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ST PETERS ANGLICAN CHURCH
2460 CONDAH-COLERAINE ROAD TAHARA, GLENELG SHIRE

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Victorian Heritage Register
ST PETERS ANGLICAN CHURCH SOHE 2008
ST PETERS ANGLICAN CHURCH SOHE 2008
ST PETERS ANGLICAN CHURCH SOHE 2008
st peters anglican church tahara
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Statement of Significance

What is significant?
St Peter's Anglican Church at Tahara was dedicated in September 1881 by the first Bishop of Ballarat, the Right Reverend Dr Samuel Thornton. Tahara township reserve was gazetted in 1869, and until the construction of the church the local population held occasional church services at the nearby Murndal or Tahara homesteads. The government ceased reserving land for religious purposes in 1875, so to enable a church to be built at Tahara the pastoralist Samuel Winter Cooke donated five acres of land and £1,000. Winter Cooke, who had inherited the Murndal estate from his uncle in 1878, was a promoter of Christian knowledge and in his capacity as a lay reader conducted religious services whenever the minister was absent.

The architect of St Peter's was Frederick Wyatt, and the contractors were Gordon, Carter and Cornish of Hamilton. The church is set on a plinth of bluestone and built of tuckpointed red bricks, which were burnt close to the site. The simple truss roof was originally tiled with Welsh slate, but was replaced with a zincalume covering in 1978. The layout of the church is a cruciform plan, and the style is early English Gothic. The original windows were all quite plain, with leaded glass in a lattice pattern. The vestry was added in 1933. The church is located in a dramatically isolated position, looking over the Wannon River valley.

The five stained glass windows in the sanctuary were made by Percy Bacon Bros. of London and were installed in 1903. These are the three windows behind the altar, with St Peter and St Paul flanking Christ, represented as the Good Shepherd. In the nave are St Cecilia and King David. The St George window, also in the nave, was installed in 1921 and was the work of the celebrated Melbourne practitioner William Montgomery. The Simeon window was dedicated in 1936 in memory of Samuel Winter Cooke. Another member of the Winter Cooke family was commemorated by a window in the nave designed by John Orval in 1979.

After construction of the church was completed in 1881 interior furnishings, including the pews, were donated by Samuel Winter Cooke's brother, Trevor. The pews are believed to have been made by James Aylmer, son of Patrick Aylmer, the highly skilled carpenter at Murndal. Several objects make a direct association between the church and the Winter Cooke family. The altar was a gift from Samuel Winter Cooke in 1903 and is carved from blackwood grown at Murndal. The pulpit is of hand-carved English oak, and was sent out from England in 1929 as a gift to the church from the second wife of Samuel Winter Cooke. The stone font was donated by Samuel Winter Cooke in memory of a nephew who drowned in one of the Murndal dams.

How is it significant?
St Peter's Anglican Church at Tahara is of historic and aesthetic significance to the State of Victoria.

Why is it significant?
St Peter's Anglican Church at Tahara is historically significant for its close association with the pastoral run of the Winter Cooke family at Murndal, located a few kilometres to the east. The donation of land and money demonstrated the strong paternalistic ties of a landowner to the local community, many of whom were employed on the estate. It demonstrates the traditional responsibilities for the welfare of their workers that the family felt as members of the British landed class. The relationship between Murndal and St Peter's is representative of similarly strong ties that existed elsewhere in the state, and amongst other denominations.

St Peter's Anglican Church at Tahara is aesthetically significant for the superb collection of stained glass windows by a variety of manufacturers, both local and overseas. The simple and modest red brick church located in a dramatic position overlooking the Wannon River valley provides a bold setting to the collection of intricate and finely executed stained glass. Changing fashions in imported and locally produced stained glass are represented in the variety of periods and styles present in the church.

