St John's Cemetery

 

St John’s Cemetery, the oldest existing European burial ground in Australia, was established on the southern outskirts of the Rose Hill settlement in 1790.

 

There were ten burials in the cemetery by the end of 1790 and a further 67 in 1791. The death of Henry Edward Dodd, 28.1.1791, approximately one year after the first burial in the cemetery, has given Parramatta two important firsts. Dodd was Superintendent of convicts employed in cultivation at Rose Hill and his was the first public funeral in the colony. His headstone is the earliest in situ in Australia. It was an indication of the esteem in which Henry Dodd was held that when the colony was facing famine, a headstone was provided. It simply inscribed, H. E. Dodd 1791.

 

The site is outstanding as a place of cultural heritage and a true pioneer cemetery. Many early landholders, whose names reflect local suburbs, are buried here. D’Arcy Wentworth of Wentworthville, John Harris of Harris Park, several members of the Blaxland family, Mary Kelly of Kellyville, Mary Pymble of Pymble and John Thorn of Thornleigh are a small selection.

 

St John’s Cemetery is a resting place for Reverend Samuel Marsden, Chief Cleric of the colony, Minister at St Johns Cathedral for almost 50 years, Robert Campbell of Campbell’s Wharf and Duntroon, noted as the father of Australian commerce, two Governor’s wives, Mrs Elizabeth Bourke and Lady Mary Fitzroy, two Assistant Commissaries John Palmer and Thomas Freeman, many pioneer missionaries and marked graves of those who arrived on the first fleet.

 

The cemetery is entered through a lych-gate in O'Connell Street Parramatta (opposite Aird Street). The cemetery is the oldest existing European burial ground in Australia. It is enclosed by a brick wall that dates to 1820.

 

The remarkable cemetery wall with many of its bricks stamped with government arrows was built by public subscription in the 1820s. It replaced the 1811 bank and ditch enclosure while the lychgate is a modern copy of James Houison’s entry gate. In colonial times, bodies from the convict hospital were carried to their graves by the chain gang, contrasting sharply with elaborate funerals of the hierarchy of the colony.

 

In the 1930's the cemetery records were destroyed by fire.

WW1 - Private Roland Walter Lofts

Roland Walter Lofts was born on 11^th November 1898 in Parramatta. He is son of Edwin Arthur and Fanny E Lofts of Harris Street, Granville. .  Ronald was a draughtsman before enlisting at the age of 18. He was enlisted on 17^th October 1917. His service number is 4861. He sailed for the front on 19th December 1917 travelling to England via Egypt, Italy and France. After undergoing a period of training in England he went over to France in July and was with his Battalion, the 4th Pioneers, near. Amiens. His parents received word from the military authorities that he had on 8th September severely fractured his ankle. Writing from the Kitchener Hospital, Brighton, Private Lofts informed his people that ‘he was making a good recovery and hoped to be back in France before long'. He served in France and came back to Australia on 5^th February 1919.

WW1 - Robert Charles Jackson

 

Private Robert Jackson was enlisted on 12 September 1916. He was 23 year old assayer and was living with his father, W.G.Jackson at "Rutland", Windsor Rd, Northmead. He embarked 8 November, 1916 at Sydney on S.S. 'Port Nicholson. He served in France in 2 Infantry Battalion and 13-23 Reinforcements. His service number was 6764.  He was wounded twice in France once with a shrapnel wound to the face and later right foot amputated.

St John’s Anglican Cathedral

 

1803 - St John’s Anglican Cathedral is the oldest place of worship in Australia. It was opened on 11^th April 1803. 

1818 - The twin towers which stand today were constructed under the supervision of Lieutenant John Watt in 1818, making them the oldest surviving part of any Anglican Church in Australia. They are built from handmade sandstock bricks, possibly by convicts, and overlaid with a stucco render giving the appearance of stone. The choice of design is attributed to Elizabeth Macquarie, the wife of Governor Lachlan Macquarie, who was inspired by a ruined church in Reculver, Kent in England.

1821 - St John’s Anglican Cathedral’s clock was built by the London Clock making Company Thwaites and Reed of Clerkenwell and installed in the northern Tower in 1821 

1850s - The church building of the early 1800s, except the towers, was demolished in the early 1850s after a severe storm and subsequent deterioration meant that the building was no longer fit for use.

1862 – The pipe organ was brought from England in 1862 and installed in the Western Gallery in 1863.

1882 - The new building was opened in 1855 and by 1882; the church family had expanded so much that the building needed to be enlarged. The well-known architect firm of Blacket and Son was commissioned to design transepts which completed the building as it is seen today.

