When george and Maria Coppin arrived in Sydney in the early 1840s, it was to a theatre scene dominated by proprietor Joseph Wyatt. Wyatt had initially been a convict transported in 1814 to New South Wales for the theft of a watch, before being officially pardoned in 1819. Some years later, Wyatt embarked on what was to become a very successful haberdashery business in Pitt Street. Selling this business in 1833, Wyatt looked towards a completely different investment opportunity—theatres.
At this time, there was one professional theatre in Sydney. Barnett Levey had opened the Theatre Royal, Sydney’s first official licensed theatre, on 5 October 1833 in George Street at the rear of the Royal Hotel. In April 1835, Wyatt was one of six lessees who took over the running of the Theatre Royal from Levey. By the following year, Wyatt had bought out the other Theatre Royal partners to become the sole lessee.
Shortly after, on 2 July 1836, The Commercial Journal and Advertiser reported an exciting new development for Sydney theatre: ‘We understand that Mr Wyatt has contracted for the immediate erection of a new Theatre in Pitt-street’.1 This was to be Sydney’s second theatre—the Royal Victoria Theatre—which was built by Wyatt in partnership with hotelier William Knight, and situated at the rear of Levey’s Theatre Royal. The foundation stone was laid on 7 September 1836.
Not everyone was happy with Wyatt’s increasing monopoly. A letter to the editor of the Sydney Gazette on 7 July 1936 questioned the fairness of expecting a small town, as Sydney was at the time, to support two theatres. The letter’s author, anonymously signed as ‘Common Sense’, also complained that ‘It is very well known that Mr Jospeh Wyatt is a very rich man, and it is also known that Mr Barnett Levey is a poor one’, and pleads ‘why not let the poor fellow [Levey] alone—he has a family to support—Mr Wyatt has none’.2
As it was, Barnett Levey died in October of 1837. Wyatt then bought the Theatre Royal from Levey’s widow, and promptly closed it down in [24] March 1838. Just a few days later, Wyatt opened his Royal Victoria Theatre in Pitt Street. The opening performances on 26 March 1838 were Othello and the farce The Middy Ashore.
The Royal Victoria Theatre was Sydney’s second official theatre and also the first large-scale theatre in Australia. The architect Henry Robertson designed the theatre in the Regency Colonial style, it consisted of four tiers, and there was room for an audience of 1,900 people. Levey’s Theatre Royal, in comparison, had three tiers and seated an audience of around 900.3
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Reconstructed perspective of the Royal Victoria Theatre after Fowles’ elevation in Sydney in 1848. Drawing by S. Clarke. From Theatres in Australia (1977) by Ross Thorne, p.11.
Across the ocean, it was around this time that actor George Selth Coppin decided to broaden his horizon of work opportunities. One could say that Coppin had been born to always find a stage. He arrived in 1819 in the Sussex market town of Steyning, to a mother and father who were part of Britain’s ‘strolling players’ travelling circuit. His father, George Selth Coppin (senior) had run away from a medical apprenticeship to join the stage at the age of 19, and married fellow player twice his age, Elizabeth Jane Jackson. George (junior) was already joining his family on the stage with a violin as a young child and found an early penchant for comedic impressions, and, with his half-sister Emma, as a family they continued to roam the county theatre circuits.
Maria Coppin in The Loan of a Lover, 1843. From Australian Stage Album (1975) by Brian Carroll, p.31.By the time Coppin set out on his own career at the age of 16, he was a jack of all theatre trades. As a young man, Coppin continued to travel to where there was theatre work—London and the counties, Scotland and Ireland. It was in September 1841 on the stage of Dublin’s Abbey Street Theatre that Coppin met Maria Watkins Burroughs. Soon after, although never officially married, they were perpetually known as ‘Mr and Mrs Coppin’.
In terms of what prompted the Coppins to journey to Australia, Alec Bagot, author of the biography Coppin the Great, gives the reasons as multipart, suggesting a combination of factors—the decline of both the ‘strolling’ county circuits and the theatre in Ireland; favourable talk and government incentives to migrate to Australia; and general actors’ gossip about a recent visit by Sydney theatre proprietor Joseph Wyatt who had set sail in 1841 on the Royal George from Sydney to London in order to ‘enlist recruits’4 for his Royal Victoria Theatre.
