WW2 Displaced Persons

This is the story of my parents. I'm writing this because I'm very disappointed in the BBC for not mentioning or covering the fascinating story of the many thousands of WW2 'Displaced Persons', or in other words Asylum Seekers, who were sent to England immediately after the war. This seems to me to be also a very topical story, seeing as immigrants and refugees are so much in the news and on people's minds in 2005. I am 42 years old and my parents, and my mother's parents, were transported to England as displaced persons because they had no home to return to due to their countries and properties being occupied by the Nazis during the war. They were not Jewish - British people mainly don't know the full picture regarding the Nazi occupation and the types of people they displaced into camps - they weren't all Jews or disabled or non-white, the Nazis terrorised all types of people. My mother's parents were originally from Russia and Ukraine - they were living in Yugoslavia where my mother was born when the Nazis invaded. My father was from Russia. Both my parents were teenagers when they came to England and they met and married here. All my family are now dead, and it's a real shame I feel that the BBC doesn't also archive the amazing emotional stories of WW2 displaced persons who came to work and live in Britain. Unfortunately I don't know as much as I should do about my family history, because for one, none of them could manage to retrace their scattered relatives overseas, and for two, it was always too hard for them to talk about the war and what they had to go through. Focusing on my parents, you can imagine how strange it must have been to suddenly find yourself put onto a big ship and landing in a foreign country not knowing what would happen next. My mother told me that it was very much a case of living from day to day and going with the flow. There were no special provisions for refugees at all, not like they have now. There was no housing or support or English lessons or State Benefits. My mother told me that she and her mother were driven to Lancashire immediately after leaving the ship. They had no possessions or spare clothes. There was nowhere to leave, but some very kind people in the area volunteered to offer the refugees temporary rooms in their homes. My mother's father arrived later and lived in a men's hostel. My mother told me that they arrived on a weekend and then on the Monday they all went to work at the local cotton mill, where my mum stayed for about twenty years until it closed, then went on to other employment until she retired. Her parents never really managed to learn much English, but my parents (being only teenagers) were able to pick it up via work and friends and by the time I was born (if not before) they were totally fluent and literate. When my parents married they bought their own house. We were all regarded by our neighbours and community in the same way as everyone else, not as foreigners. I expect this was because my parents had always worked very hard since they came to England, learnt English, stood on their own feet, loved this nation with a passion (more so than many natives), and fitted in with the rest of the working class population. I would LOVE to hear/read the stories of other WW2 refugees who came to England, either from themselves or from their offspring such as myself. I hope all these people will also be remembered by British natives who lived here during WW2 or fought in the war, because in great part it was they who your sacrifice saved, and I know for sure that my family were extremely eternally grateful for being liberated and rescued from the Nazis, and for being offered a new home. I would not be here if it wasn't for Britain's and the USA's involvement in WW2 and their determination to liberate Europe. I feel very emotional and grateful about it, and I hope that what Britain and the USA did for the world during that time will never be forgotten. Thank you for the opportunity to express myself.

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