Written by Peter Wilmoth
The Hotel Allen holds a proud place in the history of Townsville.
Built in 1876 and known by several names, the Hotel Allen has been an icon of the city in the 148 years since. In 2026 it will celebrate an extraordinary 150 years since it was opened by Prudence Houle, a remarkable Queensland hotelier and licensee of the time.
The hotel has been known as the Belle View, the Bellevue, the Derwent Hotel, the Queen’s Park Hotel and, since 1956, the Hotel Allen.
Some of the earliest businesses established in the Townsville in its settlement years were pubs and hotels and Hotel Allen soon became one of the city’s vital community hubs.
The hotel started its life in 1876 serving the crucial role of all pubs and hotels in the era of settlements across Australia: as a place to eat and drink, to stay in the upstairs rooms, to gather with others in the community and to hear about employment opportunities.
And, in its earliest years, Prudence Houle was at its centre.
In the Townsville of the 1880s settlement was contained to the section along the Strand at the foot of Melton Hill. This is where the first Roman Catholic Church and Convent, the Orphanage and the first State School were established.
In their 1988 book ‘A Pattern of Pubs, Hotels of Townsville 1864-1014’, published by the History Department at James Cook University, Dorothy Gibson-Wilde and Bruce Gibson-Wilde tell us about the Townsville of that era.
“Several houses and dairies were scattered through the remaining area. In 1870 Townsville’s first cricket ground was cleared on what is now the Central State School grounds,” they write.
“The opening of the Belle View Hotel followed the Government’s decision to build the first major gaol in north Queensland on the site of the cricket ground in North Ward.”
They note that in 1876 Miss Prudence Houle, the first licensee, advertised her hotel as “opposite the new gaol”, although work on the gaol did not begin until May 1877.
By 1878, they note, with the name of the hotel now spelled Bellevue, it had acquired a bad reputation, though the reason for this has not been discovered. The residents of the suburb petitioned the Licensing Court to refuse renewal of the licence.
“Despite the pleading of three would-be licensees (Prudence Houle, Charles Foster and James Hargraves) the licence was refused.”
So, as we approach the hotel’s 150th year, what do we know about its first licensee Prudence Houle?
Records at the West End Cemetery in Townsville where Prudence is buried show that she was born in England and her father was John White Houle and her mother Prudence Simmons.
The Cemetery confirms that there is no headstone or specific location in the cemetery but it’s confirmed she rests there.
Prudence was an active hotelier. She was licensee for two hotels in Brisbane – The Globe and The Albion – before moving north to Townsville to open The Belle View.
On 11 August 1864 the Brisbane Courier reported that “Prudence Houle was granted a licence for a house in Edward Street to be known as The Albion Hotel”.
On 6 July 1866 a notice appeared in The Brisbane Courier. “I, Prudence Houle, hereby give notice that it is my intention, fourteen days from the date hereof, to apply that the licence at the present held by me for the Albion Hotel in Edward Street may be transferred to a house situated at the corner of Edward and Elizabeth Street in the city of Brisbane until recently occupied as a licensed house under the sign of the Globe Hotel. Given under my hand this day 4th day of July, 1866.”
A newspaper report on 18 May 1867 showed her license for the Globe Hotel was renewed.
It’s clear Prudence Houle was an energetic, enterprising businesswoman, and did well at a time when managing licensed pubs must have been extremely demanding.
A veteran publican, naturally Prudence Houle endured peaks and troughs in her time running hotels.
Like most hotel licensees at the time she occasionally fell foul of the law for very minor breaches which reached the newspapers. On 4 May 1867 a newspaper noted that Prudence was fined 20 shillings “for keeping certain swine in a building adjoining the Albion Hotel in Edward Street”.
A report in The Brisbane Courier on 6 October 1866 noted “Prudence Houle, landlady of the Albion Hotel, Edward Street, was fined 10 shillings (and costs) for allowing offensive and unwholesome matter to flow from her premises.”
There was a tragic end to the Bellevue era under her stewardship. In 1878 Prudence and two of her staff died during a fever epidemic.
The building was put up for sale in September 1878, and by January 1879 it had closed following protests from local residents against the renewal of its licence.
If only we knew more about Prudence. Her life would have made an extraordinary book.
On 20 April 1887 the Brisbane Courier ran a notice from the Supreme Court of Queensland that Prudence was a “widow, deceased” and had “died intestate”. Subsequently, all “goods, chattels, credits and effects” were “granted to Elizabeth Hannah Norris of Cooktown, daughter of the said deceased”.
In 1884, on the same site, the hotel re-opened, this time called The Derwent Hotel, under the management of Henry Elliott.
Dorothy and Bruce Gibson-Wilde tell us that the licence changed ownership several times during the succeeding years, only Malcolm Meikle (formerly
the engineer for the Townsville waterworks) remaining there for more than a year until his death in 1890.
They note that in October 1891 Stephen Smith took over the hotel, changing the name to Queen’s Park because of its proximity to the park which had become a popular sporting venue.
By this time Townsville was growing significantly. Notes the Gibson-Wildes: “The Botanical Gardens (now Queen’s Gardens) were well established and a favoured spot for picnics and moonlight concerts; and Queen’s Park had become a popular sporting venue with tennis courts and cricket fields in regular use by several clubs.
“It was also the venue of exercises of the Volunteer
Defence Force. The hotel, therefore, was very well situated to attract custom from the sportsmen or troops at the park. It was most appropriate that the name should have been changed to identify the hotel with Queen’s Park.”
Photographs of the hotel at the time show it as a two-storeyed timber building with verandahs shading the facades to both Eyre Street and Gregory Street.
Horses were central to life in settlement towns at the time, as were refreshment for their owners. In 1903 George Edwards advertised that The Queen’s Park provided “good loose boxes and the best of liquors”.
The Gibson-Wildes write: “The Queen’s Park was a comfortable hotel, convenient for country visitors participating in local sporting events or visiting the Townsville Hospital. Though severely damaged in 1903 during cyclone Leonta, after which it was immediately rebuilt.”
On 6 March 1956 Cyclone Agnes, the first Australian tropical cyclone tracked on radar, tore through the area, passing over Townsville, Ingham, Cairns, McKay and then moving into the interior.
The event caused damaged roofs on multiple properties; approximately 20 houses were rendered uninhabitable. Subsequent inland flooding caused four deaths.
The Queen’s Park Hotel was severely damaged but soon rebuilt and re-opened in 1956 with a new name: the Hotel Allen.
As the hotel moves towards its 150th anniversary, when you’re next there listen carefully – you might hear the echo of Prudence Houle calling out to her staff, or receiving supplies or welcoming yet another weary traveller inside for a drink, a meal or a comfortable room to spend the night.
