SEVENTY years ago, the first cohort of Five Ways School pupils and staff from Birmingham were just getting used to their "billets". They would be the first of many who came to Monmouth between September 1939 and July 1944.

Some 350 boys between 11 and 17 years old, along with 30 teachers, were sent to Monmouth from the King Edward Grammar School, Birmingham, to stay in hostels around the town.

The properties that hosted the boys were Leasbrook House, Dixton Road, Kingsley Weston and Sanroyd Houses, all in Monk Street, Cae Elga in Highfield Road, Somerville House in Hereford Road and Inglewood, that once stood in Dixton Road, but is now demolished.

Monmouth School shared it's facilities with the "Five Ways' boys as they became known, with the evacuees using church halls in the morning for their education and Monmouth school in the afternoon.