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  Advertisement for work at the Coopers Arms.

  The Sydney Morning Herald, 28 June 1865.

  FROM COOPERAGE TO THE COOPERS ARMS

  Peter Brennan, the publican of the Coopers Arms and his wife, Elizabeth, were both born in the colony of NSW, both of convict parents. Peter Brennan was Elizabeth’s second husband.29

  In 1824, sixteen-year-old Elizabeth (nee Allman) married the convict Joseph Clayton, who was a cooper by trade. Shortly after the marriage, she had him assigned to her. His activities were restricted by his convict status, but she was a free agent, and she worked to establish their cooperage on a block of land between George Street and Sussex Street north of Goulburn Street. Clayton was granted a ticket of leave in 1829, although it appears that he had already obtained a license for a public house next to the cooperage that traded under the sign of the Coopers Arms in the previous year. Coopers often set themselves up as publicans as well, with the barrels they made being a natural link.30 Joseph Clayton steadily acquired land and houses in this area, as well as property in Redfern.

  Ure Smith, The Cooperage, 1918, etching, Sydney.

  SL NSW a7023001h.

  When Joseph died in 1836, the Claytons had five children, all minors but all in line to inherit property from the estate of this convict made good. The license for the Coopers Arms was transferred to Elizabeth but she soon sold it, and rented out the hotel on the corner of Goulburn and Sussex Streets as a private dwelling.

  Joseph Clayton’s death notice.

  Sydney Monitor, Saturday 9 April 1836.

  In 1837 she married Peter Brennan. He too was a cooper. He had previously run his own cooperage in George Street opposite the military barracks. It is possible that Brennan also worked for Clayton – one of the ‘ablest workers’ Clayton had claimed he employed in his ‘costly cooperage’.31

  Peter was the licensee of a Farmers Arms Inn at Brickfield Hill for six months from October 1837, and he continued to work at the Clayton cooperage until he and Elizabeth moved to Pyrmont around 1845 when Peter acquired a license for the Coopers Arms in Harris Street.32 Elizabeth continued to wheel and deal in properties and rentals. In 1845 she advertised the old pub on the corner of Goulburn and Sussex to let.

  In 1846 a new license was granted to her son, Joseph Richard (J. R.) Clayton for Joseph Clayton’s original pub. He had inherited the building from his father ten years earlier. Being 21 years old meant that he was old enough to obtain a license. Intriguingly, he also used the Coopers Arms sign. Apparently, it was acceptable to have two of the same-named pubs in the family at the same time. Elizabeth Brennan was fierce in her determination to appear respectable. Way back in 1826 she had written, in excellent handwriting, to the Colonial Secretary with an offer to pay anything reasonable for staves and headings from the government stores to use in her cooperage in Goulburn Street. She had signed the letter with her name and added ‘by birth an Australian’, and this letter is believed to have been the first time the term Australian was recorded in this way. They say that no-one was more anxious to be seen to be respectable than the children of convicts and Elizabeth was both a child of convicts and she was once married to a convict. This anxiety could elicit behaviour that would not be seen as respectable today, like the time she sent her first husband Joseph Clayton and another relation to visit her sister Mary Ann Allman in order to literally knock out of her any idea of marrying the man she wanted to marry because he was a mere barber and not the kind of man who would improve the family’s reputation. Becoming a publican was one way of becoming wealthy, and Elizabeth did not take long to acquire properties in the city and to marry a freeborn husband, Peter Brennan. Peter’s parents had been Roman Catholic, but he and Elizabeth were married in the St Andrews Scots Presbyterian Church. There could be no better fit for Pyrmont with its strong Protestant connections and its large Scottish Presbyterian population.

  Her own children took the next step up the social ladder. Her eldest son, J. R. Clayton, only remained as the publican of the Coopers Arms in Goulburn Street for a couple of years before taking up a position on the City Council, as did his younger brother George. George became Collector of Water Rates and by 1880, Joseph had attained the very respectable position of City Treasurer. He was also Secretary of the NSW Cricket Board.

