It seems he did have a restless mind, always looking for a better situation in
the theatre and not oblivious to the possibility of better chances outside it.1
I
have long been captivated by the history of circus in Australia. Out of that captivation has grown a deep appreciation of the range and quality of entertainers and entertainments that kept Australians amused in the pre-electronic era. While some may beg to differ, George Selth Coppin (1819–1906) has been widely credited as ‘fathering the Australian theatre’.2 In this article, I draw attention to some of Coppin’s lesser-known contributions to the annals of Australian leisure and recreation.
Certainly, Coppin made enduring contributions to the development of Australian theatre but serious theatrical activity had already been underway for a decade when Mr and Mrs Coppin disembarked from the Templar in Sydney on 9 March 1843.3 Undoubtedly, Coppin was ‘one of the busiest and most versatile figures in the history of the Australian theatre’.4 And undoubtedly, not so widely understood or appreciated were his genuine contributions to the annals of Australian entertainment, at the margins of, or even beyond, conventional ‘theatre’. Some of these contributions were successful, others not. Some have been recognised in passing by Coppin’s biographers, others not.
George Coppin as Demosthenes Dodge in The Artful Dodger
State Library Victoria, Melbourne
Sydney, 1843–44
The Coppins’ arrival and early presence in the Australian colonies coincided with an era of energetic development and profound change. Decision makers in London had already recognised that New South Wales had become ‘too well settled and too civilised to be a good penal colony’. 5 From 1840, the penal transportation system was progressively wound back. From emancipated convicts, their progeny and an ever-increasing number of free immigrants, there emerged a free labour force with purchasing power and a desire for meaningful leisure.6 In 1842, the year before the Coppins’ arrival and only 54 years after the arrival of the First Fleet, Sydney had been proclaimed a city.
While Sydney’s expanding working class was eager to leave behind the vulgar pastimes of the convicts it also spurned the well-ordered pastimes of the colony’s soi-disant upper orders, its civil and military elites. The ‘common sort’ disdained the amateur theatricals, promenades, balls and concerts of the elites, instead preferring the popular stage and the ‘light music, gaiety, ribald and sentimental songs, recitations and comedy’ offered in hotel saloons.7
At this time, throughout the industrialising British Isles, there were calls to promote ‘rational’ entertainments to amuse the ‘lower orders’, humanise their minds and serve the unrelenting imperatives of factory and office.8 New genres of mass entertainment, such as circus, pantomime and hippodrama, had evolved to compensate an increasingly urbanised workforce for its loss of rural customs and pastimes.9 Yet, these elaborate forms of entertainment would not be introduced into the Australian colonies in any strength until the gold rush era of the 1850s and then only in a truncated form.
Despite initial reservations, Mr and Mrs Coppin took Sydney ‘by storm’ during their season at Joseph Wyatt’s Royal Victoria Theatre in Pitt Street.10 Freshly arrived, Coppin observed Sydney with an enlightened sense of both its limitations and its potential. Everywhere, traces of its original penal purpose were still apparent while notions of ‘rational’ entertainments were yet to gain traction.
By the 19th century, many cities of Europe and North America boasted their own botanical gardens, often developed and maintained at public expense. At the simplest level, ‘botanical gardens’ were ‘pleasure’ gardens for which an enterprising individual charged admission and earned additional revenue from games and the sale of flowers and refreshments. At least some of Australia’s first settlers, whether bonded or free, were familiar with the gardens that dotted London. Now perched on Australia’s coastline, they were as removed from the birds, reptiles and marsupials of Australia’s interior as they were from the sights and sounds of animals from Asia and Africa to be seen in the pleasure gardens of London.
Although Sydney had been served by its Botanic Gardens since 1816, the exhibition of wild and exotic animals was only enabled by speculative sea captains who purchased them en route to sell to petty showmen waiting on the arrival wharf. Coppin recognised Sydney’s need for a zoological garden where these animals could be properly exhibited and for which care could be provided. On 4 May 1843, only eight weeks after arriving, Coppin was sufficiently stirred to write to Governor Gipps to request his assistance in establishing a zoological garden on the Government Domain. A zoological garden, Coppin maintained, would relieve ‘the great dearth of innocent amusements’ for ‘parties who object to visiting theatres’ and amuse the native-born citizens deprived of exhibitions of ‘wild animals and the surprising docility they may be brought to’. Altruism aside, Coppin’s entrepreneurial instincts were apparent. Claiming, truthfully or not, to possess ‘long experience in most of the Gardens in England’, Coppin sought an exclusive right to exhibit wild animals together with ‘fireworks, music and any entertainments not interfering with the legitimate drama’. Gipps declined to assist. The Governor had neither the power to grant land nor contribute financial support, adding that, even if Coppin attracted private support, the venture would inevitably ‘end in disappointment and loss’.11
Not to be discouraged, Coppin refined his objectives and petitioned the City Council for the ‘grant of a lease of about two or three acres of land’ opposite the ‘Catholic chapel’ (the approximate site of today’s St Mary’s Cathedral):
… in the Government Domain between the two southern gates, for the purpose of constructing a zoological garden which, beside comprising an extensive exhibition of wild animals, should contain an extensive concert saloon, and be supplied with other kinds of amusement for the entertainment of the citizens …
Coppin estimated that the cost of establishing the garden—including the erection of a pavilion 80 feet in length and the purchase and importation of wild animals from Calcutta and the Cape of Good Hope—would amount to £1500. His petition was ‘well received’ but Council did not control the Domain. Coppin’s petition was simply noted and put aside.12 Nothing more was heard on the matter but others obviously took note of Coppin’s visionary proposal. Only four years later, William Beaumont and James Waller, established their Botanical & Zoological Gardens in the grounds of Beaumont’s Sir Joseph Banks Hotel at Botany Bay. It quickly became Sydney’s pre-eminent pleasure resort. Like Coppin, Beaumont, who had arrived in Sydney in 1840, was clearly aware of calls for ‘rational recreation’. Beaumont and Waller sought to appeal to ‘parties in search of innocent recreation’ by organising ‘a collection of as many specimens of the natural history of the country as … procurable’.13
Beaumont & Waller’s Botanical & Zoological Gardens at the Sir Joseph Banks Hotel, Botany Bay. From Illustrated Sydney News, 30 June 1855. State Library of New South Wales, Sydney.
Unable to launch one entrepreneurial initiative, Coppin sought another. Financially enriched by his theatrical success and barely three months after his correspondence with Gipps and the City Council, in August 1843 Coppin purchased the lease of the Clown Hotel, opposite the Royal Victoria.14 Coppin opened its large, 40-foot long saloon each Monday, Thursday and Saturday evenings, probably for the benefit of ‘parties who object to visiting theatres’. The evening’s entertainment was called a ‘Free and Easy’, a forerunner of the music hall.15
… Mr Falchon’s singing is well known and is heard to greater advantage in a room than on the stage. Coppin amuses the company with some of his drolleries. Phillips’ Nigger [sic] songs are capital. Fillimore is excellent on the piano. Jones is also a pleasing singer. In short, the crowded saloon, on every evening it is open, speaks sufficiently for the excellence of this combination of attraction.16
Coppin did not charge admission to the saloon on these evenings and soon encountered financial difficulties. In September 1844, Coppin advertised his lease of the Clown Hotel for sale, indicating his willingness to accept one-half of its original cost 12 months earlier.17 In January 1845, he and his wife departed for Hobart Town under engagement to star in Mrs Clarke’s Royal Victoria Theatre.18 In August 1846, the Coppins arrived in Adelaide where George converted the billiard room of the Temple Tavern into the New Queen’s Theatre with seating for 700 people.19 By June 1847, George was the licensee of the Auction Mart Tavern in Adelaide’s Hindley Street.20 In October 1849, he sponsored a racing cup, ‘Coppin’s Cup’, for the Adelaide Races.21 At Port Adelaide in 1850, he built the Port Theatre, part of a complex called the White Horse Cellars that included a tavern, meeting hall, hotel and stables.22 At the ‘nascent’ township of Scarborough, Coppin built the ‘commodious’ Semaphore Hotel, enhanced with ‘marine gardens’ and a ‘thermopolium’ (the 19th-century version of a fast-food shop).23 Like the zoological gardens he had proposed for Sydney in 1843 and Melbourne’s Cremorne Gardens which he would acquire in 1856, the Semaphore was outside the craft of conventional theatre, a pleasure resort that lay on the margin of the metropolitan area.24
During his stay in South Australia, Coppin maintained his theatrical profile while diversifying his business interests. However, the gold rushes in the sister colonies of New South Wales and Victoria encouraged a large exodus of gold-seekers from South Australia and, by late 1851, Coppin was caught up in the resulting South Australian recession:
His assets were frozen. [His] shares in copper mines … were valueless. So were his [interests] in the Port Lincoln Mining Company and the Phoenix Mining Company … and the Adelaide Mining Company ... Their £5 shares were not worth 5 shillings … He advertised the lease of his new Semaphore Hotel. No one wanted it. The White Horse Hotel upon which he had spent £3,500 was unsaleable. He still owned Hart, Hagen & Co. £830 for the land on which it was built … His transactions were so closely interlocked that removal of one brought down the lot. There were so many of them: ten and a half acres of land at Port Adelaide, a block of land at Port Lincoln … [a] half share in the Black Prince, a fine seaworthy boat … [and] accounts with a dozen different firms …
Insolvent, Coppin’s best option was to sail to Port Phillip and join the gold rush. At Bendigo, Ballarat, Castlemaine and other diggings, 60,000 miners were active. However, after a few days on the diggings at Forest Creek, he realised he had no prospects as a gold digger. It was pointless to return to Port Phillip as Melbourne had been depopulated and public services reduced to a standstill.26 He retired instead to Geelong where, at Deering’s playhouse, he entertained ‘successful diggers from Ballarat … coming down with gold burning a hole in their pockets’.27 By 1853, he was able to return to Adelaide, fully repay his creditors and return to England to seek new attractions. He engaged the renowned Irish Shakespearian actor G.V. Brooke for an Australian tour. At a cost of £5000, he commissioned the manufacture of a prefabricated structure comprised of an iron frame dressed with sheets of corrugated iron. This was to be dismantled and shipped, in pieces, to Melbourne where it would be assembled and fitted out as a theatre.28
Every week, government escorts delivered upwards of 40,000 ounces of pure gold found in the bush to banks in Melbourne or Geelong to be shipped to London. During Coppin’s absence, the colony exported ‘about one hundred tons of solid gold’. People were busy and money was plentiful. Shops were crowded with imported goods. Public houses and hotels were thronged. Public demand for entertainment was insatiable.29
Olympic Theatre, Melbourne, 1855
Coppin’s Olympic Theatre, the ‘Iron Pot’, at the corner of Lonsdale and Stephen (now Exhibition) Streets, c.1858. Photograph by Walter Bentley Woodbury. Victoria & Albert Museum, London, RPS 3093-6-2018.
