The three 'lives' of St. Matthew's Anglican Church,
3. The Blacket Church 1857-1859
The gold rush of the 1850s in the Ovens and Indigo Gold fields (with towns such as Mitta Mitta and Beechworth) created a demand for a wide range of produce and concurrently the agricultural exploitation of the Albury area increased manyfold. In the 1850s Albury did not have the reputation as a progressive area. The Border Post commented on the "the proverbial apathy of the people of this district", unwilling to contribute in a meaningful way to any community project, while at the same time prepared to look after their own interests (Border Post 9 May 1857, p.2).
The population growth of the 1850s meant that it had become viable for congregations to build houses of worship. In 1856 the Presbyterians had a small wooden kirk at the corner of Hovell and Townsend Streets, which had been operating since the late 1840s or early 1850s (MacDonald 1980, p. 36). The Wesleyans had their first wooden chapel in 1855, which was replaced in August 1865 by a brick church and in 1875 by a completely new building (Border Morning Mail 28 Oct. 1953, p. 14). While the Catholics planned a church, St. Brigid's, in 1856 the priority had been to build a school house which could serve as a temporary church. When this opened for service in mid October 1858, at a time when St. Matthew's was still under construction, and the foundation stone for a four bay nave and two-bay sanctuary rock rubble church was laid in 1858 (Larkin 1956).
"The church will be in the Norman style of architecture, and the design combines neatness and substantiality with elegance and convenience. The building is to by 98 feet in length by a width of 38 feet, and is calculated to accommodate about 350 persons. The spire will give a very handsome appearance to the edifice and the vane will be 92 feet above the foundation. The material will be stone, and the roof will be shingled. The architect is Mr Edmund Blackett, of Sydney, who has designed several existing colonial churches, including the cathedral in Sydney. (Border Post 29 November 1856).There is no plan of the church showing it as Blacket intended it to be. Measurements of the Blacket Church as taken by Ian O'Connor (Restoration Architect) indicate that the Blacket church is 8.5m wide, which is equivalent of 24 feet. The measurement, however, showed that the wall sections of the bays were 3.10m long with 0.6m wide buttresses. Given minimal measurement errors either during construction or during recording, it can be assumed that each buttress was 2 feet wide and each wall section 10 feet long, making a 12 foot long and 24 feet wide bay (length to width 1:2). Thus the total length of the Blacket nave of five bays (see below) was 62 feet. The tower protrudes for about 6 feet from the west wall (not counting the buttress. It would thus appear that at least 24 feet (or the length of two bays) are missing from the projected total length of the church. The ratio of five to two is not uncommon, and the Romanesque Anglican Church of Sutton Forest is such an example, also built by Blacket.
The length and width of the chancel was confirmed during excavations by the author in 1993 when the foundations for the chancel were encountered. An interesting throw-away line is given by R.Boyes (1984) in her pictorial documentation of Albury's heritage, where she asserts that St. Matthew's had a chancel added in 1867 and was extended in 1873. Figure 3.2 shows a tentative reconstruction of the Blacket version of St. Matthew's.
Tenders for the construction were opened by the committee on 4 May 1857, and the contract was awarded to Kirkpatrick, Livier & Robertson of Albury. Plans for a slate roof, instead of shingles, were considered but deferred due to the costs (Border Post 9 May 1857).
The foundation stone for the Church of St. Matthew the Apostle and the Evangelist was laid on 24 July 1857 by Mr. George Macleay MLA in the presence of some 300 people.
A historic photograph taken presumably shortly after the completion of the parsonage in 1870. shows a five-bay church with a rudimentary tower (figure 3.2.) The western elevation, as well as the tower base are of dressed granite externally set in random course rubble (internally). As the demolition of part of the Blacket wall showed, the stones were set as two skins in locally procured mud mortar and had a loose mud and rubble fill. The buttresses, string courses and door surrounds are of finely dressed granite in regular courses. The church is built of Monument Hill Gneiss and Springdale Heights Granite with shist being used for foundations.
