You want Australian Gothic? Goulburn has got it. This page should be read to Nick Cave's murder ballads.
In 1833 two criminals White and Mooney were still hanging from the gibbet on the corner of Faithfull and Bradley street, the old police station. Their bleached bones that had been hanging there for 3 years so horrified the sensitive wife of the Guv'nor, that she fainted and the Guv'nor ordered them taken down. She was of course of a Pom of the aristocratic classes.
Convictism started Goulburn, Convictism still supports Goulburn. Goulburn has the biggest, nastiest and meanest jail ( GAOL ) in Australia. The warders love to send the crims into the cell where the condemned men spent their last night, next to the still existing gallows. Apparently a night in the condemned cell is enough to send a crim insane. The warders will tell you this with a bit of a black chuckle.
Why is it that the all the crows gather in the morning round the watch towers, when there has been a suicide or murder in the cells that night? You can hear them caw and ark above the razor wire as you look from St. Saviours cemetery. Crows find the road kill and peck out the eyes first, so can they tell when someone dies, are they sensitive to the spiritual, are they hungry for a crim's eyes, or is it all non scientific garbage?
Personally idon't think Goulburn gives a flying phuq whether people visit or not, tour or not. Yes people enjoy their town, love it, i love it, but its about friends and family, not uber tourism. I tried creating an art gallery for tourists, because we have some great artists here and a great little art school at TAFE, but no one wanted to know except the locals who were loyal to me, and bought some great local art
I reckon we should dig up Bishop Mesac and crush his bones and sell tiny vials of Bishop boness off to the religous tourists as relics. Well the catholics did it centuries ago, good old fashioned capitalism.
Whaddya fink?
Stu