When Coppin returned to Melbourne in December 1854, it was no longer the shanty town he had first visited nine years earlier. The widespread prosperity generated by the gold rush had inspired the erection of several venues for the entertainment of the public, some grand in conception others mediocre but all calculated to relieve the city of its provincialism.30 Despite a population of well less than one hundred thousand, enthusiastic audiences packed Melbourne’s theatres each evening. Nevertheless, theatre patronage was no guarantee of theatre viability.31 The exuberance of the gold rush had reached its zenith and the competition for survival between Melbourne’s various places of amusement had intensified.
The city’s first theatre, J. T. Smith’s Queen’s Theatre at the corner of Queen and Little Bourke Streets, had long been tabooed ‘on account of the improprieties tolerated there’.32 Coppin now laid eyes on two completely new theatrical edifices, the so-called Astley’s Amphitheatre (named after the legendary London establishment), at the corner of Spring and Little Bourke Streets, and, although still under construction, the 3,300 seat Theatre Royal in Bourke Street. The pleasure resort that James Ellis opened at Richmond in 1852, Cremorne Gardens, had undergone further development during Coppin’s absence. To these and other outlets for entertainment, Coppin would soon introduce a further element of competition in an already highly-competitive field: a prefabricated theatre of galvanised iron.33
Rowe’s North American Circus, corner of Lonsdale and Stephen (later Exhibition) Streets, 1854. From The Arm-Chair (Melbourne), 25 February 1854. Dixson Library, State Library of New South Wales, Sydney.
For over two years from June 1852, an American circus man, Joseph Andrew Rowe had presented his North American Circus in a pavilion of timber and canvas that he erected on vacant, centrally-located ground at the corner of Lonsdale and Stephen (later Exhibition) Streets.34 Drawing on his Californian experience, 1849–51, Rowe remained anchored at this metropolitan location rather than tolerate the hardships and lawlessness of the goldfields. Rowe knew that the diggers would eventually return to squander their newfound wealth. He had little competition apart from the Queen’s Theatre, the Salle de Valentino in Bourke Street and several concert rooms.35 Handsomely enriched during his stay and wary of the growing number of competing entertainments, Rowe closed his circus for the last time in October 1854.36 He returned to San Francisco reputedly laden with £40,000 in ‘cash and numerous chests of treasure’.37 The vacated lot presented Coppin with a desirable location upon which to erect his imported, pre-fabricated theatre of iron. He leased the lot from its owner, John McCrae, for a term of 21 years at an annual rental of £1855.38 In April 1855, the first foundation stone was laid on the vacant lot by Coppin’s esteemed associate, the recently arrived G.V. Brooke.39
The nameless theatre, it may be right to mention, was constructed in England, under the superintendence of Mr Coppin, shipped by him to this colony, and is to be erected, complete and ready for use, within thirty days from this date. It will cover an area of 156 feet by 91 feet, at the intersections of Lonsdale and Stephen streets, and will seat 1500 people … The elevation is simple and elegant in design, the central portion of the facade will be appropriately surmounted by the figures of Shakespeare, Thespis, Thalia, and Melpomene, and the wings will break the uniformity and improve the general aspect of the edifice.40
Following the Manchester manufacturer’s instructions, contractors quickly assembled the theatre for the debut of ‘The Great Magician, Ventriloquist and Improvisatore, Mr Jacobs, The Wizard of the North’ in June 1855.41 Although the ‘nameless’ edifice was given the official name of ‘Olympic Theatre’, it was informally labelled the ‘Iron Pot’.42 The Olympic’s official opening took place on the evening of 30 July after Coppin and Brooke returned from a Sydney engagement.43
With the competition of the Theatre Royal muffled, Coppin’s Olympic had only the ‘degraded’ Queen’s Theatre and Astley’s Amphitheatre with which to compete. From October 1855, Astley’s would fall under Coppin’s control and, ironically, the Olympic proved to be the ‘stepping stone’ by which Coppin obtained control of the Theatre Royal.
Royal [Astley’s] Amphitheatre, Melbourne, 1855–57
Astley’s Amphitheatre, at the corner of Spring and Little Bourke Streets, c.1858. Photograph by Walter Bentley Woodbury. Victoria & Albert Museum, London, RPS.3093:62-2018 and RPS.3093:63-2018.
On a corner opposite the Salle de Valentino at the top of Bourke Street, an American builder, Thomas Mooney, built an amphitheatre capable of accommodating both equestrian and dramatic entertainments. On completion, in September 1854, Mooney leased the edifice to the foot-juggling entrepreneur, G.B.W. Lewis.44 Grandiloquently naming the establishment Astley’s Amphitheatre, Lewis dispatched his agent, Henry Birch to London to engage a large company of circus performers from the original Astley’s.45 Three ‘drafts’ of performers arrived from London over the summer of 1854–55.46 An early visitor was:
both pleased and surprised at the spacious elegance of the building and the completeness of the entire arrangements, which are much more London-like than colonial … The athletic and gymnastic exercises were first rate, and such as we have never seen excelled in Ducrow’s or Astley’s—circuses that we often visited in our boyish years.47
However, the purpose-built, fixed-location amphitheatre, typical of London or Paris, proved uneconomic in a colonial setting. The population of London—the home of the original Astley’s Amphitheatre—was some 2,400,000 in 1851.48 The population of Paris—the home of the equally renowned Cirque Olympique—was some 1,000,000 in 1851.49 Such cities could generate audiences of the size and enthusiasm necessary to sustain the patronage of large permanent circus venues. In contrast, Melbourne’s population, swollen to around 76,560 people in 1854, declined to 52,502 by 1857 as many settled the interior.50
By June 1855, Lewis had over-extended himself. He was insolvent, indebted to Birch for £3,000 and beset by legal problems and poor weather. In addition, he was about to be confronted by the ‘superior attractions’ of John Black’s new Theatre Royal, said to rival London’s Drury Lane and Covent Gardens.51 On 16 July, the Theatre Royal opened. Four days later, Astley’s closed.52
In October 1855, Coppin took over the lease of Astley’s Amphitheatre, remodelled and redecorated it, and installed gas lighting. Re-named the Royal Amphitheatre, the venue re-opened in February 1856 with the Backus Minstrels, Coppin convinced that ‘a certain portion of the community don’t [sic] want dramatic amusements’.53 For several evenings in March 1856, the actress, vocalist and danseuse, Lola Montez was its sole attraction. The house was ‘crowded to excess’, many anticipating that Coppin would perform his burlesque of Lola’s famous—by some accounts, ‘notorious’—Spider Dance that was so popular with diggers on the goldfields.54 But Coppin refrained, having earlier been forewarned by Lola that:
… if he paid the goldfields a visit [to perform his burlesque], she would exert her influence with the miners and have him stripped in order to tar and feather him.55
An observer remarked that Lola ‘never looked more charming’ and ‘her dancing was as unobjectionable as it was elegant’.56 In the midst of applause on the evening of her benefit, Montez stepped forward in an apparent gesture of reconciliation to pay a ‘warm tribute to the ability and conduct of Mr Coppin as a theatrical manager’57
Lola Montez [Maria Gilbert], dancer and courtesan, 1821–1861. Photo by C.D. Fredricks, New York.
