Victoria Barracks, Melbourne Imperial Beginnings The Barracks were to first appear on a map of the military reservation dated in 1859, however, construction did not begin Victoria Barracks, fronting the magnificent boulevard of St. until the following year. The progress of the construction of A Kilda Road, stands four-square at the main southern entrance Block was dependent on available funding, although its com- to the city of Melbourne, its heavy bluestone walls loom pletion was clearly a priority with many of those in command. darkly in a formal and imposing military presence. Its original In March 1860, the Deputy Adjutant General's office wrote to purpose was to house the British Imperial garrison troops and the Honourary Commissioner of Public Works stressing its later the Victorian Colonial forces. Following Federation, it importance,'... it is desirable that the Officers Quarters should was to play a central role in the history of Australiais defence, be proceeded with without delay, both as a matter of conve- housing the Defence Department and Army Headquarters for nience and discipline'. some 60 years. More recently it continues to provide accom- modation for elements of the Defence Department, the Army Drawings at the time indicate that the ground floor of the and also the Royal Australian Air Force which has historic ties southern wing, or pavilion, was intended to house field offi- with the Barracks. cers. However, the 'Field Officers' Quarters' appear to have been occupied by the British Commander-in-Chief in By far the most well-known of the buildings on the Australia as a single three-storeyed residence until 1866, when Barracks site is A Block, the frontispiece, which is one of a separate residence in St. Kilda Road, subsequently known as Melbourne's landmarks. Today, few people, even in the 'The Grange', was constructed. In the early 1850s, the Australian Defence Force, are aware that this block was built Commander-in-Chief of the British forces in the Australian as quarters for officers and non-commissioned officers of the Colonies had moved his headquarters from Sydney to Imperial forces and their families. Indeed, there have been Melbourne, ostensibly so that he could receive communica- three distinct phases in the life of this building - as garrison tions from London more quickly. However, correspondence quarters until 1870, as apartments until 1906, and overlapping, on record indicates that the move might have been prompted as principal centre for Defence administration since as much by Major General Nickle's dislike of the unsatisfac- Federation. tory quarters provided to him in Sydney as any strategic considerations. A Block, Victoria Barracks, is a Melbourne landmark, but few realise that it was built as quarters for the British Redcoats and their families. 33 It is noteworthy that the residence in the southern wing By 1892, the officers' quarters were beginning to show had two internal bathrooms with only external ablution facili- signs of wear and tear. Sanitation was also becoming a ties being provided for servants. Residential occupancy of the problem and brought a spate of complaints from the occu- southern wing was to continue, as Colonel Hoad used it pants about offensive smells coming from drains behind the during the last residential phase of the building. While Hoad building as well as from the swamp behind the Barracks which was probably the most historically important occupant of this was being filled with soil dug from the Yarra River. The drains residence it has also been associated with many other influen- were clogged regularly with vegetable matter from the mess tial senior military officers during the Colonial period, notably kitchen and rats were a problem having undermined the the flamboyant Colonel Tom Price. drains of the quarters occupied by Mr Bray, the Ordnance Storekeeper, and causing them to sink. The plaster ceilings in The linking wing contained four rooms for officers' quar- the officers' quarters and staff offices were separating from the ters on the east and west side of a central hall and contained a laths and falling, causing a considerable morale problem, if stair at the rear, or western end, of another hall, which ran not injury, to those below. westwards from the front entrance. At least until the 40th Regiment returned to England in 1870, it is likely that they The complaints continued on into 1893 with further dis- were used as accommodation for single officers and not for coveries that dry rot had found its way into the wooden floors family accommodation. The central pavilion served as the of the basement rooms due to poor ventilation. A plague of social and administrative heart of the building and contained mice caused the then Major Hoad to put pen to paper after the a mess room, reading room and ante-room on either side of a boards and skirtings in his quarters were removed and the central