Trying to destroy all children, but they don't disappear (no errors)

I've got an object ('DotsHolder'), which is the parent object to many gameobjects. I would like to destroy all these objects.

I'm calling destroy on each of the child.gameobjects, but after going through the list they all remain. I see no errors in the console.

         Transform dotHolder = this.transform.FindChild("DotsHolder");
         Debug.Log("Destroying: " + dotHolder.GetChildCount());
         for(int i=dotHolder.GetChildCount()-1; i>=0;--i){
             Destroy(dotHolder.GetChild(i).gameObject);
         }
         Debug.Log("Remaining: " + dotHolder.GetChildCount());

In the log at this point I see:

 Destroying: 244
 Remaining: 244

Why is the 'remaining' count not zero at this point?