‘There not being any place to keep her’: Incarcerating Women in Nineteenth-Century Western Australia

Abstract

With the rate of women’s imprisonment still increasing in Australia, an understanding of the history of women’s incarceration is significant. This article explores the anomalous status of female prisoners in nineteenth-century Western Australia, whose very existence posed a problem for authorities. An examination of gaol returns and Colonial Secretary’s Office correspondence reveals a tension between the authorities’ desire to maintain order in the new colony and the perceived inadequacies of the colony’s carceral spaces for women. From almost the beginning of colonisation, authorities were concerned by the inadequacies of the gaols for women but it was not until 1888 that a dedicated prison was created to house female prisoners. A picture emerges of a colony which was often at a loss to know how to deal with its female prisoners. This article examines the manner in which authorities dealt with women sentenced to imprisonment, and transportation, in nineteenth-century Western Australia.