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Memorial at long last
29Apr08
THE names of 1894 Sunbury asylum inmates buried in unmarked graves are to be inscribed on a metal plaque to be erected at nearby Sunbury Cemetery.
The plans for the memorial, devised by the Sunbury Cemetery Trust, Friends of Sunbury Cemetery and Hume Council, include a memorial garden and rotunda. There is no date yet for the work to start.
The memorial has been a central part of the Sunbury Leader's "Marking lost lives" campaign that was launched last November to revive the memory of inmates and provide a lasting memorial to them.
Since the campaign started, the Leader has been inundated with stories from locals who had been touched by the asylum and its impact on relatives and friends.
There were heartbreaking stories of neglect and tragic tales of those who had died in the asylum from ailments now managed with medication.
The stories included three women Ethel Kitchen, Dorothy Zimbahl and Frances Hanrahan who died at the asylum.
Ethel Kitchen was an epileptic who suffered years of abuse and who was known as "laundry" woman. She worked every day in the asylum's boilerhouse and for that her nickname appears before her name on her death certificate.
Dorothy Zimbahl was a talented musician disfigured by scalding chocolate in a kitchen accident and was condemned to live out the rest of her days at the asylum.
Frances Hanrahan, 43, died in 1927 after she turned to alcohol to cope with the loss of her child.
Amy Nelson, the great-great-granddaughter of Frances Hanrahan, said:
"I am really excited to hear that a memorial will be erected because it was a sad chapter for the town and for the patients who were forgotten.
"A lot of family members don't even know they have relatives there, so it is just as important for them."
Leader Community Newspapers Northern Division chief of staff Nick Miller said:
"These were sad lives and forgotten deaths. It has been said that one measure of a society is how well it looks after its sick and down-trodden, and in the case of these 1894 people our society largely failed.
"Acknowledging them now does not change the circumstances of those lives but it is a poignant reminder that we failed before and must not do so again."
Hume Council corporate services manager Gavan O'Keefe said the cemetery trust could decide on a memorial timeline on May 20. Funding would come from various sources.
* "Marking lost lives" details: www.sunburyleader.com.au
