Tamar Valley Tales

Content Warning: This historical blog post contains graphic details related to suicide. Reader discretion is advised.

Strolling down Paterson Street in Launceston Tasmania, you’ll spot Launceston College, framed by its elegant date palms. However, rewind a century, and this site was home to the now demolished Launceston Gaol. Within its walls, a haunting tale emerged—a ghostly presence that instilled fear and prompted grown men to beg to change cells.

The Prison’s Gritty Past

Constructed in the 1820s, the Launceston Gaol was a relic of the Van Diemen’s Land’s convict era. Towering walls, a stone-breaking yard on Bathurst St, and the infamous treadmill reflected an era of penal discipline. The treadmill forced convicts to continuously step on a rotating platform to grind grain. It was monotonous, physically demanding, and at times dangerous.

After the transportation era ended, the gaol and conditions within it began to deteriorate, facing inquiries and Royal Commissions. In 1913, the Launceston Examiner was critical of the conditions in the prison.

The wretched condition into which Launceston gaol has fallen was strongly in evidence in the Police Court yesterday when Mr. Shields made some scathing remarks on the accommodation provided for a girl who was arrested on a charge of larceny: There was a large ventilator in the small cell, and two out of the four panes of glass in the window were broken. Nothing in the shape of a bedstead seems to have been provided, but although blankets were forthcoming, the occupant had to lie on the floor. As the night was cold and frosty, the girl was almost in a state of collapse.

Examiner

Eventually, in 1917, it closed and continued to fall into further disrepair until a decision was made to demolish the ruins. It was at this time that a reporter embarked on an investigation into the ghostly figure that had terrified prisoners.

The Ghostly Tale

The ghost story speaks of a woman brutally thrust into a particular cell, who met her end there. Her spirit continued to haunt the prison, striking terror into the heart of inmates. The old gaol’s superintendent said prisoners would plead to change cells. He was convinced they wouldn’t have heard the story of the haunting, and, if they had, they wouldn’t know which cell. However, the pleas to change cells occurred so often that it was seldom used.

Local papers printed stories of the ghostly presence as the demolition date approached. A reporter from the Examiner was determined to uncover the truth behind the haunting before the gaol was no more.

“Not many people believe in ghosts these days,” so was told the reporter given the assignment of spending the night in the haunted cell. He nonchalantly walked into the cell off Paterson Street and heard the door swing shut behind him. His assignment was to prove there was no ghost, or at least, that there wasn’t any longer.

Our intrepid reporter was in the farthest corner of the blocks of cells. A massive chain secured the exercise yard to keep him in. “Well, I hope you’ll be safe here,” the caretaker said to him. The reporter was required to stay til daylight, but he took the key for the chain from the caretaker just in case.

To the right of him was the northern wall of the gaol, with a high fence and barbed wire along the top. To the rear, the cells. He flashed his torch around, paint on one wall ominously stated, ‘be prepared.’ Ancient buildings tumbling to dust are suitable places for ghosts, he thought.

It was a chilly night. It started to rain, the wind picked up, and fog rolled in from the nearby Tamar River. Was that the sound of chains he heard? Was that an eerie face? Tap, tap, tap – footsteps were coming closer. On this occasion, it was a sheep who was wandering around the condemned gaol.

The reported started to doze. He started awake when he felt something icy cold against his left temple. He realised it was just the wall.

Before he could return to sleep, he was hurled to the floor and his head was thrown against the wall. His torch wouldn’t work. He shakily lit one of the matches he’d brought for his cigarettes. He sees that it was just his chair that had collapsed. He reaches for the flask he brought with him, purely for emergencies of course, but finds it nearly empty. He takes a long swig and waits til he sees the grey skies of dawn starting to arrive. He gets up to leave.

As he exited the gaol, he stated “I still don’t know if that cell is haunted – I do know that a lot of funny things can happen in it on a dark night of wind and rain. If anyone doubts me, I advise him to go and try it for himself. I shall not be there.”

The Search for Answers

Local legends say the ghost was the spirit of a woman who met a grim fate by hanging herself within the cell’s walls.

Our journey through history often reveals the grim theme of harsh punishment inflicted upon the elderly, the sick, and the poor. During the 19^th century, Tasmania, much like many other parts of the world, considered suicide a criminal act. Society saw suicide as a moral transgression and criminal offence, rather than viewing it through a lens of mental health.

Uncovering the identity of the female ghost proved to be a challenging quest, though. The tragic tale of a women meeting her demise within the confines of a prison cell provides little in the way of clues. Records from the era reveal a sombre truth: numerous women met their end in custody, primarily due to various health afflictions and diseases.

Records also recount numerous instances of attempted hangings. In 1885, one such account tells the story of Mary Ann Dugmore, locked up for being drunk and disorderly, who attempted to hang herself by using a string around her throat. Mary Ann’s narrative is but one among many. Newspapers from the era dubbed one woman, Maud Phillips, as “notorious.”

Maud, a young woman born in Hobart in the 1860s, found herself in Launceston during the early 1880s. Her rap sheet included offences such as larceny, being drunk and disorderly, property damage, and, on a few occasions, using ‘unbiblical language on a Sunday.’ What set Maud apart from other petty criminals of her time was her repeated attempts to end her own life.

On one occasion, she endeavoured to cut her wrist using a steel buckle torn from her hat. On another occasion, she leapt into the river from Market Wharf, only to be marooned in the Tamar’s notorious silt due to an ebbing tide. On yet another she jumped into the river from Russian Wharf.

Maud had three desperate attempts to strangle and hang herself in prison cells. On one occasion, she tried to strangle herself whilst also cutting her wrists. Another time, the prison warden found her on the cell floor, her head propped against the wall, a strip torn from her undergarments tightly knotted around her neck. Her face had swollen and darkened. On yet another occasion, she fashioned her skirt into a makeshift rope, securing it to the cell’s window bars, and suspended herself by her neck. Each time, Maud’s life was spared through timely interventions.

As we approach the twentieth century, documentation of Maud’s story fades from newspaper reports, leaving us to wonder whether she found a way to move forward or, perhaps, succeeded in her attempts.

Of course, there is nothing to say that Maud is the spirit that haunted the Launceston cell. But her story is one of many women, young and old, who passed through the gaol. Women with stories of trauma and poverty, and whose struggles with mental health were criminalised. Maud spent much time in prison for the crime of attempting to take her own life rather than receiving support for it.

Conclusion

The ghostly legend of Launceston’s old gaol offers more than a haunting tale. It’s a glimpse into the harsh realities of crime and punishment, evolving societal attitudes, and the challenges faced by women in distress during the 19th century. From a legend of haunting, it transforms into a reflection on the haunting experiences of those who once walked its corridors.

Interested in More Ghost Stories?

If this haunting caught your interest, you’ll find more Tasmanian ghost stories gathered on our Ghosts of Tasmania page.

TASMANIAN GHOST STORIES: Folklore, Facts and the People Behind Them

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Sources

A Vigil in the Haunted Cell, Examiner, 20 August 1936, p.6

Current Topics, Examiner, 11 August 1936, p.6

Find & Connect, Launceston Gaol 1827-1917, https://www.findandconnect.gov.au/guide/tas/TE00558 [accessed 29 October 2023]

The Launceston Gaol, 15/5/1913 p.4 Examiner

Will Soon Be No More: Old Gaol Eye-Sore Attacked, Examiner, 11 August 1936, p.6

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