Army of Northern Virginia Flag Silk Issue 1st. Edition
Bernard Cunningham was born in Ireland and after migrating to the United States enlisted on September 24, 1861 at Richmond, Virginia as a private into the Confederate Army;  in Co. H of the 57th Virginia.

The 57th Infantry Regiment was organized in September, 1861, by adding five independent companies to the five companies of E.F. Keen's Battalion.

Some of the men were from Powhatan, Pittsylvania, and Botetourt counties. The unit was assigned to General Armistead's, Barton's, and Steuart's Brigade, Army of Northern Virginia.   Cunningham was only in the army for two months when he deserted on December 5, 1861; camp life being too much for him and he never saw action.

His unit went on to participate in many conflicts from the Seven Days' Battles to Gettysburg, served in North Carolina, then saw action at Drewry's Bluff and Cold Harbour.   The 57th continued the fight in the Petersburg trenches north of the James River and around Appomattox. It reported 113 casualties at Malvern Hill and lost more than sixty percent of the 476 engaged at Gettysburg.
There were 7 killed, 31 wounded, and 3 missing at Drewry's Bluff, and many were disabled at Sayler's Creek. On April 9, 1865, the unit surrendered 7 officers and 74 men. Its commanders were Colonels Lewis A. Armistead, George W. Carr, David Dyer, Clement R. Fontaine, Elisha F. Keen, and John B. Magruder; Lieutenant Colonels Waddy T. James, William H. Ramsey, and Benjamin H. Wade; and Majors Garland B. Hanes, David P. Heckman, and Andrew J. Smith.
         

Kilmore, Victoria
 
At aged 21 or 23 Cunningham arrived in Australia aboard either the “Southern Ocean”, or the “Bucton Castle” in 1868. Shortly after his arrival in Australia, Bernard was said to have been hung at Kilmore, Victoria; dieing on March 23, 1868/4263, at the age of 28. Other sources, however, reveal that all hangings in that area were done at the Old Melbourne Goal. Cunningham was convicted for the murder of a workmate, 60 year old John Fairweather, a farm laborer at Keilor, on December 23, 1867. Cunningham beat his victim to death for the sum of one pound, all the money that Fairweather possessed. The body was then thrown into a creek and two days later Cunningham confessed to the killing. Cunningham was resigned to his sentence and mounted the gallows trap calmly, attended by the Rev. Dr Bleasdale and Rev. Father Lordan. Cunningham; and was hanged alongside Joseph Whelan. In the Index to “The Argus” for 1868, under the heading Homicide, there are 15 entries between January 13th  and April 1st  relating to Cunningham's murder of Fairweather.
 

The landing on the first level where prisoners were hung. As a prisoner was hung, the trapdoor would open and his body

would drop through and hang in the main coridoor.
The gaol was a relatively small and narrow building with cells either side on three levels.   The upper levels have timber floors and iron rails.   Interestingly, the hangings took place on the first landing, where a trap door was cut into the floor.

That became the hangman's box.   When the prisoner was hung and his body dropped through the trapdoor, he would have dropped down into the main ground-floor corridor of the gaol.

On  March 31, 1868 The Argus, a Melbourne newspaper, reported that:-

"The two condemned men, Cunningham and Whelan, have, it is understood, under the almost unceasing attention of the clergymen attending them, been brought to a  sense of their awful situation.  The execution is arranged to take place this morning at the usual hour, and strictly under the Private Executions Act."

On April 1, 1868 The Argus reported that Bernard Cunningham was hanged "yesterday" in the Central Melbourne Gaol.  It describes his crime of beating to death a fellow worker, 60 year old John Fairweather, and then confessing two days later.  He was reported to have been twenty-seven years old at the time and had been in the “Colony” for about eight months.

 

It stated that...  "He (Cunningham) was a native of Newry, Ireland, had served in the Confederate army, was present at the siege of Richmond, and had also been a seafaring man.." While I have been unable to locate accurate information regarding Bernard Cunningham's burial, information from Trevor Poultney's publication, “Old Melbourne Gaol : hangmen, hunger and hard labour”  (Melbourne : Old Melbourne Gaol, c2003.  p. 27) under the heading, "After a hanging," it appears to contradict what has been generally accepted, that Cunningham, being a stranger and a criminal, would have been buried in the “Strangers Section” of the old Kilmore cemetery; without a headstone.   Much like boot-hill in the old west; and that only those from a hospital were buried with headstones in the “Hospital Section”.

  
 

Goal Cellblocks

Trevor Poultney's publication states;

"Once the autopsy and death mask were completed, the executed criminal's body would be buried, covered in quicklime, in the goal yard.  After the passing of the Crimes Act in 1865, all executed prisoners had to be buried in the grounds of the prison in which they were last locked up."

Death masks were made of each hung prisoner and were used in the “science” of phrenology; or the study of the skull, in an attempt at that time to predict criminal behaviour.
 
So it appears the story of Bernard Cunningham, and his gravesite, ends with his burial within the grounds of the Old Melbourne Goal.
 
     

Old Melbourne Goal today
 

“Executions in the Colony and State of Victoria”, Trevor J. Porter, , ISBN 0947249559

 John Waghorn

 Kerri Hall, State Library of Victoria

Pauline Hitchens, National Trust of Australia, Victoria

 Mike Everhart, 54th. Virginia

 National Archives, Microfilm number M382 roll 14

 Paul Livingston, Senior Reference Librarian, National Library of Australia

 Raymond Fagg, Kilmore Cemetery

 “Old Melbourne Gaol : hangmen, hunger and hard labour”, Trevor Poultney, 2003