Hundreds of the boys and girls sent overseas as “Home Children” later enlisted in the armed forces across the Commonwealth. This index attempts to name them all, as well as honour those who gave the ultimate sacrifice.
Hundreds of the boys and girls sent overseas as “Home Children” later enlisted in the armed forces across the Commonwealth. This index attempts to name them all, as well as honour those who gave the ultimate sacrifice.
This index is provided in partnership with Home Children Canada and is available for free use on both sites.
Volunteers with Home Children Canada are creating this database to reflect all known members of the military who were also Home Children in Canada. The conflicts include the Boer Wars, World War I and II, and the Korean conflict, but are predominantly from WWI. This is an ongoing effort, and updates will be made to this index.
About the Home Children “Home Children” is a term used to identify and designate the thousands of children sent to Commonwealth countries from the middle of the 1800s until after the Second World War. This same population is often referred to as “Britain’s Child Migrants,” as well. More than 130,000 children, ranging from the very young (two to three years old) to eighteen were sent as forced migrants. Only 12% of them were true orphans in modern terms and estimates indicate there are over 4 million descendants of these children around the world today.
Some were kindly adopted into families and lived out a happy childhood, but not all were that lucky. The reality for many was a life of hard labor and servitude at foster homes, many of whom moved often through remote farms and state-run facilities. Nearly always separated from siblings and potentially subject to abuse. Findmypast believes that every story matters, and so while these migration schemes are often sensitive areas of our shared history, their stories are important to tell.
Through the Victorian period and well after WWII, there were many children and families living in extreme poverty. Migration schemes, generally created by charity groups, were one of the answers to dealing with this population. Charities, and then Poor Law Unions, began to send children to Canada in the late 1860s. These schemes only grew through the period and by the turn of the century, a new reason had been created, one which was supported directly by the government: imperialism. “An imperial vision of Dominions prospering under young settlers of good British stock complemented the moral benefits of child migration.” (Kershaw, Roger and Sacks, Janet, New Lives for Old, The Story of Britain’s Child Migrants, p. 8, published by The National Archives.) After the Great War, the focus shifted from Canada to Australia. Attempts at government regulation and oversight did not really start until the 1920s. The practice of child migration can be seen in the Empire Settlement Acts of 1922, 1937, 1952 and 1957.
The children, commonly referred to as “Waif’s and Strays,” or “Barnardo Boys” in the UK were often mistreated and they grew into their adult years ashamed of their background. Most did not openly share their experiences with future generations. Additionally, there is a distinction between Home Children and those sent as evacuees, especially during the Second World War. The British Home Children were sent away permanently, and to work. Evacuees were sent away for safety and then returned to their families.
There are a number of record sources that will need to be brough together to tell the story of just one child, and all of them are useful. Findmypast is publishing more records of this nature to offer a centralised repository, allowing descendants today an easier path to identifying their Home Child ancestor and where they came from. The following collections should be utilised, many of which are free to access:
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