| Description | This minute book contains minutes of meetings of the Ladies Committee held between 24 February 1939 and 14 November 1941. The minutes record the bombing near Lee Crescent during the war which led to the closure of the Orphanage in October - December 1940 and the distribution of children to other homes, including the Blue Coat School, Middlemore Homes, Father Hudson's Homes and Shenley Fields Cottage Homes. The volume contain loose enclosures as follows:
- letter addressed to Mrs. Sturge from Bertha Bowen, 98 Newlands Road, Stirchley, dated 22 November 1944
- 2 letters addressed to Mrs. Sturge from Edwin J. Millington, 106 Newlands Road, Birmingham regarding the health of Miss Bowen, dated 19 February 1945 and 21 February 1945
- letter addressed to Mrs. Sturge from B. Lloyd, 129 Halesowen Street, Black Heath, dated 17 May 1945
- letter with original envelope addressed to Mrs. L. Sturge from E.M. Hammersley, regarding the education of a named child, dated 01 November 1944
- a handwritten report of the Ladies Committee on the future of Crowley's Orphanage and the possibility of transferring funds to the Middlemore Homes, with one sheet of comments from committee members on the report, June - July 1945
- a press cutting from the Times on 'Domestic help in the home', June 1945
- a bundle of handwritten notes on the division of clothes and equipment to other institutions, the transfer of children to other homes and expenditure in relation to the closure of the Crowley Orphanage
- handwritten minutes of a committee meeting held on 22 June [1945] regarding the future of the Crowley Orphanage and the possibility of re-opening the Orphanage
- letters to Mrs. Sturge from institutions including the YWCA, the Blue Coat School and the City of Birmingham District Nursing Association in receipt of gifts of linen and other materials from the Crowley Orphanage, 1940 - 1941
- correspondence regarding the possibility of research by Professor P. Sargent Florence from the University of Birmingham into the conditions of domestic service prior to a decision being made on the future use of funds from the Crowley Trust, 21 March 1945 - 03 May 1945
- a handwritten note on the time bomb dropped close to the Crowley Orphanage on 27 October 1940 resulting in its evacuation and eventual closure |