The Commissariat Stores on the western shore of Sydney Cove were among the colony’s earliest large government warehouses — the logistical heart of convict-era supply. Lieutenant-Governor Joseph Foveaux commissioned building in 1809; Governor Lachlan Macquarie completed the 1810 store and ordered a further store of 1812. The big sandstone ranges stood on Circular Quay West in front of what later became the Maritime Services Board headquarters, on ground tied to the colonial naval dockyard and early quay works.
For more than a century the Commissariat buildings were among Sydney’s oldest surviving public structures. The 1938 Butters Plan for Circular Quay renewal proposed their demolition for a new Maritime Services Board office and quay modernisation. Despite public controversy — an early heritage flashpoint — the stores were demolished in 1939. Post-war construction produced the MSB building (occupied early 1950s), which since 1991 has housed the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia.
Below and around the MCA / First Fleet Park area, the Sydney Cove West Archaeological Precinct (State Heritage listed) preserves archaeological evidence of the Commissariat Stores, the government dockyard and related early quay fabric. A foundation stone from Macquarie’s 1812 building was retained at the request of the Royal Australian Historical Society and later marked nearby. This post commemorates a lost Circular Quay landmark whose site still underpins the western quay.