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ST PETERS ANGLICAN CHURCH

Location 2460 CONDAH-COLERAINE ROAD TAHARA, GLENELG SHIRE File Number HER/1999/000026 Level Registered

[1/2] ST PETERS ANGLICAN CHURCH SOHE [2/2] st peters anglican church

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.