Macquarie Place

About

The Macquarie Place Park, also known as the Macquarie Place Precinct, is a heritage-listed small triangular urban park located in the Sydney central business district in the City of Sydney local government area of New South Wales, Australia. The former town square and milestone and now memorial, public park and monument is situated on the corner of Bridge Street and Loftus Street. It is named in honour of Governor Lachlan Macquarie. The precinct includes The Obelisk or Macquarie Obelisk, the Sirius anchor and gun/cannon, the Statue of Thomas Sutcliffe Mort, the historic Underground Public Conveniences and the Christie Wright Memorial Fountain. The property was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 5 March 2010. Macquarie Place was the first formally laid out public space in Sydney in 1810, functioning as the town square. Along with Hyde Park, it is the oldest public park in Australia. Its size has been greatly reduced since colonial days. An obelisk from 1818 and designed by the New South Wales Government Architect, Francis Greenway, is located in the park and records the distance to various locations in New South Wales along the earliest roads developed in the colony...

Originally swampy mangrove land on the banks of the Tank Stream, the colony's first water supply, this site is very significant. In 1792 a path continuing Bridge Street and the carriageway to First Government House met in this approximate spot. This was then close to the foreshore. By then the alignment of lots forming its southern boundary was in existence.

Macquarie Place is shown from 1792 as a triangular area adjoining the garden of the First Government House, near the original foreshore of Circular Quay (then Sydney Cove ) and on the eastern bank of the Tank Stream (when it was an open stream into Sydney Cove). The land of Macquarie Place is represented as such in the 1792 Governor Phillip 's Survey of the settlement in New South Wales and the 1793 Sketch of Sydney by Ferdinand Brambila. The triangular shape responded to the natural topography of the original shoreline of Sydney Cove and the Tank Stream. The triangular area was formed by the intersection of three early Colonial roads running in direct lines between three important constructions of the colonial period, including the Guard House at the entrance to First Government House at the south-eastern tip of the triangle, the bridge over the Tank Stream at the south-western tip of the triangle, and the 1788 fortifications (replaced by the Dry Store in 1791) beside the Government Wharf at the northern tip of the triangle. Macquarie Place may have operated as a public place of gathering for the early settlement from as early as 1791 alongside the Dry Store, located in the approximate present-day location of Customs House. At least half of the population still depended upon this Dry Store for collecting their food rations by 1801. During this early period before the official gazettal of Macquarie Place, part of the land was leased to Shadrach Shaw. This early lease appears in plans of Sydney of 1800 and 1807 and in no other known plans before or following these years.

By 1807 a triangular layout had been formalised (relating to the existing layout of plots) and a guard house had been built next to Government House 's main entrance.

In 1810 Macquarie named the principal roads in Sydney town, envisaging a regular grid, and set aside Macquarie Place as public ground. Roads to Liverpool and Windsor were completed and toll gates built. During his term (1810–1821) a network of surveyed new towns (the five Hawkesbury towns, Liverpool, Campbelltown ) and roads pushed into the interior, well past the 64 kilometres (40 mi) possible on his arrival. Bathurst Plains were opened up with a road across the Blue Mountains in 1814–1815. Elizabeth Macquarie advised her husband on creating public spaces – she knew about landscaping country estates – her involvement in creating the setting of her family home, Airds House, in Argyle, Scotland had impressed him. She and Francis Greenway had elaborate visions for Sydney. To achieve a picturesque setting, parks were created and buildings carefully designed and arranged to enhance the composition and create vistas. This form of landscaping was often used in English gentry country estates of the era.

Landscape gardening, in contrast to architecture, was an activity where it was then acceptable for women to participate. Elizabeth was responsible for introducing it into Australia. As the Governor's wife she could and did influence the design of public and military buildings. The Macquaries transformed the Sydney and Parramatta Domains in picturesque style, sweeping away Phillip's more utilitarian, straight lined beds and layout of paddocks.

Macquarie had unofficially employed convict architect, Francis Greenway from 1814, to inspect works and copy designs from Mrs Macquarie's pattern books; appointing him Acting Government Architect and Assistant Surveyor in 1816. In that year Greenway prepared schemes including the First Government House and stables, Fort Macquarie and Dawes Point Barracks. With these he envisaged landscaped gardens. Of his vision for Sydney Cove only the stables (now Conservatorium) and this obelisk remain. Convict labour cleared and levelled the site.

