Resource | Text: Article | |
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Title | TOTAL DESTRUCTION OF THE THEATRE ROYAL BY FIRE (1872, March 20). | |
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Source | The Age, Francis Cooke, South Melbourne, Vic, 1854 | |
Item URL | ||
Page | 3 | |
Date Issued | 20 March 1872 | |
Language | English | |
Citation | TOTAL DESTRUCTION OF THE THEATRE ROYAL BY FIRE (1872, March 20)., The Age, 20 March 1872, 3 | |
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Resource Identifier | 65616 |
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It is seldom in the history of the world, let alone the history of so young a colony as this, that in so short a space the chroniclers of the time have been called on to record the destruction of three theatres. The Royal stood yesterday the last of three of the finest theatres in the Australasian group. It is now a heap of charred and smouldering ruins, the only vestige left being the bare walls, within which, in times gone by, so many tragic scenes have been rehearsed and enacted. Coming so directly after the destruction of the Prince of Wales Theatre at Sydney, this disaster is a terrible blow to the profession. Read by the light of facts, it means simply to almost numberless families ruin. This is the more to be regretted as there seems no scope of the outlet of the talent now pent up in Melbourne in any direction. Nor is it reassuring to remember that the theatre has been destroyed on the very threshold of one of those seasons during which actors, as a rule, look to a fair accession of profits to recoup them for their losses during other and duller parts of the year. We can dwell with a melancholy remembrance on the history of the place which now is to be known no more amongst us except as a name. how the company first formed to erect it, of which Mr. Black was the managing and moving man, came to untimely grief; how it afterwards fell into the hands of Messrs. Brooke and Coppin; how then there were some glorious revivals of the Shakespearian drama; how they didn’t pay; how it fell then into a state of comparative destitution, and was not one of the favourite resorts of Melbourne amusement seekers, till Mr. Sullivan stepped in and restored it to all its old glory by the revival of Shakespeare, with a sheen of scenery never before equalled in the colony; how, after Mr. Sullivan’s departure, the establishment fell into the hands of Messrs Vincent, Lambert, Harwood, Stewart, Hennings, and Bellair; how the latter soon retired from the firm, and Mr. Vincent was summoned by the grim serjeant just at the time when the wind seemed set in the sail of the ship which had surmounted so many buffetings; how Mr. Lambert retired to a life of ease, and the other lessees were brought out by Mr. Coppin, is matter of history, and we may now content ourselves with saying that, on the expiration of his lease, the theatre would have been gutted to meet the demands of the Government. One strange fact may be mentioned. Not a week ago Mr Coppin mentioned to the writer of this his complete satisfaction at the success of his season, and said that the only thing which could prevent him from retiring from the lesseeship of the Theatre Royal with a large sum to his credit would be a fire. That has come to him in a moment when he was preparing vigorously for his Easter piece, and when he had in preparation many novelties of which the Melbourne public would no doubt have been entirely appreciative. It is strange that the calamity should have come at this particular juncture, when Sydney is destitute of a theatre, and when Melbourne is bound to operate for at least some months. As we have said, the professionals in Mr Coppins employ will really be the greatest losers by the fire. Some of them have lost their all; most the them are unable to withstand the necessities of a long period of non-employment. In the name of common fairness, they who have given so much in their day to the charities of Melbourne can now ask from the people of the country for a return. Eastertide is nearly here, and Easter should not pass without a spontaneous demonstration on behalf of the poor actor.
Let us tell the history of the fire:- Two men named William Goulding and John English were sleeping on the premises, English being on the stage and Goulding in the green-room. English first gave the alarm of fire. Its first appearance was through a wall behind a frame on which the scenes were painted. English describes it as having been like a “handful of fire.” It caught the partition between the painting room and the property room, and at once spread to great proportions. The dressing rooms were speedily attacked by the flames, which reached the stage almost at a leap, and obtained such a hold on the scenery and the “flies” as made their extinction an impossibility. The fire brigade was on the spot, under the command of Mr Hoad, as smartly as possible, but hardly anything could be done, through the manner on which the spot where the fire raged, the auditorium of the theatre, was hemmed in. All was speedily in a blaze, and terrible was the sight as the great body of fire and sparks rolled up. The town was illuminated as by the electric light, and in the dense throngs which assembled along the neighbouring street faces could be distinguished over the way as if the sun was shining. The whole of the interior of the theatre is destroyed, and it lies gutted just like the Haymarket. The crowds at the back and front could hear the galleries come down one after another, like the booming of great guns. A quantity of mimic fire had been stored in a room at the back of the theatre, which is, or was, of corrugated iron. While this was in flame, and peeling off like paper, the stage fire, stowed away in parcels, also caught and sputtered away in blue and red in a highly picturesque manner.
