The Prince Henry Hospital site, formerly known as the Prince Henry Hospital, Sydney, is a heritage-listed former teaching hospital and infectious diseases hospital and now UNSW teaching hospital and spinal rehabilitation unit located at 1430 Anzac Parade in the suburb of Little Bay in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. It was designed by NSW NSW Colonial Architect and NSW Government Architect and built from 1881 by NSW Public Works Department. It is also known as Prince Henry Hospital and The Coast Hospital. The property is owned by Landcom, an agency of the Government of New South Wales. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 May 2003.
History Aboriginal historical context The greater Sydney region has been inhabited by Aboriginal people for at least 20,000 years with dated sheltered occupation sites occurring in the Blue Mountains and its foothills. Aboriginal occupation of coastal NSW has also been dated to extend back to at least 20,000 years before present at Burrill Lake on the South Coast and 17,000 years before present at Bass Point. At the time of these periods of occupation, both sites would have been located within hinterland areas situated some distance away from the coast. In the case of Burrill Lake, the sea would have been up to 16 km further east than at present and the site would have been located within an inland environment drained by rivers, creeks and streams.
There are no other Pleistocene sites recorded on the Sydney Coast. There are however two sites that have been dated to the early Holocene around 7,000 to 8,000 years ago. These are located at the current Prince of Wales Hospital site (a hearth dated to 7,800 years ago) and a rock shelter site at Curracurrang. It is likely that many coastal Aboriginal sites of a similar age within the Sydney region have been submerged and/or destroyed by sea-level changes which have occurred in eastern Australia during the last 20,000 years. In general terms, the majority of sites recorded within the Sydney Basin investigated to the present are dated to within the last 2,500 years that in most cases demonstrate Aboriginal exploitation of marine resources at the current sea levels.
Available evidence indicates that Aboriginal occupation of the Sydney region was initially sporadic, and that population numbers were fairly low during the earliest periods. From around 5,000 years ago an increasing and continued use of many sites investigated through archaeology appears to have ensued. Evidence for the Aboriginal use and occupation of the Sydney region from this period is therefore far more "archaeologically visible" than for previous periods.
In the South Sydney region at least three archaeological sites have produced dates of Aboriginal occupation that range from between 3,000 and 5,000 years ago. From about 3,000 years ago to Contact the number of occupied sites appears to have increased dramatically. This may reflect a "real" increase in the number of sites (and hence people) in the region, or may reflect preservation factors (particularly associated with shell midden deposits) where older sites have been destroyed by thousands of years of erosion, and accelerated by development in the post-Contact period.
Over the 20,000 years of Aboriginal occupation in the region, and in particular the last 5,000 to 8,000 years, numerous changes in excavated stone tool assemblages have been observed. Various temporal markers have been established by archaeologist in an attempt to distinguish what are considered to be the more significant changes in tool types and tool kit composition. The assumption being that changes in one (or more) components of the excavated material culture may reflect changes in other aspects of past Aboriginal social, economic and technological practices.
These arguments are based upon changes in stone tool assemblages and observable changes in the use of certain types of stone used in Aboriginal tool manufacture. Excavation of a number of rock-shelter occupation sites in particular indicates that the earlier phases of occupation are largely characterised by the presence of large cores and scraper tools. This appears to be followed by the addition of a variety of smaller backed implements (known variously as backed blades, geometric microliths or Bondi Points) to the toolkit previously dominated by larger tools at around 5,000 years ago. By around 1,500 years ago the smaller backed forms appear (on available evidence) to have gone out of use and excavated site assemblages are characterised by quartz bi-polar artefacts and more opportunistic or undifferentiated small tools. It is reasonable to assume that the many artefacts made by Aboriginal people from shell, bone or wood as observed at Contact were also used in the past but these materials have not survived in the archaeological record.
Research indicates that coastal sites in the Sydney region have been largely ignored by archaeologists until relatively recently. Prior to work completed over the last two decades, the majority of Aboriginal archaeological sites investigated were located south of Sydney and the Georges River. Previous focus of investigations was frequently on the stone artefacts made by Aboriginal people in the past, the sequence of changes in their form and composition, and upon comparisons between coastal and inland sites that sought to understand how people used the landscape as a means to characterise Aboriginal life on the eastern coast of NSW prior to Contact. More recent archaeological studies have focused upon the way Aboriginal people adapted to the coastal environment and the immediate hinterland, and how other aspects of the archaeological record (such as food, art, site complexity and composition, and site distribution data) can contribute to our understanding of prehistoric Aboriginal life.
