In the 1870s and 1880s, Mr B Hammill was a well-known teacher. He was said to have a "first-class certificate from the Irish Board of Education" and to be "enthusiastically devoted to his profession". Mr Peter Leonard was another prominent teacher who went on to teach at other schools in Auckland. In 1874, a report of the annual public examination of the boys attending St Peter's, presided over by Bishop Croke, stated that there was a "regular and good" attendance of about 70 pupils at the school. In 1879 St Peter's had a roll of 43. In 1881, Mr Cronin (who had "high certificates from the Irish and Auckland Education Boards") was a teacher at St Peter's School which in an advertisement for pupils also offered night classes ("7-9pm") to prepare pupils for "mercantile pursuits, civil service and teacher's examinations". In about 1884, St Peter's started to use a larger adjacent building as the number of pupils was exceeding the capacity of the brick school. In October 1884, William Mahoney, who received all his early education under Mr Hammill at St Peter's, paid a visit to the school on his return to New Zealand as a priest. He was Auckland's first New-Zealand-born priest. St Peter's School continued (largely, by then a primary school) until the Marist Brothers established their own school on the site in 1885.