Her Majesty's Gaol and Labour Prison was a government run prison in Alice Springs in the Northern Territory which operated between 1938 and 1996. It was preceded by Stuart Town Gaol and replaced by the still operating Alice Springs Correctional Centre. [1]
It is now the location of the Women's Museum of Australia. [2]
Builders began work on the gaol in 1936 and was the replacement for the, significantly smaller, Stuart Town Gaol and it was designed by CE Davies who displayed an understanding of arid zone principles. [3] It was opened in November 1938 and housed men and women; until 1964 male prisoners were segregated by race. The gaol was originally designed to house 22 prisoners and prisoners sentenced to longer sentences were regularly transferred to Fannie Bay Gaol or prisons in South Australia. [1]
The first Warden, also called Keeper, of the gaol was Philip Francis (Phil) Muldoon who was a long serving Northern Territory police officer; he was appointed by the then Administrator Aubrey Abbott. [4] He worked there alongside his wife, Bertilla Muldoon, who was the de facto (unpaid) matron and also cared for the female prisoners. [5] During the Muldoons' management, the gaol was neatly maintained with substantial vegetable, fruit and flower gardens. It also had an ant-bed tennis court constructed by Phil Muldoon. [6]
For this reason it gained the nicknames 'Vatican City' (in reference to their Catholicism) and 'Muldoon's Guest House'. [7] [8] The prisoners often called it Greenbush and this name is still in use by the Greenbush Art Group which operates from the Alice Springs Correctional Centre in partnership with Batchelor Institute of Indigenous Tertiary Education. [5] [9] Phil Muldoon left the role when he retired in 1960. [4]
During World War II one of the women's call blocks, with had been set aside for 'European' women (non-Aboriginal) women was acquired by the Army for military prisoners including, for two months, German and Italian internees; they were then transferred to Tatura, Victoria. [6] Also during World War II the gaol was the only correction facility in the Northern Territory from 1942 until the end of the war during the Bombing of Darwin. [1]
One famous former prisoner is Olive Pink who, after being denied an inspection, intestinally entered an Aboriginal Reserve (without permission) so that she would be arrested. [10] She was found guilty in court and was required to pay a fine or spent 5 days in prison. She was furious when the Warden Phil Muldoon paid her fine rather than have her in the gaol. [11] Albert Namatjira also spent a number of night there before being transferred to serve his sentence in Papunya; after his death a protest camp of approximately 250 people camped at the gates of the gaol. [10]
In 1956 Telka Williams began working in the women's section and worked there until her retirement in 1984. Telka Williams, who was an advocate for disability care in the Northern Territory, spoke out about the imprisonment of 'mental defectives' within the prison and said: [6] [12]
Before the psychiatric ward was built at the hospital - for their (mental defectives) own sake and the community's safety - the only place for them was gaol, where they were secure. It was very, very sad because staff were not trained in psychiatric nursing. Some of [the inmates] were quite violent, as you would understand. Others were personal friends of mine, which was a little hard to deal with.
— Telka Williams, Transcript of interview with Telka Williams, interview with Megg Kelham, LANT NTRS 226 TS 1243
Telka Williams husband, Joseph (Taffy) Williams, who was Superintendent of the gaol during some of the period Telka worked there called it a "black mark on the administration in the Northern Territory". [13]
Prisoner numbers rose sharply from the mid-1960s onwards and the gaol received criticism for its high levels of incarceration of Aboriginal people and for housing juvenile offenders within the main prison population. [1] To meet the needs of this increasing prison population there were many alterations made to the complex. [3]
In June 1993, three years before it was closed, the original gaol buildings were given heritage status as part of the Alice Springs Heritage Precinct and the Precinct, including the gaol, [14] was entered on the Register of the National Estate in May 1996. [3] The gaol closed two months later.
In 1997, despite heritage protection, the site was set to be developed and a locally formed protest group was formed called 'Save the old gaol". After much lobbying, and a petition with over 2,000 signatures, [6] the gaol was not developed. Instead it was leased to the National Pioneer Women's Hall of Fame, now known as the Women's Museum of Australia. [1] [10] The Women's Museum has maintained the original gaol buildings and gaol stories, including the fight to save the building, are shared. [15] The museum was founded by Molly Clark and opened in 2007. [16]
Alice Springs is a town in the Northern Territory, Australia; the third largest settlement after Darwin and Palmerston. The name Alice Springs was given by surveyor William Whitfield Mills after Alice, Lady Todd, wife of the telegraph pioneer Sir Charles Todd. Known colloquially as "The Alice" or simply "Alice", the town is situated roughly in Australia's geographic centre. It is nearly equidistant from Adelaide and Darwin.