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    • History

      ST PETERS ANGLICAN CHURCH - History

      History of Place:
      (from B J Pepper, A History of Saint Peter’s Church Tahara 1881-1981, Hamilton 1981)
      Tahara Town Reserve and Commons was gazetted in 1869. By 1871 a post office, general store and school house and other shops had opened. In 1871 Mr Tinker took up approximately 50 acres adjacent to the road, including the area of the current church. This land had been part of the Murndal squatting run, soon after 1871 Samuel Pratt Winter acquired the freehold so that it became part of the Murndal estate (p 9).

      Before the church was built occasional services were held at Murndal, in the dining room, and at Tahara homestead. By 1879 services were held regularly in the State School. Samuel Pratt Winter made available land on the Wannon River for the building of a parsonage (p 9).

      After the death of Pratt Winter his nephew and successor Samuel Winter Cooke donated five acres of his land and £1,000 for the building of an Anglican church in Tahara (p 11). Samuel Wyatt was the architect and the contractors were Gordon, Carter and Cornish of Hamilton. The cost of building was £720. The exact date of construction is not known, but in 1880 the Church Assembly Session was told by its President “that two new churches are nearly finished, one at Tahara…” (p 11) The Service of Dedication took place on 8 September 1881, presided by the first Bishop of Ballarat, Dr Samuel Thornton.

      Interior furnishings were donated by Samuel Pratt Winter’s brother Trevor. These included the pews, believed to have been made by James Aylmer, son of the Murndal carpenter Patrick (p 20).

      The altar was carved from blackwood from Murndal sometime between 1898 and 1906 by Reverend J D Davidson. It was a gift from the Tahara congregation in memory of Samuel Winter Cooke’s first wife Alice.

      The font was a gift from Samuel Winter Cooke, in memory of a nephew who drowned in one of the Murndal dams.

      The pulpit was sent out from England by Samuel Winter Cooke’s second wife in c1929. It is hand carved of English oak, and no nails were used in its construction.

      The lectern was the original lectern of Holy Trinity Church Coleraine. The organ was bought from Allens of Melbourne for £99 in 1926.

      Five stained glass windows in the sanctuary (three are behind the altar) were dedicated in 1905. They depict St Peter, The Lord as the Good Shepherd, St Paul, St Cecilia and King David. They were by Percy Bacon Bros. of London. There is a plaque on the sanctuary wall to commemorate the windows.

      The St George window I the nave was given in 1921 by Samuel Winter Cooke in memory of two nephews killed in the First World War.

      The Simeon window was installed in memory of Samuel Winter Cooke by friends. It was dedicated in 1936.

      The north-west nave window depicts a soldier with arms reversed given by the Winter Cooke family in memory of William Lempriere Winter Cooke who died in 1979.

      On 13 October 1933 a service was held to dedicate the new additions to the church, a vestry built at a cost of £198 by E H Petterson (p 13). The church was reroofed in 1978, replacing Welsh slates with zincalume.

      The memorial gates were erected in 1959.
      Associated People: Winter Cooke family. See Murndal (H289)
      Stained glass practitioners:
      William Motgomery was born in Newcastle upon Tyne in 1850 and studied art at the South Kensington School. Before arriving in Victoria in 1887 he trained at the stained glass studios of Clayton and Bell in London and also spent several years with a Munich glass firm (Jenny Zimmer, Stained Glass in Australia, Melbourne 1984, pp 94-96). He opened his own studios at 164 Flinders Street, Melbourne and maintained a close relationship with the Arts & Crafts fraternity. As well as ecclesiastical commissions he was favoured by architect John Beswicke to design stained glass for Beswicke’s own home (Lights of Our Past; Australian Stained Glass, Bronwyn Hughes, CD produced in conjunction with RMIT, 1999).

      John Orval was born in the Netherlands in 1911. He established his own studio in Australia in 1953, spending his most productive years in Hamilton, Victoria (Op Cit, Stained Glass in Australia p 120).

      Frederick Wyatt (architect). Other churches by Wyatt:
      Holy Trinity (second church) Bacchus Marsh, 1876-77. In the early English Gothic style, built of sandstone.

