Louisa's family request a tombstone

A terrific story from Liz Burke at new.com.au - Louisa's family are now fighting to get a headstone placed on her unmarked grave.

Louisa's great, great granddaughter, Janis Thompson, is quoted in the story, saying that Louisa is buried in a part of the Rookwood cemetery that is overgrown, and largely inaccessible:

Since being tracked down by author Caroline Overington, who has published the first full-length examination of the convicted murderess, (Ms Thompson) has become fascinated with Louisa’s story and has decided that she believes she was treated unfairly.

“We never knew anything about our family history prior to our grandmother and then to discover that Louisa, her grandmother, was notorious has been shocking but distressing when we find she is not commemorated in some way by a plaque or headstone at Rookwood,' she said.

As you can read in Last Woman Hanged, Louisa was executed at Darlinghurst Gaol, and her body was taken by train, as was then custom, to the large, public cemetery at Rookwood where she was buried - but nobody knows exactly where. The story goes on:

After five years of research, Ms Overington has come to the same conclusion as Louisa’s family (about the unfairness of Louisa's trials.)

“I’m not out on a limb here. Three juries of 36 men felt the same. It was only the jury at the fourth trial that finally found her guilty,” Ms Overington said.

“But of course, that was the only verdict that mattered, and the judge ordered her executed.”