Dictionary of Sydney

The Dictionary of Sydney was archived in 2021.

Cemetery Station No. 1 Rookwood

A railway station terminus at Rookwood Cemetery, also known as the Necropolis Receiving Station, which served the cemetery's railway line. It was part of a larger line completed in 1869 that ran to the Woronora General Cemetery in Sutherland and to Sandgate Cemetery in Newcastle. James Barnet adopted elements of 13th-century Venetian Gothic style and the station included wide platforms, a ticket office, two vestibules, retiring rooms and a carriage port. After the station closed, it was dismantled and moved to Canberra where it is now All Saints Church.

Milestone
Opened
01 Apr 1867
Demolished
1948 - 1957
Closed
29 Dec 1948
Name
Alternate
No. 1 Mortuary Receiving Railway Station
Alternate
Haslams Creek Cemetery Station
1867 - 1872
Alternate
Necropolis Station
1872
Alternate
Mortuary Terminus
1872 - 1897
Alternate
Mortuary General Cemetery
1897 - 1908
Property
Part of
1867 - 1957
Type

Funeral trains

CC BY-SA 2.0
,
2016

By the 1840s, Sydney's Devonshire Street cemetery was nearing capacity so planning commenced for a new cemetery at Haslems Creek. From 1867 through to 1948, a branch from the Parramatta to Sydney line brought mourners and coffins into the Rookwood Necropolis, with grand sandstone mortuary stations at both ends.