It is now legend that a coin was ceremoniously tossed by the Coppins to decide between Australia (George’s choice) and America (Maria’s birthplace and choice). Coppin recalls, ‘A toss of a penny decided me in coming to Australia rather than going to America’.5 Having been decided thusly, he purchased two Intermediate Class fares to Sydney for £40. The couple set sail for Sydney on the first-rate ship Templar leaving from Liverpool on 2 November 1842.
While aboard the Templar, Coppin continued to prove himself a superstitious man. Bagot reports that as well as Mr Coppin tossing that fateful coin into the ocean ‘for luck’ as they left Liverpool, the couple saw the Great March Comet of 1843 (scientifically known as C/1843 D1) from the ship deck as they neared Australia, and which they thought a good omen.
During their voyage, the Templar docked at Cape Town on 7 January 1843 for three weeks. Luck was indeed on their side when they serendipitously ran into an old acquaintance, a captain stationed there, and they were able to secure a paid gig at the barracks theatre.
On 10 March 1843, George Coppin and Maria Watkins Burroughs arrived into Sydney on the Templar. Also on board was Sydney’s first Catholic Archbishop, John Bede Polding, returning from two years abroad. The archbishop alighted to great ceremony, with bands and a large welcome crowd. The other passengers, including the Coppins, diligently waited before they set foot on Sydney soil.
Sydney of the early 1840s that the Coppins arrived in was going through a transition from colony to city. Convict transportations to the colony of New South Wales had ceased in 1840,6 and in 1842 Sydney was officially declared a city.7 However, the 1840s were also a time of financial depression in the fledgling city. In the UK, this decade became known as the Hungry Forties. The effect carried through to its colony of New South Wales, when the initial promise of a distant land of sunshine overstimulated the economy with confidence, resulting in raised property prices, overproduction of wool and an influx of imports. When the optimism burst in the early 1840s, bankruptcies rose sharply and New South Wales fell into economic depression.8
George Coppin, from ‘Heads of the People’ by S.T. Gill, 1849. State Library South Australia, Adelaide.Nevertheless, as the Coppins disembarked from the Templar on that Friday afternoon, they were enthusiastic. They wasted no time in gaining the lay of the land from the landlord of their George Street lodgings, particularly intelligence of Sydney’s theatre. A very determined George and Maria secured an interview for the very next morning with Jospeh Wyatt and William Knight at the Royal Victoria Theatre.
So it was that the Coppins met with Wyatt and Knight on Saturday, 11 March 1843, the morning after their arrival in Sydney. Wyatt and Knight’s Royal Victoria Theatre was not doing so well as it could. Perhaps it was for this reason that they declined to hire the Coppins for a salary. The ever-enterprising George therefore made an offer—to work without salary, and instead share in the profit of a season of performances. They had a deal.
Two plays were decided upon by the Coppins—a drama and comedy to showcase their versatility. First decided upon was The Stranger, an English version of German playwright August von Kotzebue’s 1790 play Menschenhass und Reue (translated as ‘Misanthropy and Repentance’), and which was a melodramatic drama exploring betrayal, alienation and identity.
The second piece chosen was The Loan of a Lover by British playwright James Planche. This was a vaudeville comedic farce for six players in one act, and had first been performed in 1834 at the London’s Royal Olympic Theatre.
On that same Saturday, Coppin also paid a visit to the Herald’s office in lower George Street, where he introduced himself to the editors Kemp and Fairfax. Shipping news published in the Sydney Morning Herald the day before had reported the arrival of a ‘Mr and Miss Coppin’.9 At the newspaper offices, the passenger list was consulted to ascertain that the entry was indeed ‘Mrs Coppin’. By way of an apology for this error, the editors promised forthcoming coverage on their upcoming theatrical debut.
