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11
Convalescent Home Accommodation.
The Council's four beds at the Byfleet Home for toddlers have
been kept full during the year. On hearing that the Byfleet Home
was likely to close in the early months of 1945, the Council agreed
to transfer their interest in the four beds to the new home which
the staff were to open outside Sevenoaks.
Before the war the Council had two beds at the Zachary Merton
Convalescent Home for mothers and young children at Rustington.
On learning that the home, which had been put to other uses during
the war, was expecting to reopen as soon as could be arranged,
the Council agreed to take four beds for mothers, each of whom
may be accompanied by an infant, and in some cases a toddler as
well.

The nurseries were full for the first six months of the year, but
the fly-bombs led to the evacuation of large numbers of children.
The average daily attendance fell from 435 in May to 365 in June,
209 in July and 186 in August. By September, when the fly-bomb
attack from France had ceased, the number rose to 256, and more
or less to normal for the rest of the year.
The Elder Road nursery, which was situated in and manned by
the personnel of the first aid post was closed with the post in
November. The two nurseries opened at Coral Street and Gipsy
Hill both had checkered histories. Coral Street was ready to open
in March, but was damaged by enemy action and could not be
repaired before July, when it opened with a daily average of 15
for the first two months, but progressed fairly rapidly after that.
The ice had to be broken before the conservative customs in that
area were changed and the idea of a nursery became acceptable.
Gipsy Hill nursery was twice damaged and twice repaired, on each