15/01/2026
In 1873, widespread public concern arose regarding the high rates of infanticide and child abandonment in Sydney. On 23 July 1873, the Sydney Morning Herald proclaimed that ‘Infanticide has now risen to an enormous and characteristic evil’, and concluded that ‘there is no way to meet desertion, which commonly includes infanticide, whether or not intended, but by providing a Foundling Asylum’.
Born from this public concern, about ‘forty ladies of Sydney’ met to discuss how there existed a gap in the existing charitable institutions of Sydney to meet the ‘special requirements of this child of immorality and distress – and hence, it might be inferred, the lamentable frequency of infanticide’.
From this initial meeting ‘The Sydney Foundling Institution’ was established in Darlinghurst in May 1874 as a secular refuge for abandoned babies and single mothers, run by a committee of women. The inaugural committee included President Mrs EB Parnell, Mrs Bensusan, Mrs. G.F Wise, Lady E Deas Thomson (pictured), Lady Murray, Mrs Henry Moore, Mrs Fischer, Mrs Alexander, Mrs Holt, Mrs John Smith and Mrs St. John.
In 1876 the organisaion moved to our present-day location of Ashfield and was renamed ‘The Infants’ Home’.
