Princes Pier Timeline 1839
Wilbrahim (William) Liardet and his family settle on the beach establishing the small settlement of Sandridge. European settlement leads to the rapid demise of the local Yalukit Willam people.
1840
The first jetty is constructed at Sandridge by Liardet for his ferry service between Hobsons Bay and Sandridge
1849
NSW government orders building of Town Pier at Sandridge
1851
Gold is discovered in Victoria prompting a population boom as gold seekers flood into Melbourne. Victoria becomes a self-governing colony
1854
Opening of Railway Pier, and Australia’s first railway line between Sandridge and Melbourne
1860
Sandridge is declared a municipality
1884
Sandridge changes its name to Port Melbourne
1892
Coode canal opens to facilitate the passage of ships to Melbourne
1912
Construction of New Railway Pier commences
1913
Melbourne Harbour Trust takes over control of the piers
1914
Sixteen ships depart New Railway Pier for the World War I battlefields
1915
Opening of New Railway Pier
1916
New Railway Pier is used to berth returning troopships and hospital ships
1920
HMS Renown carrying Edward VIII, Prince of Wales berths at New Railway Pier
1921
New Railway Pier is renamed Princes Pier in honour of the Prince’s visit
1928
Industrial action takes place at Port Melbourne with the introduction of the Waterside Workers Federal Awards. On 2 November 1928 unionist and Gallipoli veteran Allan Whittaker is shot by police on Princes Pier
1930
Station Pier is built on the site of the old Railway Pier
1939-45 In World War II Princes Pier is used for embarkation and disembarkation of troopships and hospital ships 1942
Princes Pier used by US navy. Melbourne is the main port for US military equipment during the Pacific War with Japan
1947-54 A great number of the 180,000 displaced persons arriving in Australia disembarked at Station and Princes Piers 1947–80 Almost 750,000 immigrants disembark in Australia, many of them at Station and Princes Piers 1988
The Tall Ships berth at Princes Pier to celebrate Australia’s Bicentenary
1989
Princes Pier is closed
1996
Princes Pier sustains significant structural damage during a fire
2011
Following a $34 million refurbishment by Major Projects Victoria, Princes Pier reopens in December as a public space
Yalukit-Willam – Traditional Owners Prior to the establishment of the settlement at Sandridge, the area around Port Phillip Bay was inhabited by the YalukitWilliam clan, a member of the Bunurong tribe, one of the Kulin nation language groups of Melbourne. Having lived on the bay area for 40,000 years, European settlement created catastrophic disruption to the lives and livelihoods of the Indigenous people. The culture and stories of the Yalukit-Willam clan have been preserved by their descendents. In 1999, City of Port Phillip acknowledged the Bunurong as the traditional owners of the Port Phillip area.
Beginnings – Liardet & Sandridge The small settlement of Sandridge was founded in 1839 by W F Liardet. In 1839, Scotsman, John Hunter Kerr described the beach at Sandridge as “. . . a silent wilderness, where tea-tree scrub grew close and thick amid the tall gum forests . . .”. Liardet has been called the “Father of Port Melbourne” for his many entrepreneurial ventures. In 1840 Liardet established a ferry service to transport passengers and cargo from ships that were anchored in Hobsons Bay. Using local tea-tree, Liardet built the first jetty at Sandridge in 1840 to service his ferry. Between 1839 and 1850, 28,632 assisted migrants arrived in the Port Phillip district. They were the predecessors of a multitude of assisted immigrants who arrived in Victoria in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Liardet’s beach and hotel in their heyday. Artist: W F Evelyn Liardet, 1875, watercolour with pen and ink, gouache and pencil | courtesy State Library of Victoria Portrait of Wilbraham Frederick Evelyn Liardet, c1870s | pm1070.1-2 Borough of Sandridge, West Esplanade | pm1517
Gold Fever – The Victorian Gold Rush Gold seekers began flooding into the small colony in the mid 19th century following the discovery in 1851, of gold in several locations in Victoria. Nine hundred ships arrived in Port Phillip Bay in 1853 alone, creating chaos as Melbourne struggled to meet the demand for accommodation, food and transport. As the settlement expanded rapidly, merchants and shipping agents began to agitate for improved water transport facilities to accommodate the demand for landing places. Within five months of the first ship of gold seekers arriving in Melbourne in 1852, over 55,000 passengers had arrived in the port. As new industries and infrastructure sprang up, it was clear that the existing port facilities were unable to cope with the demand.
