St Augustine’s Nursing Home is built on land originally belonging to Gensing Farm, which in 1828 was purchased by James Burton when he started to design the new town of St Leonards on Sea.

Mrs Dyneley and her two daughters originally lived at North Villa, now known as Winterbourne, at the corner of Quarry Hill.  However, when their mother died Elizabeth and Catherine moved into the small mansion called Gensing Lodge.  They lived in St Leonards for fifty years until Miss Elizabeth died in November 1870 and her sister Catherine in January 1880.

The Sisters Arrive

The Augustinian Sisters of the Holy Heart of Mary were founded by Victoire Letellier – Mother St Angele – in Paris in 1827.  After opening subsequent Foundations in France, the Congregation decided to come to England and arrived in London in 1880.  Their first house was in Melbury Road, Kensington but they found London unsuitable for their work and sought a suitable property on the South Coast.

Having purchased Gensing Lodge they opened the house on December 4th 1886 to care for elderly ladies who had no family or who wished for a quiet atmosphere in their latter years.  The house was soon full and had to be enlarged.

In September 1900 a Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes was constructed in front of the productive kitchen garden.  The following year a large crucifix was erected opposite the grotto: the original was destroyed during the Second World War but re-constructed after the cessation of hostilities.

The Chapel

In 1913 there were eighteen sisters in the St Leonards Community and the original chapel of Gensing Lodge was too small for the Sisters, residents and visitors, therefore, it was decided to build a new one.  The chapel building was financed by donations from local tradesmen and by fundraising by the lady boarders and was designed by Canon Scoles with the foundation stone being laid on March 25th, 1913.  80 year old Catholic artist M Westlake undertook internal decoration and the building was opened on August 5th 1913.  The first Mass was said the following day.  The Sisters were particularly delighted with their new stalls in the Nuns Choir.

The Chapel was re-decorated and re-furnished in 1960 and some years later a new altar was installed to conform to liturgical changes.

The Great War

The outbreak of the Great War in 1914 saw life unchanged at Gensing Lodge, however, soon refugees from France were given shelter including two young princesses from a European royal family.  Hospitality was also extended to some young Jesuit priests from France who went to study at Ore Place, an arrangement that continued until 1926 – during that era many of them were to say their first Mass in the chapel.

Between the Wars

In May 1928 it was decided to open a Nursing Home and the third floor of the building was altered and an operating theatre installed.  On April 5th 1929, Mrs Beatrice Tunbridge became the first Matron of the Nursing Home.

Fifty years at Gensing Lodge were celebrated in 1936 and the celebrations lasted for three days: The invited guests included Monsignor Amigo, Bishop of the Southwark Diocese.  The Sisters’ Refectory was enlarged, a floor was built into the roof space over the Sisters rooms and a new block was added to the building.

On April 3rd 1939 a statue of The Virgin Mary, designed by Dom Scott, was erected on the first floor of the new block.  The sisters called the statue ‘Our Lady of Joy.’

The Second World War

The sisters confided the protection of their work and the house to Our Lady of Joy and the dedication proved to be appropriate as the country prepared for war.  In July 1939 the chapel was one of a number of buildings in St Leonards that were daubed with graffiti that read: ‘This place will be burnt to the ground in 1940,’  War was declared on September 3rd 1939.

Upon the outbreak of war the building was camouflaged and the windows taped to prevent flying glass in the event of bombing.  The nursing home was transformed into a maternity unit for mothers evacuated from London and 100 babies were born there between September and December 1939.

On June 3rd 1940 the police were sent to advise the sisters that the coast had been designated a war zone and that all ‘aliens’ had to move at least 20 miles inland. At that time the Community included French, Italian and Belgian sisters.  However, petitions from local people secured official permission for them to stay put.

Some of the lady boarders decided to leave and when the maternity patients were evacuated the sisters decided that perhaps it was time for them to move inland, to Clock House at Nutley.

The sisters were virtually cut off from their Mother House in France and letters rarely received, the first not reaching them until July 25th 1940.  When letters did arrive they had been forwarded from addresses in Sweden or the USA.

Like many other Britons, the sisters at Nutley were digging for victory and their first harvest yielded three tons of potatoes.

After a visit from Army Officers sent by the War Office, Gensing Lodge was requisitioned in September 1941.  However, having found the building to be in such excellent decorative order the authorities hesitated to occupy the building for four months.  But, on January 12th 1942 300 officers and men from the Army did occupy the premises as preparations were being made for the abortive Dieppe Raid in August that year.