George and Maria promptly started rehearsals for their debut at the Royal Victoria Theatre. A few days after their arrival in Sydney, on Wednesday 15 March, The Australian contained a rather snarky entry:
By the Templar we have an addition to our Thespian forces, by the arrival of Mr and Mrs Coppin, from Liverpool. The fame of these aspirants has certainly not yet reached us in ‘lands Australian’ and we would advise all stars of the northern hemisphere to bring with them some credentials as to their degree when they venture into the cycle of the southern. However, we shall not pronounce of the merits of the new arrivals before we have an opportunity of tasting a ‘spice of their quality,’ and whilst we must regret that they have brought no bills for our acceptance, we are not indisposed to give them letters of credit.10
By Friday 17 March, The Australian had back-peddled:
We have hither forborne severe comment on Mr Wyatt’s importation, regarding it as a managerial error, the effect of bad judgement; and feeling satisfied that as soon as possible he would remedy the evil. This, we are happy to say, he promises to do forthwith, and the announcement for tomorrow evening of The Stranger, in which Mrs Coppin will make her curtsey to a Sydney audience in the arduous part of Mrs Haller; and also of The Loan of a Lover, in which Mr Coppin will personate Peter Spyke, is a favourable earnest of the long desired reform in the affairs of the Victoria.11
It seems that The Australian had since sighted sources, as they went on to talk about the reported talents of George and Maria—‘… we have seen several English and Irish papers of recent date, in which their efforts are reviewed in the most flattering terms. The Cork Southern Reporter designates Mr Coppin ‘the most humorous of the new school of actors’ and adverts in extravagant terms to his manner of singing ‘Billy Barlow’, a song which we learn from The Tuam Herald, was sung by him 250 times in Dublin with extraordinary success. Mrs Coppin is described as a pleasing and fascinating actress …’
Left: Playbill for The Stranger and Loan of a Lover, Royal Victoria Theatre, 18 March 1843. Coppin Collection, State Library Victoria, Melbourne. Right: Interior of the Royal Victoria Theatre, drawn by Joseph Fowler in 1848.
In 1840s depression-strapped Sydney, there was little publicity for the happenings in theatre apart from the brief notices in the newspapers. To build further momentum, and making use of his all-rounded skills, Coppin took it upon himself to draw up playbills to be printed at the Atlas Printing Office in George Street. He also notified everyone and anyone, including licensees of Sydney’s hotels and public houses, and sailors they had met on the Templar.
On Saturday 18 March, just over a week after their arrival in Sydney, the ‘first appearance of Mr and Mrs Coppin’ occurred on the stage of the Royal Victoria Theatre. The evening began with the drama billed as ‘the deeply interesting play’ of The Stranger, where Maria played the role of Mrs Haller. The evening concluded with the farce The Loan of a Lover with George as Peter Spike and Maria as Gertrude.
On Monday, 20 March, the Sydney Morning Herald cast their judgement on the first Sydney appearance of the Coppins as ‘well received’.12 They went on to say ‘Mrs Coppin is evidently an old stager: her appearance and voice are both good, and she made a decided hit in the character of Mrs Haller. She will be a great acquisition to the theatre.’ Their opinion of Mr Coppin was decidedly more reserved, stating, ‘Mr Coppin appears to have a considerable share of humour, but we must defer any decisive opinion until he has appeared in another character.’
Likewise, the review in The Australian heaped praise upon Mrs Coppin’s ‘simple and affecting performance, pervaded throughout by an earnest expression of womanly feeling’13 in The Stranger, and lauded her versatility of also playing comedy in The Loan of a Lover, which it called ‘an amusing trifle’. Again, of Mr Coppin they were more guarded, reporting ‘We shall reserve for another occasion our remarks on this performance, which our space will only allow us to say, was perfectly successful.’
All in all, the Coppins were a success in Sydney. Over the course of their four-week season at the Royal Victoria Theatre they benefitted financially from their profit-sharing deal with Wyatt and Knight, more so than if they had been paid a salary. The fortunes of the Royal Victoria Theatre also improved considerably.
As the season progressed, the Coppins performed in a variety of productions. Both appeared in the romantic drama The Lady of Lyons and the comedies The King’s Gardener; or, Nipped in the Bud, and ‘a farce written expressly for Mrs Coppin’ The Four Sisters. Additionally, Maria played in the drama Somnambulist. George also performed in the farce The Illustrious Stranger, as well as playing the comedic The Wandering Minstrel’s Visit to Sydney, performing the character of itinerant fiddler Jem Bags, which he had played previously and now adapted to Sydney.
Interior of the Royal Victoria Theatre, August 1844. The drawing is of Sydney’s first Mayoral Ball. From Theatre Buildings in Australia to 1905 (1971) by Ross Thorne, vol 1, plate 31.