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Jennie Lee

Jennie Lee, the daughter of James Lee a miner, was born in Lochgelly, Fife, on 3rd November, 1904.

When Jennie was three years old James and Euphemia were persuaded to take over the management of a hotel and theatre in Cowdenbeath, that had formerly being run by Jennie's grandmother. Trade was affected by the fact that it was a Temperance Hotel and did not sell alcohol.

In 1912 James Lee decided to give up the hotel and once again became a miner. Jennie became a regular visitor to Mr. Garvie's Bookshop in Cowdenbeath. Garvie was blind and used to read to him from his favourite book, A History of the Working Classes. Another family friend, Jim Beveridge, lent Jennie a copy of the Ragged Trousered Philanthropist by Robert Tressell. Jennie Lee was also very fond of the Happy Prince by Oscar Wilde.

James Lee was chairman of the local branch of the Independent Labour Party. Jennie accompanied her father to these meetings and heard several leading socialists including James Maxton and David Kirkwood. Lee like most members of the ILP was opposed to Britain's involvement in the First World War. In the newspapers she read about Aneurin Bevan, a nineteen year old miner from South Wales, who refused to take part in the war. Bevan, who was later to marry Jennie Lee, told the local magistrates: "I am not and never have been a conscientious objector. I will fight, but I will choose my own enemy and my own battlefield and I won't have you do it for me."

As a fourteen year old schoolgirl, Jennie remembered the excitement of her father and friends when they heard news of the Russian Revolution. After the war James Lee was one of the leaders of the Hands off Russia movement that attempted to counterbalance the campaign led by Winston Churchill to invade Russia.

Jennie wanted to go to university but her parents were unable to afford the fees. However, with support from the Carnegie Trust, who agreed to pay half her fees and the Fife Education Authority, who awarded her a grant of £45 a year, she was able to become a student at Edinburgh University.

At university Jennie joined the Labour Club, the University Women's Union and the editorial board of the Rebel Student. One of Jennie's first campaigns was to have Bertrand Russell elected as Rector of the university. Russell a pacifist and campaigner for women's rights was a popular figure with university students at that time. During the First World War Russell was sacked from his post as a lecturer at Cambridge University and imprisoned for his involvement with the No-Conscription Fellowship (NCF), an organisation that encouraged men to refuse war service.

Jennie was a great reader and favourite authors at university included H. N. Brailsford, Bertrand Russell, H. G. Wells and Olive Schreiner. It was while at university in Edinburgh that Jennie gained her first experience of public speaking. Jennie could often be found on the Mound in Princess Street making speeches on Socialism and votes for women on the same terms as men. Jennie also attended weekend schools organised by the National Council of Labour Colleges where she met Ellen Wilkinson for the first time.

During the General Strike Jennie returned home to give support to the miners. She had just won a MacLaren Bursary, which she was able to hand over to her family struggling on her father's strike pay. When the strike was over James Lee, like many union activists, was sacked, blacklisted and after four months unemployment was forced to take work as a manual labourer.

Jennie's political work did not interfere with her studies and she left University of Edinburgh with a degree in education and law. She taught at her school in Cowdenbeath but after an impressive speech at the 1927 National Conference of the Independent Labour Party, Jennie was invited to become the ILP candidate for North Lanark.

Jennie Lee was elected to Parliament at a by-election in February 1929 when she turned a 2,028 Conservative majority into a Labour majority of 6,578. At twenty-four she was the youngest member of the House of Commons. The Labour leadership selected Margaret Bondfield and the Chief Whip, Tom Kennedy, to introduce Jennie into Parliament. Jennie rejected the idea and insisted that two old friends from Scotland, Robert Smillie and James Maxton, should be her sponsors. This was the first of many conflicts that she was to have with the leadership of the party over the next few years.

Jennie's first speech in the House of Commons was a fierce attack on Winston Churchill and his budget proposals. Afterwards she congratulated Jennie on her speech and told her that he also wanted to help the poor but she had to understand that: "The richer the rich became, the more able they would be to help the poor".

In the House of Commons Jennie's closest friend was Frank Wise, one of the leaders of the Independent Labour Party. Wise was married and although he considered the possibility of divorce, they eventually decided against it. As she pointed out in a letter to Wise: "I feel that divorce and marriage would do both of us immense harm. Certainly public non-Catholic opinion is becoming more tolerant about divorce, but in triangles where all three parties are fairly equal as to age and other matters. The situation where a man has lived with one woman for twenty years, and becomes attached to another woman about twenty years younger, is too many unpleasant types, to be lightly accepted."

