Finding Records Website

The Department of Families, Fairness and Housing has updated the Finding records website helping people to find historical records.

The site allows people to search for their own or a family member’s personal

records of their time spent in a government or non-government institution.

They may hope to: 

• gain an understanding of their family circumstances

• fill in gaps in their history

• seek redress

• make more sense of their personal experience and identity.   

  
  

The website is an important resource for these searches.  The site has more than 200 guides from institutions, including: 

• orphanages

• foster care

• family or children’s homes

• disability institutions

• reception or youth training centres

• psychiatric facilities and hospitals.  

  
  

Each guide explains what records might exist from an institution.  Once a person has found relevant guides, they can then make a freedom of information request to the relevant Victorian department for the information.  

Visit the Finding records website for more information.