hall, which ran east-west. Directly underneath the holes blocked with tin to no avail. In a letter calling upon the entry hall was a large wine cellar, and a large kitchen beneath Barrack Master, Captain George Watson, to inspect the the reading and ante-rooms connected to the main hall by a damage he said, 'we are still bothered with great numbers and food lift. The impressive stairs at the rear of this wing linked they run over the bedclothes and wearing apparel and every this floor with the parade ground at basement level and also night do some damage by eating clothes etc. - eg. they are now served the offices in the two upper floors. eating away the matting around the carpet in the front room and have started to gnaw the front board of the piano and unless they can be stopped will probably soon quite destroy Apartments for the Colony's Forces it'. Colonel Price also had grounds for complaint. The departure of the 40th Regiment, in 1870, reduced the number of officers living in the Barracks. Though local troops moved into the Barracks, many local regular officers, including the Commandant, Colonel W. C. Anderson, were married and tended to live in nearby private accommodation, especially in South Yarra. Despite this reduction in demand for officers' accommodation, in 1871, additional contracts were let for completing the 'north wing of the officers' quar- ters'. The work was done by 1876, its conclusion probably being more important for the political requirement to give the public the impression that the Colony was being securely defended. Some two decades later, the British journal, Navy and Army Illustrated, in a series of descriptive articles on 'Our Colonial Defences' singled out A Block for its impressive appearance - '... a good serviceable-looking block; more so, in fact, than some barracks in the "Old Country"'. Upon completion of the northern wing of A Block, it is assumed the non-commissioned officers vacated J Block for their new, albeit temporary quarters. The extent of their quar- ters appears to have been restricted to the narrow linking sec- tion, not including the main part of the northern wing or pavilion. In 1883, Victoria's military forces were reorganised with the entire volunteer force being disbanded and a militia formed in its place. To facilitate the scheme, it was decided to bring a staff of officers of the British Army out to the Colony. Upon their arrival in Victoria in 1886, some of these high ranking British as well as local officers were accommodated in A Block. 34 Colonel Tom Price Price is one of the Army's more picturesque characters and a bathrooms and privies strong personality. He raised the Victorian Mounted Rifles on the west side of the and commanded that Regiment from 1885 to 1902. The officers' quarters in a Mounted Rifles proved to be the model for similar units raised filthy and dilapidated in the other Colonies so he is widely acknowledged as the condition, no recreation father of the Australian Light Horse. grounds for the children of the Barracks and A popular leader, he created a public controversy in 1890 offensive and unhealthy with his order to his troops that if they were called out to face surrounds caused in rioting Melbourne dockside strikers they were, in his words, part by the stagnant to 'fire low and lay the bastards out'. He survived the public swamp in the rear of the inquiry, if not the wrath of Trades Hall, and was later to suc- Barracks. Needless to cessfully command a Victorian mounted contingent during say, some seven months the Boer War, before returning to be appointed as acting after Price first Commandant of the new Commonwealth's Victorian forces. requested to be allowed to draw a living out Price spent 22 years with the British Army in India as a allowance, permission young officer. He married Mary Dunnistone Baillie of was granted. Melbourne during his Indian service and she bore him four children. As Commanding Officer of the Victorian Mounted But Price was to Rifles, Price occupied quarters No. 1 at the southern end of A drift into relative obscu- Block, Victoria Barracks, where he complained that the health rity in military annals. of his youngest son was being adversely affected by the condi- His adjutant in the Colonel Tom Price, flamboyant Victorian light tions under which he was forced to live. His application for VMR, Hoad, went on to horseman, who is credited with introducing the slouch hat to the Australian military fora's. He had living out allowance was vigorously opposed, causing him to become Australia's first much to complain about in his married quarters in write vociferously about the problem: native-born major gen- Victoria Barracks! M 94/552 Head Quarters, Mounted Rifles, Melbourne, April 16th 1894 From the Officer Commanding Victorian Mounted Rifles, To AAG Sir, I have the honour to draw attention to the conditions under which I live in my present quarters.