State Library Victoria, Melbourne
With two competing houses of entertainment under his control, the Royal Amphitheatre and the Olympic, Coppin was careful, in public pronouncements, to concoct a distinction between himself as ‘manager’ of the former (of which he was actually lessee and director) and himself as ‘manager’ of the latter (of which he was the owner, at least of the pre-fabricated theatre that sat atop the leased ground). A citizen, writing under the nom-de-plume of ‘Censor’, expressed his disgust at Coppin’s deceptive assumption of this double identity:
[In] … making a distinction between the two managerships … he is endeavouring to throw dust, in the eyes of the public; anxious that he should not, no doubt, compromise his position as manager of the Olympic with the ‘respectable classes’ by any statements he might make as manager of the Amphitheatre … This ‘sailing under false colours’ is so transparent that very few people will be deceived by it. The manager [of the Amphitheatre] states … that he will not defend the morale of Jack Sheppard, and then further on covertly argues that this play is not nearly so vicious as Macbeth, Richard III, Henry IV and others which are not only relished but praised by the most respectable portions of society … Passing over the insult offered to the memory of the Bard of Avon by comparing his plays with such vile productions, one is struck with the way in which it is attempted to hoodwink the real objection to Jack Sheppard … [The] real objection to Jack Sheppard and kindred performances is that in them vice is made into a kind of heroism ... Few things have had a greater effect on the growth of juvenile crime. But to do the Manager of the Amphitheatre justice, he does not disguise the reasons why he introduces these plays upon his boards … He is told by the press that it is immoral—that it breeds thieves ... He replies by saying that he will not defend its morality; but that it really pays him too well for him to think of withdrawing it … Really, could there be anything more insulting to the Victorian public than this! A statement also is made to the effect that the manager of the Olympic has lost ‘a fortune’ in the ‘insane attempt’ to revive the plays of Shakespeare, and that the manager of the Amphitheatre is not fool enough to follow his example … The public should … refuse their patronage to those who outrage public morals and defend it by insulting public feeling.58
Whether or not Censor’s protests gained any traction, lack of patronage forced the Royal Amphitheatre’s closure only eight weeks after its re-opening.59 Announcing the last night of the season, Coppin stepped forward to address the audience:
… the attempt to establish a popular place of amusement at a low price of admission has proved a decided failure, inflicting a considerable loss upon the treasury, which would have been very serious but for the great attraction of Madame Lola Montes [sic], and the successful production of Jack Sheppard … This result proves my previous statement ‘that a good company cannot be supported by a low price of admission, with a limited population’. It has been stated that 3s., 2s., and 1s. is not low, but in my opinion a manager of a theatre is placed in the same position as any other trader who has to depend upon the colonial market for his supplies … My farewell to a low price of admission …60
Theatre Royal, Melbourne, 1856
The ‘Old’ Theatre Royal, Bourke Street, photographed in 1861, destroyed by fire in 1872
State Library Victoria, Melbourne
Coppin had originally commissioned his prefabricated Olympic Theatre with the intention of confronting Melbourne’s only existing playhouse, the Queen’s Theatre, with meaningful competition. Instead, he found himself competing with a new theatre built during his absence and superior to his own, the Theatre Royal, which opened two weeks before the Olympic.61 Fortunately for Coppin, the Theatre Royal proved to be an unprofitable burden on its already deeply indebted owner, John Black, and after incurring construction costs inflated by the goldrush induced shortages of labour and materials. After spending a reputed £45,000 to build the Royal, Black was forced to sequester his estate only three months after its opening. Receivers kept the Royal open but only to satisfy Black’s creditors.63 In May 1856, Coppin purchased the lease of the Theatre Royal for £21,000.64
Cremorne Gardens, Melbourne, 1856
The founder of Singapore, Sir Stamford Raffles, established the exclusive ‘Gardens and Menagerie of the Zoological Society of London’ on Regent’s Park in 1828. In 1847, ‘The Zoo’, as the gardens and menagerie became known, was opened to public admission.65 By that time, London was dotted with numerous pleasure gardens.
In October 1852, James Ellis sailed from Plymouth for Melbourne taking with him scenery, properties and the ‘necessary adjuncts’ for a portable theatre to erect on the diggings.66 The failed manager of a London pleasure resort, Cremorne Gardens, Ellis was lured to Australia by the rush for gold.67
Many years later, it was reported that Ellis, the American circus man John Sullivan Noble and the equestrian John Jones ‘made lots of money’ out of their Olympic Circus ‘at the top of Bourke Street’.68 In May 1853, after obtaining a publican's license, Ellis re-opened the Bourke Street establishment as the Salle de Valentino, ‘beautifully decorated and embellished’. Concerts, music and singing replaced equestrian feats.69
The Salle [de] Valentino, Bourke Street, ‘after the appearance of Madame Carandini’, by S.T. Gill, 1854
State Library Victoria, Melbourne
Yet, the Salle de Valentino remained an old, tent-like circus pavilion that soon degenerated into a ‘low dance hall’ typically:
... thronged with diggers carrying a little fortune in their belts and charmed by female dancers sedulously intent upon securing some portion of their easily-acquired wealth.70
Out of the Salle de Valentino, Ellis cleared upwards of £6,000 over the following 21 months. In November 1853, he took out a ten-year lease on ten acres of natural bush land at Richmond on the banks of the Yarra River, about three kilometres from the city.71 There he began to shape a pleasure resort modelled on the London pleasure gardens he had once managed. He planted trees and flowers, installed paths, created a maze, drained a swamp to form a lake, installed pavilions, grottoes and ornamental bridges.72 To the sound of music, the spectacle of fireworks and devoid of anything that could offend the fair sex, this antipodean version of London’s Cremorne Gardens was opened on the evening of Saturday, 10 December 1853.73
Since the 1840s, speculative sea captains had kept colonial exhibitors supplied with wild and exotic animals they purchased at ports-of-call in Africa and Asia.74 In January 1854, the 1200-ton ‘screw steamship’ Madras from London, via Madras, Calcutta and Singapore, dropped anchor in Port Phillip.75 Captain Parfitt offloaded a ‘fine large elephant for sale in these colonies’ as well as two camels. At ‘considerable expense’, Ellis promptly purchased both elephant and camels to add to his attractions at Cremorne.76 When Ellis closed Cremorne over the winter of 1854, he moved the elephant and camels to his Salle de Valentino where he opened his Cirque Nationale for a brief season under the management of William H. Foley, an American circus man.77 As well as the equestrian company, Foley announced that ‘the Siamese [sic] elephant’ and the ‘two trained camels’ would ‘make their first bow before a Melbourne audience’.78 Although a common sight in larger circuses by the early 20th century, this was the first occasion in which these animals were presented in a circus ring in Australia.
… [The] clever elephant now located in Cremorne Gardens went through his part to the satisfaction of a densely-crowded audience. We have no doubt that his elephantine majesty will continue to reign the star of the evening for a long time to come. The sagacious animal must be seen by all the sightseers, in Melbourne ....79
The elephant and camels were returned to Cremorne for the Gardens’ re-opening in October, joining other ‘numberless’ attractions, including vocal and instrumental concerts, a splendid orchestra, illuminated grottoes and playing fountains. The elephant could be seen ‘taking water’ at six o’clock each evening. Patrons could also admire Mons LaLanne’s ‘celebrated French troupe of pantomimists’ and Monsieur Joe-il-Diavolo’s 400-foot descent in his ‘Chariot of the Sun’ over the lake amidst fireworks.80
Pleasure seekers could easily reach the Gardens from the city, whether by walking, riding or omnibus.81 They could also reach the Gardens by a little steamer, the Gondola, that plied the Yarra River.82 Between March 1853 and the end of December 1854, Ellis deposited about £22,000 into his bank account, the combined receipts from the Salle de Valentino and Cremorne Gardens.83
Despite Ellis’s ‘consummate tact and taste’, Melbourne’s ‘owl-looking’ evangelicals managed to have the sale of spirituous or fermented drinks prohibited on Sundays, the very day the Gardens were most patronised.84 Over the 21 months since Cremorne’s opening, Ellis’s Sunday takings plunged from as much as £335 to as little as £14.85 Ellis’s fortunes were not helped by ‘the depressed state of the times and the monetary condition of the colony’. In March 1855, these ‘unfortunate circumstances’ compelled Ellis to close Cremorne Gardens.86 Describing himself as a ‘licensed victualler’, Ellis filed his insolvency schedule a few weeks later.87
In March 1855, following the closure of Cremorne Gardens and James Ellis’s insolvency, ‘the celebrated performing elephant of Cremorne Gardens notoriety’ was put to auction at Tattersall’s stables.88 Exhibited in country towns and on the goldfields, the ‘sagacious’ elephant was not seen at Cremorne again. Nor were the two ‘trained’ camels. Another elephant would not be seen at Cremorne but several more camels would make their appearance some years later as discussed below.