When ‘new comedietta’ The Young King set in the 13th century about King Philip IV of France and King of Navarre through his wife Queen Joan I of Navarre, debuted on 8 April, finally there was praise from The Australian, who had beforehand settled on a distaste for Coppin’s low comedic skills. Bagot argues that co-owner Reverend Wickham M. Hesketh was particularly loathing of humour that was not ‘refined’.14 While noting in the past of Mr Coppin ‘we regretted to observe a tendency to the vulgar’, they were finally glad ‘We can truly say that a more whimsical effort than Mr Coppin’s personation of the corporate paragon, The Mayor of Navarre, we have seldom witnessed.’15
The season drew to an end with a farewell benefit to the Coppins before a crowded house at the Royal Victoria Theatre on Thursday 13 April. It was advertised as ‘their last appearance but two in this colony’. Mrs Coppin demonstrated her versatility once again by performing in James Sheridan Knowles’ historical tragedy The Wife: A Tale of Mantua and in the vaudeville The Ladies Club. Mr Coppin performed his old favourite character ‘that eccentric, peculiar and local cosmopolitan, Billy Barlow’.16 Billy Barlow was a folk song that could be adapted to contemporary settings, locations and events. And so, Coppin adapted it to the Australian setting much to the delight of the audience.17
The last performance by the Coppins for the season was on Tuesday 18 April, with the season proper closing two days later. However, the Coppins returned for Mr Knight’s retirement farewell benefit on 24 April. They performed in the comedy The Love Chase by James Sheridan Knowles, and the farce Catching an Heiress by Charles Selby. Mr Coppin also performed ‘an entire new version of Billy Barlow’.18
Billy Barlow’s Visit to Sydney ... as sung by Mr. Coppin at the Royal Victoria Theatre, Thomas Rolfe, Sydney, 1843
State Library of New South Wales, Sydney
There followed much speculation abound whether the Coppins would stay in Sydney. The Australian reported ‘we are in hopes their engagement will be renewed by the management for the ensuing season’.19 And another possibility emerged—a new Sydney theatre was to open by proprietor Joseph Simmons. The Royal City Theatre was touted to rival Wyatt’s theatre monopoly in Sydney, and Simmons had begun poaching talent from the Royal Victoria Theatre.
In an attempt to upstage the opening of the new theatre, the Winter season of the Royal Victoria Theatre was pushed forward to 15 May 1843. There were other changes before the opening—renovations and improvements such as private boxes, an enlargement of the stage, and redecoration of the theatre20 in the ‘Parisian style’21 by Andrew Torning, an interior decorator and actor at the theatre. Audiences were also given notice that ‘In order to meet the depression of the times, the Proprietor has determined on Reducing the Prices of admission’.22 Following Knight’s announcement of retirement from active managing, previous manager John Lazar was engaged as actor-manager. And it was announced that the Coppins were returning for the season!
The Royal City Theatre opened in Market Street on 20 May 1843. In the end this new theatre was not to last long. However, before it closed it certainly ruffled feathers. The situation meant that between both theatres around 3,000 seats were to be filled nearly every night. Coppin thought of having two theatres in Sydney open every evening for six nights a week—‘It is absurd to suppose that the population of Sydney can supply twelve audiences a week’.23 Sydney in the 1840s was a fledgling population. In 1840, the non-Indigenous population of the New South Wales colony, which was the entire east coast at that time, was recorded as 127,000 people, and of that 45,000 people were living in Sydney.
The Winter season at the Royal Victoria Theatre continued through to October and gradually succeeded in attracting more audiences than the Royal City Theatre. The Coppins played many of the same pieces as the previous season, with the addition of performances such as Mrs Coppin as Portia in The Merchant of Venice; comedy Winning a Husband; or, Seven’s the Main (in which Mrs Coppin played eight different characters!); musical burletta One Hour; or, The Carnival Ball (featuring a stage with views of Naples and 200 transparent lamps); and Mr Coppin in the burletta The King and the Comedian about Frederick the Great of Prussia. Continuing his character-based popular comedy, Coppin also played the character Paul Pry.
Playbills for the Royal Victoria Theatre, September 1843. Coppin Collection, State Library Victoria, Melbourne.
Coppin and Lazar clashed over who would play Sir Peter Teazle in The School for Scandal, as according to Bagot, Coppin was keen to prove his straight comedy ability and told Lazar ‘If you want my wife as Lady Teazle, I shall play Sir Peter.’24
On 18 September, a spectacular was staged for the benefit of actor Mr Grove. The Flying Dutchman, or, The Phantom Ship was billed as a nautical and romantic drama, featuring Mr Coppin as ‘cockney dutchman’ Peter Von Bummel, and an end of Act II where ‘The House suddenly observed to be in Total Darkness; the Storm rages, and the PHANTOM SHIP APPEARS (a la Phantasmagoria)’.
