PERTH (1894 to c1905)
Cantonment St, Fremantle, WA (December 1894)
The only reference to this address is on the frontispiece of Herbert's album. Cantonment Street is close by Fremantle Harbour and we can only assume that this was temporary accomodation
after disembarking after the voyage from Melbourne. The photo at the right was taken in Hay Street Perth probably a year or two after his arrival in the west.
It is possible that he stayed here with his uncle Percival Longbottom who arrived in the west at about the same time and was listed with a Cantonment Street address in the Post Office Directory from 1895. The Longbottom family were Yorkshire stonemasons and Percival went on to work as a building contractor and estate agent in Fremantle, Perth and the Cottesloe-Claremont area. He was joined in Perth by his brother's son, another Herbert.
Howick St, Perth (Dec1894 - Nov1895)
An address for December 1894 until December 1895 is shown on the frontispiece of Herbert's photo album as "Moss Lea"in Howick Street (the earlier name for Hay Street to the east of Barrack Street) The Post Office Directory for 1895/96 has an ambiguous entry, just "Shaw ----" , the third and last entry on the south side of Howick after Hill Street and before Bennett Street at what is in 2010 293 Hay St or very close by.1 It seems likely that this was "Moss Lea", home for a while for many Shaws. It was most likely Herbert's father's house before he left for Kalgoorlie in the late 1890s. The photo shows his sister Lavinia with step sisters Olive and Eileen (a second copy of the photo has a contemporary caption of "Dec 1895").
The 1895/96 directory also shows the final listing for Alfred Shaw & Co, wholesale and retail ironmongers. The store was located about nine shops to the east of the Metropole Hotel (Theatre Royal) on the south side of Hay Street, between Barrack and William Streets. In 1897 the store was listed as Drake & Stubbs, ironmongers, 59 Hay St (later renumbered to 451 before moving across the road to 454).
The last entry in the front of Herbert's album is for "Bachelor", cnr Howick and Pier Street, Perth, Nov 24 1895. "Bachelor" may not have been a house name, possibly just a rueful reference to his marital state considering Caroline Mary was back in Melbourne awaiting his return with renewed fortune. He was probably staying at the Masonic Club, which was next door to the the small building housing the Swan River Mechanic's Institute right on the corner. The other corners are all business dwellings but it is possible he might have been staying in rooms above one of them. No residential listing appears for Herbert until 1898 so it is possible he remained at this address, close by his business, for some years.
Despite his circumstances, life wasn't all bad. This photo from his album dates from about this time. It was captioned "Claremont WA Freshwater Yacht Club".
Hay Street, Perth (from c1896 to c1901)
From 1896 until 1899 the directory shows Herbert's stationer's business
at 6 Hay St (renumbered to 398 in 1899, and 616 in 1908 when it was the premises of the Webb & Webb, photographers, responsible for a number of the Shaw album photographs). This was on the north side three doors up from Barrack Street and almost diagonally opposite the Town Hall.
By 1900 it had moved to 428 Hay St where it stayed until 1904 when the photo above was taken. It would have been just down on the left and opposite the Theatre Royal which in the right foreground. The date of the photograph at the left is unknown but it probably of the first location.
By 1904 Herbert had sold the business and the owners were shown from that year as J.W.Sloan & A.B.Wahlers. The business, still bearing his name, appeared in 1906 and 1907 at 465 Hay Street. It's disappearance at that point may have been related to the massive fire at the Sandover Building. next door. 465 is the next shop beyond the Sandover building in this 1907 photograph on the left. The previous addresses of Herbert's businesses were just along to the left before the Town Hall which appears in the distance. A few years earlier, his father Alfred's ironmongery business had been a few doors beyond the Sandover Building.
Even after leaving Perth Herbert maintained a business presence there as a wholesal stationer with the 1905 and 1906 directories recording his office at the AMP Buildings, St George’s Terrace.
The first residential address to appear in this period for Herbert was in 1899 when he was shown as residing in Park Street, Subiaco. The 1898 and 1899 directories show his father around the corner at "Waverley", Hamilton Street (although in 1899 he is also shown as manager of a Kalgoorlie hardware store). The directory gives no clue to where he was in Park Street but the photo above taken there in 2006 shows the type of houses of that period in the street.
Before he married in Melbourne in Oct 1900, Herbert lived at Albany Road, Victoria Park at the eastern end of Hay St. A year later he was at his father's house at Bennett Street but there is an intriguing 1901 entry for a Herbert Shaw in Egan Street, Kalgoorlie. His father Alfred was there, possibly with his wife, three young daughters and Lavinia. Did Herbert join him for a period?
