Councillors have put off a decision on whether a crumbling 17th Century chapel in Seaford should be demolished.

They had been urged to agree the bulldozing of St Mary's Nursing Home in Kingsmead, a former school where the chapel is sited.

Lewes District Council officers had recommended for approval plans to build 23 homes in its place.

But concerns about a rise in traffic led councillors to defer a final decision to await more studies.

Plans to demolish the dilapidated chapel have provoked concern because it houses memorial stones engraved with the names of former pupils of King's Mead School who died during the Second World War.

Originally a barn near Ripe, the chapel was rebuilt in the school grounds in 1926.

In the late Sixties the school became St Mary's Nursing Home. It closed last year because it couldn't meet Government care home standards.

An inspection of the chapel found it was too dilapidated to repair.

But old boys of the school launched a campaign to preserve the chapel because of its historical associations with the school.