Portrait of Thomas Swallow, founder of the Swallow & Ariell biscuit factory, philanthropist, councillor, and Mayor of Sandridge from 1861 to 1862 Swallow arrived in Melbourne in 1853, drawn to the Victorian gold fields. An English migrant and baker by trade, he settled in Sandridge in 1854 and started a ships' biscuits bakery on the corner of Nott and Rouse Streets. In 1858 he established the bakery on the corner of Stokes and Rouse Streets. He was one of the first councillors of the Sandridge Council and founded the Sailor's Mission, the Sandridge Football Club, the Sandridge Cricket Club, the Sandridge School of Design and the Corps of the Naval Brigade. He was president o both the Football and Cricket Clubs and a very active member of the Holy Trinity Anglican Church. | pm1067.1-4
Australia’s First Railway – Sandridge to Flinders Street In 1854 the Melbourne and Hobsons Bay Railway Company constructed Australia’s first railway line. Terminating at Railway Pier in Sandridge, the railway ran between Sandridge and Flinders Street, Melbourne. In its first six months of operation, close to 157,000 patrons had made the fifteen minute trip between the stations. One of several privately owned railway lines, in 1878 the Melbourne and Hobsons Bay United Railway Company became the property of the Victorian Government. How many Port Melbourne Light Rail users today realise that in their daily commute to work, they are recreating history by travelling into Melbourne on the site of our first railway line?
Steam train to Sandridge, 1860s | pm0514.1-4
A New Railway Pier – Princes Pier In 1884 Sandridge changed its name to Port Melbourne to establish itself as the gateway to Melbourne. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the Victorian Railways began to push for a new railway pier to be built at Port Melbourne. The existing Railway Pier was inadequate to berth the massive new mail ships and steamers. At high water, the deck of the SS Medic was nineteen feet above the floor of the pier. Even larger were the White Star ships which were unable to berth at Railway Pier due to their size. Opened in 1915, New Railway Pier (Princes Pier) was three times the width of Railway Pier and was able to accommodate the largest of steamers and mail ships. New Railway Pier was renamed Princes Pier in 1921 following the arrival in 1920 of the HMS Renown carrying Edward VIII, Prince of Wales.
White Star liner Ceramic at New Pier, Port Melbourne, 1921. The Ceramic is on the left and the vessel on the right is either the Nestor or the Ulysses of the Blue Funnel Line | pm1433 View of Princes Pier from breakwater Port Melbourne | pm1411 SS Medic leaving Railway Pier, Port Melbourne with the Victorian Contingent bound for the Boer War in South Africa. 1899 - 1902 | pm1124.1-2pm1124.1-2
For King and Country – World War I Princes Pier was a key embarkation point for soldiers departing for the battlefields throughout World War I. Although Princes Pier was not officially opened until 1915, sixteen troopships departed for the Dardanelles from the pier in October 1914. In 1916 Princes Pier was used almost exclusively to berth returning troopships and hospital ships which bore the wounded home. The arrival of the returning troopships were sombre affairs featuring young men hobbling down gangways, often minus limbs, or being carried on stretchers. Of the 330,000 Australian troops serving overseas in World War I, almost 60,000 never returned, while a further 152,000 were wounded.
View looking south-west of the First Australian Expeditionary Force troop ships at Port Melbourne on 19 October 1914, with ‘Oriental Mills’ in right foreground | pm0374.1-4 Farewelling of troop ship Ceramic at Town Pier, Port Melbourne, 1915 | pm0496.1-2
At War Again – World War II World War II saw Princes Pier once again play a significant role as an embarkation and arrival point for Australian troopships. Princes Pier played host to both British and US naval ships. As Japanese forces battered the defences of the colonial Asian countries, Australia appealed to the US for assistance. In 1942 Melbourne served as the main supply port for US military equipment for the Pacific campaign. The end of World War II saw scenes of jubilation on Princes Pier as troops were welcomed home to Australia with bunting and streamers festooned on the pier. Australia was directly impacted by the Pacific campaign when bombs were dropped on Darwin on 19 February 1942 marking the beginning of a sustained campaign by the Japanese. Darwin was bombed sixty four times while bombs were also dropped on Katherine, Townsville, Wyndham, Derby, Broome and Port Hedland. The Japanese submarine campaign waged along the Australian coastline, which continued until June 1943, sank nineteen ships (including the hospital ship Centaur) and claimed 503 lives. When the campaign against Europe ended in 1945, returning servicemen, including returned POWs, were greeted with much fanfare. Princes Pier was repainted and adorned with flags and welcome home signs. Of the 993,000 Australians who served in the armed forces during World War II, 27,073 never returned, while 23,477 were wounded, and 30,560 were taken prisoner of war. Of those taken prisoners 8,296 died in captivity.