      Wyatt also completed additions to a number of Victorian churches in the 1870s.

      Permit Exemptions

      ST PETERS ANGLICAN CHURCH - Permit Exemptions

      General Exemptions:

      General exemptions apply to all places and objects included in the Victorian Heritage Register (VHR). General exemptions have been designed to allow everyday activities, maintenance and changes to your property, which don’t harm its cultural heritage significance, to proceed without the need to obtain approvals under the Heritage Act 2017.

      Places of worship: In some circumstances, you can alter a place of worship to accommodate religious practices without a permit, but you must notify the Executive Director of Heritage Victoria before you start the works or activities at least 20 business days before the works or activities are to commence.

      Subdivision/consolidation: Permit exemptions exist for some subdivisions and consolidations. If the subdivision or consolidation is in accordance with a planning permit granted under Part 4 of the Planning and Environment Act 1987 and the application for the planning permit was referred to the Executive Director of Heritage Victoria as a determining referral authority, a permit is not required.

      Specific exemptions may also apply to your registered place or object. If applicable, these are listed below. Specific exemptions are tailored to the conservation and management needs of an individual registered place or object and set out works and activities that are exempt from the requirements of a permit. Specific exemptions prevail if they conflict with general exemptions.

      Find out more about heritage permit exemptions here.

      Specific Exemptions:


      General Conditions:
      1. All alterations are to be planned and carried out in a manner which prevents damage to the fabric of the registered place or object.
      2. Should it become apparent during further inspection or the carrying out of alterations that original or previously hidden or inaccessible details of the place or object are revealed which relate to the significance of the place or object, then the exemption covering such alteration shall cease and the Executive Director shall be notified as soon as possible.
      3. If there is a conservation policy and plan approved by the Executive Director, all works shall be in accordance with it.
      4. Nothing in this declaration prevents the Executive Director from amending or rescinding all or any of the permit exemptions.
      5. Nothing in this declaration exempts owners or their agents from the responsibility to seek relevant planning or building permits from the responsible authority where applicable.

      Exterior
      * Repairs and maintenance which replace like with like.
      * Installation, repair, removal or replacement of fences and gates.
      * Installation, removal or replacement of garden watering systems, provided the installation or replacement of the system does not cause short or long term moisture problems to the building.
      * Laying of gravel toppings, bitumen, concrete, brick or stone flag paving

      Interior
      * Installation (in a window currently glazed by leaded glass) of the stained glass window from St Thomas Anglican church at Condah.
      * Painting of previously painted walls and ceilings provided that preparation or painting does not remove evidence of the original paint or other decorative scheme.
      * Removal of paint from originally unpainted or oiled joinery, doors, architraves, skirtings and decorative strapping.
      * Installation of damp-proofing by a method approved by Heritage Victoria.
      * Installation, removal or replacement of curtain track, rods, blinds and other window dressings.
      * Installation, removal or replacement of hooks, nails and other devices for the hanging of mirrors, paintings and other wall mounted artworks.
      * Installation, removal or replacement of carpets and/or flexible floor coverings.
      * Installation, removal or replacement of electrical wiring provided that all new wiring is fully concealed.
      * Installation, removal or replacement of smoke detectors.

      Permit Exemption Policy

      ST PETERS ANGLICAN CHURCH - Permit Exemption Policy



      The purpose of the permit exemptions is to allow works that do not impact on the significance of the place to take place without the need for a permit.

      The primary significance of the building lies in the social and historical associations to the Murndal estate and the Winter-Cooke family, and the aesthetic value of the stained glass windows. The collection of stained glass windows is significant as a cross-section of styles and periods, and new work has been steadily accumulated since the early twentieth century. The future introduction of stained glass windows should be permitted.

      Except for the installation of the stained glass windows, there have been few other changes or additions to the church, and future permits should take account of the intact structure and fabric as a simple setting for the collection of stained glass windows and the registered objects.

Public contributions

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