Knoyle Home For Girls

In 1888 the Society opened a home in Knoyle, a country village of only nine hundred inhabitants, situated eighteen miles from Salisbury. The Home was a short walk away from the main village, over “Windmill Hill” - which was actually a gorse-covered common. The Home housed seven girls, who were aged six to fourteen.

Every year, on the first Friday after Easter, the Home would host the 'Knoyle Band of Hope' concert, which attracted many local visitors. The Home actually proved so popular with visitors that a guest book was started, in 1889, to record their comments.

On weekdays the children would walk the three-quarters of a mile to school accompanied by the daughter of their matron, Mrs Ricketts. During the Summer, the older girls made themselves “Sunday pinafores”, while the younger ones went blackberry picking. They usually picked too many, and the leftovers were made into jam for people in the village.

The Home closed in 1898. We believe that this may have occurred because the Society was growing rapidly, and was concentrating on larger homes as a more efficient way of meeting children’s needs.