| Historical notes: | STATEMENT OF COUNTRY
The land on which Newcastle was founded is Awabakal Country (AIATSIS 1996). Prior to the arrival of Europeans in Newcastle in the late 1790s and the establishment of the convict station in 1804, the Coquon (Hunter River) and its banks provided important hunting and fishing grounds for the Awabakal. The river and surrounding land is integral to the Awabakal and their neighbours, the Worimi and Wonnaruah. Colonial accounts recorded that Aboriginal peoples gave every undulation, geological feature or landmark its own name (Lang 1834) but, unfortunately, this information is not specifically recorded for the area that contains the Newcastle Government Building Group. Mapping of the area in approximately 1823 shows the location of wells, indicating that freshwater was readily available in the immediate surrounds.
Aboriginal people have maintained connections with the site through colonisation. Although unconfirmed, it is likely that during its tenure as a Police Station, Telegraph Office and Post Office Aboriginal people were among the thousands of individuals that passed through as visitors, customers, workers and detainees. Today Aboriginal artists, curators and community engage strongly with The Lock-Up contemporary art space and the site's history.
NEWCASTLE BECAME A CITY, 1859
The area now known as Newcastle was first visited by Europeans in the 1790s. In 1804, the colony of NSW established a permanent penal settlement, intended as a place of extreme isolation and hard labour for convicts. The settlement's transition to a free society in 1823 and the abundance of natural resources facilitated its rapid growth (Special Collections 2018). At the turn of the 1860s, Newcastle transformed into a city in both name and infrastructure. Newcastle was made a municipality in 1859, shortly after the introduction of the Municipalities Act 1858. Between the censuses of 1856 and 1871, Newcastle became NSW's second most populous city, overtaking Bathurst, Goulburn and Maitland (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2019). Authorities responded by constructing new facilities, aided by increased funding for public works that became available as the role of Colonial Architect passed from Alexander Dawson to James Barnet in 1862. This included construction of the buildings located within the Newcastle Government Building Group, namely the former Police Station, former Telegraph Office and former Post Office/Public Works Department Building.
By this time, the scale of works undertaken by the office of the Colonial Architect required the expertise of a sizeable team, including the Clerks of Works. As a professional class, Clerks of Works played a considerable role in the planning, design and construction management of public works across NSW, making possible a systematic and far-reaching program of infrastructure development. Many Clerks of Works exercised considerable responsibility, and some went on to the role of Colonial Architect (Babic 2022; Australian Museum 2021; Pillars of a Nation n.d.).
The principal designer of the Newcastle Government Building Group, Mortimer William Lewis Jnr, became "first clerk of works" under Dawson (Lewis 1855, 22 December). He moved from Sydney circa 1844 to take up the position for the construction of a new gaol in Maitland (Babic 2022). He played a leading design role in public works throughout the Hunter Valley and beyond, including several Hunter police stations, a section of Maitland Gaol, the Raymond Terrace Courthouse and telegraph offices in West Maitland and Armidale among projects (Lewis 1866; Armidale Express 1884; Armidale Express 1913; Crompton 1989; Babic 2022; National Library of Australia n.d.). Between 1861 and 1890, Lewis Jnr produced the Police Station, Telegraph Office and Post Office/Public Works Department Building that comprise the Newcastle Government Building Group (Thomson 1983).
POLICE STATION, 90 HUNTER STREET: FROM POLICE STATION TO CULTURAL SPACE, 1861-PRESENT
A new police station was built for the subdistrict of Newcastle in 1861 according to plans by Lewis Jnr. The building replaced Newcastle's first police station, which was located within the 1838 Court House complex next door designed by Lewis Jnr's father, the Colonial Architect Mortimer William Lewis. Town plans from 1830 (Armstrong) and 1854 (Whyte) suggest that the site of the 1861 Police Station had been the location of a watch house for some decades. The earlier station's two cells were frequently overrun in a subdistrict that contained 63 public houses in the relatively small area extending west to Wickham Bridge and south to The Junction (The Lock-Up n.d.; Neikirk 2023, "Victorian Era Incarceration").
The proximity of the Police Station to the adjacent courthouse was intended to ensure swift justice. Yet short-term detention of up to three days often dragged out to weeks. Many prisoners' stays lengthened as they awaited costly transportation to hearings or long-term imprisonment in Maitland or elsewhere (Sydney Morning Herald 1859, 4 Mar; Newcastle Morning Herald 1891, 6 February; Neikirk 2023, "Victorian Era Incarceration").
Lewis Jnr designed the facade - initially a single story - with a simple classical elevation and entablature to complement the Georgian lines of the adjacent combined police station-courthouse (Thomson 1983). Inside, he adopted the standard template for penal design introduced by Governor Gipps and planned in 1859 for widespread use under Alexander Dawson. The six cells were cramped, as demonstrated in the unmodified Cell A, measuring a meagre 2.3 x 1.26 metres (The Lock-Up n.d.). Living quarters were provided for the police chief and his wife, who adopted the role of police matron (Neikirk 2023, "Practice of Policing"). In subsequent modifications, Lewis Jr and, later, a Mr Riggs introduced more modern standards. Increased cell sizes, exercise yards and a padded cell, added between circa 1882 and 1893, represented a partial shift from punitive Victorian philosophies to new trends in penitentiary practice emerging from Britain and the United States (Neikirk 2023, "Victorian Era Incarceration"). Additional amenities improved the living conditions for the live-in employees.