The sisters were then requisitioned to empty the chapel.  They found it freezing and a burst pipe had damaged some of the furniture.  The sisters remember with affection one Army Officer who they nicknamed ‘Can I help you ladies’ who, with the Army chaplain, supplied them with hot teas and sandwiches.  An Army lorry was sent to move the furniture back to Nutley and there was no lack of volunteers when the soldiers heard the sisters say they would feed the men on arrival – The menu was roast rabbit and potatoes.

A second intake of troops billeted at Gensing Lodge was not so considerate.  They broke into the locked rooms and stole crockery, cutlery and linen which was sold on the black market.  The sisters were compensated fully after the War.

September 23rd 1942 saw 38 killed when a Home for the Blind near Gensing Lodge was hit in an air raid but the bombs missed the Lodge.  On February 10th 1943 only the tower was left standing after another raid hit St John’s Church in Pevensey Road but again the house escaped damage.  A severe air raid on May 24th 1943 did cause damage to the roof and windows of Gensing Lodge and the laundry.  In the ‘new block’ the statue of ‘Our Lady of Joy’ moved but did not fall.  In September that year the sisters had to return to St Leonards to remove their remaining property when the Army required even more rooms.

On each of their visits to the house during the War the sisters took the opportunity to gather fruit from the trees in the garden, however, to do so they had to negotiate trenches dug by the Army but the delicious apples and pears were considered worth the obstacle course.

Post War

The War ended on May 8th 1945 and the authorities wanted to house 500 German Prisoners of War at Gensing Lodge, however, the sisters objected and the Mother Superior aided by Dr Brodribb, son of the sisters personal physician, persuaded them that there was a more important need for a nursing home for civilian patients.

The house was de-requisitioned on September 12th 1945 and after P.O.Ws were employed to fill in the trenches not one apple or pear remained on the trees that autumn.

The keys of Gensing Lodge were officially handed back to the Sisters on September 19th 1945 but it took 10 months to restore the house to a state to resume its previous work as a nursing and rest home.  Left without light or heat some of the sisters even had to sleep on the floor as they cleaned up after the Army.

The house re-opened on July 25th 1946 and by Christmas it was full.

The creation of the National Health Service in 1948 obviated the need to re-open the maternity unit and the operating theatre; therefore the sisters concentrated on their original work of caring for elderly ladies.  The nursing home facilities on the third floor were used for convalescent and terminally ill patients.

Miss Joan Hooker succeeded Mrs Tunbridge as matron.

The demand for places at St Augustine’s Nursing Home was such that the sisters purchased adjoining properties such as ‘Paygate’, ‘Winterbourne’ and the former Anglican Convent, St Peter’s Grange.  The sisters work and numbers flourished and the house was always full.

In the late 1960s the operating theatre was re-opened for eye operations.

The Beginning of the End

From the beginning of the 1970s recruitment to the religious life decreased.  With fewer younger ones joining and the increasing age of the sisters, the Congregation began to reduce its work.  More lay staff were employed and the adjoining properties were sold.

Gradually the Augustinian Sisters began to return to France and in 1984, after 98 years in England, the last sisters left to return to their Mother House in Paris where they continued the work started by their foundress in 1827.

The End

When the Community departed they left behind not only those sisters who had died here serving God and the people of St Leonards but many grateful patients and their families, friends and acquaintances made over the decades.

Those who knew them remember the Augustinian Sisters for their spirit of charity and caring as they strove to follow their foundress' desire that each of their houses should be an 'Arsenal of Charity'.

New Beginnings

Coincidentally, a project had been started in St Leonards for the founding of a Hospice for the terminally ill.  When it was learned that the sisters were leaving St Augustine’s negotiations began to see whether the nursing home could be purchased and its work continued and expanded so that it would not be lost to the community of Hastings and St Leonards.

After 18 months of hard work and with the help and guidance from St Christopher’s Hospice in London, St Wilfrid’s Hospice in Eastbourne and the National Society for Cancer Relief with the support of the District Health Authority, the negotiations were successfully concluded and St Augustine’s was acquired by the Hospice Committee.

The St Michael’s Hospice Committee busily engaged itself in fundraising activities to achieve its objectives of creating within St Augustine’s both a Day Care Centre and a separate In-Patient Unit.