Quote this number to access your records: Public Record Office Victoria registration number, VPRS 17820/P0001
These records are held by Public Record Office Victoria (1973 - current).
Labour Ward Case Books and Registers is an archival series held by the Department of Health and Human Services. These records were transferred from the Salvation Army to the Victorian government at some point following the closure of The Haven.
Open Access – Records older than 99 years are open and digitised copies of the books have been published by PROV and are available via the link on this page.
Restricted Access – Records containing personal or private information about children are closed to public access for a period of 99 years. Care Leavers (and their families) can apply for access to records via the Care Leaver Records Service.
The Labour Ward Case Books record details of mothers who gave birth to a child at The Haven between 1916 and 1967. The Registers include the name of mother, marital status, age, time and date of labour, presentation of the infant (e.g.: breech, vertex), the date the child was born, sex, delivery (e.g.: normal, forceps), weight at birth, date of discharge, progress after labour and antenatal and postnatal clinical details.
Records in the Labour Ward Case Books end in 1967, when the hospital section of The Haven closed. After 1967, mothers at The Haven were taken to the Royal Women’s Hospital to have their babies.
Entries are arranged in chronological order by date of admission and by a registration number allocated to each new admission. To locate an entry, it is necessary to know a person’s birth date.
There are 6 volumes of records dating from 1916 to 1967. There are no records for the period from May 1922 to December 1927. The whereabouts of the register for this period is not known.