Nundah Cemetery is a heritage-listed cemetery, in Nundah, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. Nundah Cemetery was built from the 1840s to 1963, and is also known as German Station Cemetery. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 21 October 1992.
The cemetery was established in 1846 by a small group of German Lutheran missionaries who, in 1838, had founded Queensland's first free settlement, at Zion's Hill above Kedron Brook. At that time, the district was known as "German Station", as the earliest settlers were Lutheran missionaries, and hence the cemetery was originally known as "German Station Cemetery". The district was originally outside of the town of Brisbane and was a farming community. At that time, the road beside the cemetery was known as "Cemetery Road". Only one death had been recorded at the German Station by 1845, but several children died the following year, and the cemetery is indicated on an 1846 sketch by missionary Carl Gerler.
As the German station settlement was established in 1838, it is unclear where the earliest burials in the settlement would have occurred. Certainly, the site had been established as a graveyard before James Warner first surveyed it as a cemetery reserve in 1862. None of the wooden crosses marking the earliest graves has survived, but the oldest headstone dates to March 1855.
Many of the pioneers of the Nundah district are buried in this cemetery. Although the German Station mission was wound down between 1844 and 1850, several of the missionary families remained in the area. From amongst these settlers the first trustees of the German Station Cemetery were appointed in 1866.
One of the duties of cemetery trustees was to maintain a record of the burials. However, the first recorded burial was in 1887 and it is believed the earlier records may have been lost in a flood. However, even after 1887, the records the trustees kept of burials were somewhat "sketchy" at times. The public can update the Nundah burial records by providing death certificates showing a burial at the Nundah Cemetery.
In 1914 a small shelter pavilion was erected at the cemetery. It was designed by architect John Henry Burley, who practised in Brisbane from 1886 until 1936. The builder was J MacDonald, and the structure cost £175.
In the 1930s, Brisbane City Council took over the management of the cemetery from the local trustees (by this time Nundah was within the boundaries of the City of Brisbane). In 1963 the cemetery was closed as no new grave sites were available.
In 1982 the Nundah Historic Cemetery Preservation Association was formed to help tend and restore the site.
Although the cemetery has no space for new gravesites, it is possible to place cremated ashes in existing family graves or in the columbarium walls. It is also possible for family members to be buried in existing graves which are not yet full. In 2011, the Brisbane City Council raised concerns about its ability to continue to provide new gravesites after another 10 or 15 years given that burial rights are perpetual in Queensland (in some other states of Australia, there is a fixed tenure). As a consequence, Brisbane City Council will now allow reuse of even full family graves in Nundah Cemetery where the last burial was over 30 years ago.
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