Rookwood Station

Reading the funeral notices for family members who died in Sydney, reference is often made to the train leaving for Rookwood at a particular time. On Facebook,  Lost Sydney has posted a photograph of the mortuary train at the station at Rookwood Cemetery.

Another photograph posted on the site provides a glimpse inside the station showing the pillars, arched roof and decorations.

Rookwood Cemetery was established in the 1840s and with the development of the railways a mortuary station was built at Redfern with the receiving station at the cemetery. Find My Past has a brief history of the cemetery and the station in its grounds. The railway line into the cemetery was closed in 1948 and the receiving house building was then dismantled and reassembled in Canberra as All Saints Church, Ainslie.

When the church was reassembled the tower is on the other side.

View inside the church showing the pillars and arched roof.

Details showing the angels that were at the entrance of the receiving house at Rookwood.

The Society of Australian Genealogists has indexed the gravesites within the Rookwood Cemetery and the records are available via Find My Past.