This book reveals stories from some of the smaller agencies for women and children that sprang up in and around Ballarat. Much less is known about these places, and still less is known about the stories of women and children who inhabited them, or those people who created and maintained them. Until now they have not been given the attention they warrant.

Dispersed across the city, some have been demolished and others repurposed as private residences or for commercial use. Refuge, Rescue and Reform: Voices of Suffering and Survival traces the stories of some of these institutions and the women and children who used them.