This ongoing series from Barrie Historical Archive curator Deb Exel shows old photos from the collection and one from the present day, as well as the story behind them.
Court House Hill
In the early days of the settlement of what would become Ontario, the Simcoe District was part of a larger Home District. In 1837, it was separated from the Home District and Barrie became the government centre for the Simcoe District.
The land allocated for the building of a courthouse and jail was purposeful and strategic. Set upon a hill overlooking the town and the bay, the positioning of these buildings reaffirmed the authority of the British Empire in both a municipal and judicial sense. The new administrative centre block was bounded by Mulcaster, Worsley, Berczy and Codrington (then known as James) streets.
Magistrates representing both the Home and Simcoe Districts formed the committee to manage the construction of the new public buildings in Barrie. Plans for a two-storey octagonal jail with two cell blocks flanking the Mulcaster Street-facing entrance, were submitted in 1838, by Toronto architect Thomas Young.
Funding challenges forced the committee to engage a stagecoach and steamboat operator, Charles Thompson, as the contractor for the construction of the jail. His agreement to long term debentures as payment for his services eased the financial pressures on the project.
Thompson’s boat was able to haul the limestone from a quarry at Longford, located on the east side of Lake Couchiching, that would be used in the building of the jail. Work began in late 1840 and the jail opened in 1841.
Also that year, the committee moved forward with the plans for the courthouse construction. Horace Keating, a local architect and Clerk of Works to Young on the jail construction, had submitted his own design for the new courthouse, in 1840. With no time to request tenders, the courthouse job as well went to Charles Thompson, who engaged John Pearson, as a subcontractor. The work was completed about 1843.
Both buildings went over budget and both were plagued with structural issues, followed by years of repairs, alterations, improvements … and lawsuits.
In 1849, the Simcoe District became Simcoe County and the buildings known as the Simcoe County Court House and Jail.
The Land Registrar’s Office for Simcoe County, in 1826, was situated in Holland Landing, an inconvenient location to the county seat in Barrie. The Registrar of Deeds, George Lount, who lived and worked in Holland Landing, was pressured to relocate to Barrie in 1846, and a Registry Office was built at the corner of Worsley and Mulcaster streets. A newer, fire-proof Registry Office was built in 1875.
An enlarged jurisdictional area forced an expansion of the courthouse facilities in 1863. To the east, a building was added to make room for legal workers, jury and housekeeper. On the west side, a council chamber, meeting rooms and a second courtroom were added. In 1877, a new roof line and tower completely transformed the appearance of the courthouse – the original modest, barn-styled frame building disappearing into the grand new façade.
Court House Hill has a distinctively different look these days. The impenetrable looking Registry Office of 1875, later a Women’s Institute and museum, was demolished in preparation for a new Land Registry Office and parking lot, in 1962.
The courthouse, which had overlooked the Town of Barrie since the early 1840s, was demolished in 1977 and replaced with a new, modern building.
Only the jail, the city’s and county’s oldest public structure, remains to tell the story of Court House Hill.
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