The building was criticised for its "sombre look" and location, deemed insufficiently aesthetic and prominent (Sydney Morning Herald 1861, 1 February; Maitland Mercury 1861, 12 November). Commentators were less critical of Lewis Jnr's Telegraph and Post Office next door, also built in 1861.
Over the next 120 years, the building functioned continuously as a police station and lock-up, receiving significant additions in 1882, 1886, 1893 and 1926. Around 1986 it ceased operation as a police station and became the John Paynter Gallery and Police Museum, relaunching as The Lock-Up contemporary art space in 2014.
TELEGRAPH OFFICE, 88 HUNTER STREET: FROM TELEGRAPH AND POST OFFICE TO CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION BRANCH HEADQUARTERS, 1861-1982
In the years immediately preceding Lewis Jnr's designs for the Newcastle Government Building Group, work was underway throughout NSW to establish telegraph infrastructure. The uptake was rapid, with the number of messages transmitted in Australia increasing six-fold between the first and second half of 1858 (Empire 1859). The Sydney network branched as far as Albury, Yass and Gundagai, and lines to Bathurst and the Hunter were laid from 1859 (NSW Government Gazette 1859). The need for a telegraph office in Newcastle reflected this uptake of the new technology.
The city was also in need of a new post office, with the post office in use at the time having been improvised at the 1818 Commisariat Store after a fire in 1851 claimed the previous one in Sessions House, both on Watt Street (previously George Street) (Heritage NSW 2009).
With a brief to house both telegraphic and postal services under a single roof, Lewis Jnr produced plans for a telegraph and post office. He based its design on a telegraph station he designed for West Maitland (Thomson 1983; Babic 2011), through which the Hunter line passed on its way from Blacktown Road to Newcastle (Empire 1859). The proximity of the new facility to the Newcastle Police Station was a rarity but one that may have afforded opportunities for coordinating efforts in the search and capture of missing persons or fugitives or responses to public safety threats (Newcastle Morning Herald 1886, 5 July)
While commentators celebrated the building's contribution to the streetscape, they noted that it lacked the domestic comforts (light, space, air) expected for the family members that would reside there with the incoming postmaster (Sydney Morning Herald 1861, 1 February; Maitland Mercury 1861, 12 November). First impressions proved true and Lewis Jnr set about making improvements to the original structure over subsequent years (Rheinberger 1998; Babic 2011). Notwithstanding its shortcomings, the Telegraph Office established itself as an essential service and place of conviviality, people gathering under its portico to read the wind and weather telegrams (Newcastle Morning Herald 1881, 13 September).
In 1873, postal services moved to the new purpose-built Post Office to the immediate east at 74 Hunter Street, also designed by Lewis Jnr (Rheinberger 1998). The building continued to operate as the Telegraph Office until 1891, when it became the Newcastle home of the Criminal Investigation Branch of the NSW Police. With telegraph usage still on the rise (Moyal 1984), the service was moved to the neighbouring Post Office.
PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENT BUILDING, 74 HUNTER STREET: FROM POST OFFICE TO PUBLIC WORKS DEPARMENT BUILDING, 1873-1992
Whyte's 1854 plan of Newcastle shows the corner of present-day Hunter and Watt Streets as the location of a District Council Chamber (Rheinberger 1998), although it is unclear if this was ever built. By the early 1870s, however, the site was one of several proposed for Newcastle's first dedicated post office. It was not favoured by those that saw practical benefits in locating the post office further west where the city's majority would enjoy easier access (Newcastle Chronicle 1871, 2 December), an argument that proved successful for the later City Hall.
Lewis Jnr's design for the Post Office was a possible pilot design, with similar examples said to survive in the Hunter Valley (Thomson 1983). The building was added to in several phases. In 1886, the Hunter Street facade received a stone arcade and verandah. The northern end received timber verandahs to both storeys and extensions included dining room, clerks' room, staircase, bedrooms. By this time, a row of Norfolk Island pines had been planted along the Hunter Street footpath (Newcastle Morning Herald 1881, 7 July).
In 1904, a new, larger Post Office was built on the corner of Hunter and Bolton Streets and the former Post Office was converted into offices for the Public Works Department. Works included the removal of the arcade and several other changes on the Hunter Street side as well as the partial demolition of the northern end for the addition of an Interwar-style building in 1921-27. The 1960s saw further changes to accommodate the Government Architects Drawing Office upstairs, previously located on the ground floor. Once again, in circa 2000, a raised two-storey office building was added at the centre-north of the overall group adjoining the Interwar addition. During its time in the building, the Public Works Department undertook works that transformed Newcastle, constructing and enlarging the harbour to its present state (Thomson 1983).
Since 1991, the Newcastle Government Building Group has been managed by the Newcastle Historic Reserve Trust (later the Newcastle Historic Reserve Land Manager) since 1991 (Boydell 2005). |