St Kilda House – Corner Cathedral Street & Palmer Street – Woolloomooloo – NSW
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[Lettering scratched on the negative, lower right:] E G SHAW [?]
Built 1844 · Georgian · Demolished after late-1950s “homes not carpark” battle
On the Woolloomooloo rise below St Mary’s — corner of Cathedral and Palmer streets — stood a Georgian mansion called St Kilda. Built in 1844 for Charles Scott, it aged into school, hospital, boarding house and flats. In 1955–59 tenants and allies fought Auto Auctions’ push to flatten it for a car park — often remembered as Sydney’s first urban heritage/housing uprising. They lost the building. The name returned in 1975 on seniors housing nearby.
At a glance
- Address: Corner Cathedral Street & Palmer Street, Woolloomooloo
- Built: 1844 for Charles Scott (Dictionary of Sydney)
- Style: Georgian (DoS)
- Later uses: school; hospital; boarding house; subdivided flats (“St Kilda Flats” in 1950s press)
- 1950s threat: Auto Auctions Pty Ltd demolition application for car-park use; City Council works committee repeatedly recommended refusal (e.g. Feb 1957)
- Fate: Demolished after the failed late-1950s campaign (still standing in Jul 1959 press pleas; gone by Brodsky-era remembrance / before 1975 naming). Live scrapbook “now” shows later commercial (Toll / tunnel-era) fabric on the site tradition
- Heritage lesson: Campaign failed but remembered — 1975 Cathedral Street seniors housing named St Kilda in honour of the protest
Site & setting
Cathedral Street drops from St Mary’s Cathedral into the ‘Loo — once Woolloomooloo Street, until the suburb’s early-twentieth-century reputation made residents petition for renaming. Dictionary of Sydney notes a rejected proposal to rename the whole area “St Kilda” after this very building. Palmer Street crosses the old Woolloomooloo / Darlinghurst height edge where colonial villas once looked over the valley and the bay.
Aboriginal Country: Gadigal land of the Eora Nation.
Timeline
- 1844 – Georgian house built for Charles Scott (DoS).
- By 1858 – Kept as a boarding house by William Hudson (R. H. Clarke, Tribune 1957).
- Late 1878 – Fr Joseph Dalton SJ rents St Kilda House (15 rooms, about one acre) at £260 a year for a Jesuit day college; later bought (Wikipedia: St Aloysius’ College; Jesuits Australia).
- Feb 1879 – St Aloysius’ College opens here: 45 pupils admitted 3 Feb 1879, 115 by year’s end; prize day 23 Dec 1879 with Archbishop Vaughan (Jesuit Archives; Woodstock Letters). Date conflict: Tribune gives 1880; Jesuit sources 1879 (opening variously “late January”, 2 or 3 Feb).
- Sept 1883 – College moves to Auburn Villa (St Aloysius’ prospectus).
- c.1884 – St Kilda House College under the Marist Brothers (Tribune 1957).
- 1885–after 1900 – St Kilda Hospital; 1922 becomes St Kilda Flats (Tribune 1957).
- Later 19th–early 20th c. – Converted successively as school, hospital, boarding house; eventually flats.
- 1955 – Car business owning St Kilda applies to demolish (DoS Woolloomooloo narrative).
- Feb 1957 – Tenants repair fence owners pulled down; Tribune / SMH coverage of “Want Homes Not Carpark” / “Homes Before Profits”; Council works committee again recommends refusing Auto Auctions’ demolition-for-carpark application.
- 28 Jan – 12 Feb 1957 (detail) – 28 Jan: two workmen pull down the back fence; 5 Feb: tenants report having repaired it (Daily Telegraph); 6 Feb: “The siege of the tenants!” — tenants twice repel workmen trying to cut the electricity and rip out fittings; 12 Feb: works committee again recommends refusal (SMH). 10 families / 26 people lived there, incl. six ex-servicemen (CoS Archives A-00260855, A-00260864, A-00260897; Tribune). Tribune issue date: captions say 6 March, file names 6 Feb 1957.
- 1957–59 – Sustained tenant/community resistance (greenbans.net; Isadore Brodsky later documentation).
- 21 Jul 1959 – SMH clip: Alderman T. Wright argues St Kilda flats should not be demolished for a car park, citing Jesuit first-home association (CoS Archives newsclipping).
- After 1959 – Building demolished (exact date not locked this pass).
- 1975 – New seniors housing in Cathedral Street named St Kilda in honour of the protest.
- Today – House gone; commercial / tunnel-precinct fabric on the corner tradition (live scrapbook “now” image).
Architecture
Dictionary of Sydney classifies St Kilda as a Georgian-style house. The live 1925 exterior is the clearest scrapbook view — keep it. By the 1950s press it was “St Kilda Flats,” a Georgian shell subdivided for boarding/flat life — the social fact that made the car-park proposal a housing fight as much as a heritage fight.
