.

Then they did of course have loads of raids and I wonder what happened to poor Winnie. She was so sweet. Her father was the Baptist minister the Rev Leslie John Stones.

It just felt we were a large family. There was rationing but my mother was a very good cook and she used to make lovely meals.

JOHN DODWELL

“We went to Burlestone Farm by Strete where my grandfather was a tenant farmer.

“The order came in November 43 to go.

“Six weeks were given to make all your own arrangements with very little assistance given.

“You had to make your own arrangements.

“Find somewhere for your animals to go.

“Fortunately he was friendly with the Rossiter family in Galmpton, Burton Farm, and we all went there.

“The whole family went there, apart from my father who was away on wartime business.

“Me and my mother and brother and sister and my grandparents all moved in.

“I wasn’t yet three so I just remember the good things such as traipsing down to the beach at Hope Cove was a treat and going to Thurlestone was a treat.

“I started at the infant school at Malborough around 1944 and we had to walk from the farm to the school and I was escorted by the two sons of another family who were evacuated to Burton Farm.

“The living conditions at the farm were fairly basic with stone floors.

“I got stung by stinging nettles so I got a razor blade and chopped down as many as I could but the blade span round and chopped a lump out of my finger and I’ve still got the scars.”

“We didn’t go back to Burlestone Farm but I can’t remember what my grandfather told me about it.

“Perhaps it had been trashed.

“Grandfather has spent 30 years in the Navy.

“After the war he tried his hand as a publican and became the landlord of the London Inn on Church Street in Kingsbridge but he argued with the customers so returned to farming.

“Father came home but sadly died in 1949 and my mother set up a guest house in Salcombe.

“My grandparents took another farm, Deer Hill Farm, at Ashford near Aveton Gifford.”