The Town Hall Fire
As a mild midsummer Saturday night turned to the morning of Sunday, 1 February 1925, the city was still busy with nightlife. Theatres, cinemas and dance halls closing their doors spilled patrons onto the streets, jostling for the taxicabs and cable trams lining Swanston Street, or hurrying to Flinders Street Station for the last trains. Some turned in for the night at city hotels, like the grand Victoria Coffee Palace on Collins Street. Atop the tower of the Metropolitan Fire Brigade’s headquarters on Eastern Hill, the watchman had a clear view of the night sky across the sprawling metropolis, for the City Council had mandated strict building height limits since 1916.
Henry Legge, the Town Hall nightwatchman, had finished his first rounds early, since there were no bookings that night, and sat down in the basement to his “midnight lunch” at about a quarter to one. Suddenly, there was the sound of a muffled explosion. Legge raced upstairs to find flames streaming from the main hall. With the help of three policemen whose supper had also been interrupted, Legge pulled the fire alarm and valiantly began trying to fight the blaze. Cab drivers, policemen and boys in the street set off alarms as the fire grew rapidly, and the Eastern Hill watchman saw a column of smoke rise swiftly. A huge contingent of firemen arrived in minutes, but the hall was well alight.
Hundreds of Melburnians gathered on the street to watch the flames against the night sky. Staff at the Coffee Palace, realising their building was threatened, evacuated more than 500 guests onto the street. But effective tactics using the fire brigade’s new extension ladders, and the heavy bluestone walls of the Town Hall, contained the fire to the main auditorium, leaving the office wings and the Coffee Palace untouched. By 3 o’clock, Town Clerk William McCall and City Engineer Henry Morton, who had rushed to the scene from their homes in Essendon and St Kilda, stood among the rubble to survey the damage. The main hall was gutted; the organ and mayoral portraits destroyed. The immediate work would be to clear the rubble, stabilise what remained of the building, and settle the insurance claim.
By Monday morning, discussion had already turned to rebuilding. For some years, prominent Melburnians had advocated for the Town Hall to be relocated to increase the space available for civic functions. Many wanted a site on the banks of the Yarra, perhaps atop the Jolimont railway yards. The destruction presented an opportunity - perhaps to rebuild on a new site. Correspondence flooded in as Melburnians offered their suggestions and building firms clamoured to be involved with what would be a city-shaping project. Meanwhile, the day-to-day work of the Council went on in the chaotic conditions; staff in the Town Clerk’s office worked late nights and early mornings to keep the wheels of bureaucracy turning.
A fortnight after the fire, the Council resolved to rebuild the Town Hall on the same site. Melbourne, the councillors agreed, could not be without its civic centre for as long as it would take to secure a new site and design a suitably grand structure. Morton made some improvements to the design of the auditorium, and slightly expanded the footprint of the building, but the new Town Hall that would rise from the ashes would be a symbol of continuity in a turbulent city.
References
- "Fire in Town Hall," Argus, February 2, 1925, 11.
- "A New Town Hall," Age, February 2, 1925, 10.
- "Restoring Town Hall," Argus, February 12, 1925, 11.
- Graeme Tucker, "Melbourne Town Hall," eMelbourne (School of Historical and Philosophical Studies, 2008).
Acknowledgements
- Text and annotations: Patrick Gigacz