In June 1856, Coppin purchased the fee-simple of Cremorne Gardens from Ellis for £10,000 intending to make improvements worthy of ‘the best gardens of the kind … in European cities.’89 Coppin moved his family within the Gardens.90 Coppin had executed an ‘entire transformation’ of the Gardens before formalising his partnership with G.V. Brooke ahead of the Gardens’ re-opening in November 1856:
Its floral decorations have been largely increased, and now that the roses are in full bloom, the flower-beds are one mass of prodigal blossom. Carved and turned seats have been formed wherever opportunities presented themselves, and the various walks will be lighted with jets of gas laid on from the works upon the premises. The Rotunda has been renovated and enlarged; two spacious bars have been erected the one at the entrance of the grounds, and the other in the rear of the old bar; a theatre, larger we believe than the Olympic, has been constructed for the performance of vaudevilles and concerts; and an extensive rifle gallery and bowling-saloon have been built in another portion of the gardens. There is also a maze, formed after the model of its English prototypes, and an interesting collection of birds and animals, including an eagle, an emu, wallaby, kangaroo, some monkeys and opossums, peacocks, and a number of Australian birds, some of them exhibiting a tropical gorgeousness of plumage. But the great attraction of the gardens is the pictorial model of Mount Vesuvius and the city of Naples, upon which Messrs Pitt, Arregoni, Henning[s], and Wilson have employed their pencils with great advantage. All the architectural details of the picture have been designed so as to exhibit the most picturesque variety-castles, churches, and palatial edifices having been grouped together in such a manner as would conduce best to the general effect. Altogether the picture is a very effective one, whether seen by daylight or by the ruddy glare of the eruption.91
The ‘theatre larger than the Olympic’ was an open-air theatre. Named The Pantheon, it was intended to present ‘novelties both amusing and instructive’ during the summer months and could offer greater comfort than the city theatres.92 And, indeed, the Pantheon saw the delivery of some sterling performances such as: the English Opera’s grand selections from the opera Maritana in November 1856 and Mr and Mrs Craven in their musical burlettas.93 More frequently, the Pantheon was adapted to less exceptional objectives when necessary such as the gratuitous ‘good old English dinner’ served to 2,000 people on Boxing Day 1857.94 In fact, the Pantheon was too far from the city to command the patronage of regular theatre-goers; too susceptible to weather conditions to ensure consistent patronage; and, freely entered, too cheap to be regarded a serious theatre.95
The Salle De Valentino, Bourke Street, photographed just before it was demolished in 1856
State Library Victoria, Melbourne
Despite these improvements and the constant infusion of attractive innovations, Cremorne Gardens proved to be ‘a bottomless pit into which money … [Coppin] made elsewhere [was] sunk’.96 Cremorne Gardens was never restored to viability. During the 30-month life of their partnership, outlined below, Coppin and Brooke relied on their interest in the Theatre Royal to fund their less profitable ventures, Cremorne Gardens in particular.97 Matters were not helped by G.V Brooke’s inability to manage the Royal upon which the survival of Cremorne critically depended.98 Eight months after purchasing Cremorne Gardens, Coppin claimed to have already spent £15,000 on improvements.99
Partnership, 1856–59
Gustavus Vaughan Brooke (1818–1866), actor and Coppin’s business partner, 1856–58
State Library Victoria, Melbourne
By September 1856, George Selth Coppin and Gustavus Vaughan Brooke had formally merged their theatrical interests into a ‘full’ partnership. At the time, it was perceived to be a ‘fortunate combination of histrionic ability and worldly sagacity, professional effort and managerial tact’.100 Brooke wrote enthusiastically to his mother to say:
Mr Coppin and I have become lessees of the Theatre Royal which we have had open for four months successfully. We have jointly purchased Cremorne Gardens, about two miles from Melbourne … We now have the Theatre Royal, the Olympic, Astley’s Amphitheatre, Cremorne Gardens and four very large hotels, all in full swing … It is a great speculation but with every certainty of success.101
To the partnership, Coppin brought his standing as one of the most popular actors in the colonies as well as the four properties under his control, outlined above: the Olympic ‘Iron Pot’ Theatre, which he had built and opened in June 1855; the Royal Amphitheatre, formerly Astley’s, the lease of which he had taken over in October 1855; the Theatre Royal, the lease of which he had taken over in May 1856; and Cremorne Gardens, which he had purchased, outright, in June 1856. Brooke, whose services had been under Coppin’s ‘entire control’ since coming to Australia, brought to the partnership his worldwide standing as ‘the great tragedian’ and, presumably, some financial capital.102 Despite their optimism, however, a constant injection of novel attractions would be required to keep afloat the partnership’s near-monopoly of Melbourne’s principal attractions.103
Of the four venues, all but the Olympic had a chequered record of success. In February 1857, nine months after purchasing the lease of the Theatre Royal, Coppin bemoaned the £4,000 lost from their presentation of grand opera there.
Although I may regret the loss of the money, I assure you I regret still more that an attempt to produce opera has proved a failure, for I look upon the cultivation of high-class music as being absolutely necessary to improve our social condition. Many have been the reasons given for this failure - bad weather, not understanding Italian, disliking a portion of the English opera company, the high prices of admission to the boxes, &c &c; but in my opinion the real cause is this: we are all in business [and] opera appeals for support to the higher classes who live out of town, and dine late; and although they may occasionally make a great exertion to visit the theatre, they will not inconvenience themselves to do so through an operatic season.104
During the life of the Coppin-Brooke partnership, from September 1856 until February 1859, the composition of its theatrical holdings underwent some radical alterations. In March 1857, the lease of the Royal Amphitheatre was transferred to John Black, the builder of the Theatre Royal.105 As early as April 1856, Coppin had come to the conclusion that the Olympic—the beloved ‘Iron Pot’—had fulfilled its purpose.106 In May 1857, unable to find a buyer, Coppin and Brooke converted the ‘Iron Pot’ into ‘an elegant and well frequented Salle de Danse’ named the Argyle Rooms.107
Cremorne Gardens, 1856–59
In 1933, George Wirth, one of the original Wirth circus brothers, founders of Australia’s pre-eminent circus of the 20th century, wrote that ‘a novelty, if it is to become a sensation, must be something entirely new and not merely a new way of doing [old] things’.108 Whether consciously or intuitively, Coppin embraced this fundamental principle of entrepreneurial showmanship. He possessed an uncanny ability to sense and reconcile not only the imperatives of risk and reward but the demands of the public and his creditors. Ever since he attempted to launch a zoological garden in Sydney in 1843, Coppin had pursued one innovation after another: introducing the notion of the ‘free and easy’; building theatres and hotels; importing a theatre of prefabricated iron; producing grand operas ‘worthy of any theatre in the world’; and developing marine and pleasure gardens, to name a few.
Of all Coppin’s ventures, Cremorne Gardens would prove to be his most challenging. The resort demanded constant attention to its natural beauty and the addition of attractive novelties to appeal, inexpensively, to the broad mass of the general public. But clever approaches to pricing, alone, would not ensure Cremorne’s viability as ‘One who was sold’ made clear in his letter to the Argus:
Sir, You will, perhaps, allow me a corner in your paper to expose what I and many others consider a ‘perfect sell’. Last night, I paid my 2s.6d. and was admitted to the gardens at Cremorne; but, to my surprise, there was literally nothing to be seen without extra payment. The Circus, Menagerie, &c, which we are accustomed on ordinary gala nights to see, were each charged one shilling. The only thing to be indulged in without extra charge was dancing, until the ‘grand’ display of fireworks, including the farce of storming Delhi, came off, the whole of which occupied less than six minutes. I understand there were more than 12,000 persons admitted on Monday; on Tuesday there were not more than one-tenth of that number, and last night the gardens were thinly attended - facts which, I think, speak for themselves. Refreshments, too, were much above the price they ought to be. I had a cup of tea and three small dry sandwiches, for which I paid two shillings - half that sum would have been ample. The whole of the proprietors of shows, booths, &c, signed a petition, praying that Mr Coppin would reduce the charge of admission to one shilling; but his answer was, ‘The gardens are mine, and I will charge what I please.’ Apologising for the liberty I have taken in asking you to insert this, I remain yours obediently,
‘One Who Was Sold’.
St Kilda, December 30.109
Although opened seven days a week, the prevailing Sabbatarian ethos only allowed the Gardens to open on Sundays ‘after church hours’ while liquor could not be served at all.110
Tellingly, the program for each Christmas/New Year season listed attractions clearly intended for the masses but not the ‘higher classes’. For the season of 1856/57, these included ‘The American Picco’ who played a common tin whistle ‘with remarkable skill’; Lewis’s Equestrian Company; the ropewalker Pablo Fanque on his corde volante [slack rope]; the Italian Brothers on the trapeze; and the ropewalkers Mons Lalanne and his wife Madame Dalle Casse.111 For the season of 1858/59, attractions included Professor Prescott’s monster display of fireworks and riding lessons for ladies and gentlemen.112 For the season of 1860/61, they included the pantomime of Jack the Giant Killer, a fancy dress ball, a wheel of fortune, a Chinese feast of lanterns, illuminated pictures on the lake, dancing, and fireworks.113 For the final Christmas seasons of Cremorne Gardens, entire circus troupes were engaged, Burton’s National Circus in 1861 and Jones’ British American Circus in 1862.114
Towards the end of 1858, the hitherto seemingly close bond of friendship between Brooke and Coppin came undone.115 On 28 February 1859, the partnership was dissolved. Of the four properties—some with adjoining hotels—that they jointly controlled at the beginning of their partnership in 1856, three properties remained to be divided between them. Brooke selected the Theatre Royal, leaving Coppin with the Cremorne Gardens and the Olympic.116 Belatedly, Coppin realised that he would have done better by taking the Royal for himself and leaving Brooke with Cremorne and the Olympic. During the winter of 1859, despite being elected to the Legislative Council, Coppin was obliged to return to acting to make ends meet and was loudly criticised for doing so.117 During 1859, a new railway station was opened to serve Cremorne but it failed to dramatically improve patronage.118 In December 1859, Coppin closed the Olympic Theatre for good but managed to offer employment for most of its company in the Pantheon, the ‘very elegant little theatre’ within Cremorne Gardens.119 Nevertheless, the Gardens continued to drain his resources. In March 1860, he attempted to dispose both the Olympic Theatre and Cremorne Gardens, whether by sale or lease.120 Failing to attract interest in either property, he converted the Olympic into a Turkish bath house that was opened in July 1860.121
In the sub-sections to follow, I have outlined some of the more striking novelties that Coppin introduced to Cremorne Gardens and their background: Australia’s first manned balloon flight, the Australasian of 1858; the presentation of camels in 1859–60 that would take their place with the expedition of Burke & Wills; and the startling aerial flights of the American trapezian, Bartine, during Cremorne’s final season of 1862–63.
The Australasian, 1858
Illustrated Australian News, 20 January 1866, p. 9. State Library Victoria, Melbourne.
