Wattle Grove Baptist Cottage

Wattle Grove Baptist Cottage was run by members of the Wattle Grove Baptist Church during 1958 and 1959. The Child Welfare Department intended to place 12 ‘specially selected’ girls in the Home, and three girls were housed there by March 1959. It is likely that the department did not place any girls there after 1963.

Reports of the Child Welfare Department (CWD) in 1958 (p.14) and 1959 (p.3) show that the Wattle Grove Baptist Church was building a cottage to accommodate what authorities described as ‘difficult girls’. There were around 100 young people in the Wattle Grove Baptist community and the CWD hoped that the girls would be ‘absorbed’ into that social group. The CWD intended to send up to 12 ‘specially selected girls’ to Reverend and Mrs Wells, who would run the Home, ‘sponsor’ the girls ‘into their community and provide a family atmosphere’. By March 1959, three girls had been placed by the CWD at Wattle Grove Cottage. The age of girls is not known.

The CWD makes no more mention of Wattle Grove Cottage in its annual reports, but the State Records Office of Western Australia holds a file that shows correspondence about the Home continued until July 1963. The Home may have continued beyond that time, but it seems that departmental placements to Wattle Grove had ceased by 1963.