| Description | At the start of the Second World War, the British Government put into place an evacuation scheme for children. However, the scheme did not provide for the evacuation of children under the age of 5 and by June 1940 this was causing some concern to a number of Friends from Cotteridge Preparative Meeting. They suggested that local Friends could start a residential nursery for children whose parents who would like them to be evacuated from the city. This was approved by Warwickshire Monthly Meeting on 11 June 1940 and the Upwood Committee was established in the following month. Members of the Committee included Christopher B. Taylor, George Cadbury, Marian Cadbury, Ada and Martha Gibbins, Winifred Bayes, Mary L. Wilson, Florence Woodcock, Dorothea Wood, Herbert and Hilda Reed, and others.
Ada and Martha Gibbins offered to lend Upwood, a large Victorian house and garden in the Lickey Hills, Barnt Green, rent free for the duration of the war or for as long as was needed. It was estimated that Upwood could house 30 children with 10 adults supervising. A letter was sent out to Preparative Meetings asking for support and a number of Preparative Meetings and individuals provided furniture, equipment, funding and other help. Six weeks after the initial suggestion at the June Monthly Meeting, Upwood opened its doors to its first evacuees.
The house was run by Margaret Gillett, an infant school teacher and her husband, Jeph Gillett. They were initially helped by a staff of 10, some of whom were refugees and included nursery teachers, a night nurse, cooks, handymen and a gardener. Staffing was subsequently increased to 16 when it was realised the initial number was insufficient to manage large numbers of small children twenty-four hours a day. Initially established as an emergency hostel for young children, by the summer of 1941, Upwood had become a residential nursery. Organised on nursery school lines, staff aimed to provide the children with a sense of security in a happy, loving home-like atmosphere. Catering for up to 30 children at any one time, some children stayed for 1-3 years, others for periods of under 3 months.
It became apparent that the small voluntary committee managing Upwood would struggle to find adequately trained staff and raise funds for the home to continue on a long term basis. The Friends Relief Service, the Religious Society of Friends' official relief organisation which had been organising war relief since 1870, was approached and took over the financial and personnel arrangements with Warwickshire Monthly Meeting Upwood Sub-committee becoming the General Committee managing the day-to-day running of the house.
Although Upwood did take in a number of young children who had been bombed out of their homes in Birmingham and Coventry, there was adequate provision for the homeless and injured with hospitals, rest centres, hostels and rehousing schemes provided by the local authorities. However, it was discovered that there was a need to provide help for children whose families were struggling to manage but did not qualify for such help. One third of the children came from families where the mother was working because the father was in the Armed Forces, or she was a widow or the parents were separated. A large proportion of children were admitted to Upwood because of domestic reasons such as poor housing conditions often due to bombing, neglect, strained family relationships often brought about by the stress of living in war-time, recent bereavement and so on. Other children were admitted due to their own or their mother's poor health caused by living in war-damaged housing, sleep deprivation and a need for peace after living in shelters for long periods of time, or fear of raids transmitted from mother to child.
The official evacuation of children from Birmingham and Coventry came to an end in the summer of 1944, and although attempts to continue a residential nursery on a smaller scale in peace time at Upwood were considered, it was felt that there were too many obstacles which could not be overcome so the children were gradually transferred to other nurseries or returned home. Upwood closed in May 1945. |