The Chalet School at War by Elinor M. Brent-Dyer was first published in 1941 as The Chalet School Goes To It.

This one begins with The Chalet School on the move again. They had fled the Austrian Tyrol after getting into ttrouble with the local  Nazis. Guernsey in the Channel Islands seemed like a good place to set up their new school!! Of course that wasn’t for long and with the Germans looking like breathing down their necks again they move on to mainland Britain.

Plas Howell on the Welsh/English border has been offered to them for use as a school. It’s a large and very grand house, beautifully decorated, much too good to be used as a school but otherwise ideal. After a dangerous journey across the English Channel the girls reach Plas Howell.

Gwensi Howell isn’t happy at all, she’s 13 years old and has lived at Plas Howell for the last nine years along with her older step-brother and his godfather. But Ernest her brother has had to join his ship and his godfather has gone. Gwensi had been educated by a governess, but she is to be part of the Chalet School now, she’s not used to other girls at all and doesn’t want to share her home with a lot of strangers.

Surprisingly Gwensi settles in fairly quickly, and she turns out to be a bit of a fan of boarding school books, and a few of them are name checked in the book, presumably Brent-Dyer was kindly mentioning some of her author friends.

With wartime food shortages looming the girls become keen gardeners and learn a lot, but as often happens in schools it’s the fourth year girls who cause a lot of trouble and angst.

I was particularly pleased that Jo appears in this book – along with her baby triplets. I’m not sure how far I’ll go with this series. It’s interesting that the books were written at the actual time of the war, but I might not go any further than the 1960s with the books. They are still being written by writers/fans who are continuing with the series.