The value of the property lost on the theatre can hardly be estimated at present. The management have lost the stock of scenery, properties, and the wardrobe belonging to the theatre. Nearly all the performers have also lost valuable portions of their private wardrobes. In this way the private loss will vary from £10 to £50, at least, per individual. Our visitor Mr Carden, is, fortunately for himself, among the lightest sufferers in this way. Besides all their loss on the way of dresses and other effects, a great number of performers and other person attached to the theatre will be thrown out of employment. Altogether there will be about 150 with their means of livelihood thus struck away, at least temporarily. The list includes actors and actresses, machinists, check-takers, and a crowd of other busy people, of whose necessary avocations in the carrying on of a theatre the outside public have no conception of.
The performance of the Streets of New York, which, by the way, included a sensational fire scene, terminated at a little after eleven, and many of the audience were in their beds when the conflagration broke out. How many of them thought, as the sham fire was represented on the stage, with the mock tocsin, the flames seen through the painted canvas, and the great effect of the burning house fronts falling with a crash upon the stage, that the actual scene was so soon to be enacted with the very theatre itself? The reflection immediately suggests itself, as it does after (the burning of every theatre we had almost said) every fire at a closed theatre what if it had occurred a little earlier? Suppose the conflagration in this case had begun an hour and a half earlier, just when the stage fire was going in, and we may wonder in which way the question of the sufficiency of the fire escape doors would have been solved. Had the fire broken out not where it did, while the audience were in the main theatre, the first impulse would be to prevent a panic. The audience would not be told at first. But the fire seems to have spread with a rapidity which would have made all efforts futile to stop it on the part of those behind the scenes. The whole theatre was wrapt in flames half an hour after the “handful of fire” was seen by English. That handful was, perhaps, smouldering away, like a grim demon, even while the actors were playing with their harmless fire at the front, before a delighted audience. We are not aware that there is any reason to connect the stage fire with the actual catastrophe. There are vague fears that it is the work of some incendiary.
No doubt thousands will visit the ruins today, and those who were at the performance last night will hardly look on the scene without a shudder. Nothing is left of the old house. The stage, with its gilt pilasters of open columns and panelled proscenium surrounded by the Royal arms, the three tiers of boxes in white and gold and the grand ceiling with its dancing muses – all,. All, have vanished; and
Like an insubstantial pageant faded
Left not a wrack behind.
There is not even a picture of our old Drury to bring its existence to the memory. Like the triumphs of the great actors who have trod its boards, it must live only in the recollection of the playgoer. No doubt a new, and perhaps a grander house will spring, like a phoenix, from its ashes, but it will not be the old Royal! No memories of Brooke, of Sullivan, of Jefferson, of long Sir William Don, of Walter Montgomery, of Charles Mathews, will haunt the new Royal. Probably it will be an opera house. But there is no time now for these reflections, and plenty of time to mourn. Old recollections and old stories about the national playhouse, round which so many fond memories cling, will doubtless well up ever and anon.
At two o’clock the fire had begun to sink, and thenceforward it died away slowly. In another hours’ time there was only a black and smouldering mess, over which the water jets went hissing, and sending up clouds of steam from the ruins. The fire had wreaked out its full force, almost without let or hindrance, so far as the theatre was concerned.
The disaster unfortunately was not confined to the Theatre Royal alone. The adjacent buildings suffered to some extent also. Not from the process of the conflagration so much as from the attempts made by well-meaning but injudicious persons to save the property contained in them. The fire ignited the roof to St Georges hall, and at one time it was feared that this also would be destroyed. The flames were extinguished more than once, but the roof again caught, and it was only by a steady and well-directed stream of water being kept constantly flowing on the building that all danger was at length averted. The damage done to the upper hall is very slight, and from £20 and £30 is the extent of the loss. The roof at the farther end is partially burnt, and the flies and stage appurtenances are damaged by water. It is anticipated that the troupe of comiques will be able to continue their performance, at any rate in a date or two, notwithstanding the fire. This is the more to be desired on their part as the rent of the ensuing week had just been paid. The damage done to the lower hall, occupied by Mr Pain’s exhibition of Australian and Polynesian curiosities, is, however, much more extensive. Very soon after the commencement of the fire, this place was opened, and an attempt made to save some of the articles. Packages and cases were bundled out in the street, being considerably damaged in the transit; but the more valuable portions of the museum were so fragile that they could scarcely be removed without being destroyed. The cases of insects, birds eggs, and the pictures, were irretrievably injured. The large model of Ballarat was too unwieldy to remove, and was allowed to remain in the hall, the solitary wreck of an exhibition which it had taken Mr Pain twenty years of toil and unceasing labour to collect. General commiseration must be felt for Mr Pain. He was dragged from his bed to learn the heavy blow which had befallen him, and which robbed him of the fruits of his lifetime. He estimates the value of the collection at £8000, but his loss it is at present impossible to calculate until he can go over the remains of his property. He was not insured for one penny, as the insurance offices refused to accept the risk.
