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Rose and Crown Hotel
Lot 386, corner of High and Queen Streets, 1830-1937, aka Fremantle Girls School, then the boarding-house for the boys of Henry Briggs's Grammar School; later the site of the Oriana Cinema, 1938-1972.
Library:
Fremantle History Centre photo no. 992A, 1927. The original Rose and Crown Hotel, the oldest house in Fremantle; which became the first government school in Fremantle, with Mrs Fanny Pulford as School Mistress. It was afterwards used as a boarding house for pupils of Fremantle Grammar School. In 1938, Hoyts (Fremantle) built a theatre on the site. Known as the Oriana, it was demolished in March 1972 for the building of shops. The photograph was taken from the Western Mail, 14 April 1927.
The house was built in 1830. It seems to have become a school by 1867. In 1872 Mrs Fanny Pulford is said by the Fremantle Library (in the Street Names document) as being the Headmistress of the Fremantle Girls School, which was noted as the first government school in Fremantle, which was apparently in this Rose and Crown Hotel building where Pulford taught from 1867.
Hitchcock (1919) also mentions Mrs Pulford: "As I said before, the old St John’s Church stood on what is now that part of High-street opposite the Town Hall Chambers. The only building then existing east of it in High-street still stands at the corner of High and Queen-streets, and in 1869 was occupied by a Mrs. Pulford as a girl’s school. In later years it was used as a Good Templars’ Lodge, and more recently by Mr. (now Sir) Henry Briggs, as a grammar school. It had originally been an hotel (the ‘Rose and Crown’), but some time in the sixties [1860s] a renewal of its license was refused on the ground that it was too far out of town to be under the effective supervision of the police."
According to the 1927 Western Mail caption (above) it was later used as a boarding house for Fremantle Grammar School boys.
The building was on the corner of High Street and Queen Street, where the Hoyts Cinema, later the Oriana Cinema, stood. There are now some very ordinary shops there.
The side caption with the photo above reads: This was taken out of the "The Western Mail", Special Fremantle Number, 14 April 1927.
The bottom caption reads: At the SOUTH EASTERN corner of High St and Queen St. In the left background can be seen part of Victoria Hall.
Photo from the Local History Collection, Fremantle Library, enhanced by Bob Sommerville: thanks!
The 'Fremantle Grammar School' to which the caption under the old photo refers had been opened in 1882 by Henry Briggs. In 1886 he:
Ewers:
... resigned and established a boys' school of his own further up High Street [at 200]. As a consequence, the Grammar School [the one on Queen Street] closed down and he took it over [in the sense that the boys moved up the hill to the new building], continuing in charge until 1897. Ewers: 108.
The Rose and Crown c. 1937, the year it was demolished. Fremantle Library photo no. 2048D - accompanied by the following text.
Library:
The Rose and Crown Hotel was built before 1849 and later used to board pupils from Henry Briggs' Grammar School. It was demolished October 1937.
References and Links
Ewers, John K. 1971, The Western Gateway: A History of Fremantle, Fremantle City Council, with UWAP, rev. ed. [1st ed. 1948].
Hitchcock J.K. 1919, 'Early days of Fremantle: High Street 50 years ago', published in 12 parts in the Fremantle Times 21 March - 20 June 1919.
This page incorporates material from Garry Gillard's Freotopia website, that he started in 2014 and the contents of which he donated to Wikimedia Australia in 2024. The content was originally created on 29 September, 2014 and hosted at freotopia.org/hotels/roseandcrown.html (it was last updated on 30 November, 2023), and has been edited since it was imported here (see page history). The donated data is also preserved in the Internet Archive's collection.