Despite these successes, the small nature of Sydney and fickleness of popularity may have led Coppin to feel the need to diversify his investments. He was also well aware of his image as a ‘low comedian’. Although they endured a rival theatre and drew crowds despite the ongoing financial depression, it was a surprise when Coppin announced that he would leave the stage and purchase the lease to the Clown Tavern, situated almost directly opposite the Royal Victoria Theatre in Pitt Street. On the 17 August 1843, the Sydney Morning Herald reported from the petty sessions held at the Police Office, where among the publican licence transfers that took place was ‘Dind, of the Clown, Pitt street, to Coppin’.25
Pitt Street from King to Market Streets Sydney, 1848. The Royal Victoria Theatre is pictured on the first row, with the former Clown Hotel directly opposite. Archives & History Resources, City of Sydney.
On 26 August, a notice appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald where ‘Mr G. Coppin, of the Victoria Theatre, begs leave to appraise the gentlemen of Sydney, and the public in general’26 of his commencement of business as a Licensed Victualler at the Clown Hotel. The entry continued that ‘the business will be conducted in the genuine London style…’. A billiard table had been specially imported from London.
Meanwhile, at the Royal Victoria Theatre, a farewell benefit was held on 12 October for Mrs Coppin before her ‘retirement from the stage’. The King and the Comedian and Ladies at Home were performed, as well as Mrs Coppin as the title character in the domestic drama The Orphan of Waterloo. Also featured was the ‘new local Australian extravaganza’ of the Barlow Family, featuring a family chorus including ten Barlow children.27
Then on 26 October 1843, just over six months since his arrival in Australia, George Coppin took his farewell benefit that evening at the Royal Victoria Theatre. The piece performed was Sam Weller, or, The Pickwickians, an 1837 comedic adaptation of Dicken’s The Pickwick Papers. Mr Coppin finished by singing a Maitland version of Billy Barlow. The 28 October was the final night before their ‘retirement’.
On 4 November, a notice appeared in The Australian by Mr and Mrs Coppin, ‘late of the Victoria Theatre’,28 thanking the public for attendance at their farewell, and advertising their new venture, the Clown Hotel, which boasted a 40-feet long saloon available for ‘public or private Dinner Parties, Balls, Clubs, Societies, or Public Meetings’, a billiard room, a commercial room, a bar and a parlour.
Coppin of course envisioned entertainment at the Clown. He initially established a ‘Free and Easy’ in the Saloon every Monday and Saturday evening, a precursor to music halls. By January 1844, he had added Thursday nights as well, with Mr Phillmore playing the pianoforte and various singers entertaining, presumably including Coppin himself, and singing commencing from 8pm. He also established a Catch Club every Tuesday night. Maria was happy to have her name associated with the Clown, but was reluctant to become a tavern entertainer.29
Sydney Morning Herald, 11 April 1844, p.3
It was not to be a success, despite Coppin’s efforts. He had bought The Clown in August 1843, but by March the next year he was looking to get out of the hotel business. In a notice in the Sydney Morning Herald on 23 March, he ‘most respectfully informs Publicans and others, that having made arrangements to embrace the theatrical profession again, he is determined to sell his interest, lease, and property’30 in the Clown Hotel.
Perhaps there were simply too many hotels in Sydney. Even on the small strip of Pitt Street between King and Market Streets, there were three hotels on one side, four on the other, as well as two hotels each side of the Royal Victoria Theatre entrance (being The Victoria and the Garrick’s Head). Finally on 25 September 1844, Coppin’s Clown Hotel was advertised for sale. Coppin was to own the Clown for just over a year. Unfortunately, the venture ultimately failed. ‘I went into the hotel line, and only succeeded in losing my money’,31 he lamented.
In July of 1844, Mr and Mrs Coppin had advertised their theatrical wardrobe for sale. The sale or loan was offered to interested buyers for ‘any character they can name’.32 Further advertisements specified that ‘500 fancy dresses’ were available, consisting of European, Indian nobles and peasants costumes, ‘ancient and modern’ English court dresses in silk velvet, embroidered satins and brocades, ‘carefully selected from all parts of the continent’.33 Perhaps it was prematurely, because after the Clown failed, they returned once more to the stage.
