Members of the Werribee Family History Group began this project in May 1996 with the intention of preserving the full text inscriptions of all existing monuments contained within Werribee and Truganina Cemeteries. The project came about because of the existence of incomplete Burial Registers for these two cemeteries and the idea to provide a similar tool that many of us have used for other cemeteries.

Truganina Cemetery was the first to be transcribed because of the small number of headstones remaining. It was thought also that being small, it would be a good training ground to "iron out" any problems. This enabled us to devise protocols for gathering inscriptions, drawing up of maps and setting up the computer databases.

On the completion of Truganina Cemetery we then moved onto Werribee Cemetery with its large range of monuments. The inital inscriptions took about six months to complete with subsequent verification procedures for errors. It was around this time that our co-ordinator began checking discrepencies with the local Council who were Trustees of both Werribee and Truganina Cemeteries. Through this we adopted the plot numbering system of the Council to make it easier with our queries.

Rothwell Cemetery at Little River was the third cemetery to be transcribed. This cemetery was added because of the large amount of "cross over" in families between Werribee and Little River.

The cut off date for the collection of inscriptions was on December 31, 1999. Final verification procedures will be done to make sure that we have as much information in the database as possible. The group has also undertaken photographing of the headstones to include in the publication of a CD-ROM. The CD-ROM will be in web page format with each entry having a photograph, inscription and maps. We are unsure as to when this will be available for purchase as yet.

As well as the transcriptions we have also produced indexes for the three cemeteries which are available for searching on this web site. These include codes as to what other information we have gathered from the headstones and where we have obtained any extra information from.

The Group would like to hear from people who have relatives buried in any of the three cemeteries. We are trying to gather information from family members so that our information on people buried in the cemeteries is as complete as possible. Also if relatives know of people buried in the cemeteries that are not memorialised in some way, we would be glad to include their details if we can be shown some proof of internment. i.e. Death certificates, Memorial cards, Newspaper cuttings, etc. Please indicate with your query if you would be willing to have your personal contact details passed onto other people researching the same names. We can be contacted on our email.