Hyde Park Barracks

The former Hyde Park Barracks is a three-storey brick building with a sandstone pediment like that of a Greek temple. Governor Macquarie was so pleased with the building that he gave Greenway his freedom. The barracks were built by convict labor in 1817-19 and housed 800 or more male convicts, who were marched in chains from here to their place of work. After the transportation of convicts to New South Wales ceased in 1848 the building was occupied by the immigration department and later (1887) by the court authorities. In 1975-84 it was restored to its original condition, and the main part of the building now houses a museum on the history of Sydney portraying the lives of the first involuntary 'settlers'.