100,000 British Children Grew Up in Army Huts — The Forgotten Story of the “Tin Can Kids”

Описание: Margaret Thompson was seven years old when her classmates started calling her "Tin Can Girl." Her family lived in a Nissen hut — a corrugated metal shed the British Army had used to store ammunition during the war. Now it was her home. The other kids wouldn't play with her. Their parents told them not to.

100,000 British children grew up in these metal sheds. This is what it did to them.

📜 THE STORY

Britain, 1946. The war was over, but 4 million homes were destroyed or damaged. Soldiers returned expecting houses — instead, the government offered them Nissen huts. These curved metal structures, 16 feet wide and 36 feet long, had been designed for temporary military storage, not families. No insulation. No heating. Condensation dripping from the ceiling every morning.

But Britain was desperate. So 100,000 families — mostly veterans and their children — were moved into these "temporary" structures. The government promised it would be six months. Some families lived there for 25 years.

The children who grew up in Nissen huts faced something worse than the cold. They faced shame. Neighbors looked down on "the hut people." Teachers seated them at the back of classrooms. Other kids refused to visit their homes. The nickname spread across Britain: "Tin Can Kids."

In this raw documentary, we reveal oral histories from now-elderly survivors who remember waking up to ice on the inside walls, wearing coats to bed in winter, and being told by other children they were "too poor to have real houses." Through government housing records and family testimonies, discover how Britain's post-war housing crisis created a generation of children who were made to feel ashamed of where they lived — because their veteran fathers couldn't afford anything better.

🎬 WHAT YOU'LL SEE:
Why Britain chose military storage sheds as "family housing"
What it was actually like living in 16x36 feet of corrugated metal
The winter mornings when condensation froze solid on the ceiling
How "Tin Can Kids" were treated by their communities
The schools that segregated Nissen hut children from "real house" kids
Why some families stayed for 25 years in "temporary" housing
The psychological scars that lasted into adulthood
Survivor testimony: "I was ashamed to tell anyone where I lived until I was 40 years old"
What happened when the last Nissen huts were finally demolished in the 1970s

This isn't about British resilience. It's about 100,000 children who were given storage sheds to live in and then mocked by their communities for it.

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📚 PRIMARY SOURCES:
British Ministry of Housing emergency housing records (1945-1960)
Oral History Society: "Growing Up in Nissen Huts" collection
Local education authority records showing residential discrimination
Family testimonies and personal correspondence
Nissen hut construction specifications and military usage documentation
Photographic archives: British families in temporary housing
Medical records: respiratory illness and cold-related health impacts

💬 Imagine coming home from school to a metal shed. Your friends live in real houses. They call you "Tin Can Kid." You're seven years old. How would that shape who you became? Tell us.

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ABOUT FOXHOLE STORIES:

We dig into the raw, unfiltered moments of WW2 and its aftermath that happened at ground level — where families faced impossible hardships, children carried shame they didn't deserve, and survival came with a cost. These are the stories that don't make it into textbooks.

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