On 18 November 1844, an advertisement in The Australian announced that Mr and Mrs Coppin had been re-engaged by the Royal Victoria Theatre ‘for a limited period’.34 However, it was not long before it was time for another farewell performance by the Coppins, held on Christmas Eve, 24 December. This time it was to say goodbye not to the stage, but to Sydney. The Coppins were heading to the stages of Tasmania.
The farewell consisted of the comedic Sweetheart and Wives and the farce Why Don’t She Marry; or, the Swiss Cottage. Coppin’s Billy Barlow made another appearance to farewell the Sydney audiences, billed as ‘Billy Barlow’s Farewell for ever and a day, introducing some new local verses, by Mr Coppin’.35 The farewell raised enough to pay off his debts.36
In less than two years since they had arrived in Sydney, George Coppin’s fortunes had gone up and down. It was a pattern of bust and boom entrepreneurship that would continue throughout his career. Tasmania would contain success, and Australia would remain his home.
Endnotes
1. Commercial Journal and Advertiser, 2 July 1836, p.2
2. Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser, 7 July 1836, p.3
3. Philip Parsons & Victoria Chance (eds), Companion to Theatre in Australia, pp.585–586
4. Port Phillip Patriot and Melbourne Advertiser, 1 April 1841, p.2
5. ‘The Infant Melbourne—Coppin’s Diary’ in Hamilton Spectator, 23 September 1911, p.2
6. Order-in-Council ending transportation of convicts 22 May 1840 (UK), Museum of Australian Democracy—New South Wales documents, https://www.foundingdocs.gov.au/item-sdid-76.html
7. History of City of Sydney council, City of Sydney, https://www.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/history/history-city-sydney-council
8. Barrie Dyster, 'The Depression of the 1840s in New South Wales', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://adb.anu.edu.au/essay/29/text40594, originally published 1 August 2022.
9. Sydney Morning Herald, 10 March 1843, p.2
10. The Australian, 15 March 1843, p.2
11. The Australian, 17 March 1843, p.2
12. Sydney Morning Herald, 20 March 1843, p.2
13. The Australian, 22 March 1843, p.2
14. Bagot, Coppin the Great, p.62
15. The Australian, 12 April 1843, p.2
16. Sydney Morning Herald, 12 April 1843, p.3
17. George Selth Coppin, Billy Barlow’s Visit to Sydney. Billy Barlow: The favorite comic song, as sung by Mr. Coppin at the Royal Victoria Theatre, arranged for the piano forte with the original and encore verses, Thomas Rolfe, Sydney, 1843. State Library of New South Wales, Sydney, https://collection.sl.nsw.gov.au/record/74Vvl6Qq8kx3
18. Sydney Morning Herald, 21 April 1843, p.3
19. The Australian, 19 April 1843, p.2
20. Sydney Morning Herald, 12 May 1843, p.3
21. The Sun and New South Wales Independent Press, 13 May 1843, p.3
22. Sydney Morning Herald, 12 May 1843, p.3
23. Bagot, Coppin the Great, p.78
24. Bagot, Coppin the Great, p.79
25. Sydney Morning Herald, 18 August 1843, p.3
26. Sydney Morning Herald, 26 August 1843, page 3
27. The Australian, Thursday 12 October 1843, p.3
28. The Australian, 4 November 1843, p.1
29. Bagot, Coppin the Great, p.82
30. Sydney Morning Herald, 23 March 1844, p.1
31. ‘The Infant Melbourne—Coppin’s Diary’ in Hamilton Spectator, 23 September 1911, p.2
32. Sydney Morning Herald, 11 July 1844, p.3
33. Sydney Morning Herald, 17 July 1844, p.2
34. The Australian, 18 November 1844, p.2
35. Sydney Morning Herald, 23 December 1844, p.2
36. Bagot, Coppin the Great, p.83
References
Alec Bagot, Coppin the Great: Father of the Australian Theatre, Melbourne, 1965
Sally O'Neill, ‘Coppin, George Selth (1819–1906)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/coppin-george-selth-3260/text4935, published first in hardcopy 1969, accessed online 2025.
Philip Parsons & Victoria Chance (eds), Companion to Theatre in Australia. Currency Press in association with Cambridge University Press, Sydney, 1995
Dr Graeme Skinner, A Biographical Register of Australian Colonial Musical Personnel, University of Sydney, https://www.sydney.edu.au/paradisec/australharmony/register-C-4.php#COPPIN-George