In June 1857, leaving Brooke and their manager, Richard Younge, in charge of their joint interests, Coppin made a hurried trip to England in search of fresh talent.122 In London, he approached several ‘stars’ only to find that most were ‘shining to such advantage … that they declined to move in any other orbit’. Nevertheless, Coppin was able to engage the celebrated magician, ‘Professor’ Anderson, The Wizard of the North, fifty other less-celebrated ‘notabilities’ and two experienced ‘aeronauts’, Charles Henry Brown and ‘Captain’ William Dean, together with two balloons.123 One of the balloons, the 60-foot high, 31,000 cubic foot Australasian, was crafted for Coppin by England’s foremost balloonist, Henry Coxwell. The other balloon was a spare.124
Since Anderson could not commence his Australian tour until June 1858, the most outstanding attraction that accompanied Coppin from London were the two aeronauts and their balloons.125 So that the aeronauts could make their first ascent from Cremorne on Boxing Day 1857, Coppin and his party hastened their return by way of Egypt from where they would cross overland to Suez to ship for Melbourne. However, a five-week delay at Suez meant that it was 29 November before they could depart by the Simla. The homeward voyage was further delayed as the 2500-ton Simla had to deliver troops to India ‘to help quell the mutiny’. The Simla finally docked at Hobson’s Bay on 8 January 1858.126 Several more weeks passed before the Australasian could be made ready for the first manned, successful balloon ascent in Australia.127
A medallion struck to commemorate the launch of Coppin’s balloon from Cremorne Gardens,
February 1858
Museums Victoria, Melbourne
On the afternoon of Monday, 1 February 1858, the Australasian was partially inflated with coal gas at the Melbourne Gas Company at Batman’s Swamp. It was then transported by horse and cart to Cremorne where the inflation was completed from the gasometer that illuminated the Gardens at night also and served Coppin’s residence.128 After several false starts, the Australasian lifted from a platform with its sole passenger, ‘Captain’ Dean.129
… The roads leading to Cremorne were thronged with vehicles, and the paths with foot-passengers from 3 until 5 o’clock, and when the latter hour arrived the environs of the gardens were thronged with curious spectators .... An adequate supply of ballast having been taken in and all the preparations completed, the signal was given to let go; and the huge machine slowly arose amidst the cheers of the assembled multitude inside and outside the gardens - cheers which were repeated and re-echoed by the spectators in more distant localities. As the balloon arose, it cleared the Pantheon very dexterously and sailed but a few feet over the gates at the northern enclosure of the gardens. The aeronaut [Dean] hastily flung out a bag of sand en masse, and the balloon commenced a rapid but perfectly easy ascension, its sole passenger waving his cap in response to the cheers which rose from the crowd below ... [In] twenty minutes, she had become a mere speck, a homoeopathic globule in the far distance, serenely and steadily sailing onwards… About half-past 6 the balloon appeared to have commenced its descent, and speculations became very rife as to the part of the country in which Mr Dean would once more touch his mother earth.130
This inaugural flight of the Australasian lasted about 25 minutes and covered about seven miles until it came to earth in the vicinity of Heidelberg. Accustomed to ballooning over the green countryside of England, Dean was struck by the ‘dirty buff colour’ of Melbourne’s dry, summer landscape.131 At the Theatre Royal later that evening, after the fall of the curtain, thunderous cheers greeted Coppin’s announcement that the aeronaut and his ‘machine’ had both safely landed.132
Although the flight of Coppin’s Australasian was the first successful, manned, lighter-than-air flight to take place in Australia, it was not the first attempt. In Launceston in 1845, ‘Professor’ Rea, a popular magician and ventriloquist, made several attempts to ascend in his ‘machine’, none of which were successful.133 As Coppin was treading the boards in Launceston at that time, he probably witnessed one or more of Rea’s attempts and learned something from them. Branded a ‘humbug’, Rea fled to Port Phillip to escape his creditors.134 On Sydney’s Domain in 1856, a Frenchman, Pierre Maigre, attempted a balloon ascent before a large crowd.135 Maigre’s spectators paid as much as 5s for the pleasure of witnessing what was to be the first manned balloon ascent in the colonies. Insurmountable technical complications prevented the balloon from being launched. Maigre, set upon by hundreds of angry spectators, convinced they had been duped, fled the scene for his own safety.136
Despite the apparent sincerity of Rea and Maigre, each man obviously lacked access to the practical and technical expertise that balloonists in Europe and America had accumulated since the Montgolfiers’ paper-lined linen balloon, filled with hot air, had risen above Paris in 1783.137 Balloonists had constantly refined their craft to captivate spectators at fairs and pleasure resorts. Hot air was replaced by hydrogen until it was found that coal gas was not only cheaper but safer and more widely available.138 Balloons of paper-lined linen were replaced by ballons of silk fabric coated with rubber.139 By the 1820s, a new generation of professional balloonists had emerged who hired out their services and balloons to anyone with an occasion to celebrate.140 Combining aeronautics with showmanship, the balloonist, Charles Green, became a favourite at London’s Vauxhall Gardens.141 Until Coppin’s initiative, these developments hardly touched the Australian colonies although they were widely reported in the colonial press.
There were several other early ballooning attempts in the colonies but all apparently unmanned. In Launceston in January 1849, the canvas roof of Radford’s Amphitheatre was drawn back to enable the launch of a large ‘Montgolfier’ [hot air] balloon from the arena. The balloon kept on its course southwards two hours but how far it ultimately travelled and whether in the direction of Campbelltown or Hobart Town, nobody could establish.142 The following January, from the same venue, a ‘grand ascent’ of probably the same Montgolfier [hot air] balloon was announced to take place before the performance.143
At Botany Bay in May 1850, at William Beaumont and James Waller’s Botanical & Zoological Gardens, a balloon was launched aloft from which several ‘living aeronauts’—probably only dolls or puppets—were to be released and descend by parachute. To counter a rumour that their balloon was ‘nothing more than an ordinary fire balloon’ (lifted by the heated air from a cauldron slung beneath), Beaumont and Waller hastened to assure the Sydney public that theirs was an ‘air balloon’. Filled with heated air prior to its launch, it carried a ‘car’ (wicker basket) that would carry its ‘living aeronauts’.144
If a manned balloon ascent was ever to be made in Australia, there was much to be learned from these previous failures. Coppin could not afford to spoil a balloon ascent at Cremorne by amateurish tinkering. An ascent would have to employ the most advanced technology and rely on the skill of experienced aeronauts. Understandably, in London, Coppin had consulted the pre-eminent balloonist of the era, Henry Coxwell of Tottenham, and had engaged the experienced aeronauts Dean and Brown on Coxwell’s recommendation.145
Unfortunately, Coppin had overlooked a lesson learned from the exhibition of the Siamese elephant at Geelong some years earlier for, although the surrounding precincts were thronged with curious spectators:
… they assembled in thronging numbers everywhere but in the grounds themselves. In fact, the public seemed to have arrived at the conclusion that Mr Coppin had imported balloons and aeronauts … with no other object than that of providing the assembled thousands with a spectacle ... Pecuniarily speaking, the balloon ascent must have been a failure, while, as a matter of fact in science, it was a great success …146
As outstanding was Coppin’s achievement in initiating the first manned balloon ascents in the colonies, he seems to have treated the milestone with indifference. There was a personal tragedy, the death of his daughter Harriet a few weeks after Dean’s first ascent from Cremorne Gardens. Other matters claimed more of his attention. In April 1858, he was elected a Councillor of the Municipality of Richmond. In June, he announced his retirement from the stage while still ‘in the prime of life’ to devote his ‘unexpended energies to his adopted country’. In October, he was narrowly elected to a seat in the Colony’s upper house, its Legislative Council.147
Camels, 1859–60
The departure of the Burke & Wills expedition from Melbourne, 20 August 1860
State Library Victoria, Melbourne
Cremorne had been neglected for over 15 months when Coppin purchased the property on June 1856. He restored the Gardens, made improvements and engaged artists in time for its re-opening in November 1856.148 The Gardens, now lit with gas, featured a pyrotechnic display of the eruption of Mount Vesuvius; a dancing rotunda; a new theatre, the Pantheon; restaurant, bar and oyster saloons; a shooting gallery, bowling saloon and maze.149 Patrons could also see a circus staffed by Mr Lewis and his troupe of equestrians; Professor Lennox’s admirable feats of magic and legerdemain; Madame Dalle Casse’s ascent and descent over the lake on her rope, 300 feet long and 60 feet high; her husband Felix LaLanne’s ‘grotesque evolutions upon stilts’ and the Italian Brothers on the trapeze.150 Despite these attractions, the Gardens contained no more than an ‘incipient’ menagerie and an aviary.151 Some 4,000 people attended the Gardens on the evening of Wednesday, 3 December when a complimentary benefit was given to Coppin ‘the enterprising owner of the Gardens’.152
Two years later, Cremorne held more birds and beasts than ever. To the menagerie, an ourang-outang, several lions and half-a-dozen dromedaries had been added.153 Each evening, Signor Fernandez, ‘The Lion King’, gave his ‘daring performance and zoological exhibition’ the highlight of which was to place his head within a lion’s jaws.154 Presumably, Coppin had numerous opportunities to purchase exotic animals landed by speculative sea captains. As far as the record speaks however, Cremorne’s menagerie was never as extensive as the ‘zoological garden’ that Beaumont and Waller assembled on the shores of Sydney’s Botany Bay from 1848.155
Coppin was partial to camels. Indeed, there was much talk about the need to import camels for exploration parties as horses were excruciatingly slow.156 Coppin had long believed in the use of camels to explore the outback:
If that idea had been followed upon when I originated it in South Australia, it would have been the means of saving many valuable lives. If I had my way, I would pass a law that no exploring party should go without camels. The self-denial and endurance of the camel in crossing the sand barren desert are well-known.157
In November 1859, Coppin touted the presentation in Cremorne’s menagerie of six camels – dromedaries - delivered from Aden by the mail steamer, Malta:
These interesting animals, intended to explore the interior of this country, will only remain on view for a limited number of days previous to their departure.158
After their display at Cremorne, the six camels were removed to the Olympic Theatre to appear in Azael, The Prodigal: An Old Offender; or, Jack Sheppard No. 2, to illustrate the arrival and departure of a caravan.159 The camels did not return to Cremorne. What happened to them?
