Springthorpe Memorial

Annie Springthorpe was born on the 26th of January 1867, married on the 26th of January 1887 and then died on the 26th of January 1897. So records the monumental Springthorpe memorial at Kew Cemetery, erected by Annie's grieving husband following her death ten years into their short-lived marriage.

Dr. John Springthorpe was professionally accomplished and utterly devoted to his young wife before her passing. The couple lived on the so-called 'Paris End' of Collins Street, a fashionable area still in the 19th Century. When the birth of their fourth child took Annie away from him, the doctor was so wracked with grief that he sent the children to live with relatives.

He poured his feelings into writing and created a precursor to this memorial in the home they had lived in together. He filled it with paintings and mementos of their love, even going so far as to leave the blood on the bedsheet, where she had lost too much of it.

The Springthorpe Memorial was the apotheosis of this impulse, and took ten years to complete. It is a sprawling and hauntingly beautiful grave that reflects the immense love that inspired it. Annie is rendered in marble lying on a sarcophagus with disconsolate angels weeping over her body. Her birth, marriage and death are all recorded (the date just happens to be Invasion Day aka Australia Day) as well as passages from the Romantic poets testifying to how much she was loved.

The monument has a miniature wall ringing it with quaint gates, reflecting the Gothic / Greek Revival style. Most dramatically, there is a canopy of stained glass that on sunny days casts the entire thing in blood red light.