Boggo Road InmatesPrint Page 
The plaque identifies the graves of the 42 prisoners who were executed in Boggo Road from 1883 to 1913. One man who is listed also has an individual stone.
The project was undertaken by the Boggo Road Gaol Historical Society in conjunction with the Brisbane City Council. The broken sandstone block that stands by the plaque came from the Boggo Road prison site, and was part of the base of the original walls. The plaque itself lists the names of all those executed, where they came from, and when they died. Beneath the names is a quote from an 1899 parliamentary speech by Joseph Lesina MLA calling for the abolition of capital punishment.
Location
| Address: | 185 Annerley Road, South Brisbane Cemetery, Dutton Park, 4102 |
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| State: | QLD |
| Area: | AUS |
| GPS Coordinates: | Lat: -27.499158 Long: 153.027787 Note: GPS Coordinates are approximate. |
Details
| Monument Type: | Plaque |
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| Monument Theme: | Culture |
| Sub-Theme: | Crime |
Dedication
| Actual Monument Dedication Date: | Friday 6th May, 2005 |
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This stone marks the place where forty-one men and one woman are buried
They died by the gallows of Boggo Road Gaol.
Only one man`s grave was marked
[ Names ]
In 1899, Joseph Lesina MLA began a campaign to abolish capital punishment with a two-hour parliamentary speech in which he said :
"The criminal is not a wild beast ... he is an erring brother whose feet have wandered from the narrow path which we all weakly strive to follow. To take his life is not the way to cure him; you only brutalise him. It has been condemned by history as a failure. If I should fail I can only fail and somebody else as surely as the sun will rise tomorrow, will take the matter up where I leave it. I feel perfectly satisfied that it will not be many years longer before the humanitarian feeling now spreading through the colony, and through all civilised communities, will demand once and for all the abolition of flogging and the death penalty."
This stone was placed here by the Brisbane City Council and the Boggo Road Gaol Historical Society on 6 May 2005. This sandstone block was carved by convict labour for ths construction of Boggo Road Gaol. Two broken pieces that have come back together - representing reparation ; the fabric of imprisonment reappropriated to commemorate a humanitarian shift in social policy.
