Mouat Street, between Phillimore and High Streets.
Town Lot 41 is now occupied by the [[../buildings/steamship.html|Steamships Buildings]], which was formerly owned by the Adelaide Steamship Company, 10-12 Mouat Street. (It is also on part of lot 42.)
The first owner noted by [[../hitchcock.html|Hitchcock]] was George Williams.
From 1830 it was the site of [[../people/collinsrobert.html|Robert Collins]]'s hotel, which he called the Commerical Hotel and then the [[../hotels/watermans.html|Waterman's Arms]], it being near the river about two blocks away. [[../people/heardwilliam.html|William Heard]] took the hotel over from Collins in 1831.
Hitchcock (1919, describing Mouat Street in 1869):
At the time of which we write (1869) what is now [[../westend/phillimore.html|Phillimore-street]] formed part of the old Recreation Ground, known as ‘[[../parks/green.html|The Green]]’, and only a few of the allotments in [[../westend/mouat.html|Mouatt-street]] were built upon. An old widow lady named Mrs. [Eliza?] [[../people/agett.html|Agett]] resided in a fairly large bungalow house on the site now occupied by [[../hotels/hismajestys.html|His Majesty’s Hotel]]. During the gold boom times this house underwent alterations and additions, and became Fremantle’s first café under the name of ’[[../hotels/hismajestys.html|His Lordship’s Larder]]’. In course of time a hotel license was secured, and the old building gave place to the present modern structure.
Next to it was the station and quarters of the [[../harbourmasters/index.html|Harbour Master]]’s crew. This was a body of smartly uniformed and well disciplined men, whose duties were in connection with the shipping, which, at that time, was represented by sailing ships lying out in the open and exposed roadstead, none but the small coasting craft being to berth at the jetty.
References and Links
Fremantle History Centre. Look for the PDFs called:
Purchasers of Fremantle Town Lots 1829-1837
Purchasers of Fremantle Town Lots 1855-1879
Hitchcock, J.K. 1919, [[../books/hitchcock1919.html|'Early Days of Fremantle: High Street 50 Years Ago']], Fremantle Times, one of a series of articles on 'Early Days of Fremantle' publ. 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 4 December, 2022 and hosted at freotopia.org/lots/41.html (it was last updated on 31 December, 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.