Journey for Margaret

by William Lindsay White

William L White, "Bill White" of Kansas, went to England with a private memo - "uplook kids." This memo, in cablese, recorded his desire to adopt an English child. Not long after he landed in England, White found Margaret, who at this time was three and a half years old.

Margaret was White's personal job in England, and this is his personal book about Margaret and her England. His public job was writing dispatches for America, and he made it his business to see, hear, and feel all phases of the war. He spend nights at the R. A. F. flying posts, watching the bombers go off to Germany. He went mine-sweeping in the English Channel. He was bombed himself. This is the fiery background for Margaret, the little girl White was finally able to adopt and bring to America.

With the thoughts, speech, and action of an embattled people focussed through the story of a child, the reader feels as if he is reading for the first time the human story of England at war.

Genres: History, Memoir, Nonfiction, Biography

256 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1941

About the author

William Lindsay White (June 17, 1900 – July 26, 1973) was an American journalist, foreign correspondent, and writer.

He succeeded his father, William Allen White, as editor and publisher of the Emporia Gazette in 1944. Among White's most noteworthy books are They Were Expendable (1942) and Lost Boundaries (1948), which was adapted into the film Lost Boundaries in 1949.

Reviews

[Stephanie Fitzgerald · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I was about ten, I tuned into an afternoon Saturday movie, called “Journey for Margaret”. It caught my interest immediately, because it starred Margaret O’Brian, a child star that a little girl in a Judy Blume book adored. (I grew up in the 70’s, when Judy Blume books were the “in” ones to read.)
I was hooked on this movie from the very beginning, and it was the start of my intense interest in the London Blitz from that point on.
Imagine my excitement when, several years later, I was able to obtain a copy of the non-fiction book that the movie was adapted from! To be honest, however, I wasn’t as enthralled as I had expected to be, the first time reading it. The parts concerning little Margaret were wonderful, but the war scenes didn’t draw me in.
Fast forward to 2025: After a trip to London and a very wonderful visit to the Imperial War Museum, as well as having read many books previously about the Blitz as an adult, I returned to “Journey”. It was as though I read it with different eyes this time around; the entire book was absolutely intriguing!
*One very unique thing about this book: the author, a journalist during WW2, wrote this book from the notes he took while overseas during the Blitz. It was written and published in 1941, before America entered the war. So reading this, told through the eyes and voice of one who had no true perspective on how WW2 would end, is mind-bending…*

[Kathleen Vincenz · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve never been able to finish the movie A Journey for Margaret that I started one afternoon on TCM, but I was so taken by the scenes I had watched, that I searched out the book (out of print) by Bill White.

The book has little in it about Margaret. Rather, it is a war correspondent’s dispatches to America during the Blitz. This is the kind of book we should read in school. Bill White tells us what he saw, how he felt, how he slept, and what he ate (even during the bombings).

The writing is extraordinary because he provides such a sense of immediacy; of what it is like to be in the streets after the bombs fell, when all of London is blazing pink; to be out trawling for mines off the White Cliffs of Dover; or what it would be like to be Butt-End Charlie in a bomber. Bill White also loves and admires the British people, especially their ability to keep their lips stiff and upper as P.G. Wodehouse says, and this comes through.

The book is more poignant because it is written as the horrific bombing occurs; there is no perspective that the British will win or that America will get in the war.

I recommend taking the journey.

[Alice Paterra · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this after seeing the movie starring Robert Young and Margaret O'Brien. I found the story to be a visceral portrayal of wartime, unlike any I have read before. Excellent.

[Denise Barney · Rating 5 out of 5]

In 1940-1941, journalist William Lindsay White traveled to England about a U.S. destroyer, manned by Canadians & British sailors as part of the Lend/Lease program. Britain was fighting Third Reich and enduring the Blitz. Mr. White was there to report on the fight and to see about adopting a war orphan and bringing him or her back to the U.S. Journey for Margaret is his story.

