An article by Robyn Coates with contributions by Tony Mansell
It is estimated that during the 19th century, 250,000 Cornish folk left their homeland to find employment overseas. Forced by the lack of work in Cornish mines they travelled thousands of miles, some with their families and some without. These Cousin Jacks and Cousin Jennies took their culture with them: their Choirs, their Methodism, their Pasties, their Wrestling and, of course, their Brass Bands.
This article by Robyn Coates (Riyas Nerthek – Energetic Giver) of Ballarat is about the early development of brass bands in Ballarat and covers the contribution made by Cornishman Samuel Prout from Calstock in Cornwall. (Tony Mansell)
Ballarat is in Victoria where Samuel and his colleagues made their homes
In Victoria, the earliest bands were those formed in the gold mining towns of Ballarat and Bendigo. Ballarat has had a long association with brass music with a band of musicians playing at the Eureka Rebellion in December 1854.[1]
Brass music was popular throughout the early settlement of Australia. It was played by both non-military musicians (town bands and individual Bands) and the military musicians that had evolved from the early regimental brass groups of the colonial period. Non-military bands originated from the culture of the British bands during the population booms of the gold rush era, especially in Victoria.
Both military and non-military bands used similar instruments and musical repertoires which consistently included marches, the ‘classics’, hymns and popular airs. Regimental bands played for parades, military drills and marches. Non-military bands were like military bands in their organisation and often in their uniforms, with a generally disciplined group of men dedicated to providing a high standard of music at various engagements. Both kinds of band would play at church services, concerts and at more formal ceremonies including funerals and national celebrations. It was the role of the band to heighten the solemnity of the occasion. Military bands in Britain had long been engaged to add dignity to the funeral processions of respected or heroic figures such as monarchs, military and naval leaders, as well as government leaders. A well-disciplined band or two, playing a steady march could control the pace of the procession, contribute colour and define its structure.[2]
One of Ballarat’s earliest brass bands was Prout’s Ballarat (Brass) Band which began in 1858. The founder, Samuel Prout, had a band in Britain and given that he was Cornish, it was probably in Cornwall. Supposedly on hearing of the good things which were happening in Australia, and more particularly in the goldfields of Victoria, Samuel Prout decided to emigrate to Ballarat, leaving his wife and young family behind.
Samuel was born in Calstock and baptised on 30th January 1831. His parents were Samuel Prout, a butcher, and Mary (nee Rowe). Samuel had younger siblings Mary, Martin, George, Richard, Thomas and John. Samuel Prout married Mary Nicholls on 25th December 1854, at Gunnislake – quite close to Calstock. He was a miner and they had two children who were born in Cornwall – George Henry (1855) and Samuel Nicholls (1857).
Samuel convinced some members of his Band to travel with him to Australia and we know that included in the number was Messrs Prout, W Croughey, Josiah Mager, Phillips and Vincent who arrived in Melbourne aboard a man-o-war. It is probable that on the voyage to Melbourne they entertained their fellow passengers in the popular music of the day and perhaps also for Church services aboard the ship.[3] They decided to go to the Ballarat goldfields where they formed the nucleus of the band from about 1858. The band probably had twelve members and looked splendid in their blue and yellow uniforms and dark blue helmets with coloured plumes.
Sam’s wife, Mary, and two children were still living in Calstock according to the census of 1861 – she is listed as a copper miner’s wife and residing next door is Samuel Prout (butcher), her father-in-law, who by this time is a widower as his wife Mary had died in 1859.
Mary Prout and the two children arrived in Victoria aboard the Prince of Wales in December 1861, suggesting that Samuel must have had some success either on the goldfield or with his music-making thus enabling the family to sail and join him. Three more children Albert John (1869), Mary Ellen (1871) and Francis Richard [aka Arthur Francis Richard] (1873) were all born in Ballarat.
Reading early newspaper reports in the Ballarat Star, Samuel Prout’s Band had many engagements – various picnics, race meetings, funerals, open air concerts in the parks and gardens around Ballarat, and at the opening of significant public buildings and churches.
Samuel died in 1894 and the band was taken over by his son, Albert, for two years (1894-1896), after which his younger brother Arthur took up the conductor’s baton until 1922, when he then shifted to Melbourne and played trumpet in various theatrical orchestras. Arthur had joined his father’s band at the age of six and was an accomplished cornet player.
A brass band cornet
Under Arthur Prout, the Band achieved fame that few bands could better. It did not concentrate so much on bandstand interpretations but rather on quickstep or marching contests. Prout’s Band in this area was practically invincible. Their marching, counter marching, figure marching, wheeling etc. whilst playing were beyond reproach and their movements were so machinelike that it was often suggested that they should be sent home to give British bands an insight into perfect quickstep work.[4]
Prout’s Ballarat Brass Band toured interstate and competed throughout Victoria in many band competitions including the first South Street Band Competitions in October 1900.
One of the features of the South Street competitions will be presented today, when the brass band contest will take place at the City Oval. Nine bands have entered for the contest, namely: The Lord Nelson (St Arnaud), Prout’s (Ballarat), Bulch’s (Ballarat), Launceston Garrison, Hopetoun (Long Gully, Bendigo), Geelong Town, 3rd Battalion (Ballarat), Bathurst District (NSW) and Eaglehawk.
The judges are Messrs Ernest Wood, T E Bulch, and T Riley.
The bands will be marshalled in Sturt Street at 9 a.m. and will march up to the City Oval, where, should the weather be fine, there ought to be a very large concourse to listen to the competition.
In the event of the day being very wet, the contest will be held in the Alfred Hall. Each band will play one selection to-day, and another to-morrow afternoon, when the awards will be announced.
