{{short description|Former Anglican theological college in Australia}} {{about|the former Anglican theological college near Adelaide|the secondary school in Adelaide| St Michael's College, Adelaide|the theological college in Llandaff|St Michael's College, Llandaff|the 1930s clubhouse at St Michael's Chester Square, called St Michael's House |St Michael's Church, Chester Square}} {{Use dmy dates|date=March 2021}} {{Portal|Christianity}} '''St Michael's House''' was an Australian educational institution in Crafers outside Adelaide, under the auspices of the Society of the Sacred Mission, established in 1947 and which was destroyed by fire in the Ash Wednesday bushfires in 1983 shortly after its closure. It trained candidates for ordination in the Anglican Church of Australia.

==Origins== A colonial businessman, John Bakewell (who was the son of the South Australian MP William Bakewell), built a home in Mount Lofty (now known as Crafers) which he named "Koralla". Bakewell's daughter, Audine, married an Irish doctor, Arthur Pryce Evelyn O'Leary.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.maltaramc.com/regsurg/o/olearytc.html|title=RAMC Officers of the Malta Garrison: Thomas Connor O'Leary|access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref> O'Leary died in 1929 and in 1943 his widow left "Koralla" to the Anglican Diocese of Adelaide.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.users.picknowl.com.au/~robertel/SSM.html|title=Robert Elson: St Michael's House, Crafers – My Memories|access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref>

Bryan Robin, Bishop of Adelaide from 1941 to 1956, encouraged members of the Society of the Sacred Mission (SSM) to come to Adelaide from Kelham to establish a theological college in order to boost clergy numbers.<ref>{{Cite book|chapter-url=https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/robin-bryan-percival-11546|title=Australian Dictionary of Biography: Bryan Percival Robin|chapter=Bryan Percival Robin (1887–1969) |publisher=National Centre of Biography, Australian National University |access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref> SSM had been established in London in 1893 by Fr Herbert Kelly and the following year began training working-class men for the priesthood. In 1903, SSM purchased Kelham Hall, which then formed the origins of St Michael's House.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://academic.oup.com/book/8184/chapter/153701362 |access-date=2023-10-10 |website=academic.oup.com|doi=10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198269298.003.0019 |title=Kelham |date=1997 |last1=Dowland |first1=David |pages=107–150 |isbn=978-0-19-826929-8 }}</ref>

St Michael's House was established in 1947,<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.users.picknowl.com.au/~robertel/SSM.html|title=Robert Elson: St Michael's House, Crafers – My Memories|access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref> and offered a five-year training course.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.samemory.sa.gov.au/site/page.cfm?u=1456|title=State Library of South Australia: Religion – Education|date=7 December 2005 |access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref> Along with the theological college, there was an SSM priory on the site. The first priest to graduate from St Michael's was Fr Austin Day, later the renowned rector of the leading Anglo-Catholic church in Sydney, Christ Church St Laurence, for 32 years from 1964 to 1996.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.users.picknowl.com.au/~robertel/SSM.html|title=Robert Elson: St Michael's House, Crafers – My Memories|access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.trushare.com/79DEC01/DE01AUST.htm|title=David Chislett: Letter from Australia|access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref>

==College years== It was the students at St Michael's House (along with those of Ormond College at the University of Melbourne) who were the first in Australia to observe the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, in the 1950s.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.strathalbynanglicans.org.au/2015/05/|title=Strathalbyn Anglicans: Week of Prayer for Christian Unity|date=12 May 2015 |access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref> St Michael's students protested against the Vietnam War, regarded as a controversial act at the time.<ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, p 241.</ref>

Kelham, priding itself on its tradition of offering working class men a route to ordination, never issued hoods, but St Michael's House introduced a hood.<ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, p 251.</ref> With the passage of years, and increasing reticence of bishops to send candidates to St Michael's for training, the future of St Michael's had become uncertain. By 1983 most of the teaching was undertaken at the society's priory house in central Adelaide, St John's.<ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, p 242.</ref> St Michael's House had been reduced to just a retreat house.<ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, p 242.</ref>