  This newspaper notice confirms Elizabeth Brennan’s determination that her hard-earned fortune would not go the way of all flesh.

  The Sydney Morning Herald, 1 January 1845.

  When Elizabeth Brennan died at the Coopers Arms (now the Terminus) in 1866, she was probably surrounded by some of her many children who also lived in Pyrmont, including son Joseph who signed the death certificate and lived in one of the Brennan houses across the road from the pub. She had been twice married to coopers and had been the mistress of at least three pubs, all of them called Coopers Arms. The name went way back.

  2

  The pub as a meeting place

  IN 1869 two of Pyrmont’s publican families joined forces when Julia Brennan, the eldest child of Peter Brennan, married James C. Pratt, the son of the erstwhile owner and publican of the Land’s End. They married at St James Anglican church in the city centre and if they celebrated afterwards, it would have been at the Coopers Arms because Pratt senior had sold the Land’s End a few years earlier.

  After Elizabeth Brennan senior’s death, anyone answering advertisements for domestic work at the Coopers Arms was to apply to Miss Brennan, who was probably Julia. Brennan left his various Pyrmont properties to his son and three daughters. The Clayton stepchildren did not receive anything, probably because they had already inherited a lot of property from their own father. There was no obvious animosity in the large combined family, and J. R. Clayton was one of Peter Brennan’s executors of his will. Brennan’s will bequeathed the Coopers Arms to Julia, and because she was now Julia Pratt it, was now effectively Pratt’s. That’s how things worked back then.

  A map outlining Peter Brennan’s house on the corner of Harris and Mount Streets. His daughter Julia inherited the Coopers Arms and his daughter Sarah inherited the old house on John Street. Peter also bequeathed land on the opposite side of Harris Street stretching to Pyrmont Street, including his original Coopers Arms, to his children.

  NSW LPI, Primary Application 16695.

  The newly married Pratts were not interested in running a pub or living in Pyrmont. Owning a pub was a tried and true method of getting a toehold in the colonial economy, but like many other successful publicans’ sons, James C. Pratt was moving on. He and Julia established themselves in Surry Hills and eventually went to a very good address in Paddington. Pratt chose to do clerical work, and most of his working life was spent at Mort’s Dock & Engineering Company where he eventually held the senior position of the Manager’s Secretary. His marriage would keep his hand in the hotel game, but until things started to go wrong years later, the pub was run by others.

  PYRMONT’S HEYDAY

  The city’s economy was soaring and jobs were easy to come by in the 1870s and 1880s. In many ways, these were Pyrmont’s best years. However, the area remained isolated and it still carried a chip on its shoulder over perceived neglect by the authorities. A petition in 1883 complained of the way Harris Street was cut up in the summer months, and it requested water carts to be used to settle the dust. By now there were many people living in the area so the list of signatories was very long.33 The problem was partially caused by the ‘extensive and heavy traffic daily’ – and it wasn’t just Pyrmont that was growing. Ultimo, until recently a semi-rural barrier between Pyrmont and the Parramatta Road where sheep grazed on the Harris Estate, was finally being subdivided and the petition was signed by Ultimo people as well.

  The population across the peninsula had grown large enough to support a range of community activities. It was said that 2000 people turned up one Saturday afternoon in November 1881 to celebrate the arrival of a fire engine purchased by the good citizens of Pyrmont and Ultimo.34 Until the Presbyterians built
a new church on the corner of Harris and Quarry Streets in Ultimo, this land was used as an edge-of-town fairground by itinerant troupes, minstrels and magicians. Local strongmen held contests to lift the heaviest blocks of sandstone. When the world-famous tightrope-walker Charles Blondin performed in the Sydney Domain in 1874, he inspired local imitators who strutted their stuff on Harris Street.35 There were sporting clubs and brass bands and church groups. And the best of all came in 1875. Public baths opened at the end of Point Street where the locals could gather to relax and swim.