People
Charles Scott is the documented first owner (DoS). The 1950s tenants — including families organised in the Woolloomooloo resistance remembered by later green-ban walkers — are the story’s second cast. Communist Alderman T. Wright’s 1959 council plea and the Tribune’s “Homes Before Profits” coverage show how the fight sat inside Cold War municipal politics. Isadore Brodsky’s Sydney’s Little World of Woolloomooloo fixed the episode in local memory; the 2011 Green Bans Art Walk returned to the site as the “first urban heritage uprising.”
Added: Fr Joseph Dalton SJ (Irish Jesuit, founder of St Aloysius’ and Riverview) was the first Rector at St Kilda House for about a year; with no room to live on site, the Jesuit staff lodged at North Sydney and Riverview and came in daily by ferry (Jesuits Australia; Woodstock Letters). Historian R. H. Clarke (RAHS councillor) urged National Trust protection in 1957, and Lord Mayor Jensen and thousands of petitioners backed keeping it as homes; Aldermen Frank Dixon and E. C. O’Dea (ALP) supported Wright; Housing Minister Landa told tenants to “stay put” (Tribune 1957).
Gallery
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[Lettering scratched on the negative, lower right:] E G SHAW [?]
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[Sign on the modern building (lower photo):] Cross City Tunnel
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Save St. Kilda
Historian says:
ST. KILDA FLATS should be preserved by the National Trust from demolition, Mr. R. H. Clarke, leading historian of old Sydney, told the Tribune in an interview this week.
Mr. Clarke is a councillor of the Royal Australian Historical Society.
His researches in past weeks have brought to light the interesting history behind this fine old example of early Australian architecture now threatened with destruction by a motor company.
The old building has served in [?its] time as a boarding house, a college and a hospital.
Mr. Clarke cannot find the exact date of construction. It was later than 1822 but earlier than 1858 when it was kept as a boarding house by William Hudson.
In 1880 it was a college run by the Society of Jesus with Rev. Joseph Dalton as headmaster. Four years later its title was St. Kilda House College, conducted by the Marist Brothers.
From 1885 till some time after 1900 it was St. Kilda Hospital, becoming St. Kilda Flats in 1922.
Woolloomooloo, the district where St. Kilda Flats stand, was originally named Garden Island Cove by the officers of the first fleet, says Mr. Clarke.
One of them, John Palmer, purser or commissary of Governor Phillip's flagship, the Sirius, was given 100 acres of it by acting-governor
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[continued] Grose in 1793.
Mrs. Edward Riley bought the whole of the present Woolloomooloo in 1822 for £2290.
Originally the waters of Woolloomooloo Bay came right up to the present Cathedral Street, which before 1907 was called Woolloomooloo Street.
Sydney Lord Mayor Jensen and thousands of petitioners have declared that St. Kilda must be preserved as a dwelling place.
It now houses 10 families and is in good repair.
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Want homes, not car park
WHEN a company which wants to demolish St. Kilda Flats, Woolloomooloo, to make way for a car park had part of a fence pulled down, residents promptly put it up again (pictured).
The tenants are campaigning to save the building, and on Monday, Alderman T. Wright (Communist), supported by Aldermen Dixon and O'Dea (ALP), took a strong stand in the City Council against demolition of homes for commercial premises (see story Page 12).
The Council decided to seek powers from the State Government to prevent such demolitions.
Yesterday the company sent workers to begin demolition work in the building. But tenants have been advised by Housing Minister Landa to “stay put” — and they intend to do so.
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HOMES BEFORE PROFITS
Alderman Wright's stand in Council
SYDNEY: The Sydney City Council's only Communist Alderman, Tom Wright, struck a significant blow for the legion of the Australian homeless at this week's Council meeting.
HE successfully moved that the Council send a deputation to the State Government seeking power to prevent the demolition of homes and their replacement by non-residential buildings.
At present, he explained, the City Council has not this power.
“Stop demolitions”
In consequence, despite the “terrible” housing position, a large number of habitable houses were being destroyed to make way for more profitable commercial and industrial undertakings.
“If we can't build houses for the people we should at least stop the demolition of existing homes by seeking the necessary powers” said Ald. Wright.
“Any local Government body should be able to stop residences being demolished.
“Council should warn speculators who buy residences that if they are demolished it will not give them [?permission] to build anything but houses on the sites they have acquired.”
The Council had before it a letter from members of 10 families facing
Transcription:
[continued] eviction from a block of flats in the City.
Wanted for car park
One of the residents made this statement to the Tribune:
“Auto Auctions (Suttons) the big second-hand car dealers, have threatened to drive out 26 people from their homes at St. Kilda Flats, corner of Cathedral and Palmer Streets, Woolloomooloo, to make way for a car park.
“Some of the tenants have lived at St. Kilda for more than 20 years. They include six ex-servicemen.
“On Monday, January 28, Auto Auctions celebrated Australia Day by sending two workmen to pull down the fence surrounding the building.
“The back fence was demolished, but the two workmen would not go on with it when the nature of the act was explained to them.
