by Carla Caruso

Adelaide has been dubbed ‘the murder capital of Australia’, thanks to a few notorious crimes.

So, it’s fitting that the city is home to several ‘dark history’ walks and ghost tours.

As winter sets in, we thought it a good time to check out one such tour – at the West Terrace Cemetery in GS Kingston Park / Wirrarninthi (Park 23).

Called Mavericks, Madness and Murder Most Foul!, the tour has run since 2018 and is generally held every fortnight on a Friday. During the Adelaide Fringe and SA’s History Festival, the tour runs even more often.

We joined a group of about 30 history enthusiasts, weaving through the tombstones on June 10. It was a clear, moon-lit night, though participants were also given lanterns to help light the way.

The lanterns often flashed or changed colour to highlight the stories being told and re-enacted by performers.

Among the graves we stopped at, we learned about the tale of Colonel Light’s housekeeper, Maria Gandy. As the tour guide said: “The design of the city of Adelaide by Colonel William Light is unique in the world, being the only city surrounded by Park Lands.

“While he is celebrated for this work, his [personal] life is less well-known, including his controversial relationship with Maria Gandy.

“Maria lived with Light and was 25 years younger than him, but it was the fact he was already married to another woman that set tongues wagging in 1836.”

Light had, in fact, separated from his wife, Mary Bennet, in 1832 after she formed a relationship with another officer. Though Light and Bennet never divorced, he lived with Gandy for three short years. Unfortunately, during this time, his health deteriorated.

Gandy nursed him in his final days “as what light was in him faded” care of tuberculosis. Light’s estate was left to Gandy and she unexpectedly found love again with the new colony surgeon, Dr George Mayo.

After giving birth to four children, however, Gandy died at just 36. “Some might say this was my penance for the choices I made living with William,” a performer, acting as her on the night, said.

Did you know Light was given the unique honour of being buried beneath a memorial in the city’s Light Square / Wauwi?

Tour-goers also learned about the site, which once housed the grave of the mysterious ‘Somerton Man’ (Advertiser subscriber link). His remains were exhumed by police for DNA testing last May. The unidentified man was found dead on Somerton Park Beach in 1948 and the case remains unsolved.

Public interest continues for several reasons: the death occurred at the time of heightened international tension following the Cold War, the apparent involvement of a secret code (as per the below pic), the possible use of an undetectable poison, and the inability of authorities to identify the dead man.  

The coroner wrote the autopsy was inconclusive, there was no indication of violence, and he was compelled to the finding that the death was the result of poison. Investigations continue…

On the cemetery tour itself, it’s scooped many awards, with its unique sound and light effects, and is well worth a gander - if you dare!