Because Journey for Margaret was written while Mr. White was in London, his writing has an immediacy not often seen in other books about WWII. Mr. White has discussions with a fellow journalist, a Canadian, about where the safest place to sleep is in the hotel. He meets with a French journalist he knows, Margaurite, and after dinner they check out various neighborhoods the Germans have hit with incendiary bombs. He goes to an airfield, meets the crews of several bombers, listens in to their planned attack, then waits for them to return home. He does a shift with the fire wardens and rides a fire engine as they respond to areas where bombs have dropped.

Mr. White is clearly a fan of the ordinary British citizens who, quietly and competently, carry on. He is also asked, repeatedly, by these same citizens, "What is the U.S. going to do? When are you blokes joining us?" With the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, I know the answer; Mr. White does not.

Interspersed is the story of his search for a child to adopt. He finds two: James and Margaret. He takes them to Anna Freud's "Kindergarten" for evaluation and the children accept him as a stable adult in their chaotic lives. Unfortunately, he can only take one back to America--he is heartbroken, but there are restrictions on travel from London to Lisbon where he can then continue to on to the U.S.

Most WWII nonfiction is written about the battles and the men fighting them. Journey for Margaret documents those on the homefront.

This book was the inspiration for the movie of the same name, featuring Margaret O'Brien--who took her stage name from this role.

I was able to borrow this book through archive.org as a scanned copy. The quality was quite good.

[Joe Keefhaver · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book, published in 1941, is the third one by William Lindsay White I have read in recent weeks. White was the son of famed Emporia, KS, newspaper publisher William Allen White. Besides succeeding his father as publisher in Emporia, W.L. White also worked as a correspondent for CBS Radio, the North American Newspaper Association and Reader's Digest. In this volume, White tells of a visit to London during the days before America entered World War II. He gives vivid descriptions of the damage done by German bombers and highlights the resilience of the English people. I think his writing here is the best of the three books I have read. It is said W.L. White was not always well liked in Emporia, but he makes several references to his upbringing there. He also exhibits a self-deprecating humor that makes him a sympathetic figure. White, whose wife Kathrine remained in the U.S., also sets about finding an orphaned child to adopt. The child he chooses is Margaret. It is somewhat disturbing to me that White starts out attempting to choose between Margaret and a boy named John on the basis of an intelligence test. While he ultimately decides to adopt both, in the end he only takes Margaret. This is because there are only two seats available on the plane going back to America. I had a hard time understanding this, since John was also very attached to White and the two children were very close. (In fairness, it WAS wartime, and trans-Atlantic travel was quite dangerous.) I don't know if "Margaret" was the girl's real name and she was renamed or if a fictional name was used in the book, but the real Margaret was Barbara White Walker who died earlier this year at age 86. She became editor of The Emporia Gazette, and it is now run by her son.

[Kathi · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book after seeing a trailer for the movie based on the book starring Margaret O’Brien.

[Jane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well, this kind of book is the reason why I read contemporaneously-written history: it's much more effective at translating the weight of events without the overly morbid backwards-looking feel of secondary histories. White did a great job of giving Americans a taste of Blitzed London and what life was like for regular Britishers. Knowing that he was writing for an American audience that was divided between isolationism, some Antisemitism, and ignorance about what was happening over in Europe, I could feel his anger. He very directly derides his countrymen for sitting back (at their bridge tables) and admiring the bombed-out British from an ocean away, without sending any real help.

The Margaret O'Brien movie of the same name is extremely good, although it changed a significant part of the ending for Hollywood's benefit (and Good. Lord. that girl was aDORable). Big recommend for both.

[Suzi · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. One of the few cases where I saw the movie first. [with Robert Young, Margaret O'Brien and Larraine Day] Rarely do I like a story in both mediums. Although there is some typical Hollywood license, I found the story quite familiar when I ran across this book. It was written in 1941 before the U.S. entered the war, and the outcome was by no means certain. It's a beautiful story, beautifully told.

[Lynn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a lovely story about a newspaper reporter falling in love with orphans during his stay in London during WW! -- a heartbreaking, heartwarming story, made me cry! I got the book through our Inter-loan library's where I live!

[Lisa Lawrence · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a find! Original newspaper clippings about the author inserted into this first edition .... estate sale owner, dated 1941! Beautifully written, both the book and the articles.