Rock solid, 175 years on

HIGHLY respected Geelong law firm Harwood Andrews has this month celebrated its 175th birthday.

The firm traces its links back to 1842, making it nine years older than the state of Victoria and nearly as old as the which was founded in 1840.

Harwood Andrews, which now has a staff of 155, can trace its links back to the city’s first solicitor, Henry Tyssen, who set up in the infant town of Geelong in 1840.

Tyssen died two years later, and his business was taken over by Charles Sladen, marking the birth of the firm which would become Harwood and Pincott in the late 1800s.

Harwood Pincott merged with Andrews Backhouse in 1992 to form Harwood Andrews.

Sladen went on to become a major public figure, and was briefly premier of Victoria.

Sladen House, at the river end of Pakington St, was built for Charles Sladen in 1849.

In its early years the firm acted for Victorian squatters who were major players in developing Australia’s wool industry, a fact noted by Harwood Andrews’ current principal, Richard Anderson, who said the firm was very proud of its Geelong connections.

“We are firm believers in Geelong and its institutions, including the

and we have a good crop of young people coming on who all share the same view, and like many people, some of them have moved to Geelong to make a new life,’’ he said.

Mr Anderson said the firm and its previous incarnations had represented many Geelong institutions, including the the Geelong Harbour Trust, Geelong Water Board and the Geelong city council.

“The firm has kept evolving over the years. When the firm started off it really did work for the squatters and the firm also acted as a general agent and made sure their business affairs were attended to, and as Geelong became more sophisticated the role of the firm became more sophisticated,’’ he said.

Such was the firm’s involvement in the early days of the colony of Victoria that at one time Harwood and Pincott held one of the counterparts of the original treaty John Batman concluded with Aboriginal leaders. Contact: peterjohnbegg@gmail.com

Picture: COURTESY GEELONG HERITAGE CENTRE COLLECTION The inhabitants of Sladen House in about 1890, soon after the death of Harwood and Pincott founder Sir Charles Sladen, for whom it was built in 1849.

Picture: COURTESY GEELONG HERITAGE CENTRE COLLECTION Harwood and Pincott staff in Geelong in 1913.

Sir Charles Sladen