In Melbourne in 1857, an Exploration Committee had been established to promote the exploration of Australia’s unknown interior.160 As plans to traverse the continent from south to north took shape, camels were decided upon as the most feasible means of moving an exploring party through the interior.161 In December 1858, the Victorian Government sent George Landells to Calcutta [Kolkata] to procure camels for the expedition.162 Landells purchased 24 camels from markets in Peshawar and Afghanistan, then walked them 1,000 kilometres to Karachi where they were loaded aboard the Chinsurah for the three-month voyage to Melbourne.163 The expedition still short of camels, the Victorian Government purchased for £300 the six that Coppin had exhibited at Cremorne Gardens and the Olympic Theatre.164 In August 1860, the Victorian Exploring Expedition set off from Melbourne to considerable fanfare, its fate to eventually enter the pages of Australian history as Burke & Wills. Of the four explorers who reached the Gulf of Carpenteria, only John King saw Melbourne again.165
Coppin’s contribution of six camels might have been his only engagement with the legendary expedition but its tragic outcome provided entrepreneurs with abundant material for commemorative literary, theatrical and artistic projects. When Coppin funded the production of a diorama of the expedition, containing three-dimensional miniature scenes, he approached the Exploration Committee to secure the services of John King for £1,000 as narrator for 12 months. The proposal was damned for its ‘wretched taste’, Coppin damned as a ‘trumpery showman and charlatan’ and King, ill and traumatised, nobly declined to turn himself into a public exhibit for financial reward.166
By this time, Melbourne had emerged into opulence. From gold, agriculture, and the rise of industry and commerce, its population had reached 140,000, surpassing even Sydney.167 In December 1860, Coppin and Brooke resolved their differences and publicly reconciled.
The Royal was filled to overflowing. When the two men clasped each other’s hands and then stood arm-in-arm, the audience rose in unison, wildly cheering … Actors such as Brooke and Coppin were by no means merely players. They belonged to the people, who shared with them, their trials and triumphs.168
But, if the renewal of their friendship was meant to renew their partnership, nothing was forthcoming. Brooke returned to London in 1861 expecting to recover his former theatrical fame. Instead, he found that production and acting styles had moved ahead and he had not. He was often drunk on stage. Deciding to try his luck in Australia again, he sailed from Plymouth by the London in January 1866. A few days later, the vessel sank in the Bay of Biscay. Brooke was drowned.169
In 1862, Coppin built the Haymarket Theatre in Bourke Street but its cost of construction exceeded expectations. Despite spending over £41,000 improving the grounds and buildings of Cremorne Gardens since 1856, Coppin had failed to restore the resort to viability.170 Facing insolvency, he closed Cremorne until the Christmas-New Year season of 1862–63.171 The brief season would be the swan song of Cremorne Gardens.
Bartine, 1862–63
Bartine, trapeze artist, c.1838–? Photo by Archibald McDonald, Melbourne.
State Library Victoria, Melbourne
Upwards of 3,000 people visited Cremorne Gardens on the opening day, Boxing Day, Friday, 26 December 1862. The Melbourne Railway Company ran trains each half-hour from Prince’s Bridge and additional ‘special’ trains ran in the afternoon. The purchase of a single ticket admitted the holder to almost every attraction including Jones’ British-American Circus; the performance of a troupe of Maori War Chiefs, 21 in number; a gallery of cosmoramic views and stereoscopic pictures; a small collection of birds and beasts, including lions, a tiger, leopard, panther and ‘other denizens of the desert’; dancing on the rotunda; and a display of fireworks. For unknown reasons, an additional sixpence was charged to see an Indian snake charmer. But the outstanding attraction was the ‘first appearance in the Australian colonies’ of 24-year-old Henry Mahoney, better known as Bartine, a solo performer on an open-air trapeze.172
In his seminal work, A Seat at the Circus, the late British circus historian, Antony Hippisley Coxe, distinguished three eras in the historical development of the modern circus over the 200 years since Philip Astley laid its foundations in London in 1768. Each era, he argued, emphasized a particular aspect of circus but left its fundamental character unchanged. The unrelenting pursuit of innovation was common to each era.
Experimentation was the watchword of progress … [The] industrial revolution created conditions which led to innovations in the performance arts and … trapeze would be one of these.173
In the first era, in the 90 years following Astley, the horse and equestrian feats prevailed; in the second era, the 60 years following Blondin’s tightrope traversal of Niagara and Jules Leotard’s flying trapeze performances in Paris, in 1859, greater attention was focused on the human performers—the acrobats, gymnasts, rope-dancers and jugglers—previously confined to supportive roles on circus programs; the third era, following World War I, saw the rise of animal acts and their trainers.174
In the few years following Leotard’s novel displays on his single trapeze in the cafes of Paris and London, others built on his innovations, refined them and took them to other parts of the world. Several gymnasts and gymnastic troupes soon arrived in the Australian colonies to present the latest examples of aerial performance. Over the summer of 1862–63, Bartine, thrilled Cremorne’s audiences with solo, open-air performances, such as The Leap for Life and Zampillaerosation.
The scene of his exhibition [of The Leap for Life] was that space immediately in front of the Pantheon Theatre. A narrow platform was there erected, about twelve or fourteen feet high, and 100 feet long. Three sets of ropes were suspended from posts of about thirty feet high, and these hung over the platform at equal distances, with bars attaching them together. The performer then, with the nearest bar, swung himself from a platform projecting over the theatre, and by the impulse given, he travelled to within six or eight feet of the next bar, on which he threw himself, catching hold of the handle, and in like manner he propelled himself to the next bar, from which he swung to a platform at the other end. He then repeated the same feat back again, and in his course threw several somersaults. His performance was received with well-merited applause, but owing to the wind, which at times blew rather strong, the rope did not hang true, and twice he sustained a slight fall, but with no injury. He calculated his movements with great precision, as he well required, considering the dangerous nature of the performance he was engaged in.175
Trapeze gear set up within Cremorne Gardens, 1861. Photo by Cox and Luckin, Richmond.
State Library Victoria, Melbourne
Despite the appeal of Bartine and the numerous other attractions, the end for Cremorne Gardens was clearly approaching. On 7 February, the gates were closed for the last time.176 Less than two years earlier, on the shores of Botany Bay, William Beaumont’s Botanical & Zoological Gardens had hosted its last Grand Fete. The 600 ‘elegantly dressed’ visitors was well short of the thousands who had attended its fetes in the early 1850s. By the end of 1861, Beaumont had closed his resort for the last time.177 A perceptive observer of the closure of Cremorne Gardens remarked:
Even as a historical fact in colonial chronicles, the decline and fall of Cremorne are not unimportant; but as an indication of a certain condition of our social system, they are especially significant. They constitute one among many instances of the rapidity with which the phases of our colonial existence succeed each other. They seem to suggest that we have acquired, by some means, or in consequence of certain conditions, the power of compressing time into a smaller limit, or at least of bringing within a more defined compass a succession of events. Perhaps we are only obeying a rule prevailing in all new countries, of living fast, and of doing more in a given time than they are in the habit of doing in the older countries of the world. In this way, perhaps, a couple of years may be rendered as useful to mankind as are a dozen on the other side of the equator, for, as some philosopher remarks, we ought not to measure our lives according to their duration, but according to the good we effect in them. It is true that the quantity of labour does not always represent an equivalent amount of good, and perhaps if the truth were known, some of our apparent progress is of the Sysiphus kind. Nevertheless, it is also true that most of our institutions are sudden in their inception, rapid in their career, abundant in their changes, and precipitate in their termination.178
The Gardens’ properties, including ‘all the fine works of art and curiosities of all kinds … [and] about 150 plaster casts of classical subjects’ were sold by auction on 21 November 1863.179 The title to the land, advertised for sale for £8000, was sold the following February for £4100 to a Mr Harcourt who intended to erect a private lunatic asylum upon the property.
*******
The end of Cremorne Gardens was not the end of George Selth Coppin. After resigning from the Legislative Council, he returned to the stage in earnest. He made several intercolonial tours and engaged Charles and Ellen Kean for an Australian tour. He regained control of the Theatre Royal only to see it burned to the ground in 1872. Promptly acquiring a 99-year lease of the land, he raised the capital to build a new Theatre Royal. In 1874, he engaged the Americans J.C. Williamson and his wife, Maggie Moore, for an Australian tour of their production, Struck Oil. In 1881, Williamson became sole lessee of the new Theatre Royal, a stepping stone towards the evolution of Australia’s leading theatrical enterprise of the 20th century, J.C. Williamson Ltd. Returning to politics, albeit quietly, Coppin represented East Melbourne in the Legislative Assembly for two terms, 1874–77 and 1883–88 and represented Melbourne in the Legislative Council in 1889–95. Coppin energetically promoted specific reforms and institutions which had caught his attention. He died at Richmond in March 1906, survived by his wife, their two sons and five daughters, and by two of the three daughters of his first marriage.
To close this essay, I pay tribute, albeit posthumously, to Coppin’s biographer, the late Alec Bagot (1893–1968). Bagot’s Coppin the Great, is an extraordinary work of research and writing, the absence of footnotes notwithstanding. Published in 1965, without the convenience of modern technology and when the serious appreciation of Australia’s cultural history was still to enter the national conversation, makes it even more outstanding.
Endnotes
1. Alec Bagot, Coppin the Great: Father of Australian theatre, Melbourne University Press, Carlton, 1965, p. 81.
2. 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 7 January 2025.
3. Ancestry.com: New South Wales: Unassisted Immigrant Passenger Lists, 1826–1922, Series 1291, Reel 1270.
4. Eric Irvin, Dictionary of the Australian Theatre, 1788–1914, Hale & Iremonger Pty Limited, Sydney, 1985, p. 75.
5. Gail Davis (ed.), Guide to New South Wales State Archives Relating to Convicts and Convict Administration, State Records Authority of New South Wales, Kingswood, 2004, pp. 255–56.
6. Richard Waterhouse, Private Pleasures, Public Leisure: A history of Australian popular culture since 1788, Longman Australia Pty Limited, South Melbourne, 1995, pp. 45–46.
