A former Australian prison, Fremantle is now preserved as Western Australia’s only World Heritage-listed building. Visitors can still explore its cellblocks, perimeter walls, gallows, and and underground labyrinth of tunnels—once home to imperial convicts, colonial prisoners, enemy ‘aliens’, prisoners of war, and maximum-security detainees.
Although Western Australia began as a “free” colony, economic hardship led it to ask Britain to send prisoners, who then built the very prison meant to contain them. When transportation ended in 1868, Fremantle became a prison for locals. Intended for petty offenses, it soon housed inmates convicted of far more serious crimes.
The establishment was notoriously hard on its inmates, culminating in a riot in 1988. It was fueled in part by extreme heat and growing tensions among prisoners, but also as a cover for a planned escape. It closed in 1991, with inmates moved to a maximum-security facility located in Perth.
Today, it is one of the largest surviving convict prisons in the world. Visitors can walk the same halls as its inmates once did and learn the site’s history.