Five Children and It

Content Warning: This section discusses racist descriptions of Indigenous people and Romani people. Derogatory language is reproduced in quotations only.

The story begins as five siblings arrive in a hired carriage to a house next to a garden and orchard. Cyril, Anthea, Robert, Jane, and baby Hilary (always called “the Lamb”) have come from London for a holiday and are thrilled to be staying at the house, which they call the White House. There are woods behind it, a chalk quarry on one side for mining chalk (used to make cement and bricks), and a gravel pit (a natural deposit of gravel used in construction) on the other.

The author interrupts her story to insist that she will only tell the “really astonishing things” that happened to the children because “children will believe almost anything” (14). She is sure that her readers will believe that before the children had been at the house for a week, they found a fairy.

After both parents are called away suddenly, the children go to dig a hole in the ancient gravel pit. Anthea (also called “Panther”) sees something moving at the bottom.