7. Waterhouse, p. 44; Eric Irvin, Dictionary of the Australian Theatre, 1788–1914, Hale & Iremonger, Sydney, 1985, p. 206.
8. J.M. Golby & A.W. Purdue, The Civilisation of the Crowd: Popular culture in England, 1750–1900, Sutton Publishing Limited, Stroud, 1999, pp. 91–92.
9. Arthur H. Saxon, Enter Foot and Horse: A History of hippodrama in England and France, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1968, p. 1.
10. ‘Theatricals’, Omnibus and Sydney Spectator, 25 March 1843, p. 10.
11. MHNSW StAC: NRS-905, Main series of letters received [Colonial Secretary], [4/4558.3], Letter No. 43/3389, letter dated 4 May 1853, Letter No. 43/3546, letter dated 9 May 1843.
12. ‘City Council’, Australasian Chronicle (Sydney), 30 May 1843, p. 2; ‘City Council’, Australian (Sydney), 31 May 1843, p. 2.
13. ‘Zoological Institution’, Sydney Morning Herald, 26 June 1852, p. 3.
14. ‘Publican’s Licenses’, Sydney Morning Herald, 18 August 1843, p. 3; Bagot, p. 81.
15. Bagot, p. 82. The Clown Hotel was also known as the Clown Tavern.
16. ‘Our Weekly Gossip’, Dispatch (Sydney), 13 April 1844, p. 2.
17. Advertisement, Sydney Morning Herald, 25 September 1844, p. 1.
18. Bagot, p. 85.
19. ‘Local News’, South Australian (Adelaide), 25 September 1846, p. 5.
20. ‘Bench of Magistrates’, South Australian Register (Adelaide), 16 June 1847, p. 1.
21. Advertisement, South Australian Gazette (Adelaide), 24 November 1849, p. 2.
22. ‘New Theatre’, Adelaide Times, 19 October 1850, p. 8.
23. ‘The Semaphore Hotel’, South Australian Register (Adelaide), 18 August 1851, p. 2.
24. Bagot, p. 212.
25. Bagot, p. 150.
26. Ross Thorne, Theatre Buildings in Australia to 1905: From the Time of the first settlement to arrival of the Cinema, Architectural Research Foundation. University of Sydney, 1971, Vol. 1, p. 86.
27. Bagot, p. 157.
28. Irvin, p. 182.
29. Bagot, pp. 178–79.
30. Thorne, p. 86.
31. ‘Public Amusements’, Age (Melbourne), 10 March 1856, p. 3.
32. ‘Detestable Tyranny’, Argus (Melbourne), 3 June 1852, p. 5.
33. Bagot, p. 201.
34. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 28 June 1852, p. 5.
35. Paul McGuire, with Betty Arnott and Frances Margaret McGuire, The Australian Theatre, Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1948, p. 90.
36. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 19 October 1854, p. 8.
37. Albert Dressler [ed.], California’s Pioneer Circus, Joseph Andrew Rowe, Founder, H.S. Crocker & Co., San Francisco, 1926, p. 19; E.D. Potts and A. Potts, Young America and Australian Gold: America and the gold rush of the 1850s, University of Queensland Press, St Lucia, 1974, p. 149.
38. Bagot, p. 221.
39. ‘Domestic Intelligence’, Argus (Melbourne), 18 April 1855, p. 5.
40. ‘New Theatre in Lonsdale Street’, Age (Melbourne), 19 April 1855, p. 5.
41. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 7 June 1855, p. 8.
42. Bagot, p. 190.
43. Bagot, p. 192.
44. ‘The New Amphitheatre, Spring Street’, Argus (Melbourne), 29 August 1854, p. 5.
45. ‘Mummer Memoirs’, Sydney Sportsman, 8 January 1908, p. 3.
46. The first of these three ‘drafts’ arrived in Port Phillip by the Callibar after a 91-day voyage from London. See: ‘Arrival of Mr Barry, The Celebrated Clown’, Argus (Melbourne), 6 November 1854, p. 8.
47. ‘Astley’s Amphitheatre’, Age (Melbourne), 11 January 1855, p. 5.
48. G.D.H. Cole & Raymond Postgate, The Common People, 1746–1946, Methuen, London, 1968, p. 347.
49. Demographia. com, 2025.
50. Wray Vamplew (ed.), Australians, Historical Statistics, Fairfax, Syme & Weldon Associates, Sydney, 1987, p. 29.
51. VPRS 267/1/71/2483; ‘Closing of Astley’s’, Argus (Melbourne), 18 June 1855, p. 5; Irvin, p. 181.
52. ‘Closing of Astley’s Amphitheatre’, Argus (Melbourne), 21 July 1855, p. 8.
53. ‘The Theatres’, Argus (Melbourne), 18 February 1856, p. 5.
54. Bagot, p. 202.
55. ‘Melbourne’, Geelong Advertiser, 14 March 1856, p. 2.
56. ‘The Theatres’, Age (Melbourne), 11 March 1856, p. 2.
57. ‘Royal Amphitheatre’, Age (Melbourne), 19 March 1856, p. 3.
58. ‘Theatrical Representation vs Public Morals’, Age (Melbourne), 29 March 1856, p. 3.
59, Bagot, pp. 202–03.
60. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 12 April 1856, p. 8.
61. Bagot, p. 200.
62. ‘Mr Black and the Theatre Royal’, Age (Melbourne), 9 October 1855, p. 5.
63. Bagot, pp. 200, 201–02.
64. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 12 April 1856, p. 8; ‘Commercial Intelligence’, Argus (Melbourne), 12 May 1856, p. 4; Bagot, p. 204.
65. Wilfrid Blunt, The Ark in the Park: The zoo in the nineteenth century, Hamilton, London, 1976, pp. 74–75.
66. ‘A Theatre for the Australian Gold Diggings’, Argus (Melbourne), 11 October 1852, p. 5.
67. VPRS 1189/242/K54/14281; Mimi Colligan, ‘Cremorne Gardens, Richmond, And the Modelled Panoramas, 1853 to 1863’, Victorian Historical Journal, Vol. 2, No. 2, November 1995, p. 123.
68. ‘St Leon’s Circus at Wangaratta’, Ovens & Murray Advertiser (Beechworth), 22 December 1877, p. 4.
69. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 22 June 1853, p. 8.
70. Thorne, p.128.
71. Colligan, 1995; VPRS 1189/242/K54/14281.
72. ‘Cremorne Gardens’, Argus (Melbourne), 29 October 1853, p. 5.
73. ‘Our Charitable Institutions’, Argus (Melbourne), 10 December 1853, p. 5.
74. W.C. Coup, cited in Janet M. Davis, The Circus Age: Culture & society under the American big top, University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 2002, p. 17.
75. ‘Fashionable Arrivals’, Argus (Melbourne), 17 January 1854, p. 4.
76. ‘Fashionable Arrivals’, Argus (Melbourne), 18 January 1854, p. 5.
77. Unable to live on his $1,200 a month gold-inflated salary in San Francisco, Foley had followed J.A. Rowe to Australia. See: Dressler, pp. 10–11.
78. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 29 June 1854, p. 8. In 1849, the first circus seen in Melbourne, Hayes’, briefly occupied a site on the south side of Little Bourke Street East, between Russell and Stephen (now Exhibition) Streets. It has been speculated that the structural remnants Hayes left behind were incorporated into Noble’s circus which opened on a block further east in February 1852 and which later became the Salle de Valentino. Two sketches by S.T. Gill made early in 1854 show the Salle de Valentino’s tent-like interior: five rows of sloping benches surrounding a circus ring boarded over to serve as a dance floor with a small platform projected into one side of the ring. See: Ralph Marsden, ‘Salle de Valentino’, On Stage, 2004, pp. 22–24.
79. ‘The Greatest Performer in Victoria’, Courier (Hobart Town), 8 July 1854, p. 3.
80. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 9 October 1854, p. 8.
81. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 19 February 1855, p. 8.
82. Christmas Festivities and Amusements’, Argus (Melbourne), 26 December 1854, p. 5.
83. ‘Insolvent Court’, Argus (Melbourne), 31 May 1855, p. 6.
84. ‘Supreme Court’, Argus (Melbourne), 9 March 1855, p. 5. The Act in Council, No. 24 of 1855 was entitled ‘An Act to make provision for the Sale of Fermented and Spirituous Liquors and Refreshments in certain Districts’. See: ‘Confirmation of Acts of Council’, Argus (Melbourne), 24 January 1855, p. 5.
85. ‘Insolvent Court’, Argus (Melbourne), 31 May 1855, p. 6.
86. ‘Astley’s Amphitheatre: Mr Ellis’s Benefit’, Argus (Melbourne), 31 March 1855, p. 5.
87. ‘New Insolvents’, Argus (Melbourne), 5 April 1855, p. 6.
88. ‘Auction Sale Extraordinary’, Argus (Melbourne), 9 March 1855, p. 5.
89. ‘Cremorne Gardens’, Argus (Melbourne), 21 June 1856, p. 5. The ‘fee-simple’ gave Coppin a permanent and absolute tenure in the land and the freedom to dispose of it as he chose.
90. Colligan, p. 126; Bagot, p. 223.
91. ‘Opening of Cremorne Gardens’, Argus (Melbourne), 3 November 1856, p. 5.
92. Bagot, p. 212.
93. Advertisements, Argus (Melbourne), 22 November 1856, p. 8, 29 November 1856, p. 8.
94. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 26 December 1856, p. 8.
95. Bagot, p. 234.
96. Bagot, p. 240.
97. Bagot, p. 223.
98. Bagot, p. 220.
99. ‘Music and Drama’, Age (Melbourne), 2 February 1857, p. 3.