The roughly triangular area bounded by the Government Domain to its east, the civil officers' houses to the south, the Tank Stream to the west and the houses of Messrs. Lord, Thompson and Reibey on its north was to be cleared of buildings and enclosures and made into an open area to be named "Macquarie Place". There was no reference to access for the inhabitants of the town and its very naming implied possession. Although it was not enunciated in 1810, Macquarie's immediate moves to replace the guard house to the west of First Government, to construct new residences for officials and to enclose Macquarie Place with a dwarf stone wall and paling in 1816, indicated that Macquarie Place was a triangular town "square" accessible only to the surrounding and sanctioned residents. The Obelisk constructed in 1817–1819 was primarily ornamental but given a more functional status, provided a decorative centre piece. The water fountain, demolished before it was completed in its first manifestation under Mrs Macquarie's instructions and replaced with a structure to a design by Francis Greenway, stood at the south-west corner outside the Macquarie Place enclosure, providing a publicly-accessible water source as far removed from Government House as possible while providing a suitable ambience to the approach to First Government House from the town.

Macquarie Place was the first planned town square in Sydney, as well as the geographic centre of the early Colony, marked by the erection of the Obelisk at the centre of this park in 1818. Macquarie Place was the first formally laid out public space in Sydney and thus in Australia. Governor Macquarie was responsible for its formal layout, befitting its important situation at the centre of the colony. The park and the memorials standing in this park outline the development of Sydney since its foundation.

Macquarie Place separated the town from the Governor 's private domain, including the First Government House and its grounds extending into and including the present day Domain. Macquarie Place thus marked the boundary between the grounds of Government House and the surrounding residential allotments owned by the elite and leading Colonial officials of the early colony, including the Colonial Judge's residence and offices, Colonial Secretary's residence and offices, Simeon Lord, Andrew Thompson and Mary Reibey. The park containing the Obelisk formed the main town square of Sydney and both were popular subjects for many artists in the early days of the colony, including Conrad Martens, Joseph Fowles, Thomas Watling and Major James Taylor. This parcel of land was gazetted as Macquarie Place in 1810.

The western side of the reserve was available for private purchase, while the south side was occupied by Government buildings and the east by the Governor's Domain. Significant emancipist traders such as Mary Reibey and Simeon Lord bought land on the west and Lord's prominent three-storey mansion occupied the site of today's (1931) Kyle House.

Macquarie Place is now the oldest town square in Australia. Together with Hyde Park, it is also the oldest urban park in Australia and has been in continuous operation as a public space for at least 195 years.

The Obelisk is the oldest surviving milestone built to mark the place from which all public roads in the Colony were to be measured, and is the second oldest known European monument in Australia. The oldest known monument is the 1811 obelisk also erected by Macquarie's Regiment at Watsons Bay to commemorate the completion of construction of the road to South Head. An obelisk could be used to mark a point from which a view could be obtained and could form an element in a vista to draw the eye. It is assumed this one was designed not only to enhance the entrance to Government House but also the vistas from it and the Government Domain / Governor's Pleasure Garden (to the east and south). The scale of Sydney has much changed but the obelisk was once clearly visible from the ridges above Sydney Cove, the front of Government House and the North Shore. The park in which it was built was divided into segments by paths leading to the sandstone obelisk. A low wall surrounded the reserve.

Obelisks originated as Egyptian sacred symbols to sun God, Heliopolis. Pairs flanked temple entrances. Many were transported to Rome by emperors and erected in public squares. Adding a cross on top turned them into Christian symbols. Renaissance designers used them singly to mark particular points, such as the Piazza in front of St. Peter's, Rome. Gardens such as the Villa Lante, Bagnaia and Pitti Palace, Florence also used them. These inspired many English gentlemen on the "Grand Tour", and were widely published, probably finding their way into private libraries such as those of Elizabeth Macquarie and Francis Greenway. She brought pattern books with her here. He had to sell his library to pay creditors and relied on memory, and her books. Lord Burlington erected an obelisk in the gardens of Chiswick House, London ( c. 1724 ) and they became a very fashionable element, especially after one was erected, with pyramid, in Bath, by Richard (Beau) Nash (1734). Elizabeth Macquarie and Greenway may both have visited, or at least seen drawings of Bath.

The obelisk's form seems to be directly influenced by Georgian examples rather than Egyptian: Greenway is reputed to have based his design on that of Nash in Bath. It is also possible the source of the Macquaries' fancy may have been the pair of obelisks in the Passeio Publico overlooking the harbour in Rio de Janeiro, which they visited in August 1809.

