Underbelly
Rates, Rubbish & Razors
To celebrate the success of TV sensation, Underbelly Razor the City of Sydney has created an online treasure trove of artefacts relating to Sydney’s most notorious crime figures and locations of this sensational era.
Brothels, floozies, booze and battles fought with razors in the back alleys of inner city Sydney are all part of life in the hit Channel Nine series.
But in between running illegal liquor dens, shooting their enemies, selling cocaine and amassing the profits from prostitution rackets, vice queens Tilly Devine and Kate Leigh had to take care of the sort of issues which beset ordinary citizens . . . paying their rates, collecting rent, calling in the council to fix their drainage problems and answering to the Health Board for the insanitary state of the premises.
Caption: Kate Leigh's prison file. Courtesy of State Records of New South Wales
Caption: Tilly Devine’s prison file. Courtesy of State Records of New South Wales
The City has uncovered long forgotten photographs and records from the “Razor” era in the inner city haunts of Madams Devine and Leigh that give a fascinating insight into the fascinating picture of razor-era Sydney.
City archivists have delved into the old assessment books in the Sydney Town Hall basement and found nuggets of history, in neat municipal handwriting.
“Mrs Matilda Devine” owned a string of brothels in east Sydney, in which she ran the gauntlet with the police, but never escaped the Council assessor who duly recorded her properties for rating – at £26 per immoral house – at Tilly’s principal whorehouses, two adjacent terrace houses at 191 and 193 Palmer Street, and other houses of ill repute around the corner in Woods and Liverpool lanes.
Other gems include the rates records for properties that may have been occupied by Kate Leigh – who went on to run a string of notorious sly grog shops.
Downloads
- Matilda Devine NSCA 17, Assessment Books, Macquarie Ward, 1939 PG 73 | PDF 962Kb
- Matilda Devine NSCA 17, Assessment Books, Macquarie Ward, 1945 PG 57 | PDF 992Kb
- Matilda Devine NSCA 17, Assessment Books, Macquarie Ward, 1945 PG 59 | PDF 952Kb
- Matilda Devine NSCA 17, Assessment Books, Macquarie Ward, 1945 PG 71 | PDF 1Mb
- Kate Leigh NSCA 17, Assessment Books, Macquarie Ward, 1914 PG 25 | PDF 1Mb
View a Flipbook of the Assessment Books
190 Palmer Street 1939 - where Tilly Devine's Ladies of the Night passed daily (City of Sydney Archives, CRS 51/1750)
In February 1928, the City’s Civic Commissioners, “astonished at their recent discovery that the City Council is the owner of a large proportion of Sydney's houses of ill repute, the Civic Commissioners have determined on an immediate, rigorous investigation of the occupations of their tenants in certain areas”.
Photographs taken by the City Building Surveyors Department in the course of their daily duties provide a literal snapshot of street life where the rival gangs of Leigh and Devine held sway in the suburbs dubbed “the Chicago of the South”. . . Darlinghurst, Surry Hills, Woolloomooloo and Kings Cross.
Buildings photographed ahead of their proposed demolition in the infamous rat-infested pit in Surry Hills called Frog Hollow, home to marauding mobs such as the feared Riley Street gang, include the notorious Sunbeam Hotel where criminals planned robbery and murder and gathered to smoke opium, take cocaine and sink booze.
Between Riley, Ann and Albion Streets, Surry Hills 1928 - Frog Hollow was home to razor gangs, opium dens and cocaine peddlers.(City of Sydney Archives, CRS 51/2691)
As the extortion and prostitution rackets ground on, so did council work, investigating neighbourhood complaints about road conditions and drainage, public conveniences, rats and pigeons, noise, smells, disorderly houses and undesirable behaviour from neighbours.
The Council archives show that since the early 1900s, the City had been urged by the Public Morals Association “to cleanse City streets of prostitutes and curtail and eventually prevent the use of public pavements for immoral purposes”. But it was easier said than done.
Liverpool Street near Police Court Grimes Car Park 1934 (City of Sydney Archives, CRS 51/1653)
City of Sydney historian, Dr Lisa Murray, said: “Kate Leigh and Tilly Devine may have avoided government taxes, but they couldn’t avoid property rate assessments by council.
“The everyday lives of many extraordinary Sydney characters are captured in the City’s archival records.
“The assessment books, correspondence inspections and photographs can help us pull-back the curtains on the lived experience of inner-city dwellers during the razor gang period of the 1920s and 30s.
“Many of the City’s historic records have been catalogued and digitised. I encourage all Sydneysiders to jump online and discover Sydney’s past as captured in the records of the City archives.”
Cnr Bayswater Road and Kellett Street, Kings Cross 1937 - Scene of the Devine v Leigh gang gun battle. (City of Sydney Archives, CRS 51/2799)
Downloads
- Matilda Devine NSCA 17, Assessment Books, Macquarie Ward, 1939 PG 73 | PDF 962Kb
- Matilda Devine NSCA 17, Assessment Books, Macquarie Ward, 1945 PG 57 | PDF 992Kb
- Matilda Devine NSCA 17, Assessment Books, Macquarie Ward, 1945 PG 57 | PDF 992Kb
Gallery
Resources
Archives Investigator- descriptions of archival records to help you evaluate what records might be relevant to your research. Click on “Simple Search” and enter a name, street name, suburb or topic (like “prostitution”).
ArchivePix - more than 50,000 photographs.
Assessment Books - record details of ownership, occupation, construction, and value for property in the City between 1845 and 1948. They provide valuable information for family and property history which is not available from any other source.
Dictionary of Sydney - articles on Darlinghurst and Woolloomooloo that provide excellent historical overviews of these suburbs.
Historical Atlas of Sydney - view and download a range of historic maps of the area
Last Updated: Friday 18 November, 2011
