| Historical notes: | The traditional owners of the land from South Head to Petersham were the Cadigal. Following European occupation of Woollahra the Cadigal band disappeared from the area by about the middle of the 19th century (Woollahra Library, 2015, 1). The Cadigal occupied the South Head peninsula, managing the vegetation, and fishing and collecting shellfish from the surrounding rock platforms and waters. When Europeans arrived in 1788, South Head was the site of a number of meetings between groups of the old inhabitants and the new arrivals, and more sustained interaction took place after the establishment of the signal station at Signal Hill in 1790 (Wotherspoon, 2012).
Rose Bay:
Rose Bay was called Ginagulla (Prof. FD McCarthy) -open sea - in fact in geological times there was indeed an opening to the sea from there, evident still near Bondi. (Charles F. Laseron 'The Face of Australia'.)(Joan Lawrence, pers.comm., 5/12/2019).
Bellevue Hill:
The name given to the suburb was taken from that given to the look-out area which later became Bellevue Park - named 'Belle Vue' by Governor Macquarie as an alternative to the colloquial 'Vinegar Hill' which Macquarie considered vulgar (Woollahra Council, local history fast-facts, Bellevue Hill, accessed 7/8/2015). The area was accessed by the Old South Head Road from 1811 and the New South Head Road from the 1830s. Victoria Road was formed by the Surveyor General, Sir Thomas Mitchell's survey of 1844 (Broomham, Bellevue Hill thematic history, in Woollahra Library, 2015, 1).
Point Piper Estate (this Bellevue Hill part of it):
The subject properties were originally part of the extensive Point Piper Estate, land accumulated by Captain John Piper since 1816, later conveyed to the emancipist traders Cooper and Levey in 1826 following Piper experiencing financial difficulties. The estate, by then comprising 1130 acres, became the property exclusively of Daniel Cooper in 1847. After 1850 Cooper began offering some sections of his estate for sale and others as 99 year leases (ibid, 2015, 1).
Edwin Tooth took up a lease of over 40 acres in Bellevue Hill in December 1854 (Broomham, R., 'Coopers of Woollahra', 2000, 14). Following Edwin's death, his brother Robert Tooth built the mansion Cranbrook on the southern side of New South Head Road in 1859-60. Cranbrook was eventually sold to the founders of Cranbrook School in 1917 (ibid, 2015, 1).
In c1880 Edward Knox and his brother-in-law William GIlchrist sub-leased an area of Edwin's land in Bellevue Hill, and by the turn of the century had purchased the freehold from the Cooper family. Edward built the house 'Rona' on his part of the land in 1883. Edward Knox and William Gilchrist made available a portion of land adjacent to Rona for Edward's brother Thomas Forster Knox (ibid, 2015, 1).
Edward Knox was a self-made man who coped with adversity, in a world of great uncertainty. Not only did he prosper, but he supported and led others to flourish. His highly principled behaviour and deep religious faith created valuable industries, thousands of jobs and pioneered fair and just industrial practices. He was born in 1819 in Helsingor, Denmark. After commercial training in Denmark and his uncle's London merchant house, he arrived in Australia in 1840. Through hard work and good connections, he progressed, becoming involved with the Australian Sugar Company and acquiring assets from astute commercial deals. At the age of 26, he became a director of the Commercial Banking Company of Sydney in 1845, acting as manager from 1847-51 and remaining a director until his death in 1901. In 1855 he started the Colonial Sugar Refining Company (CSR), owning 1/3 of its capital and remained associated with it until his death. He established a vertically integrated sugar milling and refining operation which became the dominant sugar company in Australia and beyond. CSR today has become a major conglomerate expanding internationally into building products. By the early 1860s, Knox had resettled his family of four sons and four daughters in Sydney, returned CSR to prosperity, become a substantial pastoralist; and built his family home, Fiona, which is now Ascham Junior School, in Darling Point . He co-founded the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital and the Carrington Convalescent Home and assisted many other benevolent institutions and activities over the term of his life (Tresise, 2020).
Leura:
Site of an old Aboriginal camp and has a natural spring (NTA, 1978).
What became Leura was Lot 5 of the 1883 subdivision (ibid, 2015, 4). The house Leura was built in 1891 for Thomas Forster (Tom) Knox, adjoining Rona (ibid, 2015, 1). The tender for construction of the house dated 3/4/1890 is reprinted in 'Cranbrook - the first fifty years 1918-1968' by A.C.Child, Cranbrook School, 1968, 159. It has been suggested in the classification sheet of the National Trust of Australia (NSW), 1978 and the Woollahra Heritage Study 1984 that the architect for the house was 'probably the same architect' as Rona, namely G.A.Morell. However a note on the tender reads 'Addendum to contract by Mr. Vernon' - which suggests that the architect was in fact Walter Liberty Vernon* (ibid, 2015, 2; Boyd, 2012). The house was completed in the following year, 1891, for Thomas Knox (ibid, 2015, 2).