Colonial history One of the earliest land grants in this area was made in 1824 to Captain Francis Marsh, who received 12 acres bounded by the present Botany and High Streets, Alison and Belmore Roads. In 1839 William Newcombe acquired the land north-west of the present town hall in Avoca Street.
Randwick takes its name from the town of Randwick, Gloucestershire, England. The name was suggested by Simeon Pearce (1821–86) and his brother James. Simeon was born in the English Randwick and the brothers were responsible for the early development of both Randwick and its neighbour, Coogee. Simeon had come to the colony in 1841as a 21 year old surveyor. He built his Blenheim House on the 4 acres he bought from Marsh, and called his property "Randwick". The brothers bought and sold land profitably in the area and elsewhere. Simeon campaigned for construction of a road from the city to Coogee (achieved in 1853) and promoted the incorporation of the suburb. Pearce sought construction of a church modelled on the church of St. John in his birthplace. In 1857 the first St Jude's stood on the site of the present post office, at the corner of the present Alison Road and Avoca Street.Pollen, 1988, 217-8.
Randwick was slow to progress. The village was isolated from Sydney by swamps and sandhills, and although a horse-drawn omnibus was operated by a man named Grice from the late 1850s, the journey was more a test of nerves than a pleasure jaunt. Wind blew sand over the track, and the bus sometimes became bogged, so that passengers had to get out and push it free. From its early days Randwick had a divided society. The wealthy lived elegantly in large houses built when Pearce promoted Randwick and Coogee as a fashionable area. But the market gardens, orchards and piggeries that continued alongside the large estates were the lot of the working class. Even on the later estates that became racing empires, many jockeys and stablehands lived in huts or even under canvas. An even poorer group were the immigrants who existed on the periphery of Randwick in a place called Irishtown, in the area now known as The Spot, around the junction of St.Paul's Street and Perouse Road. Here families lived in makeshift houses, taking on the most menial tasks in their struggle to survive.
In 1858 when the NSW Government passed the Municipalities Act, enabling formation of municipal districts empowered to collect rates and borrow money to improve their suburb, Randwick was the first suburb to apply for the status of a municipality. It was approved in February 1859, and its first Council was elected in March 1859.
Randwick had been the venue for sporting events, as well as duels and illegal sports, from the early days in the colony's history. Its first racecourse, the Sandy Racecourse or Old Sand Track, had been a hazardous track over hills and gullies since 1860. When a move was made in 1863 by John Tait, to establish Randwick Racecourse, Simeon Pearce was furious, especially when he heard that Tait also intended to move into Byron Lodge. Tait's venture prospered, however and he became the first person in Australia to organise racing as a commercial sport. The racecourse made a big difference to the progress of Randwick. The horse-drawn omnibus gave way to trams that linked the suburb to Sydney and civilisation. Randwick soon became a prosperous and lively place, and it still retains a busy residential, professional and commercial life.
Today, some of the houses have been replaced by home units. Many European migrants have made their homes in the area, along with students and workers at the nearby University of NSW and the Prince of Wales Hospital.Pollen, 1988, 218-9.
The choice of a site for The Coast Hospital The Prince Henry Hospital and former Coast Hospital at Little Bay represent an important phase in the provision of public health in New South Wales and Australia. Established by the Board of Health in 1881, in response to an outbreak of smallpox, the hospital was the first government-controlled public hospital in the post-convict era. The Board of Health, forerunner to the Department of Health, was created initially to deal with the smallpox outbreak of 1881. The Board of Health and New South Wales government's involvement in the early administration at the hospital empowered both organisations in their dealings with other New South Wales private hospitals in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. It also laid the foundations for the administrative policies in regard to hospitals that became standard within the system.
The location of the Coast Hospital was a reflection of the prevailing beliefs with regard to the treatment of infectious disease and in health care generally. Fear of infectious diseases in the nineteenth century meant that those diagnosed or suspected of having infection were geographically isolated and removed from the general population. At the same time, fresh ocean air was considered highly beneficial in the treatment of disease. The Coast Hospital was built with both these ideals in mind. Not only was the original hospital well removed from the populated areas in Sydney, but within the grounds of the institution, the patients were duly separated depending on their ailment. The main section was located on the southern headland of Little Bay where maximum exposure to the elements was assured.
The isolated nature of the Coast Hospital also led to the establishment of the first complete ambulance service in New South Wales and a forerunner of permanent ambulance services throughout the entire country.