However, while the structure may have been built, the church was far from complete. The window openings were covered with calico, until the windows could be installed in August 1860 (Bayley 1954, p.121). In July 1861 the editorial of the Albury Banner commented on the state of affairs:
"...efforts for the completion of this building-for the internal arrangements, at all events; and ere long, we feel assured, we shall see St. Matthew's nicely and comfortably plastered (for is it not miserable to look on-aye, to feel-those rough, cold, unfurnished walls?), and we shall also see a nice light-looking gallery for the choir- ...Another thing will be done by the next winter which will be agreeable to all, we are sure-and that is, a door (a "blind door," it is called?) will be put up inside to protect us from that fearfully cold wind that rushes in so piercingly, and makes us all shiver into complete stupidity and insensibility as to what is going on, and renders us only susceptible to the thought, "How glad I shall be to get out again!" (Albury Banner 17 July 1861).The courtyard had also an unfinished appearance with water accumulating in large puddles after a good rain (Albury Banner 1 June 1861).
Since the funding problems, both for the construction fund and the stipend of the minister continued, Rev. Potter resigned and was replaced by M.Blake Brownrigg, who also only had measured success in clearing the debts. Small scale work was carried out in 1864, but two years later the work was still not complete, as a brief account of the state of the church in 1866 in the annual report of the Parish states:
"desirability of the completion of the church wanted the chancel completed, roof needed panning, and the walls required to be coloured, and the flooring of the aisle wanted looking to in the removal of the bricks and the supply of a better flooring. The arrangements with regard to the communion table were very defective..... [the font is a] little unhappy basin and nothing else" (Annual Report of Church of England, Albury 1866).
Materials
The plinth, string courses and the buttress coping are made from Table Top sandstone, while the walls are made from Black Range granite. The tracery and mullions of all windows of the Boles church, with the exception of the eastern windows and the circular windows in the transepts, consist of Omaru New Zealand freestone and were made by Messrs. M'Donald & Hughes, Bourke Street, Melbourne. The tracery for the east window was made of Table Top sand stone by Messrs. Dickson and Sons, at the cost of £ 81. The roof trusses, made from Kauri pine , were made by Mr. J. Sharpe, Collins Street, Melbourne (Town and Country Journal 5 February 1876, p. 228)
As Boles nave was considerable wider than the original Blacket nave there was a gap between the two structures. This was filled with a timber-framed wall which was covered with thin iron sheeting. A small wall stub, for the second bay had been built in a fashion that it could act as a buttress.
The church had a series of stained glass windows. The 22 by 10 feet east window in the chancel, "The calling of St. Matthew', a gift by Mr.George Day, M.P., was made by Lyons, Cottier & Co., Sydney. Other windows were donated by W.M.N. Edmondson, Dr. R.N. Cobett, and Mr. DuFaur of Sydney. Four others were funded by subscriptions collected by Mrs Wilcox, Mrs Husing and Mrs Swyny, while a fifth was funded by collections by the pupils attending Sunday School (Town and Country Journal 5 February 1876, p. 228).
In 1904 a series of renovations were carried out. The shingles on the roof were replaced with galvanised iron. In addition, a campanile was erected to replace the bell tower, paid by the newspaper proprietor George Adams (Webb 1983). After 1908, but before 1957, a small brick tower with pointed arched openings has been erected, which had a four-gabled roof. In the late 1960s this roof was replaced by a small copper spire. In 1990 five new bells were added and the Elizabeth Bell from 1908 was rehung. In 1908 the western perimeter fence, which until then had been a wooden picket fence, was replaced by a dwarf stone wall and a wrought iron fence. It had been donated by Benjamin Bell as a memorial to his wife Elizabeth (Bayley 1954, p. 121).
The gable of the southern transept had some structural problems, Underpinning of the foundations was carried out in the 1950s (Lucas et al. 1992, p. 5). The sanctuary had been refloored with Murray pine and the tessellated flooring had been removed, save for a small patch. In the 1960s the wooden flooring was covered with parquetry.
The original Blackett church was the first non-government funded public building erected in Albury. The Border Post of the time editorialised upon the selection of tenders:
"It is, of course, needless to dwell on the importance of the object; but we may mention, as an additional reason for exertion, that upon the success of the 'movement' depends, in a great measure, the future of Albury. This is one of the first attempts made to establish public buildings in this town; and should the Committee be unsupported, we may postpone our anticipations that an hospital, a mechanics' institute, and other useful establishments, will some day be founded here. At the present time, when every little town in the interior is struggling for superiority, and when it is generally admitted that the requirements of trade and the necessities of the inevitable Australian Union, demand that a large metropolis shall spring up on the Murray river, it becomes a matter of importance to promote our social importance by establishing some claim to be considered a Christian and a civilised community" (Border Post 9 May 1857).In the event, the erection of other public buildings was funded by appeals and bazaars, such as the Presbyterian Manse, and the Mechanics Institute.
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