Eventually the hall floor was scrubbed so I was able to allow her to crawl as long as I watched the milk, but the tip-up chairs presented a real problem. She was not heavy enough to hold the seat down when she was strapped in so if I didn’t keep my foot on the seat the chair would snap shut with her inside.

To begin with our food consisted mainly of fried spam and sausage rolls which I didn’t consider perfect for an eleven-and-a-half-month-old baby, but I got hold of a large container of dried egg which I was able to reconstitute and scramble on the corner of one of the stoves.

And what if the two hundred and fifty boys and girls? Well, there was no-one to look after them, so they had to run the place themselves. The sixth form took responsibility for the younger ones without being asked; saw them to their own huts and to bed before, we suspected, running their own grown-up parties in the woods. We thought it best not to know. The eleven to fourteen girls took up housekeeping, and could be seen gossiping at the door of their huts as they leant on the half-doors. A dozen or so each day, missing their little brothers and sisters, would queue up outside our hut each morning and beg to be allowed to do something for Gale.

“Can’t I even wash a dirty nappy, Mrs Hewett?”

Soon I found that I could be more useful to the whole party as I could trust them to mind her and stop her eating the sandy soil of the cliff top. Wherever I was in camp I could hear the chant, “One... two... three... four...Oh!”, “One ... two... three... Oh!” “One... two... three... four...FIVE... SIX!... Oh!” as Gale learnt to walk.

Meanwhile the fifteen-year-olds began organising regular evening classes and entertainments in the other hall. The leading light was Spud, although in general he was one of the least law abiding. From somewhere he had cadged on long loan a Music Centre, so dances were popular with himself as Master of Ceremonies. “Come on, Mr Ewett, look at Eileen all dressed up and with no partner! Do your duty!”

Really the “children” were no trouble... that is, until the beginning of September when the rest of the staff arrived. They were horrified! “How are we going to keep them in camp with no fences and no gates?” they asked anxiously, and immediately set about organising a rota to patrol the camp at night. Lessons started although we had no books – but it would “keep them out of mischief”. Nightly we watched the Doodlebugs pass over on their way to fall on other, less fortunate, people.