The Alice Springs Correctional Centre, an Australian medium to maximum security prison for males and females, is located 25 kilometres (16 mi) outside Alice Springs, Northern Territory, Australia. The centre is managed by Northern Territory Correctional Services, an agency of the Department of Justice of the Government of the Northern Territory. The centre detains sentenced and charged felons under Northern Territory and/or Commonwealth law.
Hermannsburg, also known as Ntaria, is an Aboriginal community in Ljirapinta Ward of the MacDonnell Shire in the Northern Territory of Australia, 125 kilometres (78 mi); west southwest of Alice Springs, on the Finke River, in the traditional lands of the Western Arrarnta people.
Fannie Bay Gaol is a historic gaol in Fannie Bay, Northern Territory, Australia. The gaol operated as Her Majesty's Gaol and Labour Prison, from 20 September 1883 until 1 September 1979.
Berrimah Prison, was an Australian maximum security prison formerly located in Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia. The centre was managed by Northern Territory Correctional Services, an agency of the Department of Justice of the Government of the Northern Territory. The centre detained sentenced and charged felons under Northern Territory and/or Commonwealth law.
Olive Muriel Pink was an Australian botanical illustrator, anthropologist, gardener, and activist for Aboriginal rights who spent much of her life in Central Australia.
The Women's Museum of Australia, formerly the National Pioneer Women's Hall of Fame, is a museum focused on the place of women in Australian history, situated in the restored HM Gaol and Labour Prison building in Alice Springs, Northern Territory, Australia.
The Centralian Advocate is an Australian regional online newspaper based at Alice Springs, Northern Territory. The Centralian Advocate is part of News Corp Australia, and serves under the Northern Territory News banner, containing headlines from the newspaper, as well as stories that cover various events and issues primarily outside of Darwin, particularly central Australia. Until 2020, it was published as a standalone bi-weekly print newspaper on Tuesdays and Fridays, claiming a readership of 15,000 people and with an audited circulation of 4401 as of 2018.
The Alice Springs Telegraph Station is located within the Alice Springs Telegraph Station Historical Reserve, four kilometres north of the Alice Springs town centre in the Northern Territory of Australia. Established in 1872 to relay messages between Darwin and Adelaide, it is the original site of the first European settlement in central Australia. It was one of twelve stations along the Overland Telegraph Line.
Lycurgus John Rickard Underdown, generally known as "Uncle" Ly Underdown, was a prominent hotelier and businessman in Alice Springs, in the Northern Territory, Australia.
Hamilton Downs Station was a cattle station west of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory of Australia. It is now a youth camp.
Jose Petrick OAM is a British-born Australian historian and community advocate living in Alice Springs in the Northern Territory.
Rona Ellen Glynn, also known briefly as Rona Schaber after marriage, was the first Indigenous Australian school teacher and nurse in Alice Springs in the Northern Territory. In 1965 she became the first Aboriginal woman to have a pre-school named in her honour in Australia.
Shirley Naomi Brown is an Australian author who has written extensively about the history of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory of Australia.
Stuart Town Gaol in Alice Springs, Northern Territory, Australia, located on 9 Parson Street, was constructed in 1907, when Alice Springs had a European population of approximately 30 people, and held its first prisoner in 1909. It is one of the earliest permanent buildings constructed in the town and the first government building. The gaol follows a simple design and was built, using local materials, by stonemason Jack Williams.
Gerhardt Andreas Johannsen was a stonemason, builder and pastoralist in the Northern Territory.
Ah Hong was a Chinese market gardener who spent most of his life in Alice Springs, and was a well regarded figure in an era of considerable prejudice towards Chinese people in Australia.
Amelia Kunoth née Pavey was an Aboriginal Australian woman who developed well-known cattle stations in Central Australia, including Utopia, Bond Springs, Hamilton Downs and Tempe Downs.
Pearl Ruth Powell, née Price, formerly Bird, was an Australian memoirist. She was the co-writer of By Packhorse and Buggy (1996) alongside her daughter Eileen McRae. This memoir follows her life where she grew up at the Alice Springs Telegraph Station, the daughter of postmaster Fred Price and, following his early death life on various cattle stations throughout Central Australia.
Annie Meyers was the owner of the first guest house called 'Stuarts Guest Home', sometimes referred to as 'Mrs Meyers Guest House', in Alice Springs in the Northern Territory.