Channel Seven
Five decades on after Victorian schoolgirl Eloise Worledge vanished from her home, her family’s heartbreak remains raw.
Victoria Police has announced a $1 million reward for information that could finally bring answers to one of Australia’s most haunting cold cases – an increase from the original $10,000 reward offered in 1976, and the maximum amount permitted for a missing person in Australia.
The reward is currently the only one of its kind in Victoria, as it applies not only to information that leads to the identification of those responsible, but also to information that could help recover Eloise’s remains.
Eight-year-old Eloise was the eldest daughter of Lindsay and Patsy Worledge, and sister to Anna and Blake. She was affectionately known as ‘Ella’.
Was Eloise Worledge ever found?
On the night of January 12, 1976, Eloise went to bed as usual at the family’s home on Scott Street in Beaumaris, VIC. By morning, she was gone.
The flyscreen on her bedroom window had been cut and rolled open, yet nothing else in the house appeared disturbed.
She has never been seen or heard from since and police presume her to be deceased.
Described as a quiet, intelligent child who would not have left home voluntarily, Eloise’s disappearance was treated as suspicious from the outset.
Police launched one of the largest missing-person search operations in Victoria’s history, deploying more than 250 officers over 18 days, canvassing more than 6000 properties, parks, reserves, vacant homes and the Beaumaris foreshore. No trace of her was ever found.
Over the decades, detectives interviewed thousands of people, followed countless leads and reviewed the case multiple times.
What happened to Patsy Worledge?
A 2003 coronial inquest returned an open finding, unable to determine what happened to little Eloise.
Patsy spoke candidly about the moment she realised her daughter was missing.
In an ABC report, she recalled a detective saying he could not believe she hadn’t noticed the “gaping hole” in the window.
“The gaping hole to me was that she wasn’t in her bed,” Patsy told the detective, overwhelmed by the emptiness Eloise’s absence left behind.
Just weeks after Eloise vanished, Patsy told our sister publication The Australian Women’s Weekly: “My main fear is that people will forget. If they do, Ella might never be found.”
Lindsay and Patsy, who both passed away without ever knowing what happened to their daughter, spent their lives carrying the weight of unanswered grief.
In a January 2026 statement, surviving family reflected on how the disappearance of their beloved Eloise had left their lives changed forever.
“Memories of waking up to find her missing are still very vivid and raw, and the passage of time has not eased the pain of this loss,” they said.
“Ella was and remains deeply loved. She was more than a missing person or a case file – she was a daughter, a sister, a friend, someone who mattered greatly to all who knew her.”
