The Bridge Rescue Home

The Bridge Rescue Home was opened by the Salvation Army in Adelaide in 1899. It operated as a home for women and girls in need of shelter. Women were asked to do laundry and other work in return for accommodation. In 1927, 36 women and girls resided at the Home. In 1934 The Bridge Rescue Home was officially renamed The Bridge Industrial Home.

The Bridge Rescue Home was opened as a home for women and girls in need of shelter by the Salvation Army in 1899. In 1898 the Salvation Army purchased the property of the former Bushmen’s Club, which ran from Gilbert Street right through to Whitmore Square, for £4,500. The buildings on the Whitmore Square side of the property were renovated, added to and opened as the Adelaide Brigade Prison-Gate Home for men in Jan 1899. The main building at number 146 on the Gilbert Street side was turned into a women’s rescue home. It was called The Bridge Rescue Home as it was intended to be a ‘bridge back into society’ for the women who were given refuge there. Women were asked to do laundry and other work in return for their keep. In 1927 36 women and girls resided at the Home.

In later years the Home became increasingly known simply as ‘The Bridge’ as the focus of the Salvation Army’s social work spread. However, many women and girls were still brought to the home from the Police Courts by the Salvation Army’s Police Court officers.

Although referred to in newspaper articles as ‘The Bridge Industrial Home’ as early as 1929, the name did not officially change until 1934 when the Home began to provide a residential program for the ‘training’ of teenage girls who were placed there for ‘uncontrollable’ behaviour.