St Stephens Anglican Church & Cemetery, 187-189 Church St, Newtown, NSW, Australia
S 33° 53.660 E 151° 10.810
56H E 331724 N 6248069
St Stephen's is an English decorated Gothic Revival Church. This building is one of Australia's best Gothic Revival Churches on this scale and its unique and historic cemetery surroundings render it a building of the highest importance.
Waymark Code: WMVE8N
Location: New South Wales, Australia
Date Posted: 04/07/2017
Views: 2
It was designed by Edmund Blacket between 1871 and 1874 on a portion of 240 acres granted to Governor Bligh and was known as the Camperdown estate. This building is one of Australia's best Gothic Revival Churches on this scale and its unique and historic surroundings render it a building of the highest importance. The Church is in a prominent position on the crest of a rise and the spire is notable for miles. The cemetery and Church form a unique group.
St. Stephen s is an English Decorated Gothic Revival church in cruciform plan with side aisles, gallery, two vestries, porch. The building is dominated, on the north side, by a fine stone tower and spire, completed in 1876, and which can be seen for miles. The walls of the church are sandstone, quarried from the nearby Pyrmont stone quarries. The exterior ornamentation, apart from the stone traced windows is restrained. Interior columns are of Melbourne bluestone and the roof is slate. With dimensions of 110 by 48 feet, and cost of £13,000, it was the largest and most prominent building in the area, and was widely recognized as one of Edmund Blacket s finest designs.
The cemetery pre dates the Church and has numerous fine trees amongst an amazing array of historic graves.
Source: Australian Heritage Database.
** We visited this cemetery (during a geocache hunt) and were fascinated by the old graves and headstones. We loved the atmosphere, and were surprised to see locals using the grass spaces for relaxation, reading, picnicking etc, the cemetery became a friendly place, although it could easily become an eerie setting after dark. This became our most favourite cemetery area we've ever seen and we enjoyed our walk among the old graves. Oh, and be warned, there are resident ghosts! **
In the late 1980s a Bicentennial Heritage Grant made possible the restoration of the Cemetery Lodge and the basic repair of many broken monuments. This followed in the 1990s with donations from the New South Wales Institution of Surveyors for the restoration of the tomb of Sir Thomas Mitchell and from the Andrews family for the restoration of their family memorial. A conservation strategy for monuments was created, a landscape management plan was commenced and several individual studies focused on aspects of the cemetery such as inscriptions, trees, native flora and the Dunbar tomb. Since 2001, the gateposts have been repositioned and the original gates restored. The vandalised gravestone of one of the cemetery's best-known inhabitants, Eliza Emily Donnithorne, a jilted bride whom many believe inspired Charles Dickens' creation of Miss Havisham in Great Expectations, has been restored. From (
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Register of the National Estate (Non-statutory archive)
Class Historic
Legal Status Registered (21/03/1978)
Place ID 1714
Place File No 1/12/025/0003