Refugees from Vietnam (1970s)
Photo 1: Gate to the Vietnamese community in Cambridge. (Photo source: Mike Levy)
Photo 2: Bell School of English. The school offered free lessons and even accommodation for refugees from Vietnam and Chile. (Photo source: Mike Levy)
Photo 3: Hooper Street – a house in this street became a kind of hostel for Vietnamese refugees. (Photo source: Mike Levy)
Photo 4: Great St Mary’s – the church asked congregants for help to support the Vietnamese boat people. (Photo source: Mike Levy)
The end of the war in Vietnam in 1975 left many Vietnamese feeling vulnerable and unsafe and approximately 800,000 fled in small boats from Vietnam to other countries in Asia. Around 19, 000 were allowed to resettle in the UK. Some had been rescued by the Royal Navy and housed temporarily in Hong Kong (a British territory in the 1970s). Around 250 Vietnamese came to Cambridge. A house in Hooper Street became a de facto hostel for Vietnamese families and support was given by local volunteers from different churches. The Bell School and other schools offered free English language courses. The Vietnamese community quickly organised itself, and several small businesses were set up. As the older generation became more frail, the community set up a care home in Coldham's Lane, marked by a traditional Vietnamese gateway.
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Trinh John talks about her perilous trip as one of the ‘boat people’ getting out of Vietnam, where her family felt in danger in the mid 1970s. She and her family settled in Cambridge, and now Trinh is one of the central figures in the local Vietnamese community.
1. Country of origin and reason of refuge
" I was born in Hai Phong, Vietnam and I came here as a refugee. I am Chinese-Vietnamese. So at those times, the Vietnamese government put the Chinese people out of their country. So a lot of people ran away. We paid gold to get in the boats, mainly Chinese-Vietnamese people
I think my boat had over 30 people. It was quite a dangerous crossing. We got onto the sea, we're not allowed to bring anything apart from a few sets of clothes …we were aiming to go to Hong Kong. So before we arrived in Hong Kong, we got picked up, and rescued by a Hong Kong ship."
2. Arrival and support
" We were sent to a camp for refugees in Norfolk. I wanted to help get my family to join me [the teenager came alone]. Then I lived in Hooper Street [Cambridge], sharing a house with other Vietnamese refugees. There was also a house people rented next to to the Mill Road bridge.
Then we moved to An Lac House on Coldham’s Lane. It was an allotment before. We raised some money to build a special home for Vietnamese. It is still there today [it is sheltered housing]. They used to meet for social events there. Now we have to hire spaces for festivals, as we have over 150 or more members in the community."
The community had an office in Overstream House, Chesterton [before it became a charity for homeless people]:
" People came there, to get help - all sorts of paperwork, arrival, whatever they needed."
3. Culture
" We run events two or three times a year. For Moon Festival and the Lunar New Year, there is a big celebration. So we tend to hire church halls. For the last five years we have been in Eddington. We get about 200 people in the building.
We managed to raise money to build an old people’s home on Coldham’s Lane."
4. Language
" I was in Norfolk for two years and learnt English at the Bell School in Norwich. I wanted to come to Cambridge to study, and the Bell School sent me to its other school here.
My sister and another two or three Vietnamese were quite afraid of seeing English people and learning English. So when the teacher came to the house, they tried to hide in the bathroom."
5. Education
" From the Bell School, I was sent to study at the Cambridge College of Art and Technology, now Anglia Ruskin University. I studied Accounting."
6. Employment
" While I was studying I had a part time job, working at a takeaway in Cherry Hinton Road."
7. Feelings and experiences of identity and integration
" Everyone had an English befriender. I had Brian and Paula Corby and Julia Napier. The English couple were so kind to us – we are still friends."
Brian Corby and his wife Paula were one of the earliest volunteers in Cambridge, who came forward to help the newly arrived Vietnamese ‘boat people’ in the 1970s. Brian reflects on how they got involved.
" Our church (Great St Mary’s) got involved generally. And they passed a message, that these people wanted help. People were trying to get people to not only befriend them, but to help them with their English. Once we befriended Trinh’s family, we became part of their family.
You start with a community, in this case church, and then you spread outwards from there. Sylvia Watson was very involved. She was the regional director of Save the Children. Her home on Huntingdon Road became a hub for helping the Vietnamese."