Rosemary statue - stolen again!

In 2016, the delightful Rosemary statue installed in Victory Park, Ascot Vale, in honour of the enduring sacrifice made by women who cared for veterans of World War I, was cut off at the ankles. It was replaced a year later by the City of Moonee Valley. You can read our original story, here. 

However, we were informed on Monday, April 13, 2026 that Rosemary has just suffered the same fate again - cut off at the ankles and the statue stolen. This is a sad thing for the community, especially happening so close to ANZAC Day, when we remember all the victims of the First World War.

The 2017 replacement Rosemary statue

Image: City of Moonee Valley

Vanished Victoria is hopeful that the City of Moonee Valley will replace Rosemary again.

All that remains of Rosemary, April 2026.

Image courtesy of  Mick Slocum. 

Contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or submit a report online at www.crimestoppersvic.com.au, if you have any information on this act of vandalism.

Mick Slocum, Pillar Box Restorer

In a time when our heritage is vanishing on a daily basis, here is some good news. Mick Slocum, O.A.M., is slowly restoring the original cast iron pillar boxes around Victoria. The pillar boxes were designed and built in Melbourne from the 1850s and the early ones were painted green.

A Vanished Victoria team member was out for a stroll recently and they came across Mick working on the pillar box in Brighton Road, Elwood and heard his story. 

Mick, a former pharmacist and a musician (The Bushwhackers Band), started this project in April 2023 cleaning graffiti from a pillar box in Ascot Vale. After completing six boxes, Australia Post  approached him and  offered to commission him to restore all the 180 boxes in Victoria. Mick completed sixteen in Ballarat and won the National Trust Ballarat Heritage Award for his work. 

The Brighton Road box is his 78th restoration and Mick is to be congratulated and admired for his role in maintaining an every-day part of our heritage in such a practical manner. 

Mick working on the Brighton Road, Elwood pillar box, April 2026

Image: © VanishedVictoria

Mick working on the Brighton Road, Elwood pillar box, April 2026

Image: © VanishedVictoria

Mick working on the Brighton Road, Elwood pillar box, April 2026

Image: © VanishedVictoria

The following three joyous photographs were supplied to Vanished Victoria by Mick and
they are a celebration of his amazing work.

Brunswick Street, Fitzroy, February 2025

Image courtesy of Mick Slocum

The only pillar box left in Geelong, November 2025

Image courtesy of Mick Slocum

Kerferd Road, Middle Park, December 2025

Image courtesy of Mick Slocum

Three Memorial plaques stolen from Caulfield Park

Three plaques, of historic significance, were stolen from Caulfield Park on Good Friday (April 3, 2026). This report comes from the Facebook post of Robert Littlewood (1).

These war memorials were vandalised, removed and stolen on Good Friday: Just in time for ANZAC Day

Beer-Sheba Israel Memorial
The Beer-Sheba Israel Memorial features a plaque that faces Hawthorn Road. Unveiled on 25 April 1995, it commemorates the Light Horse Charge of Beer-Sheba in 1917, during World War I. This was the last triumphant cavalry charge in world history. (2)

The Beer-Sheba Israel Memorial, 2015

Image: https://dossier48.wordpress.com/2015/08/06/caulfield-park-memorials/

The Beer-Sheba Israel Memorial, April 2026

Image: https://www.facebook.com/robert.littlewood.39

Raoul Wallenberg Memorial Plaque
The Raoul Wallenberg Memorial Plaque commemorates the planting of a tree (directly behind the plaque) in honour of Raoul Wallenberg, a Swedish diplomat who saved 100,000 Jewish lives in Hungary during World War II.

Raoul Wallenberg Memorial Plaque, April 2026

Image: https://www.facebook.com/robert.littlewood.39

Memorial Stone
Adjacent to the new Lone Pine, the Memorial Stone lists the names of 298 people from the Caulfield district who died in World War I. In 2015, we moved the stone from near the rose garden to its current position on the site of the former conservatory, in front of the new Lone Pine.

The Caulfield World War One Memorial, 2015

Image: https://dossier48.wordpress.com/2015/08/06/caulfield-park-memorials/

The Caulfield World War One Memorial, April 2026

Image: https://www.facebook.com/robert.littlewood.39

Coming only a few weeks before ANZAC Day, this is an insult to the memory of those Australians who fought and died in the Great War and to the millions of Jewish people murdered in World War Two.  Even worse, it is likely they were just stolen for their scrap value.

Contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or submit a report online at www.crimestoppersvic.com.au, if you have any information on this atrocious act of vandalism. 

