While indexing the Windsor & Richmond Gazette newspaper of 11 November 1907, we found the following article and thought it may be of interest to some on the list, especially those researching NOWLAND family. Best wishes, Rod & Wendy Gow Hallowed Ground A Neglected Cemetery There is probably no other place in Australia, if indeed in the whole world, where a graveyard is situated in the grounds of an hotel. This curious situation is to be seen at Tomerong, thirteen miles from Nowra. At the junction of the Jervis Bay and main South Coast roads stands the Commercial Hotel, and attached to its grounds, on the Bay road side, is Gods acre - the resting place of the early pioneers, and the property of the local publican. We dont want to write sorrow on the bosom of the earth, (says the Nowra Leader) but it struck us as being singularly incongruous that the plot of ground, which has been hallowed by the deposition there of the remains of those who lived and died nearly half a century ago, should be part and parcel of the hotel yard. It comes about this way - Mr. John Parnell, who was one of the first residents of Tomerong, conducted the local hotel, and owned the property upon which it is built. Years ago - probably 45 years - he gave the people of Tomerong part of the property - about an acre, a few paces from the building - as a public cemetery.No legal transfer of the land to any trust was ever made, and apparently none was ever asked for. Burials took place from time to time, and nobody ever thought of the necessity for getting the property handed over.. Bye and bye Mr. Parnell died without having conveyed the property to a trust, and when the estate came to be disposed of the local publican found that he had purchased the graveyard, probably the first and only public graveyard that has been sold in Australia. And this is the situation as it exists to-day. It is difficult to tell how many bodies have been interred in the ground, but there are standing nearly twenty fences, in a state of disrepair. and also a few headstones. Probably thirty or forty graves are absolutely beyond identification. In fact crops are being cultivated above the remains of many forgotten pioneers. And unless something is done by the people of Tomerong the fences will disappear one by one, and in a few short years not a record will remain of the good people who braved the vicissitudes of the earlier times. Mr. John Nowland, son of Mr. M. Nowland, of Mountain View, Richmond, recently purchased the estate which embraces the cemetery, so he is the owner of the only graveyard that has ever been sold in Australia. - (Editor of the Gazette)