St Marks Anglican Church

The first St Mark’s Church on the Bonney Avenue site was built in 1888 on the corner of Bridge Street (now Hudson St) and Moore Street, Albion. The site was chosen while Bishop Webber was away and on his return, he directed that the timber church be moved to a higher, more suitable site. The present property on the corner of Bonney Avenue (then called Old Sandgate Road) and Bellevue Terrace was purchased in 1898 [check date] for £680 and the timber church was moved to its new site in 1899. At the time, this locality was known as Maida Hill due to the development of the Maida Hill residential estate to the west of what is now Bonney Avenue. An existing house at 56 Bellevue Terrace was purchased as a rectory but replaced with a new rectory in 1972.

Once the church was established on its new site, planning began for the construction of a church hall and Sunday school to meet the needs of the growing congregation. In July 1910, a contract was signed for the erection of a timber hall by Mr E J Pentecost. On the 26 November 1910, the new hall and Sunday school was dedicated by Archbishop Donaldson. The building committee planned to rent the hall to social groups to assist with paying the debts incurred by its construction. The hall was well used by the Sunday school, the church kindergarten, parishioners and community groups such as the Girls’ Friendly Society and the Boys’ Gordon Club. By 1916 a verandah had been built to provide additional space. 

A tennis club was established at the church prior to 1913, but it was reformed after the parish council laid down strict guidelines about the use of the court and restriction of membership to members of the Church of England. The tennis court is still in use today although it has a modern surface.

The years of World War I had a considerable impact on the congregation and activities of St Mark’s. The church hall was used for various patriotic efforts, particularly by the women and girls of the parish who knitted socks and donated funds to the Red Cross and towards the cost of a travelling kitchen for the 5th Light Horse Regiment.

St Mark’s was also a place where the grief of the local community found expression during and after the years of World War I. Most Australian communities erected war memorials  in remembrance of the war dead. This was commonly a “digger” memorial in a local park or other civic area. Honour boards in public buildings and memorial stained glass windows were also frequent expressions of the community’s desire to remember those who had died.  On 9th July 1916, a timber honour board to record the names of some 110 of the ‘fallen’ from the congregation was unveiled in St Mark’s church. The board was paid for by the collection of funds and designed, made and polished by Mr Harry Love. It now hangs in the current St Mark’s Church.  

On 29 July 1917, another World War I memorial was unveiled – a stained glass panel presented by the family of Lieutenant Jack Treverne Hockin, who died in France on the Somme exactly one year earlier. The window which depicts a fallen soldier at the foot of the crucified Christ was designed by British artist, Charles Tute and made by Exton & Co of Ann St, Brisbane. 

Two additional stained windows were presented in 1918 and unveiled by Captain Richards, Lieutenant Jardine and some returned soldiers of the congregation. These formed a triptych with the first World War I memorial window. The later windows represented St John and St Mary. One was donated by Mrs E. G. Blume and the other by public subscription. The band of the 1st Military Division played at the service and the excess money from the offering contributed to the fund for a memorial reredos made of red cedar. These memorials provide evidence of the lasting effects of World War I on the Brisbane community.

By 1923, the church hall was once again too small, especially as the Sunday school had 60 pupils and four teachers. It was extended again, incurring a cost of £395. As usual, donations and fundraising events such as fairs contributed to paying the building debt

During the late 1940s, the Sunday school taught more than 120 children and moves were again afoot to extend the hall. St Mark’s applied to Council for further extensions to the hall in 1953 (extending the eastern verandah and constructing and enclosing a second verandah on the western side) and 1977. The appearance of the hall has been somewhat altered with the addition of brick cladding.

Other memorials were donated to the church in the early years of the twentieth century including a carved litany desk presented by the friends of Miss Dorice Wilcox, a former Sunday school teacher who accidentally drowned in 1913. This desk is now in the sanctuary of the current church.

During the late 1940s, there was discussion in the parish about the need to construct a new church as the old timber building was deteriorating. However, the state of the church’s finances prevented these plans from eventuating. The option of moving the timber church to the middle of the site on to a brick base was proposed and later considered in 1951 but abandoned due to the age of the timber and the associated costs. 

Finally, in 1963, the architectural firm of Conrad and Gargett were engaged to design a modern brick church for the site. The application to the Brisbane City Council shows an estimated building cost of £22 500. The new church was dedicated by the Rt Rev JJ Hudson, Coadjutor of Brisbane on 31 May 1964.

AH Conrad was a Melburnian architect who was employed by the Queensland Works Department before moving to the Brisbane architectural firm of Atkinson and McLay in 1912. TBF Gargett, a Queensland trained architect, joined the firm as a draftsman in 1918 and registered as an architect in 1929.  

Arnold Conrad was known for his use of the Spanish Mission style of architecture particularly ‘Craigston’ flats on Wickham Tce  (1927) and the former Tristam’s factory at West End (1928). Atkinson and McLay’s practice eventually evolved into Conrad and Gargett in 1939 with Conrad the senior partner. 
 