Footnotes

(1) Robert Littlewood's report is the first I can find on the incident. It was posted on his Facebook page  https://www.facebook.com/robert.littlewood.39 on 5/4/2026. However, his description of the monuments comes from the City of Glen Eira website here https://www.gleneira.vic.gov.au/our-city/history-and-heritage/our-monuments-and-sites/war-memorials

(2) The Beer-Sheba charge took place of October 31, 1917 and you can read more about it here 

https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/blog/the-charge-of-the-4th-light-horse-brigade-at-beersheba  There was a later Cavalry Charge  in World War One, at the Battle of Haifa on September 23, 1918, when Indian and British troops captured the city of Haifa from the Ottoman Army. You can read about this here https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/battle-of-haifa-1918-a-saga-of-indian-valour/

Sources

• Robert Littlewood Facebook https://www.facebook.com/robert.littlewood.39 
• Dossier 48 website - https://dossier48.wordpress.com/2015/08/06/caulfield-park-memorials/
• Channel 7 interview with Dvir Abramovich on the theft of the plaques - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEQJ5vCVcVM

Fallen Fruit Scuplture - twice vanished

The Herald Sun of April 2, 2026 reported on the Fallen Fruit sculpture, created by Adam Stone, which once graced the corner of Rose Street and Brunswick Street in Fitzroy.

The short article, written by Craig Dunlop, is reproduced here. The punny headline - was

Vandalised Sculpture still has ap-peal....and this time there will be no slip-ups

The City of Yarra has bought an $8000 miniature replica of a controversial sculpture of a carved banana that was almost beheaded in a vandalism attack in 2021. The new version of artist Adam Stone’s sculpture, Fallen Fruit, has been placed on display behind security glass outside the staff toilets on the top floor of the Fitzroy North Library.

A City of Yarra spokeswoman confirmed the sculpture was purchased with some of the proceeds from the insurance payout the council received when the original sculpture was vandalised on the corner of Rose and Brunswick streets in Fitzroy.

The original sculpture cost the council $22,000, and was funded by a TAC grant to “activate” the street. “Since the original artwork was vandalised and damaged, council has been working with the artist to find a way to re-imagine the artwork in a cost effective way,” the spokeswoman said.

“Unfortunately, the sculpture was damaged beyond repair when vandalised.” The spokeswoman said there were no plans to move the sculpture to a more prominent location.

The new sculpture is 60cm in height, and is described in a curator’s statement as celebrating the “creative character of the neighbourhood”. “Conceptually, the sculpture reflects on the excesses of Western hubris and late capitalism, where over consumption and greed foster imbalance and inequality,” the description says. “By enlarging the banana and transforming it into a weighty, art historically resonant object on a plinth, the outdoor sculpture became a surreal monument to our cultural fixation on performance, ambition and spectacle."

"Today, the smaller version of Fallen Fruit remains, preserving the story and history of the original while continuing to evoke the themes it first explored.”

The vandal who tried to behead the original has never been identified or brought to justice.

Original report

Vandalised Sculpture still has ap-peal....and this time there will be no slip-ups by Craig Dunlop

Herald-Sun, April 2, 2026, page 11.

This was an interesting sculpture that created much conversation, and it is a shame that it was destroyed by wanton vandalism. However, whilst Vanished Victoria understands why a full-scale replica was not created, the location of the replacement on the top floor of the North Fitzroy Library in St Georges Road, further north than the Edinburgh Gardens, seems a bizarre decision. If the original purpose of the sculpture was to "activate'' the street, then this new location fails to do this. If the only suitable location was indeed the North Fitzroy Library, surely it could have been installed at street level.

The Fallen Fruit sculpture has now vanished twice - once when then originally sculpture was vandalised and removed and now when the replacement was installed in an obscure location. 

Source: 

Dunlop, Craig Vandalised Sculpture still has ap-peal....and this time there will be no slip-ups 

Herald-Sun, April 2, 2026, page 11.

On-line version of this story (behind a paywall) https://www.heraldsun.com.au/leader/north/city-of-yarra-buys-8k-replica-of-vandalised-banana-sculpture-fallen-fruit/news-story/875a1135566c65f1fc9665518f275e81

Other references:

Reports of the original vandalism - 

Holsworth, Mark https://melbourneartcritic.wordpress.com/2021/11/27/attempted-banana-split/

Sun, Michael Dramatically vandalised’: publicly funded $22,000 banana splits opinion in Melbourne. The Guardian November 26, 2021  https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2021/nov/26/dramatically-vandalised-publicly-funded-22000-banana-splits-opinion-in-melbourne

Adam Stone website https://www.adam-stone.com.au/