This afternoon, at 1.30, the quickstep contest will be decided, and at night at 7.30 o’clock, the cornet solo competition will take place in the Alfred Hall.
The Mayors of the City and Town, and the committee of the South -Street Society, will be pleased to see as great a display of bunting as possible, out of compliment to the visitors and the competitors.[5]
At the city oval on Saturday the inter-colonial band contest under the auspices of the South-street Debating Society was brought to a conclusion, when the first prize of £150 was won by the Lord Nelson Band, of St. Arnaud. The awards and total points are as follow: Lord Nelson, 178 points, 1; Bathurst (N.S.W.) 153 points, 2; Prout’s (Ballarat) 149 points, 3; Eaglehawk 125 points, 4; Launceston 125 points 4; Geelong Town, 121 points 6, Hopetoun (Bendigo), 115 points. 7; Ballarat Militia 115 points 8; Bulch’s 103 points, 9.
Awards were made in the quick-step contest as follows:
Prouts Band Ballarat 1; Bathurst District Band (N.S.W.), 2; Geelong Town Band, 3. [6]
It is interesting to note that three Brass Bands from Ballarat were competing. This may have been because of the location or it could have been to do with the talented musicians in the Ballarat area. Also noteworthy is the amount of prize money awarded. This was a very generous award and in today’s money would be worth many, many thousands of dollars.
Not only were cash prizes awarded but shields and assorted trophies were presented plus gold and silver medallions given to individuals from various sponsors and through donations from individuals.
Weston Bate in Lucky City comments that music was universal in the Ballarat of the nineteenth century and that it continued into the first three decades of the twentieth century. It was partly a matter of the number of places in which music was heard and partly a matter of the degree of active participation in musical performances. Music was integral to the town’s social life.
No-one thought of raising funds for charity, holding a break-up, a Sunday school or Lodge Anniversary, opening a hospital or organizing a tea meeting without a concert… they were always eager to sing, and their Ballarat Eisteddfods were held on St David’s day … encouraging choral, solo voice and instrumental performance and providing the framework for the even more successful South Street Competition. [7]
Mr Arthur Prout was also connected with the Brass Band for boys at the Ballarat District Orphan Asylum. The Orphan Asylum had been established in 1865 in response to widespread community concern about the lack of services for neglected, abandoned and destitute children, during the gold rush years. It was a two-storey building, in Victoria Street, East Ballarat designed by Cornish born Henry Richards Caselli and comprised dormitory wards, staff quarters, school rooms, and hospital wards. It was the first institution of its kind to have a swimming pool.
Ballarat Orphanage (Photo: State Library of Victoria Collection)
Although it received some government funding, the Ballarat Orphanage relied heavily on charities, fund-raising and cheap labour provided by its residents – the boys worked an extensive farm (the orphanage was renowned for its Jersey Cattle) and vegetable garden while the girls did much of the sewing, cooking, washing and cleaning and caring for the younger children. Schooling was on-site. At the turn of the century, the orphanage housed 150 children, but the numbers peaked at over 230 during the First World War. Some children were wards of the state, legally bound until the age of 18, while others were voluntary admissions, placed in the hands of the orphanage by a struggling parent or by relatives who no longer felt able to care for the family members or their kinfolk. In an era when family support benefits, as we know them today, were non-existent, the death or desertion of a parent was devastating for many families, not only for the emotional suffering but also for the economic stress that followed the loss. It was difficult for a father to work and keep his children but widowed mothers faced the problem of finding paid employment and, if they did, they needed someone to mind their children while they were at work.
In a report in one of the local Ballarat newspapers regarding the Orphanage it is recorded:
… Special mention must be made of the brass band; the boys having made remarkable progress under the tuition of Mr Arthur Prout and has in a great measure been self-supporting. The fact that some of the members have to leave when becoming proficient somewhat retards its progress but the number of players is now being increased from sixteen to twenty-two, so this year it has earned more than sufficient to meet its needs. During the year, new uniforms and several instruments have been purchased.
END NOTES
[1] History of Ballarat Band
[2] Music: An illustrated History – Max Wade-Matthews
[3] The Ballarat Star – Friday 13 January 1922, page 2
[4] A Brief History of Prout’s Ballarat Brass Band 1858-1924 R. Pattie/C Ducardus 2010 p21
[5] The Ballarat Star (Vic.: 1865 – 1924) Friday 5 October 1900 p 2 Article
[6] The Argus (Melbourne, Vic: 1848 – 1957) Monday 8 October 1900 p 3 Article
[7] Lucky Country, Weston Bate
We are grateful to Robyn Coates for this contribution to Cornwall’s brass band history. Samuel Prout was just one of our Cornish sons who contributed to the brass band movement overseas. Countless others have a similar story in other parts of Australia and in many other countries. They are a part of the reason that there is still a little bit of Cornwall in so many areas across the world. (Tony Mansell)
Robyn Coates lives in Preston, a suburb of Melbourne, and trained as a Primary School Teacher. She and her husband Arthur have four adult children and three young grandsons. Robyn began family research in 1996 and joined the Cornish Association of Victoria, in Ballarat in 2008, where they have a holiday home and a very long and continuous association, with Arthur’s Cornish ancestors settling there in the 1850s. Since then she has served on both the Victorian Cornish Association and Ballarat Committees and produces the Ballarat and Victorian Newsletters. Currently she is researching members of the 39th Battalion from the First World War. Robyn’s interests include photography, reading, children’s literature and travel and has been fortunate to have visited Cornwall on six occasions. Robyn was Barded at St Austell in 2015.