“Child rescue at home, overseas migration within the empire”1: the Child Emigration Society during the interwar period, 1918–39
Between 1869 and 1967, tens of thousands of British children, mainly from poor backgrounds, were selected for permanent emigration to the British settler Dominions. Crucial in carrying out this social policy were government-funded private philanthropic societies such as for example the Child Emigration Society (CES). This society shaped social welfare policy by organizing the permanent migration of British children to special Fairbridge Farm Schools in the Dominions, where they would grow up and be trained to become farmers and farmer's wives on the land.This chapter examines the underlying motivations and aims of the British government and of the CES to develop, fund, and carry out this social welfare policy during the interwar period. Special focus is placed on the (gendered) experience of growing up on a Fairbridge Farm School. The strategies of action used by the CES in order to gain the support of the wider public, and in the political sphere for their undertaking is analyzed.