Children of the Orphan Schools Print Page

The garden commemorates the children who died while they were in the Orphan Schools, many of whom were then buried in St John’s Burial Ground—often in unmarked graves.

On 30th October 2012, specially-created bronze plaques were unveiled in memory of the 406 children who died in the government-run Orphan Schools between 1828 and 1879. A small number of Aboriginal children died in the Orphan Schools.

The Orphan School, built by convict labour, operated from 1833 until its closure in 1879. In 1848, when Charles O'Hara Booth was superintendent, there were 463 children at the institution, of whom 411 were the children of convicts and seven were Aboriginal. Reports indicate that conditions within the school were harsh and the buildings were sparsely furnished and cold. Food was often in short supply and many of those responsible for caring for the children treated them harshly. Epidemics of scarlet fever in the 1840s, measles in the 1860s, whooping cough and scarletina in the 1870s exacted a heavy toll among the children in the Orphan School.

From 1879 until the 1920s sections of the original Orphan School operated as the New Town Charitable Institution. Women were accommodated in the Infant Orphan School building constructed in 1862, but which had operated since 1874 as a lying-in hospital and home for "mentally defective" girls as well as providing accommodation for destitute women.

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