  Despite this, there was still much not to like about the place. The government abattoirs on Glebe Island created a stench in Pyrmont when a westerly wind was blowing. The piles of rubbish dumped by both industrialists and public authorities in the obsolete quarries stank. Here, rag-pickers survived on some kind of a living and erected makeshift huts, a constant reminder that poverty was no stranger to Sydney. Generally, earlier ephemeral housing and primitive industrial structures in Pyrmont had given way to more solid buildings. Industries expanded and work was easy to come by.

  The Colonial Sugar Refining Company (CSR) acquired land at the end of Harris Street in 1875. By the end of the decade it was employing many men in its refinery, spirit bond, cooperage and stores. It had chosen the site partly for its isolation. The Company’s polluting and odorous operations had encountered years of opposition from both the residents around its earlier plant in Chippendale and from the authorities. In far-off Pyrmont, it hoped for acceptance, which it got. Pyrmont was an industrial place, and its residents valued the jobs.

  A sketch of the Colonial Sugar Refining Company’s (CSR) building at the end of Harris Street. The tower of the John Street Public School can be seen on the horizon.

  Illustrated Sydney News, 25 July 1889.

  The quarries were steadily chewing into the western side of the peninsula with over 100 men and 50 horses working the rock by 1883. By the mid-1880s, quarrymaster Robert Saunders levelled down Darling Island, which was recently vacated by the Australasian Steam Navigation Company (ASN Co.). The land was used for wharfage and storage, connected to the Darling Harbour goods line. Shipbuilding disappeared as shipping and wharf work expanded along with the construction of huge wool stores, ice works and meat-processing works.

  Eventually the industries of Pyrmont, especially the CSR, would eat up the houses, and the total number of residents would fall, but for now the population was well on the way to its maximum, and the community was at its strongest.

  Families provided children for the Murray Street Public School built in 1877 and the John Street Public School behind the Coopers Arms, opened in 1884. On the day the John Street Public School was officially opened, the weather was bad and the Minister for Education failed to turn up, but that was par for the course in Pyrmont. The building was symbolic of how the area had progressed. It was a state-of-the art building that took account of light, air and modern sanitary arrangements, and it had been designed by an architect – one of the few buildings in Pyrmont which ever had been.

  This ‘remarkably handsome’ building had rid the area of many problems. It had been built on land where there had been a jumble of old cottages; Pyrmont’s worst ‘rookery’ tenanted by ‘undesirable citizens’.36 It was designed to hold a staggering 1300 children.37 The school was also surrounded by hotels: the Coopers Arms was just one house down on Harris Street, and two more pubs were within spitting distance on John Street. At the time this was not remarked on, but later it would become relevant.

  With a large population and a dearth of public halls, Pyrmont’s pubs were still in demand for social gatherings, political rallies and community meetings, as well as drinking.

  There were over a dozen pubs in Pyrmont by the end of the 1870s, including the Lands End located on the opposite corner of Harris and John Streets from the Coopers Arms. If you headed up the hill westwards along John Street, you would have come to the Quarryman’s Arms on the next corner, Mount Street. If you crossed Harris Street and headed down John Street toward Darling Harbour, you would have quickly come to the Lord Clyde on the corner of Pyrmont Street. Had you stayed on Harris Street and headed north towards the CSR, the next corner along from the Coopers Arms offered both the Pyrmont Royal Exchange and the Pyrmont Arms on the corner of Bowman Street. Other pubs located just a short walk away were the Spread Eagle and the Green Tree on Harvey Street. There was a pub on every corner. But the most important corner of all was still the corner of John and Harris Streets.

  A PART - TIME PUBLICAN

  After his death, Brennan’s license transferred to James Hilton. He was English and had arrived in Sydney in 1854 when he was 21 years old, accompanying his mother, Esther, and his stepfather, James Davison.38 They were assisted immigrants but James already had a grandfather in the colony, living in Balmain, and his house became an anchor for James and his family for all of his life, despite periods of living outside Sydney for years at a time. Hilton was a restless soul who turned his hand at many things, and in 1856 he headed off to try his luck on the goldfields.39 After nine years of fossicking he returned to Sydney in debt, but he managed to work his way out of it by the time he married English-born Jane Agnes Tucker in 1864. They lived in Balmain for a few years and started a family that eventuated in five children over the next decade. James described himself vaguely as a ‘salesman’.