Governor Macquarie caused the sandstone Obelisk to be erected in the (then) centre of Macquarie Place in 1818 to mark the place from where all public roads were to be measured for the expansion of the colony into the interior on New South Wales. It was erected near the carriageway into the first Government House. "New South Wales" at the time was mapped as covering two-thirds of the continent, excluding only the territories now known as Western Australia. The distances and other Colonial centres inscribed on the Obelisk show the actual extent of the still tiny colony in 1818 despite its vast extent shown on maps at the time. Mileage is given only for Bathurst, Windsor, Parramatta, Liverpool, South Head and the North Head of Botany Bay. This was nevertheless the first major expansion of Sydney town into the interior of New South Wales, compared to when Macquarie first became Governor when he described the poor state of the colony, noting that the roads only penetrated forty miles into the interior. Built between 1816 and 1818, the obelisk before the Department of Lands building is literally the "hub" of NSW, the datum point from which all distances in NSW were measured from Sydney. Its inscriptions record the extent of the road network in 1818.

The Obelisk operated as the "zero point" for measuring the distance of roads from Sydney from 1818. It played a central role in the subsequent surveying, mapping and planned expansion of the Colony from the early 1800s beyond the current extent of New South Wales. Surveyors measured and laid out the line of many roads. Distances in the County of Cumberland were measured from this Obelisk. Those distances were also recorded at the side of the road on milestones or other distance markers. Road plans prepared by surveyors show these distances as well. Public works officers and workers were responsible for forming and making the roads, but it was the surveyors who laid them out, thus providing a direct link to the Macquarie Place Obelisk. The early surveyors of the Colony at the time of the erection of the Obelisk for this purpose included John Oxley, who was appointed by Governor Macquarie as Surveyor General in 1812, and James Meehan, who was appointed by Governor Macquarie as Deputy Surveyor General from 1812 to 1822.

Much of the time of John Oxley was devoted to journeys of exploration into the interior of the colony rather than in ordinary survey work. The duties of surveying land were largely performed by James Meehan, who produced the 1807 Plan of the Town of Sydney. In addition to his surveying duties, Meehan carried out considerable journeys of exploration, a matter largely ignored by his predecessors. As a result of the recommendations of Commissioner Bigge additional surveyors and draftsmen were appointed in an attempt to overcome the arrears of survey work in the colony. In very many instances land had been occupied without any proper survey having been carried out. T L Mitchell was the Surveyor-General from 1828 to 1855, and was also responsible in the early 1830s for road building. In that role, he laid out the main Northern, Southern and Western Roads, undertaking major works such as the Victoria Pass works at Mount Victoria. The distance of these roads laid out by T L Mitchell and other major nineteenth century roads for the expansion of the Colony were measured from the Obelisk. With few exceptions, roads emanating from Sydney, in particular the historic "Great Roads" continue to be measured from the Macquarie Obelisk. The RTA "ROADLOC" distance measurement system is also measured from this point.

The Obelisk was designed by Francis Greenway, one of the most celebrated architects of early NSW with strong influence from Elizabeth Macquarie, and was built by the stonemason Edward Cureton in 1818–20. It was one of the first works of the former convict, Francis Greenway, formed part of a group of civic adornments designed by Greenway, but was the only one built due to the intervention of Commissioner Bigge. Greenway is reputed to have based his design on the influential 1734 Georgian Obelisk erected by Richard (Beau) Nash in Bath, England, more so than the Egyptian prototypes. While the stone used to construct the Obelisk would have been quarried locally near Sydney Cove, the exact location of the quarry is not known. There are no other structures in Sydney that are built from this particular fine grained white sandstone. Unusually for obelisks, this needle was constructed of ashlar blocks of sandstone because, despite the availability of a convict labour force, the technology for excavating a single block of sandstone was not available in colonial Sydney at the time.

Macquarie Place and the Obelisk provide evidence of Governor Macquarie's vision for the planning of the Colony and its future. This far exceeded the views of the British Government at the time which considered NSW to be a gaol outpost of the British Empire, and as such did not warrant the substantial public buildings, monuments and public investment by Macquarie. This was embodied in the reaction of Commissioner Bigge to the Obelisk when he travelled from England to investigate the Colonial management and convey this British view. Bigge found even this simple monument too grand for a penal settlement. Governor Macquarie defended with indignation the expense and design describing it as a "little unadorned Obelisk... rendered at a trifling expense, somewhat ornamental to the Town..." which did not, in his view, "merit any censure".