Gender and domesticity in Woogaroo Asylum 1865-1869

On January 10th 1865, 57 male and 12 female lunatics were transported from the Brisbane jail by steamer to the first Asylum in Queensland at Woogaroo. The five male and two female prison warders accompanying them were the first attendants and nurses at this institution. From their beginnings these early attendants and nurses atempted to fulfil a role that was often intangible in nature and shaped by the gendered expectations of Victorian society and the demands of living and working in an institution. The experiences of the patients they cared for were similarly influenced by a society whose ideal lay in the patriarchal Vicotrian family. This chapter presents the stories of two patients from the 1860s. Isabella Lewin and Catherine Althers' stories allow an exploration of the way in which gender was central to the physical and social organisation of this asylum, the definition of female patients and staff roles and patient care.