  Today, not many people think too much about it, but back in Hilton’s day it mattered a lot whether you were Anglican, Protestant or Roman Catholic. There were a few other more exotic religious groups represented in Sydney, most notably Jews and some so-called heathen Chinese, but for many people, the primary interest was in whether you were Catholic or not. Hilton joined his local Branch No. 33 of the Loyal Orange Lodge. This society supported the Protestant ascendancy and was named for the Protestant Dutch king, William of Orange, who overthrew the Roman Catholic English King James II, in the Battle of the Boyne in Ireland in 1690. Hilton was elected treasurer of his local branch in 1872, but he only held this office for a few months before resigning because he was moving ‘to a distant part of the colony’.40 If he did, it wasn’t for long. By the beginning of 1873 he was back in Balmain, and by July of that year he was managing a new venture called the Sydney Coachbuilding Company on George Street opposite St Andrews Cathedral in the city. He left this position just three months later, and a month after that he got the license for the Coopers Arms from the deceased estate of Peter Brennan.41

  To Mrs. Hilton, ‘respectable’ probably meant a Protestant churchgoer.

  The Sydney Morning Herald, 6 March 1874.

  Hilton was 40 years old when he arrived in Pyrmont with the family. When he eventually died he was buried as an Anglican, but his stepfather had been a Baptist. He and Jane were married in a Presbyterian church. Like the Brennans, this made the Hiltons a good fit for Pyrmont, with its many English, Scottish and Australian-born residents. Irish publicans like the O’Tooles at the Green Tree had their following, but the Coopers Arms was well positioned to attract the patronage of the Scottish quarrymen and shipbuilders who walked along John Street between the quarries and ferry wharf at Darling Harbour. By all accounts, the new publican was a jovial man.

  They’d only been there six months when Hilton was found guilty of selling liquor out of hours on a Sunday. He had to choose between paying a fine of 5s plus 5s 6d court costs, or spending four days in jail.42 The liquor laws at this time permitted trading between the restricted lunch time hours of 1 pm to 3 pm on Sunday, but some hotels did not open at all. For many Protestants, Sunday was neither for fun nor for profit. It was for church attendance and for rest. How could Hilton do this? Orangemen were not opposed to liquor, but they were strong advocates of the commandment to keep the Sabbath day holy. By the time the fine was reported in the newspapers, the date of the offending Sunday was given as 26 July, but with a little leniency, could it have been a month earlier?

  Around midday on Sunday 21 June a fire destroyed six houses behind the old hou
se that had been the original Pyrmont Hotel in John Street. Known as Walworth’s Buildings, or alternatively ‘The Rookery’, each of these houses consisted of one room with an attic. They housed some of Pyrmont’s poorest people, all of them single, some widows, who paid 4s a week for the privilege. They were little, old stone cottages with a shared, wooden shingled roof that was just waiting to go up in flames. It was a windy day where sparks arched up high over the neighbourhood. Even though one report said that most people were at church, a large crowd soon gathered to watch the spectacle. Police were called in to restrain the onlookers and firemen remained on the site until late in the evening. One man was badly hurt when escaping the blaze and the rest of the residents were left to rely on the goodwill of neighbours to find them a bed for the night.43 Even a good Orangeman may have seen the virtue of providing a little liquid comfort in these extenuating circumstances.

  If it were this Sunday, would anyone have dobbed him in? You bet they would. The Teetotal Society, also known as the Abstinence Society, had first met in Pyrmont in 1842, and by 1856 there was also a Band of Hope, an anti-liquor society for children. By Hilton’s time the temperance movement was on the rise, and it had its spies everywhere.44 There was always pressure on publicans to supply grog under the counter, and there were always publicans being fined for obliging. However, there were no further reports of Hilton trading out of hours on Sundays. Either he got better at clandestine trading or he toed the line. Ever the joiner, he had himself elected to the general council of the Licensed Victuallers Association of NSW, and was re-elected the following year as well.