Maryborough Cemetery is a cemetery in Walker Street, Maryborough, Fraser Coast Region, Queensland, Australia. The cemetery and its heritage-listed Mortuary Chapel have importance to the local community as the principal place of public burial in Maryborough for over 120 years.
Contents
History
The original township of Maryborough was situated, not in its current place, but on the north of the Mary River, after wharves were established in 1847-8 providing transport for wool from sheep stations on the Burnett River. In 1850 Surveyor, Hugh Roland Labatt, arrived in Maryborough with instructions to "examine the River Mary...to suggest ...the best site or sites for the laying out of the town, having regard to the convenience of shipping on one hand and internal communication on the other...also...point out the spots desirable as reserves for public building, church, quay and for places for public recreation." The site recommended by Labatt was not where settlement was established but further east and from the early 1850s this is where the growing town developed.
The Maryborough Cemetery was established in the mid 1870s, and was the third cemetery site in the town. As Maryborough grew previous cemetery sites became inappropriately close to the centre of town. The site of the first cemetery is unknown and the second site was in Kent Street and was registered in October 1871. Development surrounded this second site and by 1873 it was closed and the third cemetery site was established. In the early twentieth century families were given the option of having headstones removed from the second cemetery site to this third site.
Like most nineteenth century cemeteries, the Maryborough Cemetery was designed on a grid plan with burial areas used by various religious denominations separated by lanes and walkways. At the intersection of two principal tree-lined lanes, a mortuary chapel was placed to provide shelter for family and friends of the deceased attending grave side services. This unusual building was designed by Queensland architect Willoughby Powell and constructed by Bundaberg firm Clement and Sons at a cost of £534 in 1883-4. Occasionally mortuary chapels were constructed for one denomination and placed in their section of the cemetery, but this centrally placed chapel served all denominations, the four entrances ensuring that each of the surrounding religious sections had equal access and ownership of the small chapel. The entrances are large to permit entry of a horse-drawn hearse. Its position at the intersection of the cemetery lanes and its height make it a landmark and its tower form has caused it to be locally known as "the rocket".
Description
The cemetery is laid out on a simple grid plan with a series of intersecting lanes and walkways separating the denominational sections. The lanes are lined with established trees and other trees and plantings are found within the burial sections. The cemetery contains representational examples of memorials from the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
The mortuary chapel is a timber building comprises two intersecting barrel vaults, producing four identical round arched entrances at the ends of the vaults. Surmounting the point of intersection of the vaults is a tall fleche, in the form of a tower and dome, which doubles the full height of the building.
Notable burials
Notable people interred in Maryborough Cemetery include: