Parramatta female factory

Australia's first Female Factory, the Factory above the Gaol was located in what is now Prince Alfred Park, Parramatta, New South Wales. It was a simple log walled and thatched roof construction built in 1796 and used primarily as a place of confinement for convict re-offenders. The original construction burnt down and was replaced with a two storey stone building in 1802. This building was also damaged in a fire and again rebuilt in 1804 during Governor King's administration.

The upper floor of the gaol was used as a place of confinement for delinquents and a house of industry for female convicts known as the Factory above the Gaol and later the Female Factory.

The Female Factory was the destination of all convict women transported to the colony who had not been assigned as servants. Within a decade there was considerable pressure on the authorities to deal with increasing numbers of female convicts who could not be adequately accommodated at the Factory but it was not until the arrival of Governor Lachlan Macquarie that a solution was found.

Macquarie selected a four acre site on the opposite bank of the Parramatta River from the Governor's Domain to build a new Factory and issued instructions to convict architect Francis Greenway to design a building that would accommodate 300 women.

The Factory was built using convict labour from locally quarried sandstone and was completed in 1821 at the cost of 4778 pounds. The walls of the main building ranged from convert|2|ft|6|in|m at the foundation to convert|20|in|mm at the apex of its three storeys. It had an oak shingled roof, floors of convert|6|in|mm paving or stringbark with barred leadlight windows in the basement and lead glazed windows on the upper floors.

The first floor was used for meals with the top two floors for sleeping. The porter, deputy superintendent, superintendent and matron were provided separate accommodation on the site.

The Factory was often referred to as the Nunnery and served as a refuge, a gaol, an asylum, a home for the infirm, a labour exchange, a marriage bureau, a hospital and a manufactory.

Originally intended as a place of refuge for the women and children of the NSW colony, within a decade it became more like a conventional prison, like that of Pentonville in the UK.

The Factory was the site of Australia's first industrial action in 1827 when women rioted for better food and conditions. It was also the site of the colony's first manufactured export producing convert|60000|yd of woven cloth in 1822.

By 1842 the Factory accommodated 1,203 women in the most deplorable conditions, riots occurred frequently and reforms were called for which resulted in the cessation of solitary confinement and alterations to the main building.

With the end of convict transportation to the NSW colony the site was reassigned as a Convict Lunatic and Invalid Asylum in 1847.

Today the remaining buildings form part of the Cumberland Hospital and NSW Institute of Forensic Psychiatry.

Other Female Factories

Female Factories were also established in Newcastle, Port Macquarie, Moreton Bay, andin Van Dieman's Land (Tasmania) at Launceston, George Town, Ross and the Cascades Female Factory.

External links

* [http://www.parragirls.org.au Parramatta Female Factory Precinct]
* [http://www.femalefactory.com.au/ Cascades Female Factory]
* [http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~jray/gordon/index.htm Early images of the Female Factory]