| Hull Colony - 16 |
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| ....The Mail reports, 'Forty little outcasts came last night to Hull, where they will live until peace comes to their own country. They are the Basque children from Bilbao, and Hull could not have given them a greater welcome if they had been 40 Cabinet Ministers'. Weekends At weekends the children would often stay with Hull families, and many people got to know the Spanish children, some as young as five years old, very well. As the war progressed, more refugees arrived and were cared for. Some were taken in by local builder Robert Tarran. Some of the refugees returned to their parents before the end of the war, if the Red Cross and other agencies were able to find them. Others returned when the war ended in 1939, and some stayed on, marrying local people and remaining in England for the rest of their lives. Hull's interest in the war also included raising money to send food to Spain. Coun. Violet Mitchell, deputy leader of the City Council, remembers the Cop-op selling milk tokens for Spain at 6d a time. She said, 'Spain was blockaded and because of the non-intervention policy, no official contact was allowed, but ships with food used to brave the blockades. Two ships went from Hull several times. One of them was skippered by Captain 'Potato' Jones. They took food for the Republican Army, but there was some opposition. Once there was a big meeting in the City Hall to raise money for food, and those of us who took refugees into our homes at weekends were pointed out. Afterwards one of us, Maurice Miller, was beaten up outside, in suspicious circumstances. (HULL CIVIC NEWS March/April 1986). |
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| We would like to thank Rob Wardle from Hull for providing enough material for us to post this page. If you can help us name these children, and adult, please let us know. |
| "The majority of the Sutton Basque children's parents are themselves refugees in France. To talk about sending the children back to Bilbao...is wicked." This remarked Mr T. A. Dobson, J.P., the general secretary of the Hull Basque Children's Fund, when interviewed by the "Mail." "This Mr Sturrup from Spain," he observed; "who is supposed to have over 1,000 alleged "appeals" from parents for the return of the Basque children will have to produce much more powerful 'credentials' to achieve his end." The Basque Children's Committee has ascertained from the Foreign Office that this "envoy" has had no communication with them--nor has the Basque Children's Committee itself ever been approached by Mr Sturrup. |
| Spanish childen welcomed to city |
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| Hull's Basque Children Unfounded Rumours of Return |
| There were 40 Basque children from Bilbao. Crowds began to gather at Paragon station an hour before their train was due, and when it arrived, there were hundreds to meet them; the crowd included over 50 Spanish seamen from ships in dock. The children's reception party included the Lord Mayor; Alderman Frederick Holmes, and the Lady Mayoress Mrs Holmes. There was also Mr Sydney Priestman (chairman of the Basque Children's Committee), the Rev F M Haythornth-waite (joint secretary), and Mrs Ubieta, the English wife of a Spaniard fighting for the government and who was to help look after the children. There was also the young committe of the Regal Cinema Mickey Mouse Club, who on their own initiative, voted funds and supplies for the young Basque children. The report said that the children arrived in clothes given by English children, and carrying their luggage in biscuit tins and little cloth sacks. |
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| "Hazeldene" 34 Pearson Park, Hull. This house belonged to a local builder called "Tarrant". |
| "Two teachers had travelled here with the children from Southampton -- a young woman and a white-haired motherly old soul," said the report. The children were taken to a Corporation bus which "was mobbed as it stood in Collier Street, people handing sweets in through the windows." "The Lord Mayor came in, and told the children, through an interpreter, he hoped they would be happy in Hull." They replied: "Long live the Lord Mayor." Ferensway and Jameson Street were lined with waving crowds, and the children sang Basque songs all the way to Sutton. "Here another crowd waited to cheer them into their new home, which was a splendid country mansion called Elm Trees. (we believe it was Hazeldene and not Elm Trees-editor)... ..."Two Spanish fruit merchants were among those waiting to welcome the little guests -- and they had brought with them stacks of fruit and Spanish onions." It was said that the party consisted of 22 boys and 18 girls. The youngest child was Mrs Ubieta's eight-month-old daughter. The eldest girl was 14 and the eldest boy 12. (HULL DAILY MAIL, 28 September, 2002,, written by Rex Booth). |
| A group of the children including adult helpers. We apologise for the somewhat poor quality of the picture, but we hope we to obtain a better one soon. |
| How Hull helped the children of Spain |
| APPOINMENT NOT KEPT On two occasions...the London Committee have approached Mr Sturrup and made appointments for him to meet the officer at his own time and place. On neither occasion did Mr Sturrup appear. The responsibiliby for the repatriation of the children rests with the Basque Children's Committee, the one which originally brought them over. No one will be more pleased than the local committee for an early reunion of these boys and girls with their parents... Letters, which are now coming through more frequently to the majority of the children, show an express desire on the part of the parents for their children to stay in England until such time as it will be safe for them to go back to Spain... (HULL DAILY MAIL Saturday 18 September 1937). |
| Left to right: Soledad Orton, Maria de los Angeles (Mrs Coupland), Teresa Hudson. |
| Three years that became a lifetime |
| Maria, now Mrs. Coupland, was one of the 40 Basques refugees from who arrived in Hull in the summer of 1937, after escaping from the terrors of the Spanish Civil War. Maria's home had been near the town of Guernica, which was bombed heavily by Germans and Italians, and is now immortalised in Picasso's painting, 'The Fall of Guernica'... WORRIED Maria and Dolores settled at Elm Trees with the other children. Maria said that although they worried about their parents, without knowing whether they were dead or alive, they did not want to make a fuss, but tried to keep their feelings to themselves. They did their best to fit in with the society in which they had arrived, for |
| Maria said she thought to herself, that she was a guest in Britain, and must behave like one... (HULL CIVIC NEWS, March/April 1986). |
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| Elm Trees, Sutton-on-Hill, Hull. This house also belonged to another local builder by the name of "Sewell". |
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| We regret to inform you that Rob Wardle past away recently. We would like to express our condolences to his wife and family. He will be sorely missed. |