Victoria Hotel Assemblage
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The Victoria Hotel (1841-1865) was destroyed by fire under suspicious circumstances on 15 February 1865. It was one of Auckland’s earliest and best known hotels, situated between Shortland Street and Fort Street in the central business district and in its early days was a temporary raupo building right on the waterfront of Commercial Bay. By 1842 a more permanent structure was built. Various modifications followed with the last extension being added in1864. Not long after completion, it was burnt to the ground. An archaeological salvage excavation, undertaken in 1989, uncovered one of the hotels cellars, filled with the remains of the hotel and its contents. A large assemblage of artefacts relating to life at the hotel up to the time of the fire was recovered. It includes bottles, ceramic tableware, drinking glasses, clay tobacco pipes and animal bones.
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