Wilcannia cemetery crumbling away, burial records lost (ABC)

View Comments ABC The inscription of this sandstone grave has been lost with time in the Wilcannia Cemetery.

Wilcannia cemetery, set amongst gnarled gum trees and saltbush on the outskirts of town, has an estimated 700 graves.

The burial records have long been lost and in many cases any earthly inscriptions that once existed, such as wooden crosses, have vanished over time.

Of the headstones that sprout from the red outback soil, some are in good repair.

But a great many are withering away and the details of those that lie beneath them are slowly being lost.

"Finance is the biggest challenge," said Shirley Evans, a stalwart of the cemetery committee.

"For 30 odd years we've been trying to get finance to get the old graves restored before they fall down.

"You've got an old angel over there. It's ready to go and I said: 'It's no good waiting till it falls and then say, oh! We should have done something about it.'"

Ms Evans points to an elaborate grave erected in 1916.

The ornate white marble angel on top is on a fearful lean.

The cemetery committee has tried for years to find descendants or family who may be able to fund or oversee the grave's preservation. But the task, like so many of the graves here, has proven fruitless.

Maintaining and preserving the final resting places of the dead is a huge challenge confronting the trustees of cemeteries nationwide.

Rich history found in Wilcannia graveyard

For long-established graveyards like Wilcannia, the problem is compounded by the age of the graves.

But in death many of the poignant inscriptions tell a rich history of earlier Australian life.

Dr Herbert Butcher is a case in point.

A short, misspelled inscription on a pointed sandstone column provides no clues to the life of the man who lies beneath it.

In death he has long remained in near obscurity.

Evidence of his brief earthly presence in far western New South Wales is easily seen by visitors - his grave is close to the main gate - -but the wording merely says that he died on March 24, 1893 aged 38 years and was "loved and respected by all".

The stonemason made a mess of it, misspelling Butcher as Butcer and running out of room for the word March.

Herbert Butcher was probably the first in Australia to attempt to find a biological control for the rabbit plagues that swept across the Darling River region in the 1880s.

"He was a pupil of the celebrated Pasteur," said the obituary in the Barrier Miner newspaper.

It detailed how his method was based on inoculating rabbits with a lethal virus, then releasing them back into the wild to spread the sickness.

Herbert Butcher's work was partly motivated by the government of the day. It offered a sizeable reward for a means of destroying the rabbit pest.

However he could not sufficiently convince the authorities of the efficacy of his method, so was never able to claim it.

A few years later a kick from a horse prematurely ended his life, so the true merits of his work will never be known.

Lack of resources thwart efforts to preserve headstones

At least his grave is in good condition. It is made of solid stone and has been restored in recent years.

"There's a lot of challenges here and not a lot of resources to fix it," said Christine Elliott, secretary of the Wilcannia cemetery.

She has detailed knowledge of many graves, but admits to being frustrated by the countless other plots that are either unmarked or have no known descendents to care for them.

"It's such a historic cemetery, graves going back here to before 1866 when the town was gazetted, they picked this area for the cemetery and we've got a Jewish section, there was the Chinese section," she said.

"It's just so historic. It would be a shame to see it deteriorate any further."

There are graves of drowning victims, of accidental shootings, victims of epidemics such as measles and at least eight tombs containing victims of the heat wave of January 1896 when the temperature in Wilcannia reached 48 degrees Celsius.

The most poignant memorials are the innumerable graves of young children, frequently infants.

Ms Elliott and Ms Evans are part of a small band of older locals who organise working bees and try to carry out maintenance work at the cemetery.

But as age and the elements continue to take their toll on eroding headstones and rusting iron railings it is a race against time.

Restoring old monuments can also be very expensive.

"To get them restored back to originality is almost impossible," said George Zanon, a monumental mason from Broken Hill whose work takes him to the small bush cemeteries scattered throughout the region.

"The cast iron kerbing, it's impossible to source that. The old marble is far too expensive, so to restore them, you've just gotta restore them to basics.

"As long as you can keep the original headstone, I think that's the main thing."

Mr Zanon believes Wilcannia's historic graveyard deserves some special attention, such as federal heritage grants if it is to preserve many of the decaying, historic graves.

"There's no state or federal government funding," Mr Zanon said.

"The local government hasn't got the finances to put into restoring old monuments.

"If the families don't do it, they'll just continue to get run down until perhaps they're lost forever."

Mr Zanon and Ms Elliott both believe that the Federal Government's proposed work-for-the-dole scheme could assist in the preservation and maintenance of old cemeteries.

"A lot of practical skills can be got doing this type of work," Ms Elliott said.

"A proper program with proper supervision could be set in place to maintain historic cemeteries, any town cemetery."

Mr Zanon is a little more circumspect.

"First thing you'd have to have those people willing to do the work," he said.

"A lot of people, if you mention the word cemetery and they go 'oh, I'm not setting foot in there'. If they're willing to come out and they're wanting to learn some sort of skills to help restore these old monuments. Yeah I think it's a good idea."

Tim Lee's story screens on Landline on ABC1 at noon.*
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