“The City Council, and the tenants also, will send a deputation to the Minister for Local Government, Mr. Renshaw, demanding legislation under which landlords can be prevented from demolishing [?residences] of the people.
“At this time of critical housing shortage, it is criminal to allow the destruction of any more houses in the 'Loo [?or] anywhere else.
“Although the Council has twice refused a permit for a car park, Auto Auctions are trying to drive the tenants out.
“But Auto Auctions will not succeed because the tenants are united in their determination to defend [?their] homes.
“Ald. Frank Dixon, (ALP) and Ald. Tom Wright (Communist), have given excellent assistance to the tenants.
“Widespread support is being [?offered] to the tenants and St. Kilda may well turn out to be the rallying point
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[continued] for an all-out offensive by the working people to ensure that the people have protection for their homes and that more houses will be built to meet the needs of [?our] nation.”
Tenants in gallery
A DELEGATION of St. Kilda tenants was in the City Council gallery on Monday night to hear Ald. Wright put their case.
He told the Council that Auto Auctions' attitude was a challenge to the Council.
Twice the Council had refused permission for part of the area to be used for parking cars, yet the firm made no secret of its intention to get the tenants out.
Ald. E. C. O'Dea (ALP) a [?former] Lord Mayor, gave strong support to Ald. Wright.
“There is every reason why we should prevent this demolition” he said.
“Where there is a choice, I will go for homes for the people [?every] time.”
It would take the Housing Commission two years to build homes equivalent to those destroyed in the area they were discussing.
Ald. Dixon also supported Ald. Wright, but the “Democratic Labor” aldermen remained silent.
“Enough stations”
Two other items bearing out the [?truth] of what the labor movement [?aldermen] had to say:
● Living in a shack near a beach close to The Spit with her husband and three children, Mrs. J Hansen told a Tribune reporter she thought there were enough petrol stations. More homes should be [?provided] for the people
Mrs. Hansen said that despite what a daily paper had stated, the family
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[Caption:] ALD. T. WRIGHT
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[continued] did not intend to “defy” the Mosman Council's ruling that they must leave.
She was living there only in the hope of finding a home where the family could keep together. Otherwise they must separate.
“And yet a house is even now being demolished in Military Road, Mosman, to make way for commercial premises,” she added.
(As revealed in last week's Tribune, a house able to accommodate three families was bulldozed into the ground two months ago to make way for a petrol station a mile from where the Hansens are now camping).
“Immoral”
● Alderman Mrs. Estelle Hillard, of North Sydney Council, told Tribune in a telephone interview that she thought the commercial re-zoning in MacMahon's Point, involving the destruction of homes, was “immoral”.
She said that some aldermen were even resisting residents' requests for a new children's playground in Dumbarton Street, part of the re-zoned [?area].
One alderman she said, had asserted the children could “go and play on Ball's Head” — some distance away.
Transcription:
[Caption:] THIS is the St. Kilda Flats building, Woolloomooloo, [?under] threat of demolition to make way for a car park.
What stands today
St Kilda House does not stand. The Cathedral / Palmer corner is later commercial fabric. Remember the fight at the 1975 St Kilda seniors housing name on Cathedral Street, and pair this post with other Woolloomooloo / Darlinghurst losses on the blog.
Sources & further reading
- Tribune (Sydney), 1957 — “Save St. Kilda”, “Want homes, not car park”, “Homes Before Profits” (clippings above; Trove article 236327192)
- Jesuit Archives (Ireland) — St Aloysius’ College, Sydney, 1879–: https://jesuitarchives.ie/st-aloysius-college-sydney-australia-1879
- Jesuits Australia — “Founding Father” (Fr Joseph Dalton SJ): https://jesuit.org.au/founding-father/
- Wikipedia — St Aloysius’ College (Sydney): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Aloysius%27_College_(Sydney)
- St Aloysius’ College prospectus (history): https://www.staloysius.nsw.edu.au/
- Woodstock Letters (Jesuit), 1910 — Australian mission history: https://web.bc.edu/jsdc/jsl/wlet_19101001.pdf
- City of Sydney Archives — Tenants oppose flats demolition (DT, 5 Feb 1957), A-00260855: https://archives.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/nodes/view/887784
- City of Sydney Archives — The siege of the tenants! (6 Feb 1957), A-00260864: https://archives.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/nodes/view/887802
- City of Sydney Archives — Demolition of flats opposed (SMH, 12 Feb 1957), A-00260897: https://archives.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/nodes/view/887868
- Dictionary of Sydney — St Kilda (building): https://dictionaryofsydney.org/building/st_kilda
- Dictionary of Sydney — Woolloomooloo (entry discusses the 1950s fight): https://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/woolloomooloo
- City of Sydney Archives newsclippings — demolition opposed / tenants oppose / Wright plea (1957–59)
- greenbans.net — “Sydney’s first Conservation Protests – Woolloomooloo, 1957”
- Existing scrapbook post (clippings to keep): https://historicsydneymansionsmanorshouses.blogspot.com/2026/07/st-kilda-house-cnr-cathdral-st-palmer.html
