Celebrate the bicentenary of the Supreme Court of New South Wales on 17 May 2024 On 17 May 2024, the Supreme Court of NSW will celebrate the bicentenary of its founding under the Third Charter of Justice, providing us with the opportunity to reflect on its profound impact on Australian society. In a recent interview with ABC RN's Law Report, NSW Chief Justice Andrew Bell emphasised the Supreme Court’s pivotal role in democracy. He also discussed notable cases, including the Myall Creek...

Alan Atkinson's Elizabeth and John awarded the Australian History Prize The 2023 NSW Premier’s History Awards, with $85,000 in prize money, were announced at the State Library of NSW on Thursday, 7 September. The winner of the Australian History Prize was Alan Atkinson’s Elizabeth and John: The Macarthurs of Elizabeth Farm. The Judges said that Atkinson had ‘produced a landmark book that will refresh early colonial studies and stand as a model for comparative biography, sensitive research and...

By Davina Jackson [PhD, M.Arch, FRGS, FRSA, FRSN] Two hundred years ago, in June 1821, Australia’s first learned society was launched in Sydney. Named the Philosophical Society of Australasia – because ‘natural philosophy’ was the prevalent term for science at that time – the group comprised seven prominent men who shared the goal of establishing a museum of natural history. The founders were Judge Barron Field, Dr Henry Grattan Douglass, Colonial Secretary Frederick Goulburn, surveyor John...

Written by RAHS Volunteer, Maximilian Reid On 14 May 1855, the Royal Mint in Sydney was first opened to the public. The discovery of gold in 1851 created the immediate need for such a vital institution due to the increased economic growth in the colony of New South Wales. The building itself – housed in the southern wing of the General Hospital and Dispensary – was already undergoing a conversion. The Hospital, built in 1811, was three buildings grouped together and by 1850 had undergone...

By RAHS Volunteer Elizabeth Heffernan On 24 November 1934, sixteen years after the signing of the Armistice on 11 November 1918, the Anzac Memorial in Sydney’s Hyde Park first opened its doors. An estimated one-hundred-thousand spectators attended the ceremony. Eighty-five years later it remains an iconic national monument, commemorating the “ENDURANCE, COURAGE AND SACRIFICE” of Australia’s fallen soldiers in the First World War. [1] For all its timeless splendour, however, the road to the...

Written by RAHS Volunteer, Elizabeth Heffernan On the 7th of October 1819, builders under the guidance of convict architect Francis Greenway laid the foundation stone for what was intended to be Governor Lachlan Macquarie’s new courthouse on King Street. A far grander building was planned for George Street as Sydney’s new metropolitan cathedral – It was not to be. Sent all the way to Sydney from London, Commissioner John Bigge questioned the expense of Macquarie’s proposed cathedral, and...

Written by Christine Yeats, RAHS President The twenty-eight year old Thomas Walker, spiritualist, secularist, free-thought lecturer, journalist and politician, encountered the full force of the law when he presented the last of his series of Thursday evening lectures in the Secular Association’s rooms at 20 Oxford Street in Darlinghurst on 9 April 1885. [1] The subject of his lecture was Moral and scientific checks to over-population; or large families and poverty. [2] Walker was an advocate...