Melbourne Morgue, Princes Bridge

Melbourne was growing fast in the 1850s. No longer a colonial outpost it had boomed into one of the leading cities of the Empire.

People flocked here, people were born here, people died here. And it was the dying that created the problem. 

Melbourne needed a morgue but wasn’t sure it wanted one. This was the beginning of a 150-year-journey through place, time and purpose as the morgue evolved from an unpleasant necessity to an internationally respected institution.

On the rare occasions we think of a morgue the image is sterile, white, gleaming, a pastiche of Kathy Reichs, CSI and Silent Witness. Fact or fantasy this was not the 19th century idea of a morgue.

Traditionally in Britain bodies of the unknown or dubiously dead were bought to public houses where they remained until an inquest could be convened. This practical approach meant the body was accessible to the community, which could aid in identification. 

Unsurprisingly this practice was adopted in Melbourne but was undermined by a major problem – the heat – which encouraged decomposition and discouraged landlords from participating.

During the summer of 1852, a corpse was refused entry to a number of inner-city hotels before finally being accepted by the publican of the Queen’s Arms. It remained there, decomposing rapidly, for more than two days before an inquest was performed.

A new solution was needed.

The need for a morgue was undisputed but where to put it and how to use it was not. The concept of a morgue was new in the 19th century and its purpose open to interpretation. The most famous morgue – the Paris morgue – was designed to display corpses to the public for the purpose of identification but became a tourist attraction. Melbourne, chasing respectability, acknowledged the need but declined the practice. 

The Melbourne Coroner, Dr Wilmott, was anxious to have a centrally located facility where its functions, including identification, could be undertaken with decency and efficacy. 

While this principle was generally accepted the location remained contentious. Proximity to the river where many corpses were found was a consideration, but this needed to be balanced against public distaste for bodies being transported and stored in the centre of the city. 

The first listed morgue was at Australian Wharf, off Flinders St and beyond Spencer St. In other words, suitably invisible. This building shows Melbourne’s desire to distance itself from the morgue which was so ramshackle lunching wharfies could peer through cracks in the walls and give a running commentary on the progress of the surgeon.

Other temporary morgues appeared at different times at Princes Bridge, captured in our photograph, and Coles Wharf where “the dead house is so infected with rats that the bodies have to be protected from them with iron covers”. 

Medical and legal considerations held little sway until the creation in 1888 of a purpose-built facility in Batman Avenue where it remained until 1951. The advent of a purpose-built morgue ushered in the concepts we now associate with the institution – decency, integrity, trustworthiness and justice – predicated on scientific excellence. 

The Melbourne Morgue, now located on Southbank, is internationally recognised for its contribution to forensic medicine. It has been a long journey from one side of the river to the other and from disdain to excellence. •