After an extended period away, ghost tours and hunts are returning to the Old Gundagai Gaol on Saturday 18 April at 7.30pm.
Brought to Gundagai by the team at APPI Ghost Hunts & Tours and in agreement with the CGRC, the event will feature a hands-on ghost hunt, where participants will explore the gaol after dark, and attempt to communicate with whatever may still linger within its walls.
Running for approximately two hours, throughout the evening participants will investigate inside the historic gaol compound after dark, use specialised paranormal investigation equipment, take part in structured experiments designed to encourage spirit communication, learn both the scientific and spiritual approaches to paranormal investigation and work alongside experienced investigators who will guide participants throughout the evening.
Participants are advised to dress appropriately for the weather and bring a bottle of water. Bookings are available via humanitix.
Following the devastating 1852 Gundagai flood, the town lock-up was rebuilt as a formal watch-house and gaol.
The building was designed by Colonial Architect Alexander Dawson, with construction completed by Charles Hardy in 1859. Additional structures were added in the following years, including a kitchen designed by Government Architect James Barnet in 1863, and the imposing stone boundary wall constructed in 1866.
The gaol complex consists of a number of buildings including:
• The Gaoler’s Residence
• The original hospital building (the earliest gaol structure)
• The main cell block and exercise yard
• External kitchen buildings
• Outbuildings, well and archaeological remains
Prisoners serving short sentences from Gundagai and surrounding districts were held here.
The gaol also housed prisoners in transit between other gaols, including bushrangers and offenders awaiting transfer.
By 1870 the gaol was classified as a “proclaimed gaol”, capable of holding between four and twenty prisoners at a time.
Records from that year show the gaol held:
• Debtors
• Prisoners awaiting trial
• Prisoners in transit
• Men sentenced to labour
• Prisoners serving imprisonment sentences
Although the gaol closed in the 1970s, the complex remains one of the few surviving gaol compounds from the 1850s, and a rare example of an almost intact colonial prison site.
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