Children’s Rest Home/Dunkley Children’s Temporary Homes

Dates: c.1918-1944

The Children’s Rest Home was founded in 1918-1919 by Mr Sidney Dunkley to provide a temporary home for children of sick mothers. It started out as an emergency measure to cope with the influenza epidemic, housed in the soon to be opened Memorial Home at Vauxhall. Its first building, with accommodation for about 30 children, was at Andersons Bay. In about 1921 Dunkley sold his business to concentrate on the children’s rest home, purchasing a home in 253 Kenmure Road, Mornington, and later at 400 Cumberland Street.

Mrs Archibald Hill Jack bequeathed (possibly in 1930) a large home in Highgate, Roslyn, for a home for incurable and crippled children. There did not seem to be a need for such a home and after various legal maneuvers, the home was placed in the hands of Mr Dunkley and the Children’s Rest Home, then in need of a larger property. New buildings were built on the site, and opened in 1933 as Hill Jack Memorial Home.

In 1944 the government took over the home for the Otago Hospital Board as a returned soldiers’ hospital. Dunkley and his committee then ran a foster parent scheme.

The organisation apparently came under the auspices of the Anglican Church, which holds its archives.