150th Anniversary of the Quarantine StationPrint Page

The monument commemorates the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Quarantine Station at Portsea. 

In the early 1850s the peninsula of Point Nepean was inspected and subsequently found to be acceptable as the location for a permanent quarantine station. The Port Phillip District Health Officer, Dr Thomas Hunt, had the following to say about the selected site:

"The Sanitary Station is admirably adapted for the purposes required; its position isolated, its anchorage good and easy of access both from inside the Heads when a vessel takes a pilot there and from Shortlands Bluff. The soil is sandy and at all times dry, the air pure. Water is procured by sinking wells to the depth of 12 to 15 feet, in abundance and sufficient purity, although somewhat aluminous and impregnated with lime. A root resembling sarsaparilla, wild parsley, a root known here as pennyroyal, grow wild and cure scurvy in a short time."

In early 1852 the new Victorian government allocated the sum of £5000 for the erection of a ‘sanatorium’ and the establishment of the quarantine station was put in train.

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Dedication