The history of the (now) Canberra Hotel on the corner of Creswick Road and Macarthur Street. 

The first hotel on the site was called The Cornubian Hotel, a single-storey timber building constructed in 1861.

The first licensee was William Ball (or Bull), but following his death in 1863, the license was transferred to Margaret Maule, who just scraped through with her license after an accusation of selling “sly grog.”

From 1862 to 1865, The Cornubian served as the site of several coronial inquests, predominantly of children who met tragic deaths. In 1863, an inquest was held into the death of Mary Ann Rattray, ten-year old daughter of Robert Rattray, the sexton of Ballarat Cemetery. Mary Ann was watching commemorative rituals in the Chinese section of the cemetery when her clothes caught fire, and she died shortly thereafter.

In 1866, the hotel was taken over by Michael Sheeran and christened the Rose of Denmark. In Michael’s publican license application it states that the building housed “a bar, bar-parlor, two sitting, six bed-rooms, kitchen, stables”.

By 1877, the name had been changed to the Vine Hotel and the licensee was Patrick Sheeran, a former police officer. In 1883, a fire destroyed the timber structure, with only some of the hotel’s furniture salvaged from the blaze. The two-storey brick structure we see today appears to have been built the following year.

In 1886, Patrick was found dead in Lake Wendouree, apparently having drowned himself “through weariness of suffering” from rheumatism. He left behind a wife and eight children, and an insolvent estate.

The following year, the license was transferred to Alexander Ronalds, whose name adorns the hotel and the horse tram advertisements in this image. Horse drawn trams commenced in Ballarat in 1887. Ronalds ran the Vine Hotel until 1891.

The hotel was given its current name, The Canberra Hotel, in 1915.