Bishop's House is a heritage-listed former Roman Catholic monastery and now bishop's residence at Abbott Street, Cairns City, Cairns, Cairns Region, Queensland, Australia. It was designed by Father Joseph Phelan and built in 1930 by Michael Garvey. It is also known as St Monica's Monastery/Priory. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 1 July 1997.
History
The Bishop's House at Cairns, a two-storeyed reinforced concrete building, was erected in 1930 as a monastery for the Augustinian fathers who administered the Vicariate Apostolic of Cooktown, and St Monica's Parish in Cairns. It replaced an 1887 timber presbytery.
Cairns was established in October 1876, as a port to service the Hodgkinson goldfields. In the same year the area from Cardwell to Cape York was separated from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brisbane as the Pro-Vicariate of North Queensland. In 1884 three Irish Augustinian fathers took charge of the Pro-Vicariate, establishing a monastery at Cooktown, and founding the parish of St Monica's at Cairns in 1885. An acre of land bounded by Abbott, Minnie and Lake Streets was acquired and the first St Monica's Church, a timber building at the corner of Abbott and Minnie Streets on the site of the present Bishop's House, was opened on 10 January 1886. In 1887, the year in which the Pro-Vicariate of North Queensland was constituted the Vicariate Apostolic of Cooktown, a timber presbytery was erected in Abbott Street, adjacent to St Monica's Church. In 1906, the Vicar Apostolic of Cooktown moved his residence to Cairns, which had eclipsed Cooktown as the principal port of far north Queensland, and St Monica's Church became a pro-cathedral.
St Monica's Monastery was erected during a flurry of Catholic building activity in Cairns, which included St Monica's Church-School in 1927, St Augustine's College in 1929, St Monica's Monastery in 1930 and Our Lady of Good Counsel Church-School (North Cairns) in 1936. The work was undertaken principally at the instigation of Father Joseph Phelan, transferred from Mareeba to Cairns to help with the re-construction of St Monica's Church and School following the devastating Cyclone Willis of 9 February 1927. Father Phelan had a knowledge of architecture, and appears to have designed the college, monastery and church-school at North Cairns.
The old St Monica's presbytery was demolished June–July 1930, and by the time the foundation stone of the new monastery was laid by the Bishop of Townsville on 31 August 1930, the exterior walls were half completed. The building was officially opened on 21 December 1930 by Archbishop James Duhig of Brisbane, who described it as "the finest episcopal residence in Australia". The design is attributed to Father Phelan, who supervised construction along with Cairns builder Michael Garvey, who had constructed St Monica's Church-School in 1927 and St Augustine's College in 1929. The monastery was erected in less than 6 months, using day labour and Father Phelan's volunteer week-end working-bee. The plumbing and electrical work was contributed free of charge, and an altar for the oratory was donated as a memorial to a former parishioner. The staircase reputedly was donated by the English family of Malanda, who owned a sawmilling business. Total cost was about .
Construction of the new Augustinian monastery in Cairns illustrated the strength of the Catholic Church in the Cairns district in the 1920s. The effects of the February 1927 cyclone, followed by flood damage, a severe trade depression, and waterfront disputes affecting the city's building industry, did not deter the predominantly working-class Catholic community of Cairns from contributing funds and labour. The rapid construction was a tribute to the zeal of the Augustinian Fathers at Cairns, particularly Father Phelan, and the enthusiasm they inspired in the local parish.
St Monica's Monastery was erected during the third major phase of Cairns' development, which saw the city boom in the 1920s and 1930s. The Cairns hinterland Soldier Settlement Schemes of the 1920s, the completion of the North Coast rail link to Brisbane in 1924, the continued success of the local sugar industry, the expansion of wharf facilities, the extensive re-building necessitated by a spate of cyclones in the 1920s and the poor condition of earlier timber structures, combined to produce unprecedented building activity in Cairns. The city centre in particular was dominated until the 1980s by substantial, reinforced concrete and brick structures of the interwar period, and in this respect was markedly different from other 19th century-established Queensland towns and cities.