RESIDENCE
Governor Phillip’s first home was a prefabricated canvas and timber-framed tent that was brought out flat-packed with the First Fleet. On 15 May 1788, not far from the site where this temporary house had been erected, work began on a more permanent home for the governor. The site chosen was on a hill overlooking the harbour and the tank stream that for a short time provided fresh water to the colony. To mark the occasion, Phillip placed an engraved copper plaque between two foundation stones. This plaque, discovered in 1899 during excavations for telephone lines in Bridge Street, is on display at the Museum of Sydney.
The house intended for myself was to consist of only three rooms, but having a good foundation, has been enlarged, contains six rooms, and is so well built that I presume it will stand for a great number of years.
Governor Arthur Phillip, 12 February 1790
Built with convict labour on a foundation of Sydney sandstone using a combination of locally made and imported bricks from England, Australia’s first Government House was typical of the so-called Georgian style then popular in England: two-storeys, rectangular in shape with a central doorway and symmetrically arranged windows. To the rear were the service buildings – kitchen, bakehouse and stables. In front, Phillip established a garden with plants and seeds he brought with him from England and some he picked up along the way in Rio deJanerio and the Cape of Good Hope.
Over the next 57 years Phillip’s original six-room house was extended by successive governors, who invariably found their predecessor’s house too small, run down or not befitting the status of the governor’s position. In 1836 building began on a new Government House (still in use today), closer to the harbour on Bennelong Point within the parklands of the Governor’s Domain. By 1846 the ‘incongruous mass of buildings’ that first Government House had become had been demolished.
‘In the evening a Ball and Supper were given at Government House, to the most numerous assemblage of Ladies and Gentlemen that ever graced a public festival in this Colony … About eleven o’clock the party ... sat down to a superb and elegant repast: after which they resumed the sprightly dance, and continued ... to a late hour in the morning.’
Sydney Gazette, describing a ball held at Government House for the Queen’s birthday, 1818
With the buildings gone and their foundations buried, Sydney’s streets were extended across and along the site to meet up with the newly formed Circular Quay. This now vacant city block bounded by Bridge, Bent, Phillip and Young streets was originally granted to the Council of the Municipality of Sydney as a site for a town hall but the council opted to build in George Street instead. Between 1867 and 1875 five terraces were built along Phillip Street and another four along Young Street (these terraces are still standing). In the middle of the site behind hoarding and wooden fences were storage sheds and a carter’s yard and cottage. In 1912 the site was cleared to make way for a large two-storey corrugated iron building designed and later occupied by the Government Architect’s Department. Luckily, this building was at the rear of the site leaving the foundations of first Government House largely undisturbed. Although the ‘Tin Shed’ as it became known was meant to be temporary offices, it remained in use until its demolition in 1968. Remarkably, the site was left vacant (though used as a car park) for the next 14 years.