Another close friend was Aneurin Bevan, who represented Ebbw Vale in South Wales. Jennie was particularly impressed with Bevan's attack on David Lloyd George. The two young MPs had much in common. They both had fathers who were miners who had suffered terrible industrial defeats in 1919, 1921 and 1926. As she wrote later: "We were both now pinning our hopes on political action. We were eager to test to the full the possibility of bringing about basic socialist change by peaceful, constitutional means.

Jennie was totally opposed to Ramsay MacDonald and the National Government he formed in 1931. Like most Labour MPs who refused to support MacDonald, Jennie was defeated in the 1931 General Election. Over the next couple of years Jennie spent her time writing articles for the ILP New Leader and on lecture tours of the United States and Canada.

In 1931 G.D.H. Cole created the Society for Socialist Inquiry and Propaganda (SSIP). This was later renamed the Socialist League. Other members included William Mellor, Charles Trevelyan, Stafford Cripps, H. N. Brailsford, D. N. Pritt, R. H. Tawney, Frank Wise, David Kirkwood, Clement Attlee, Neil Maclean, Frederick Pethick-Lawrence, Alfred Salter, Gilbert Mitchison, Harold Laski, Frank Horrabin, Ellen Wilkinson, Aneurin Bevan, Ernest Bevin, Arthur Pugh, Michael Foot and Barbara Betts. Margaret Cole admitted that they got some of the members from the Guild Socialism movement: "Douglas and I recruited personally its first list drawing upon comrades from all stages of our political lives." The first pamphlet published by the SSIP was The Crisis (1931) was written by Cole and Bevin.

According to Ben Pimlott, the author of Labour and the Left (1977): "The Socialist League... set up branches, undertook to promote and carry out research, propaganda and discussion, issue pamphlets, reports and books, and organise conferences, meetings, lectures and schools. To this extent it was strongly in the Fabian tradition, and it worked in close conjunction with Cole's other group, the New Fabian Research Bureau." The main objective was to persuade a future Labour government to implement socialist policies.

In November 1933, Frank Wise collapsed and died. The following year she married Aneurin Bevan. Jennie Lee was defeated again at North Lanark in the 1935 General Election. Jennie remained involved in politics, and was especially active in trying to persuade the British Labour movement to create a Popular Front with other European groups in an attempt to stop the spread of fascism in the 1930s.

In 1940 Lord Beaverbrook, Minister of Aircraft Production, employed Jennie Lee in his department. She later left to work as a journalist for the Daily Mirror. In the 1945 General Election, she won the mining constituency of Cannock in Staffordshire. In the government formed by Clement Attlee, Jennie's husband, Aneurin Bevan, was made Minister of Health and was responsible for the introduction of the National Health Service.

Jennie Lee agreed with Aneurin Bevan about most political issues, but was unhappy with his decision to reject unilateral nuclear disarmament at the 1957 Labour Party Conference. However, she was aware that his decision was based on what he thought was best for the Labour movement and was deeply shocked with the way he was treated by fellow socialists during and after his speech. For as he had told her, "I can just about save this Party, but I shall destroy myself in doing so."

After the 1964 General Election Lee was appointed arts minister and was responsible for what Harold Wilson later called the greatest achievement of his Labour Government, the setting up of the Open University. She retired from the House of Commons in 1970 when she was created Baroness Lee of Asheridge.

Jennie Lee died in 1988.

The Parramatta Justice Precinct

 

Parramatta’s Justice Precinct lays in the north-west area of Parramatta, bounded by many of Parramatta’s original streets, George Street running east-west, Marsden running north-south and O’Connell, north–south on the western side of the precinct.  The Precincts’ northern end is bounded by the upper reaches of the Parramatta River.

Parramatta, prior to British settlement, was inhabited by the Darug Aboriginal people, who would have certainly made use of the area for its proximity to the river and its fresh water, wild duck, turtle, eel and fish reserves.  The Precinct is one of Parramatta’s oldest (British) inhabited areas dating back to 1788 when the first colonists established their redoubt at Rose Hill, only a few hundred meters from the site.  In 1790, the then Governor, Arthur Phillip and Surveyor Augustus Alt laid out their plan of the town of Rose Hill (Parramatta), with High (George Street) and Marsden Streets figuring prominently in their plan.

The Hospital

The first convict hospital in Parramatta, the third in the colony, was erected on the northern end, facing the river and consisted of a series of tents.  Watkin Tench, described the hospital as: “A most wretched hospital, totally destitute of every convenience. Luckily for the gentleman (Thomas Arndell, First Fleet Surgeon) who superintends this hospital, and still more luckily for those who are doomed in case of sickness to enter it, the air of Rose Hill has hitherto been generally healthy”.  A second hospital, 25m long and 6m wide, operated from operated from c. 1792 until 1818.  David Collins stated the foundations of the hospital had been laid in April 1792.  By December, he observed: “At Parramatta a brick hospital, consisting of two wards, (two separate buildings) were finished this month and the sick were immediately removed into it.  The spot chosen for this building was at some distance from the principal street of the town, and convenient to the water.   A surgeon’s residence was added c.1799.