==Destruction== On Ash Wednesday in 1983 parts of South Australia and Victoria experienced devastating bushfires, subsequently known as the Ash Wednesday Bushfires. St Michael's House was destroyed, and not rebuilt. The few remaining members of SSM survived the fire by hiding in the basement.<ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, p 243.</ref> Those who escaped the fire included Fr Jonathan Ewer, the last prior.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.ukpressonline.co.uk/ukpressonline/view/pagview/ChTm_1994_02_18_008|title=''Church Times'': "A quest for lives given to God", 18 February 1994, p 8|access-date=19 March 2021}}</ref><ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, p 280.</ref> The only remaining ruins are the former gatehouse.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.users.picknowl.com.au/~robertel/SSM.html|title=Robert Elson: St Michael's House, Crafers – My Memories|access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref> The entire 40,000 volume library, which had been sold to Trinity College in Melbourne in anticipation of the closure of the college, perished.<ref>Doig, Judith, ''Disaster Recovery for Archives, Libraries and Records Management Systems in Australia and New Zealand'', (1997: Centre for Information Studies), {{ISBN|0-949060-35-6}}, p 10.</ref> Kelham had closed in 1971, and the library had been dispersed, in part to St Michael's House. Those volumes were all lost.<ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, p 244.</ref> The theological college did not reopen; the priory house moved to Diggers Rest in Victoria.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.users.picknowl.com.au/~robertel/SSM.html|title=Robert Elson: St Michael's House, Crafers – My Memories|access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref>

==Wardens== {{Incomplete list|date=March 2021}} Most wardens were also priors of the SSM Priory, and often provincials of the Australian SSM.

*Fr Basil Oddie SSM, 1947-56<ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, pp. 231-236.</ref> *Fr Nicholas Allenby SSM, 1957–62, subsequently Bishop of Kuching in Sarawak and then Malaysia, 1962-68.<ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, p. 236.</ref> *Fr Austin Day *Fr John Lewis SSM, 1962–68, subsequently Bishop of North Queensland, 1971-96.<ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, p. 236.</ref><ref>''Crockford's Clerical Directory, 1973-74'', 85th Edition, p. 576.</ref> *Fr Dunstan McKee SSM, provincial and prior 1969 -? (not warden) *Fr Thomas Brown SSM, 1969- c. 1971<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.users.picknowl.com.au/~robertel/SSM.html|title=Robert Elson: St Michael's House, Crafers – My Memories|access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref><ref>''Crockford's Clerical Directory, 1973-74'', 85th edition, p 124.</ref> warden but not prior. *Br (later Fr) Gilbert Sinden SSM, c 1973<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.australianchurchrecord.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/19th-April-1973.pdf|title=''Australian Church Record'': "Tasmania Plans Mission", 5 April 1973, p. 8|access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref><ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, p. 309 fn 48.</ref> *Fr Jonathan Ewer SSM, 1976-83.<ref>Mason, Alistair, ''History of the Society of the Sacred Mission'', (1993: The Canterbury Press), {{ISBN|1-85311-079-5}}, p 280.</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.australianchurchrecord.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/9th-December-1976.pdf|title=''Australian Church Record'': "Mainly about people", 25 November 1976, p 8.}}</ref>

==Notable alumni== *Douglas Brown SSM, director of the Anglican Centre in Rome, 1991-1995.<ref>"Briefly", ''Church Times'', 8 February 1991, p 4.</ref><ref>''Crockford's Clerical Directory'', 99th Edition, 2006-07, p 103.</ref> *John Forsyth, warden of Wollaston College, 1979-82<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.crockford.org.uk/people/21067/the-revd-john-warren-forsyth|title=''Crockford's Clerical Directory'': The Revd John Warren Forsyth|access-date=23 March 2021}}</ref> *Hilary Greenwood, teacher at SMH (1961-66) and warden of Kelham Hall (1970-73) *Hamish Jamieson, Bishop of Carpentaria (1974–84) and Bunbury (1984–2000) *Michael Lapsley, anti-apartheid and social justice activist<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.acu.org.au/downloads/sermon-keblemass2008.pdf|title=Sermon preached by Father Michael Lapsley, SSM for the 175th Anniversary of John Keble's Assize Sermon, Christ Church South Yarra, Melbourne, Australia, 18 July 2008|access-date=20 March 2021|archive-date=2 March 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210302155828/http://acu.org.au/downloads/sermon-keblemass2008.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref> *John Lewis, Bishop of North Queensland (1971–96)<ref>''Crockford's Clerical Director, 1973-74'', 85th Edition, p 575.</ref> *David McCall, Bishop of Willochra (1987–2000) and Bunbury (2000–10) *David Murray, assistant bishop in the Diocese of Perth (1991–2006)

==References== {{Reflist}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Michael's House, Crafers}} Category:Anglican seminaries and theological colleges Category:Former theological colleges in Australia Category:Education in Adelaide Category:1947 establishments in Australia Category:Educational institutions disestablished in 1983 Category:Universities and colleges established in 1947 Category:1983 disestablishments in Australia Category:Universities and colleges disestablished in the 20th century Category:Destroyed libraries