Morning Star Boys' Home

The Morning Star Boys’ Home in Mount Eliza (Mornington ) was established in 1932, and run by the Franciscan Brothers. It was a training centre for young offending boys. Morning Star ceased operation in September 1975.

In 1932, the Archbishop of Melbourne received a bequest, part of the purpose of which was ‘to found a farm to train delinquent or orphan boys to country life’. The legacy was given to the St Vincent de Paul Society of Victoria which used it to acquire a property on the Mornington Peninsula.

The Franciscan Friars entered into an agreement with the St Vincent de Paul Society, to provide educational, correctional and residential care services at Morning Star. The Society retained control and ownership of the property and its finances, and was responsible for its maintenance. Later, the Society returned the property to the Archdiocese, with which the Franciscans continued the original agreement.

Research conducted by the Care Leavers Australia Network (CLAN) in 2012 into the Victorian Police Gazettes indicated a high rate of absconding from Morning Star. Members of CLAN gave evidence to the Victorian Inquiry into handling of child abuse by religious and other organisations in December 2012. Leonie Sheedy, presenting the findings of the research into absconding, said: ‘Thousands of children absconded from homes as their only way of getting away from abusers.’ In February 2013, the Inquiry heard allegations of widespread abuse of children at Morning Star.

Former residents of Morning Star recall harsh physical labour, such as ploughing, digging, breaking rocks and sorting through ex-army boots to see if they could be repaired. Submissions to inquiries contain accounts of physical and sexual abuse, by the friars and by other residents. One man described the typical day at Morning Star in the late 1940s:

Out of bed 7.30am, morning prayers, breakfast, weeties, toast with jam, cup of tea. After breakfast, made your bed, swept whatever, quade, rec-room, big dorm, etc. 9.00am to work, 10.00am smoko, 10.30 back to work, 11.45 knock off for lunch. Midday lunch sometimes sandwiches, mostly a hot meal. 1.00pm back to work, 3.00pm smoko, 3.30pm back to work, 5.00pm knock-off. 6.00pm tea, mashed potatoes with fish paste (3 times a week), 2 slices of bread and jam, cup of tea and junket. 6.30pm finish tea, then locked in the quade until bed time, about 7.30pm, prayers in the big dorm, then to the cells to get undressed for showers, have a shower, then back to the cell for lock-in for the night by 8.00, 8.10pm. Iron gates to top and bottom corridors locked.

Could not get out of the cell at all, glass in the opening in the door. Clean laundry once a week on Saturday night, wore the same clothes all week. Winter, long pants, shirt, pullover, karki jacket. Summer, shorts, shirt, 1 pair of socks which you had to wash, and try to dry the on the hot water pipes, in the hot box beneath the stairs, in front of the shower block. No underwear or PJs in winter, wore clothes to bed (D. Suckling submission, 2012).

From 1945 until around 1960, older boys leaving Morning Star to work in the city went to stay at Padua Hall, a hostel in Kew also run by the Franciscan Friars.

The closure of Morning Star in 1975 placed further strain on government-run services for youth, particularly at Turana and Malmsbury.

In 2002, the former dormitory wing became part of a boutique ‘country house’ hotel.