Carnal knowledge was an offence under Sections 45-47 of Victoria’s Criminal Law and Practice Statute 1864. This act prescribed that carnal knowledge of a girl under the age of 10 was subject to capital punishment, or for an attempt up to 10 years imprisonment. Carnal knowledge of a girl between over the age of 10 and under the age of 12 was subject to up to 10 years imprisonment, or for an attempt up to 3 years.

The age of consent was raised to 16 under Victoria’s Crimes Act 1891, which specified that carnal knowledge on girls above the age of 10 and below the age of 16 years carried a prison term of up to 10 years. If the relationship was between a male teacher and female pupil, the sentence could be up to 15 years. This Act also made carnal knowledge of a daughter, step-daughter or other lineal descendant (child or adult) an offence punishable by up to life imprisonment, or for an attempt up to 10 years. Capital punishment was removed as a potential sentence for carnal knowledge of a girl under the age of 10 under Victoria’s Crimes Act 1958.

Sexual abuse of children has and continues to suffer from a significant ‘dark figure’ of unreported offences. One of the factors discouraging reporting and prosecution has been the tendency of blaming female victims – irrespective of age – for having ‘tempted’ men to commit offences against them. Historically, cases of carnal knowledge often only came to like after resulting in a pregnancy or birth of a child. An example of a case from 1944 is reported here.

Further information:

Allen, Judith A. Sex and Secrets: Crimes Involving Australian Women since 1880.  Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1990.

Bailey, Victor and Sheila Blackburn. “The punishment of Incest Act 1908: A case study of law creation,” Criminal Law Review (1979): 708-718.

Barber, Ross. “The Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1891 and the ‘Age of Consent’ Issue in Queensland.” Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology 10 (1977): 95-11.

Bavin-Mizzi, Jill. “Understandings of Justice: Australian Rape and Carnal Knowledge Cases, 1876-1924.” In Sex, Power and Justice: Historical Perspectives on Law in Australia, edited by Diane Kirkby, 19-32. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995.

Bavin-Mizzi, Jill. Ravished: Sexual Violence in Victorian Australia.  Sydney: University of New South Wales Press, 1995.

Featherstone, Lisa and Amanda Kaladelfos. Sex Crimes in the Fifties. Carlton, Vic., Melbourne University Press, 2016.

Featherstone, Lisa. “”Children in a Terrible State”: Understandings of Trauma and Child Sexual Assault in 1970s and 1980s Australia.” Journal of Australian Studies 42, no. 2 (2018): 164-76.

Kaladelfos, Andy. ‘Uncovering a Hidden Offence: Social and Legal Histories of Familial Sexual Abuse’. Gender Violence in Australia: Historical Perspectives, edited by Alana Piper and Ana Stevenson. Melbourne: Monash University Publishing, 2019. 63-77.

Kaladelfos, Amanda. ‘“Call All Male Offenders By Their Right Name”: Masculinity and the Age of Consent’. Melbourne Historical Journal, Special Issue No. 1 (2009): 1-19.

Kaladelfos, Andy, and Lisa Featherstone. ‘Race and Ethnicity in Sex Crimes Trials’. In Robert Mason ed. Legacies of Violence in Modern Australia. Berghahn Publishing, 2017, 217-232.

Kaladelfos, Andy, and Lisa Featherstone. ‘Sexual Assault by Teachers: Historical Legislative, Policy, and Prosecutorial Responses’. In Yorick Smaal, Andy Kaladelfos, and Mark Finnane eds. The Sexual Abuse of Children: Recognition and Redress. Clayton, Vic., Monash University Publishing, 2016, 20-34.

Smaal, Yorick, Andy Kaladelfos and Mark Finnane, ed. The Sexual Abuse of Children: Recognition and Redress (Melbourne: Monash University Publishing, 2016).

Smaal, Yorick. “Historical perspectives on child sexual abuse, part 1.” History Compass 11, no. 9 (2013): 702-714.

Smaal, Yorick. “Historical perspectives on child sexual abuse, part 2.” History Compass 11, no. 9 (2013): 715-726.

Smaal, Yorick. “Keeping it in the family: Prosecuting incest in colonial Queensland.” Journal of Australian Studies 37, no. 3 (2013): 316-332.

Westera, Nina, Sarah Zydervelt, Andy Kaladelfos, and Rachel Zajac. “Sexual Assault Complainants on the Stand: A Historical Comparison of Courtroom Questioning.” Psychology, Crime & Law 23, no. 1 (2017): 15-31.

Zajac, Rachel, Nina Westera, and Andy Kaladelfos. “A Historical Comparison of Australian Lawyers’ Strategies for Cross-Examining Child Sexual Abuse Complainants.” Child Abuse & Neglect 72 (2017): 236-46.

Zydervelt, Sarah, Rachel Zajac, Andy Kaladelfos and Nina Westera. “Lawyers’ Strategies for Cross-examining Rape Complainants: Have We Moved Beyond the 1950s?” British Journal of Criminology 57, no. 3 (2017): 551-569.