Heritage significance
Block 19, Bonegilla Migrant Centre is an important place with many heritage values. It is one of eight Victorian sites on the Australian National Heritage List. This list includes natural, historic and indigenous places that are of outstanding national heritage value to the Australian nation.
Block 19 provides valuable evidence and insights into post-war migration and refugee experiences. It is of heritage significance because it is a rare example of a post-war migration centre which retains considerable existing fabric. The buildings at Block 19 form a group of timber framed 'P' Series World War II army huts laid out symmetrically in a grid pattern, and used as migrant and staff housing, office accommodation, recreation and mess halls, kitchens and ablution blocks. The buildings illustrate the use of former war time army camps as migrant reception and training centres. The rudimentary barracks buildings demonstrate the basic conditions typical of migrant reception places. Other typical features included the separate accommodation of men from women and children, purpose built recreation halls and planting of native and exotic species in an attempt to 'civilise' the place. Block 19 retains a strong sense of what the migrant experience would have been like.
Bonegilla holds powerful connections for many people in Australia. It forms an important part of Australia's recent collective memory and symbolises the central role of Bonegilla in the peopling of Australia with migrants in the post-war years. It is estimated that there are now over 1.5 million descendents of migrants who spent time at Bonegilla. It represents the role of Australia as the 'host' nation.
For the migrants who spent time at the migrant reception and training centre and their descendants, Block 19, Bonegilla is important as their first home in Australia. For the broader Australian community, Bonegilla represents the arrival of the post-war migration which has transformed the nation economically, socially and culturally.