In addition to the 1964 church of St Mark’s, Conrad Gargett designed St Michael and All Angels’ Anglican Church at New Farm (1958-59), which was also built as a war memorial church. Like St Mark’s, the New Farm church is a modern, brick building with a striking bell tower.

Prior to the construction of the new church of St Mark’s, the old timber church was offered to other parishes but due to the cost of removal, the church was eventually dismantled. Parts of the church and its fittings were distributed to other churches and individuals, including a Methodist Church in Goondiwindi and the Uniting Church at Wandoan which has the pews and some of the cedar panelling.  

The new church was built as a war memorial church and is referred to on the dedication plaque as “The War Memorial Church of St Mark”. Several elements of the earlier church have been incorporated into the 1964 building. The memorial stained glass windows have been resited in the eastern wall behind the altar of the 1964 church. An additional panel has been added to the triptych featuring the crests of the Australian armed forces and the Red Cross and dedicated to the fallen of World War II and subsequent wars: “This group of windows is dedicated to the Glory of God and in loving memory of the men and women of this parish who made the supreme sacrifice in world conflicts since 1914 and is a thanks offering from those who cherish the freedom thus ensured by their sacrifice”. 

The dedication of a new church to the memory of those who died in wartime was part of a movement after World War II to create lasting, practical memorials that could be used and enjoyed by the community. Memorial halls, swimming pools and hospitals were also built in many towns and suburbs. Churches built as war memorials in Brisbane during the post-war period include St Michael’s and All Angels Anglican Church at New Farm in 1958-59 and St John’s War Memorial Church built in honour of the Royal Australian Navy at Northgate in 1962. 

Other significant fabric from the earlier church includes the red cedar altar (extended to better suit the new sanctuary), the cedar reredos, the pulpit, the windows on either side of the sanctuary, the baptismal font and the memorial window to Canon Osborn in the west wall. The Rev’d Canon Edward Osborne (1890-1920) was the first Rector of St Mark’s. The original Bishop’s Chair from the earlier timber church has been returned to the current church.

St Mark’s also displays information and the walking stick of Rev John Barge, an Anglican clergyman who attended and preached at St Mark’s. John Barge was one of nine World War II “New Guinea Martyrs” who lost their lives in New Guinea in 1942 and 1943 during the Japanese occupation. Rev John Barge and the other New Guinea Martyrs are remembered in the church each year in September/October.

More recent changes to the church’s precinct include the replacement of the old timber rectory adjacent to the church in Bellevue Terrace with a brick rectory in 1971 and the construction of a  25 metre bell tower in memory of Jack and Irene Kennan in 1977. The bell tower contains the bell from the earlier St Mark’s church. The church applied to Council for further additions and renovations in 1979. A columbarium has been incorporated into the precinct and careful landscaping and mature trees provide additional spaces for contemplation. Three modern stained glass windows (one of which depicts St Mark) have been added to the front of the northern wall. The windows use a muted colour palette to complement the existing stained glass windows.

St Mark’s Anglican Church provides evidence of the use of this site as a place of Anglican worship and social interaction for well over a century. The church continues to provide a place which offers spiritual guidance and social contact for the local community.

The church entrance is located at the western end of the building beneath a large stained glass window, which is a memorial to Canon Osborn.  The double wooden entrance doors are reached by a short flight of stairs from a porte cochere. This area is screened from the street by a decorative brick wall featuring cross shaped apertures and solid brick pillars which support the roof. A 25 metre steel bell tower (painted white) stands outside the north western corner of the porte cochere.

Apart from two small rooms just inside the entrance on either side, the interior of the church is a simple, open, high ceilinged space. Both side walls have banks of windows in a rectangular pattern along their lengths between simple exterior brick buttresses. The ceiling has timber beams at regular intervals to the apex of the roof.

The eastern wall of the church behind the altar is dominated by the memorial stained glass window panels which include the triptych of World War I windows from the earlier church on the site, surrounded by the 1963 panel memorialising World War II and subsequent conflicts. The window is set within timber cladding which contrasts with the white walls and ceiling. Two other windows from the earlier church are now on either side of the sanctuary (on northern and southern walls). At this end of the northern wall, three more recent stained glass windows decorate the upper section of the last two bays.

On the southern side of the church, a door leads out into an open paved corridor, semi enclosed by the brick columbarium wall. Beyond the columbarium is the landscaped garden with mature trees, landscaped garden beds and a small “ash garden” for quiet contemplation.

The 1910 hall is at the rear of the church. Originally a timber hall, it has been extended and altered in brick and is no longer considered to be of local heritage significance.

1. BCC building cards

2. BCC Detail plans and surveyor’s field book surveys

3. Kidd, Alex. St Mark’s on Maida Hill 1888-1964. Brisbane: Corporation of the Synod of the Diocese of Brisbane 2001

4. St Mark’s Bonney Ave Clayfield: 1925 – Golden Jubilee – 1975

5. St Mark’s Clayfield website: http://stmarksclayfield.org/?page_id=596. Retrieved October 2015

6. NLA Trove website. https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper. Telegraph, 11 Jul 1916, Brisbane Courier, 4 Dec 1911