The progress of the flames was arrested before two o’clock, and the conflagration confined to the theatre itself. The pit of the theatre was like a burning hell, and the streams of water poured upon it from all available points produced but little apparent effect. Clouds of steam were the only result visible, and the fire in that quarter would evidently last from some hours. All danger of its spreading however was averted. The front portion of the building, the Café de Paris, was not injured very appreciably except from water, and the damage inseparable from a fire of that magnitude. The dress circle bar was flooded, the hose being carried through it; but beyond this there was nothing injured. The stock was thrown into some confusion, and a few bottles of spirits might have been taken. The billiard room was not damaged at all. The vestibule was also uninjured and, in this portion of the building, the fire did not extend beyond the limits of the theatre itself. While the fire was at its height and the water was being directed into the theatre from the dress circle door, some little alarm was occasioned by a portion of the ceiling above tumbling on the head of the person beneath. A rush was made to get away, but it was discovered that the fall was slight, and work was again proceeded with. The entrance up to the dress circle has not been burnt, and the warning placard that the free list had been entirely suspended, except the press, still hung there. The warning, however, is useless now, and even members of the press are not likely to exercise their privilege of entering. In addition to the Metropolitan Fire Brigade there were present also the brigades from most of the surrounding boroughs – Sandridge, Hotham, Emerald-hill, and East Collingwood were all noticed there, and did good service. A rumour was prevalent that about the time the fire broke out, so as to be observable in the streets, a man was seen on top of the roof, the suspicion of course being that he was an incendiary. His presence, however, in that position may be explained. The man was passing at the rear of the theatre, and he observed smoke issuing from it. He dashed open the doors and climbed upon the roof, with the object of extinguishing the fire. He found the task too much for his energies, and had to descend.
It is believed that very little of the property in the Theatre Royal is insured. Mr Coppin says that there is a £1000 policy on some of the ground landlord’s property. But Mr Coppin, who had power to get the theatre at the end of his lease, is the greatest loser. Among the property destroyed is Mr. Flemming’s latest panorama of the overland route, and a whole host of collections of his finest paintings.
For more than half an hour there seemed every probability of the fire extending to the Chinese quarters, and the tenements between the east wall of the Theatre and Davis-lane, a right of way which runs from Bourke street to little Bourke street, was a scene of indescribable confusion. The frail tenements were like rabbit hutches, both in their construction and the living swarm which they held. Every house contained an almost incredible number of Chinamen, and it was difficult to get them to understand their danger, or to arouse them from the stupor into which many of them had fellen. Between opium and stupidity many of them would have remained in their houses but for the exertions of the police and the bystanders. But when once they were thoroughly alive to the risk they were running, they got to work vigorously; and in a few moments the street was full of Chinese furniture, knick-knacks, and the usual Celestial paraphernalia, including several half-caste children and a large number of women. It was not too soon, for one of the houses in Davis-lane, at a distance of at least a hundred feet from the theatre, was in flames, and the attention of the firemen being directed to the theatre, it looked as if the whole quarter would take fire. Fortunately a small supply of water was obtained from the taps, and with the aid of a few buckets the further progress was stayed. Beyond a considerable amount of injury sustained by hasty removal no loss was sustained by the Chinese.
Unfortunately the damage was not confined to the persons mainly engaged in the “show business”. Mr M’Donald’s, the well-known photographer, was in extremis. They naturally thought, and rightly too, from the appearance of the fire, that their turn would come next, and an effort was made to clear out the premises. Several persons rushed in, and before many minutes had elapsed the place was quickly denuded, though there was a difficulty in getting down the heavier portion of the furniture. Many thousand negatives of old colonists, said not to be in other galleries, were hurried pell-mell into boxes or carried into the street. A few valuable photographs – amongst others that of Sir James Martin and other colonial celebrities were – destroyed. What was one of the best galleries in the city is now a ruin.