The Union Bond Store is a heritage-listed former warehouse, bond store and Westpac bank branch and museum located at 47 George Street in the inner city Sydney suburb of The Rocks in the City of Sydney local government area of New South Wales, Australia. It was designed by John Bibb and built from 1841 to 1842. It is also known as Union Bond Store (former) and Westpac Bank. The property is owned by Property NSW, an agency of the Government of New South Wales. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 10 May 2002.
History The story of European occupation in the vicinity of the subject property began with the lease of land on the western foreshores of Sydney Cove to Captain Henry Waterhouse c. 1799. Charles Grimes's Plan of Sydney, prepared in 1800, shows three parcels of land held by Waterhouse on the foreshore near present-day Campbell's Cove. The alignment of George Street appears to have run between these parcels of land. It appears that Waterhouse only held his leaseholds at The Rocks for one year, and does not appear to have built on them during his tenure.
Occupation by Robert Campbell Land on the western side of George Street (between Argyle and Cumberland Streets) was from 1800 occupied by Robert Campbell, one of Sydney's most prominent merchants in the first decades of European settlement. He acquired Captain Waterhouse's leases in The Rocks soon after Waterhouse's return to England in 1800. The 1807 James Meehan's Plan of the Town of Sydney shows two leaseholds occupied by Campbell on the western foreshores of Sydney Cove. Lot 1 is the large rectangular parcel of land on the western side of George Street (and may also include land to the north, on the waterfront), while Lot 2 is a small square directly addressing the waterfront in the vicinity of today's Campbell's Cove. Campbell was officially granted this land (the Lot 2) in 1814.
The Lot 1, on the western side of George Street, was officially granted to Campbell on 16 October 1834 by Governor Richard Bourke. This land was divided into four allotments. Allotment 1 comprised 3 rods and 34 perches. A plan of The Rocks dated to 1835 does not show this land grant, only the extent of Campbell's earlier grant on the western foreshores of Sydney Cove is marked on this plan. In the early 1840s, Campbell set about subdividing his land holdings in The Rocks, particularly the land from the 1834 grant that was set back from the wharves and therefore less useful to his mercantile enterprises. On a personal note, Campbell was spending less time in Sydney following the death of his wife in 1833, and was increasingly living at his property Duntroon, near Canberra.
In 1841, Allotment 1 of Campbell's grant on the western side of George Street was subdivided into six lots. The subject property is located on Lot 4 of this subdivision. On 2 July 1841, Lots 3 and 4 from Allotment 1 of Campbell's 1834 grant were purchased by John Martyn and James Combes. The Union Bond Store at 47 George Street, The Rocks, was built in -43 on Lot 4, at the same time as a matching three-storey warehouse on the opposite corner (on the southern side of Union Street) on Lot 5. Both warehouses were built for John Martyn and James Combes to a design by architect John Bibb. A plan at the Mitchell Library dated to June 1841 shows the street and side elevations of a warehouse building designed by John Bibb for Martyn & Combes, ideally symmetrical to the existing subject property. Bibb is also speculated to be the architect for Merchants House at 43 George Street, to the north of the subject property (built in 1848). John Martyn and James Combes were brothers-in-law and business partners. They traded as Martyn & Combes, a "plumbing, painting and glazing business", but as the nineteenth century progressed, their business interests diversified, and they became known as merchants. By 1848, they were operating from a building on the junction of Jamison and George Streets, near Wynyard, possibly used as a warehouse / office. In 1847, Lot 5 of Allotment 1 of Campbell's grant (adjoining Lot 4 to the south) was acquired by Martyn & Combes, from the estate of Robert Campbell who had died the year before. In , Martyn & Combes oversaw construction of the Merchants House at 43 George Street, along with an infill warehouse building between it and the adjoining subject property (45 George Street).
The first recorded tenant at 47 George Street was Ashford Daniels, who occupied the building on a yearly lease from August 1843. The matching warehouse at 49 George Street on the southern side of Atherden Street was also owned by Martyn & Combes and was leased by Thomas Woolley. Both buildings were described in the Council Rates records in 1845 as "new no back premises" and were valued at £70 apiece. The Council Rates records for 1848 show that 47 George Street was vacant in this year. From to 1855, 47 George Street was occupied by Martyn & Combes. Richard Fawcett was appointed manager of Martyn & Combes in 1853, and two years later was recorded as the occupier at both 43 George Street (Merchants House) and 47 George Street.
47 George Street was occupied by Lotz & Larnach, merchants, from -65; Walker & Co was listed as a co-occupant in . The subject property was occupied by R Thompson, Sergeant of Police, in 1866, but was vacant the following year. In 1868–69, Martyn and Combes resumed occupation at 47 George Street, followed by William Martyn, the eldest son of John Martyn, in 1870–71.
