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Our Earliest Australian Printed Document

For the Benefit of J. Butler and W. Bryant: at the Theatre, Sydney ...
broadside; 20.0 x 12.0 cm
Rare Books Collection; nla.aus-vn4200235

The reverse of the rare playbill


Director-General of the National Library, Jan Fullerton, and Canada’s High Commissioner, Michael R. Leir, with the playbill
Photo: Greg Power

Andrew Sergeant and the Canadian High Commissioner, Michael R. Leir, view the 1796 playbill
Photo: Greg Power

The National Library recently acquired a uniquely significant addition to Australian printing, publishing and theatre history. The single-sheet broadside playbill advertises a theatrical performance at the Sydney Theatre on 30 July 1796 and was printed by our first printer, George Hughes. It is the earliest surviving example of a document printed in Australia.

A Lucky Historic Find

The playbill was found by Elaine Hoag, a rare books bibliographer at the Library and Archives Canada , in a scrapbook in their collection. The scrapbook had been transferred from the Canadian Parliamentary Library in 1973 and had previously been owned by Dawson Turner (1775–1858), a British banker, botanist, antiquary and Fellow of the Royal Society. It contained a number of pieces of mostly Canadian printed ephemera, as well as the Australian playbill and advertisements for English shows. This playbill was the only item in the scrapbook relating to Australia.

It was presented by the Canadian Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, to then prime minister, John Howard, on 11 September 2007 as a gift to the nation.

A Very Special Item

The playbill is extremely significant, being not only the earliest surviving printed document, but the earliest known advertisement for a theatrical performance in Australia. This tiny document, measuring only 20.0 x 12.0 cm, provides information for researchers interested in printing history, convicts, the social and cultural development of the colony, and more.

Ephemeral material such as this rarely survives, as it isn’t produced to last. Playbills exist only to publicise particular performances, and their fate has always been to be torn down or papered over, exactly like modern theatrical or music posters that we see around town. It is thus very fortunate that the playbill survived to the present, and in such good condition.

Before the discovery of the playbill, the oldest known printed Australian publications were two broadsides containing instructions for constables and watchmen, printed in November 1796, in the State Records Authority of New South Wales, and two other playbills dated March and April 1800 in the collection of the State Library of New South Wales. All five documents were printed by George Hughes on the same press, which had been brought to Australia as part of the cargo of the First Fleet.

Program and Provenance

The National Library playbill offered a trio of performances: Jane Shore, a popular drama of sin and redemption written by Nicholas Rowe in 1714 about the mistress of King Edward IV; The Wapping Landlady, a pantomime dance performed by male members of the company, intended to amuse and distract a rowdy crowd during interval, and, to finish the evening, a farce, The Miraculous Cure. The playbill lists the actors and other company members, all of whom, as far as we know, were convicts. Hughes himself appears in the cast list, as a sailor in The Wapping Landlady.

Much is unknown about the document’s provenance. It probably left the colony in October 1796 with Lieutenant Governor Philip Gidley King, who was returning to England to recuperate from illness. There are notes about other Australian theatrical performances in King’s handwriting on the back of the sheet, addressed to George Chalmers (1742–1825), a writer, antiquary and Chief Clerk to a Privy Council Committee on Trade and Foreign Plantations.

The playbill has been digitised, and can be viewed through the National Library’s catalogue at http://nla.gov.au/nla.aus-vn4200235.

Andrew Sergeant
Reference Librarian, Information Services