23 Bennett Street, Perth (c1901)
By August 1901 we know from the birth of son Tom that the family was in Perth at Bennett Street. This street intersects the eastern end of Hay St and runs down to the Swan River. The 1902 directory has Alfred Shaw at 23 Bennett Street and Caroline is recorded on the electoral roll as living there. It is possible that they moved there immediately on returning to Perth after the wedding and only Alfred was in Kalgoorlie.
This photo is almost certainly the 23 Bennett Street. Tthe number of houses to the end of the street agrees with it being 23 and the midday shadows agree with the Bennett St aspect. The Swan River seems close but the area at the end of the street was reclaimed some years later.
"Halehurst", Mends St, South Perth (c1903 - c1905)
Originally known as an isolated artist's colony by 1903 South Perth was becoming a tourist destination and a dormitory suburb for the city. The Zoo opened in 1898 and Mends Street became a part of the tourist walk from ferry to zoo.
Artist May Gibbs lived close by and "depicted well-known local residents (including first Zoo Director Ernest Le Souef on a bicycle) hurrying along Mends Street to catch the Duchess to Perth. One of May Gibbs’ 1906 cartoons, depicted well-knownSouth Perth characters hurrying down Mends Street to catch the ferry to Perth.(pictured). ... Looking back, the talented father-daughter team was also part of a defined artistic community in South
Perth, in the early days of the twentieth century.
May Gibbs arrived in South Perth in 1890 with Herbert and her mother, Cecilia.
The family lived together at ‘The Dune’, a bungalow on the corner of Harper Street and Suburban Road
(now Mill Point Road) until Herbert’s death in 1940.
May grew into adulthood in the tranquillity of South Perth in the 1900 era – relying heavily on the Perth -
South Perth ferry service – with the construction of the Narrows Bridge six decades away."
Herbert and Caroline's daughter Mary was born in South Perth in May 1903 at "Halehurst", Mends Street. "Halehurst", after Caroline's family, later became the name for the long term family home in Melbourne.
Mends St is short and runs down to the Swan River opposite the Perth business district. Just prior to 1900 a ferry terminal was built at the end of the street (shown in this family photo).
The 1904 directory shows only two houses on the east of Mends Street between the jetty and the Windsor Hotel with the Shaws closest to the water. Opposite were only a couple more houses and a tea gardens establishment. By 1926 when the photo on the right was taken the number of houses on Herbert's side of the street hadn't changed. The view is down Mends Street to the ferry terminal from near the Windsor Hotel and it is just possible that the house on the right is "Halehurst". Certainly in 1904 the Esplanade seems to have finished at Mends Street so Herbert must have enjoyed "absolute waterfront". It is likely that the photo below, showing the jetty with Perth in the background, was taken from close by the house.
The Shaws weren't alone in South Perth with two of Herbert's sisters and their young families within a short walk. Almost next door in the first house back up The Esplanade were Theo and Eva Felstead and family (left with Bill and Muriel abt 1900). Horace and Effie Summers and their family were living about a kilometre away at the corner of Stirling and Melville Parade and Alfred Shaw was not far away living in one of the first houses in the newly developed Applecross.
On the right are Eva, Effie, Caroline and their eight children in late 1903.
Herbert wouldn’t recognise the Mends Street of today. It has become a modern commercial strip servicing the ferry traffic of commuters and tourists. Apparently some of the original houses may remain behind the later additions of shop fronts but from a quick look they have probably been completely replaced by now. Some landmarks do remain. The Windsor Hotel is certainly still open for business looking much as it did in 1904. Further up the point the old mill which appears in many of the photos has been restored as a heritage centre.
The photo on the left was captioned "Mary, Elaine Felstead, Tom". Judging by their ages it would have been taken in 1904 probably in South Perth. (There was more to the caption but I cut it off when scanning the photo).
On the right are Ailsa Shaw (b1892) and Tom Shaw (b1901) taken about 1902.
There is an interesting footnote probably to do with the other building at that time in Mends Street, a private school. About fifteen years later, Caroline Mary's close schoolfriend Agnes Cross, then recently retired as headmistress of Tintern in Melbourne, was brought to Perth to set up a school in Mends Street. It seems too coincidental that their relationship had nothing to do with this.
From South Perth, Herbert and family moved on to Collie.