The longest term tenant at 47 George Street was the pharmaceutical manufacturing and distribution firm of Edward Row & Co, from 1875 to . The company was at the corner of King Street and Bank Court in 1855 and appears to have been trading at 219 Pitt Street from at least 1871, prior to moving to premises in The Rocks in 1875. Edward Row & Co. manufactured drugs and remedies onsite but was also a wholesale distributor of pharmaceutical products to NSW and Queensland. An advertisement for the company indicates it had been trading since 1820 (probably in England). The firm of Edward Row & Co. was declared bankrupt three times in the nineteenth century, first in 1866 and twice in 1875. Edward Row & Co's signature product was Row's Embrocation, a liniment originally intended for horses and livestock and known as the 'Farmer's Friend'. By the late nineteenth century, its use was extended to people. In 1880, Row's Embrocation was promoted as a cure for gout, rheumatism, "old sores of 30 years standing", burns or scalds and stiffness of joints, and it was claimed that 'Row's Embrocation has no longer a place alone in the Stable, but thousands of families now keep it as an invaluable Embrocation in cases of accident'.
Union Street was renamed Atherden Street in 1875, in honour local resident and landowner George Atherden.
Edward Row & Co. oversaw construction of a rear building along Atherden Street (the rear addition was not shown in Dove's 1880 plan but first appears in 1889). The architect for this additional building was speculated to be Benjamin Martyn, the youngest son of John Martyn. According to Fox & Associates, the stores at 6-8 Atherden Street were "added to the rear portion of property" in 1887: "William Martyn by inheritance was the owner in 1887 and it is suggested that Benjamin Charles Martyn, Architect, and later trustee of the property was responsible for the store erection." This building seems to consist of two elements: A skillion roofed sandstone walled section (also referred to as a 'laundry') connected to the Union Bond Store that met the Union Bond Store in a horizontal flashing at second floor level and sloped to the west; and A single storey shallow pitched gable roofed building fronting Atherden Street.
Edward Row & Co was registered as a business in 1903, under the Registration of Firms Act 1902. Warren, Ernest and Kenneth Row continued the family business manufacturing patent medicines at 43-47 George Street, along with business partners Clive Webb, George Seaborn and Alfred Pettifer. Warren and Ernest were the sons of Edward Row, while Kenneth Row was his grandson (being the son of Warren Row). Cecil Row, recorded as a tenant at Merchants House from was the grandson of Edward Row and the youngest son of Warren Row (born in 1892). Edward Row & Co. remained at the subject property until , followed by Blake & Hargreaves, printers, from to 1925. The rear addition along Atherden Street was occupied by Bushells Ltd from 1914 until at least 1933, and was used as the Bushell's Coffee Factory.
Resumption by the New South Wales Government The ownership of the subject property changed halfway through Edward Row & Co's tenancy. Much of the land and many of the houses, shops, pubs and warehouses in The Rocks, including the subject property, were resumed by the NSW Government in the early 1900s.
From 1927 to 1937, the subject property was used as a bond store and was known as Clelands Bonded Free Store. The Customs House at Circular Quay was used as a clearing house for port transactions, where goods were cleared or stored until duties were paid on them. Bonded goods, meaning goods that had bonds placed on them prior to being cleared through customs, were traditionally stored in the Queens Warehouse which adjoined the Customs House, but the growth of trade to Sydney in the nineteenth century meant that much of this storage was contracted out to private bond storage companies such as Clelands Bonded and Free Stores, which later used a warehouse on Playfair Street (adjoining Argyle Stores).
From , the subject property was leased and occupied by H. A. Zlotkowski Pty Ltd, as a "store for cork etc". From , the subject property was leased and occupied by an importation company, Craig, Mostyn & Co Pty Ltd. Initially, the building was used as the "No 2 Store" by the company, but by 1949 it had been 'partly converted into a bottling plant and distribution centre. Large, custom built concrete tanks were installed to hold the best-selling wines in bulk, the less popular lines being stored in hogsheads or puncheons on the first floor until needed for bottling on the ground floor. The Berri Co-op supplied the wine and spirits for bottling in the early days. These included brandy, gin and fortified wines such as port, muscat and sherry. By the early 1960s, the warehouse was being used "for the purpose of storage of skins, fruit and general merchandise". In April 1966, Craig, Mostyn & Co Pty Ltd sublet the premises to P. Heath, Baggage, Shipping and Forwarding Agent, as stores and offices.
Although there is speculation that 47 George Street was restored in the late 1960s for use as offices, this is not evident on the Maritime Services Board (MSB) tenancy cards. The MSB had ownership of buildings in The Rocks, including the subject property, until . It is possible that the Sydney Cove Redevelopment Authority (SCRA) oversaw restoration works at 47 George Street when they took control of The Rocks in the early 1970s, although no documentation of these works came to light during research for the Conservation Management Plan in 2007. There is, however, photographic evidence that repainting was carried out in c. 1977. The SCRA was responsible for renaming the subject property as the Union Bond Store, in honour of the earlier name of Atherden Street,Union Street before 1875 although the building had only briefly been used as a bonded store.
The tenant at 47 George Street is not known from , although it is likely that Howard O'Farrell & Co occupied the building for at least some of this period. In , the subject property was occupied by Howard O'Farrell & Co Pty Ltd, and used for offices and storage. The building at the rear (6-8 Atherden Street) was used as parking "for themselves and others".