Situated 18 kilometres off Fremantle Wadjemup was occupied for up to 30,000 thousand of years by the Noongar people of the South-west prior to being separated from the mainland by the rising sea around 7000 years ago. Wadjemup has a significant spiritual quality that has been handed down from one generation to the next. 
 

In 1696 Dutch sailor Willem de Vlamingh named the island 't Eylandt 't Rottenest ("Rats' Nest Island") after he mistook the quokkas on the island for giant rats.

Unoccupied at the time of the colonisation in 1829 Wadjemup was the ideal location to incarcerate and rehabilitate a growing number of Aboriginal people deemed to be a threat by settler society.  It was acknowledged at the time that the methods of incarceration being used were deemed to be inadequate.

The original intent for establishing a prison at Wadjemup was that it “offered many advantages both as a place of detention and affording a greater degree of personal liberty”. 

From 1838 through to 1931 over 3500 Aboriginal men and one Aboriginal woman were imprisoned there. Over the course of its existence the island was also a place of incarceration of non-Aboriginal prisoners, juveniles within a Reformatory (1880-1902) and 1300 German, Serbs and Croatian internees who were held there for a short time during World War 1 (1914-1916).

"An Act to constitute the Island of Rottnest a Legal Prison", 1841.

At the turn of the 20th century there were 50 Aboriginal prisoners on Wadjemup, 130 less than were on the island seven years earlier.   By May 1903 this number had dwindled to 21 with a further eight transferred to work in government offices such as police and telegraph stations across the state until they completed their sentences.  

In June 1904 the prison was reclassified as a penal settlement becoming an annex of Fremantle Gaol both for Aboriginal and good conduct non-Aboriginal prisoners.  By the end of the decade moves were being planned for the removal of all non-Aboriginal prisoners to the mainland.  This did not occur and they continued to remain at the prison until it closed.  

Throughout the history of the prison the Aboriginal inmates were assigned to more basic tasks such as wood chopping, carting water and sanitary requirements. The non-Aboriginal prisoners attending to the more sophisticated tasks.  This system remained unchanged until the close of the prison in 1931.  

From 1922 onwards there were less than a dozen Aboriginal prisoners on Wadjemup at any given time. In December each year, with the beginning of the tourist season, they were transferred back to Fremantle and then returned to the island six months later.  

Though still confined to their huts at night their daily existence was vastly different to that endured prisoners in the preceding 60 years.  By December 1931 there were only five remaining Aboriginal prisoners at Wadjemup. Four departed on 3 December and the last prisoner a week later. 

During its lifespan Rottnest Prison reformed from a draconian establishment where around 400 Aboriginal men died and were buried prior to the turn of the century, to a more accepting institution very much aligned to the original intent from 1900 to 1931.