The discovery of a baby burial (c.1790’s), possibly new born, to the south of the 1792 hospital is stark evidence of the fragility of life and the difficulties of child bearing in the new colony.

From 1818, a new two-storey building that became known as the Colonial Hospital catered for the health care of the convicts.  But it wasn’t till 1848, that this building became the centre of one of Australia’s earliest public institutions when it was established as the Parramatta District Hospital.

A Nurses’ Home was suggested to be built, in honour to the WW1 nurses, but was never erected, within the Precinct.

1948 saw the construction of Jeffery House, a large modern brick six storey hospital which went on to be utilised as Parramatta District Hospital (P.D.H.).  With the establishment of Westmead Hospital, at Westmead in 1978 the role of P.D.H. changed and Acute Services were relocated from Jeffery House to Westmead.  Jeffery House continued to function as the rehabilitation arm of Westmead.  In 1991 all services were moved out of Jerry House and in 1995 the building was decommissioned.  The Parramatta Health (Community) Services moved into the recommissioned, newly refurbished Jeffery House in 2006, continuing the sites long history of health to the Parramatta area.

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Macquarie Street Asylum

 

Macquarie Street Asylum, Parramatta (1884-1913) / State Hospital and Asylum for the Blind and Men of Defective Sight and Senility, Macquarie Street, Parramatta (1913-1935)

First listed as a Government Institution in June 1884 (1), the Macquarie Street Asylum, Parramatta was formerly known as The Erysipelas Hospital, and "gradually merged into an Asylum for the Infirm and Destitute". (2) The premises had originally been built as stables and barracks for convicts, before being converted into a Military Hospital in 1843. After the Military Hospital closed in 1851, the premises were utilised by The Erysipelas Hospital. (3)

Although functioning primarily as an asylum for infirm and destitute men from 1884, wards for infectious conditions were still maintained and used for cases refused admission to Sydney Hospital, the Macquarie Street Asylum reputed to be "one Hospital whose doors are open to cases of all kinds of disease." (4) The Government Asylums generally included medical wards, and Macquarie Street became the centre for treatment of serious eye conditions, with 342 ophthalmic cases treated at Macquarie Street in 1893. (5) After administrative responsibility for Government Asylums transferred from the Department of Charitable Institutions to Public Health in 1913, Macquarie Street Asylum became known as the State Hospital and Asylum for the Blind and Men of Defective Sight and Senility, Macquarie Street, Parramatta. (6)

During 1926 admissions to the Hospital numbered 703, with 173 remaining resident at the end of the year. Residents of Government Asylums who were able to work were expected to contribute towards a measure of self-sufficiency, at Macquarie Street residents made clothing and bedding, carried out repairs to the building, and assisted in the Bakery which supplied bread and pastries to all the State Hospitals. (7)

In January 1935 the premises at Macquarie Street was found to be in an unsatisfactory condition, and too old for reconstruction. Patients were transferred to Lidcombe State Hospital, and Macquarie Street was closed on 13 February 1935, with the building demolished in July and August of that year. (8)

FOOTNOTES
1. NSW Government Blue Book 1884, p.42.
2. Government Asylums for the Infirm and Destitute, Report for 1884, in Votes and Proceedings 1885, Vol. 2, p.611 - (additional note, erysipelas is a medical term for an acute inflammation of the skin, usually on the face, caused by infection from streptococcus bacteria).
3. Health Dept, Histories of various NSW Government Hospitals 1879-1980, Folder for Parramatta Asylums, SRNSW Ref: [10/50590].
4. Government Asylums for the Infirm and Destitute, Report for 1884, op. cit.
5. Annual Report from the Director of Government Asylums and Boarding-Out Officer on the Department of Charitable Institutions, for the year ended 31 August 1894, Votes and Proceedings 1894-95, Vol. 5, p.449.
6. Report of the Director-General of Public Health for the year ended 31 December 1913, in Parliamentary Papers 1914-15, Vol. 4, p.340.
7. Report upon the State Hospitals under the control of the Director-General of Public Health, Report for the year 1926, in Parliamentary Papers 1927,Vol 2, p.951.
8. Health Dept, Histories of various NSW Government Hospitals 1879-1980, Folder for Parramatta Asylums, op. cit.

Source: State Records NSW

http://investigator.records.nsw.gov.au/Entity.aspx?Path=\Agency\1998