An Anglican mission organization established in England in 1698 and still in operation today, the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge (SPCK) began work in Australia in the late eighteenth century, establishing the first library by sending 4,000 books out with the First Fleet in 1788.
Divided into 12 sections (Bibles, Testaments, Common Prayer, and Nos. I-XII), this 1826 catalogue of 77 titles ‘ordered from England’ is primarily made up of bibles, testaments, prayer books, homilies, sermons, catechisms, devotions, and religious tracts. The price of the books in pounds, shillings, and pence is recorded on the right-hand side of the catalogue. Of note are D’Oyly and Mant’s Bible (an annotated bible commissioned by the SPCK costing the substantial sum of £3 9s 6d); a series of titles by Sarah Trimmer including her Fabulous Histories (1786) and Instructive Tales (1810); William Gilpin’s Lives of the Reformers (possibly the two-volume collected edition of 1809); and William Cobbett’s Reflections on Religion (1820).
The catalogue contains a small number of biographies and histories, such as Bishop Burnett’s History of the Reformation (1679) and William Hamilton’s Life of Bonnell (1807). It also contains some educational tracts including Dr. Bell’s Systems of Instruction (1808). The only imaginative works are John Gay’s Fables or Fifty-One Fables in Verse (1727-38) and Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (1719). A later 1828 catalogue suggests that it was, in fact, Defoe’s Journal of the Plague Year (1722) and not Robinson Crusoe that was held in the collection. A further 32 titles are listed as being held in the Library of St. John’s Church Paramatta, all of which are religious or moral tracts including Sunday School tracts and the National School Magazine.
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