Success Prison Hulk: prison profile
VIC | Decommissioned | Australian Prison Directory
Source-linked profile checked 2026-11-12. Dates and capacities below describe the stated source period, not necessarily today’s available beds or prisoner population.
About this facility
Former trading and immigrant vessel used as a floating prison by Victoria, with its public-prison proclamation dated June 1853. National Archives describes prison service through 1859 and subsequent reformatory and explosives roles. Its legal prison designation was revoked in February 1869. The later travelling exhibition falsely promoted it as an original convict transport; that exhibition history is not an additional Australian prison.
Classification: Historical floating public prison; not a modern security-classified land facility
One record per named vessel. Shared anchorages, relocations, later non-penal use and the collective “Victorian prison hulks” are not additional facilities.
Contact details
Address: Historic moorings north of the lighthouse at Point Gellibrand, Williamstown, Hobsons Bay VIC; no current Australian prison street address
No current dedicated contact verified.
No operating prison or dedicated visitor contact; historical vessel moorings are not present-day prison addresses.
1859 marks the prison-service period in the National Archives account; 1869 is the directly verified legal discontinuation. Do not advertise continuous adult-prison operation throughout that interval, or use later museum destruction as closure.
Opening, closure and history
Opening: 1853-06-27 — Proclaimed a public prison at the Gellibrand’s Point mooring
Closing: 1869-02-11 — Public-prison designation formally revoked; gazetted 19 February
1859: End of the floating-prison service period given by National Archives; later institutional uses distinguished
Capacity
Capacity has not yet been independently verified.
Deaths in custody: totals and limitations
No complete facility-level series is established here for suicide, medical or natural causes, homicide, other causes, Aboriginal deaths or combined Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander deaths. Missing data does not mean zero deaths. Selected cases below, where available, are not lifetime or reporting-period totals. “Murder” is a legal conclusion and is not substituted for a source’s classification.
Photograph
No verified licensed photograph is installed in this profile. No stock or generated image is presented as a photograph of this prison.
Sources
Using this profile
Confirm visiting arrangements and current contacts with the corrections department or heritage operator. Heritage visitor contacts are not operational prison contacts. General information only, not legal advice.
This directory includes prison complexes and components and is not a complete Australian operational or historical census. Component capacities must not be added to their parent complex a second time.
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