Aerial view of Station Pier and Princes Pier, Port Melbourne showing British Service squadron, 1924. The battleships HMS Hood (45,000 tons), HMS Repulse (32,000 tons) and destroyers Delhi (4,750 tons) and Danae (4,750 tons) | pm1160.1-2
Industrial Strife – The Shooting of Allan Whittaker One of the darkest periods in Port Melbourne and Princes Pier’s history followed the introduction of the Waterside Workers Federal Awards by conservative Justice Beeby in 1927 and 1928. A period of often violent industrial action ensued, the flashpoint being 2 November 1928 when a bloody battle between scabs and angry unionists began on a train headed to Port Melbourne and spilled out onto Princes Pier. Several protesters were shot by police, including Gallipoli veteran Allan Whittaker. Witnesses claim Whittaker was shot in the back of the neck on Princes Pier. The original police inquest found Whittaker’s death was “justifiable homicide” but a recent review of the evidence suggests an injustice was done. When Allan Whittaker passed away in hospital on Australia Day 1929, three months after he was shot, there was no mention made in the media that he had been a Gallipoli veteran. Allan Whittaker was one of the first to enlist for the armed services in World War I and he was one of the first soldiers to land on the beach at Anzac Cove. At Gallipoli he was wounded so badly it took him eighty days to get out of his hospital bed. Whittaker returned to Australia at the age of twenty-four, crippled in one leg and living on a war pension of £1.10 a fortnight. The only prospects open to him were the most unpleasant jobs. Many today believe that this man, who sacrificed so much for his country, died in shameful circumstances and that his memory should be honoured appropriately.
The Argus Saturday 3 November 1928. Courtesy State Library of Victoria The Examiner, Launceston 3 November 1928. Courtesy State Library of Victoria
Leaving the Homelands – Post War Immigration to Australia Following the end of World War II, the Port Melbourne piers served as the arrival point for approximately half of the 180,000 displaced persons who fled their ravaged countries for Australia between 1947 and 1954. In the post war years, an average of 61,000 passengers arrived in the port each year. The first ship to arrive under the International Refugee Organisation arrived in Port Melbourne in 1947. Over 735,000 assisted immigrants were settled in Victoria between 1947 and 1980. This influx of new peoples from a variety of cultural backgrounds contributed to the transformation of Australian society in the second half of the twentieth century.
Aerial view of Station Pier and Princes Pier | pm0699 Liner Patris at Station Pier, 1960s | pm1219.1-2
Endings and new beginnings With the advent of modern commercial air travel, arrivals to Princes Pier gradually declined from the 1970s. The last hurrah for Princes Pier was the spectacular scene of the Tall Ships which arrived at Princes Pier in the Australian Bicentenary year 1988. Closed in 1989, Princes Pier has been neglected until its recent refurbishment and is due to re-open in December 2011. Closed for refurbishment, Princes Pier has had a $34 million dollar make over by Major Projects Victoria. The first 196 metres of the pier deck have been replaced and the historic Gatehouse has undergone restoration, while at the seaward end of the pier, the piles have been preserved as a heritage and sculptural centrepiece. The redeveloped Princes Pier will be reopened as a public space in December 2011. MPV’s website offers regular updates www.majorprojects.vic.gov.au
Five Tall Ships which took part in the Australian Bicentenary celebration, berthed at Station Pier, 1988 | pm1277.1-2 Decking on the Western Finger Pier, showing front beacon, Princes Pier gatehouse and Westgate Bridge, 1991 | pm1372