100. Bagot, p. 206.
101. Bagot, p. 207.
102. Advertisement, Empire (Sydney), 14 June 1855, p. 1.
103. Bagot, 1965, p. 207.
104. ‘Music and Drama’, Age (Melbourne), 2 February 1857, p. 3.
105. ‘Law Report’, Argus (Melbourne), 25 November 1857, p. 6. Black converted the Amphitheatre into a conventional theatre which re-opened as the Princess’s Theatre in April 1857. Owing to its makeshift accommodation, poor lighting and inadequate ventilation, the Princess’s was not a popular theatre. It was completely renovated in 1865. See: Robyn Ridett, Ross Thorne, ‘Princess Theatre, Melbourne’, in Philip Parsons, General Editor, Companion to Theatre in Australia, Currency Press in association with Cambridge University Press, Sydney, 1995, p. 465.
106. Irvin, p. 183.
107. ‘Public Amusements’, Argus (Melbourne), 29 May 1857, p. 6.
108. ‘Under the Big Top: The Life Story of George Wirth, Circus Proprietor’, Life: A record for busy folk (Melbourne), Part V, 15 May 1933, pp. 406–10.
109. ‘Cremorne Gardens Fair’, Argus (Melbourne), 31 December 1858, p. 5.
110. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 11 December 1858, p. 8.
111. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 17 December 1856, p. 8.
112. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 27 December 1858, p. 8.
113. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 31 December 1860, p. 8.
114. Advertisements, Argus (Melbourne), 21 December 1861, p. 8, 31 December 1862, p. 8.
115. ‘Amusements’, Argus (Melbourne), 17 June 1859, p. 1.
116. Bagot, p. 222; ‘The Theatres’, Argus (Melbourne), 19 July 1859, p. 5.
117. ‘The Theatres’, Argus (Melbourne), 19 July 1859, p. 5.
118. ‘Cremorne’, Argus (Melbourne), 16 December 1859, p. 7.
119. ‘Miscellaneous’, Argus (Melbourne), 17 December 1859, p. 2.
120. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 9 March 1860, p. 8.
121. Untitled article, Argus (Melbourne), 2 November 1860, p. 5. In 1901, the site was briefly occupied by a large Australian outback ‘wagon’ circus that wandered into Melbourne, Eroni Bros Colossal Circus and Menagerie. Despite ‘big business’, ‘old Bill’ Eroni [William G. Perry] closed the season prematurely as there was ‘too much noise’. By that time and due in no small measure to Coppin’s initiatives several decades earlier, Melbourne had developed into Australia’s affluent and discriminating theatrical capital. See: ‘At Poverty Point’, Bulletin (Sydney), 18 May 1901, p. 25; ‘At Poverty Point’, Bulletin (Sydney), 9 July 1914, p. 9; ‘At Poverty Point’, Bulletin (Sydney), 16 February 1905, p. 30.
122. ‘Departure of Mr Coppin for England’, Bell’s Life in Victoria (Melbourne), 27 June 1857, p. 2.
123. ‘Theatres’, Argus (Melbourne), 16 January 1858, p. 6.
124. ‘The signal exploits of Mr H. Henden, Aeronaut’, Canberra Times, 14 January 1984, p. 15.
125. Owing to existing commitments, Anderson did not make his appearance in Melbourne until June 1858 when he opened at the Theatre Royal. Anderson’s success in Australia exceeded ‘all his previous good fortune’. He was paid the ‘generous’ sum of £10,000 for the six-month engagement. See: ‘Anglo-Australian Items’, Age (Melbourne), 21 December 1857, p. 5; ‘A Wizard’s View of Australia’, Age (Melbourne), 24 December 1858, p. 6.
126. ‘Shipping Intelligence’, Argus (Melbourne), 9 January 1858, p. 4; Bagot, p. 211.
127. ‘Mail Steam Packet Company’s Litigation’, Argus (Melbourne), 19 January 1858, p. 4; Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 29 January 1858, p. 8. The name of the balloon is sometimes given as the Australian.
128. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 29 January 1858, p. 8; ‘Cremorne’, Bell’s Life in Victoria (Melbourne), 30 January 1858, p. 2.
129. Advertisement, Age (Melbourne), 1 February 1858, p. 1.
130. ‘First Balloon Ascent in the Australian Colonies’, Argus (Melbourne), 2 February 1858, p. 5.
131. My Note Book (Melbourne), 6 February 1858, pp. 470–72.
132. ‘Theatre Royal’, Argus (Melbourne), 2 February 1858, p. 5.
133. ‘Attempted Balloon Ascent’, Cornwall Chronicle (Launceston), 15 March 1845, p. 2.
134. ‘Ballooning’, Cornwall Chronicle (Launceston), 14 January 1846, p. 35.
135. ‘The Monster Balloon Ascent’, Sydney Morning Herald, 22 November 1856, p. 2; ‘The Sydney Balloon’, Sydney Morning Herald, 16 December 1856, p. 5.
136. ‘The Sydney Balloon—Attempted Descent and Failure—Riotous Proceedings and Serious Accident’, Empire (Sydney), 16 December 1856, p. 4.
137. Helene Rogers, Lighter than Air: Australian ballooning history, The author, 2021, p. 7.
138. Richard Holmes, Falling Upwards: How we took to the air, William Collins, London, 2013, pp. 16, 53, 57.
139. Alvin M. Josephy, Jr, The American Heritage History of Flight, American Heritage Publishing Co Inc, New York, 1962, p. 41.
140. Holmes, p. 56.
141. Dave Coke and Alan Borg, Vauxhall Gadens: A history, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2011, pp. 319ff.
142. ‘Radford’s Circus’, Cornwall Chronicle (Launceston), 13 January 1849, p. 300.
143. Advertisement, Cornwall Chronicle (Launceston), 26 January 1850, p. 58.
144. Advertisement, Sydney Morning Herald, 23 May 1850, p. 1.
145. Rogers, pp. 21ff.
146. ‘First Balloon Ascent in the Australian Colonies’, Argus (Melbourne), 2 February 1858, p. 5.
147. Bagot, p. 215.
148. ‘Opening of Cremorne Gardens’, Argus (Melbourne), 3 November 1856, p. 5.
149. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 30 October 1856, p. 8
150. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 2 December 1856, p. 8; ‘Cremorne Gardens’, Argus (Melbourne), 26 December 1856, p. 5.
151. ‘Social’, Age (Melbourne), 12 November 1856, p. 5; ‘Eight Hours Movement’, Age (Melbourne), 22 April 1857, p. 5.
152. ‘Cremorne Gardens: Complimentary Benefit to Mr Coppin’, Age (Melbourne), 5 December 1856, p. 6.
153. ‘Cremorne Gardens’, Argus (Melbourne), 16 November 1858, p. 5; Gippsland Guardian, 7 October 1859, p. 2.
154. Advertisement, Age (Melbourne), 13 November 1858, p. 1; Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 24 December 1859, p. 8.
155. See Mark St Leon, ‘Beaumont & Waller’s Botanical & Zoological Gardens, at the Sir Joseph Banks Hotel, Botany Bay 1848–61’, Journal of the Royal Australian Historical Society, Vol. 9, Part 1, June 2023, pp. 30–54.
156. Tom L. McKnight, The Camel in Australia, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne, 1969, p. 19.
157. Bagot, pp. 217–18.
158. Advertisement, Age (Melbourne), 14 November 1859, p. 1.
159. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 28 November 1859, p. 8.
160. ‘Exploration of the Interior’, Argus (Melbourne), 24 December 1857, p. 4.
161. ‘Australian Exploration’, Argus (Melbourne), 27 October 1859, p. 6.
162. Untitled article, Argus (Melbourne), 17 December 1859, p. 5.
163. Tim Bonyhady, Burke & Wills: From Melbourne to myth, David Ell Press Pty Ltd, Balmain, 1991, p. 44.
164. ‘Miscellaneous’, Age (Melbourne), 23 June 1860, p. 5.
165. ‘Golden Age Almanac’, Golden Age (Queanbeyan), 7 January 1864, p. 4.
166. Bonyhady, pp. 195, 222; ‘King, The Explorer’, Mount Alexander Mail, 1 January 1862, p. 3.
167. Russell Ward, The Australian Legend, Angus & Robertson, Sydney, 1958, pp. 113–14.
168. Bagot, p. 231.
169. H.L. Oppenheim, ‘Brooke, Gustavus Vaughan (1818–1866)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/brooke-gustavus-vaughan-3064/text4519, published first in hardcopy 1969, accessed online 24 January 2025.
170. ‘News of the Week’, Argus (Melbourne), 27 February 1864, p. 2
171. ‘Cremorne Gardens’, Bell’s Life in Victoria (Melbourne), 20 December 1862, p. 2.
172. ‘Boxing Day’, Argus (Melbourne), 27 December 1862, p. 5; Ancestry.com: Assisted and Unassisted Passenger Lists, 1839–1923: Bartine arrived in Port Philip by the Norfolk from Gravesend on 17 October 1862. Bartine’s true name was Patrick Mahoney.
173. Steve Gossard, A Reckless Era of Aerial Performance: The evolution of the trapeze, 1991, pp. 12, 43.
174. Antony Hippisley Coxe, A Seat at the Circus, Macmillan, London, 1980, pp. 31–35.
175. ‘Christmas Festivities: Cremorne Gardens’, Age (Melbourne), 27 December 1862, p. 5.
176. Advertisement, Argus (Melbourne), 7 February 1863, p. 8.
177. ‘Botany Bay’, Sydney Morning Herald, 2 April 1861, p 5.
178. ‘The Last of Cremorne’, Herald (Melbourne), 10 February 1863, p. 7.
179. Untitled article, Argus (Melbourne), 21 November 1863, p. 4.
180. ‘News of the Week’, Argus (Melbourne), 27 February 1864, p. 2.