The date of construction predates the requirement of the 1906 Local Government Act (which came into force in 1909) that a building application including plans/drawings be lodged with the relevant Council. Thus no plans of the original building are held by Woollahra Municipal Council (ibid, 2015, 2).
Walter Liberty Vernon (1846-1914) was both architect and soldier. Born in England, he ran successful practices in Hastings and London and had estimable connections in artistic and architectural circles. In 1883 he had a recurrence of bronchitic asthma and was advised to leave the damp of England. He and his wife sailed to New South Wales. Before leaving, he gained a commission to build new premises for Messrs David Jones and Co., in Sydney's George Street. In 1890 he was appointed Government Architect - the first to hold that title - in the newly reorganised branch of the Public Works Department. He saw his role as building 'monuments to art'. His major buildings, such as the Art Gallery of New South Wales (1904-6) are large in scale, finely wrought in sandstone, and maintaining the classical tradition. Among others are the Mitchell Wing of the State Library, Fisher Library at the University of Sydney and Central Railway Station. He also added to a number of buildings designed by his predecessors, including Customs House, the GPO and Chief Secretary's Building - with changes which did not meet with the approval of his immediate predecessor, James Barnet who, nine years after his resignation, denounced Vernon's additions in an essay and documentation of his own works. In England, Vernon had delighted his clients with buildings in the fashionable Queen Anne style. In NSW, a number of British trained architects who were proponents of the Arts and Crafts style joined his office and under their influence, Vernon changed his approach to suburban projects. Buildings such as the Darlinghurst First Station (Federation Free style, 1910) took on the scale and character of their surroundings. Under Vernon's leadership, an impressive array of buildings was produced which were distinguished by interesting brickwork and careful climatic considerations, by shady verandahs, sheltered courtyards and provision for cross-flow ventilation. Examples are courthouses in Parkes (1904), Wellington (1912) and Bourke, Lands Offices in Dubbo (1897) and Orange (1904) and the Post Office in Wellington (1904)(Le Sueur, 2016, 7).
The term 'villa' was first used in England in the 17th century, partly from the Latin and Italian 'country house, farm', perhaps derived from the stem of vicus (village). The villa was a country mansion or residence, together with a farm, farm-buildings, or other house attached, built or occupied by a person of some position and wealth. It was taken to include a country seat or estate and later a residence in the country or in the neighbourhood of a town, usually standing in its own grounds. From this is was appropriated by the middleof the 18th century to mean a residence of a superior type, in the suburbs of a town or in a residential district, such as that occupied by a person of the middle class, and also a small, better-class dwelling house, usually detached or semi-detached. The term 'villa garden' was used in the context of Hobart and Sydney residences in the 1830s, and if near the coast or harbour, the appellation 'marine villa' was often applied. Australian origins probably date from the grant conditions applied to Sydney's Woolloomooloo Hill (1827, under Governor Darling), which obligated the construction of villas fulfilling certain conditions... 'with garden like domain, and external offices for stables and domestic economy' (John Buonarotti Papworth, 1825, quoted in James Broadbent's 1997 book, 'The Australian Colonial House'). Many gardens of 19th century villas followed Gardenesque conventions, with garden ornaments often complementing the architecture of the house. The term had acquired such widespread usage by the 1850s that when Jane Loudon issued a new editiion of her husband (John Claudius Loudon)'s 'Suburban Gardener and Villa Companion' (1838) she merely entitled the revised work 'The Villa Gardener' (1850). This coincided with a growing period of suburbanisation in Australia with consequent fostering of the nursery trade... By the 1880s, descriptions of Australian villas implied sufficient room for a lawn on two or three fronts of the residence...(Aitken, 2002, 619-20).
Thomas Knox and his family lived at Leura from 1891 until 1956 when Miss Helen Knox died and the house was sold (ibid, 2015, 2).
Thomas Forster Knox (1849-1919):
Thomas Knox was managing director of the Sydney branch of Dalgety & Co. Ltd. (Rutledge, in ADB online) from 1884-1912 when he resigned). He was the third son of Sir Edward Knox (1819-1901), founder of the Colonial Sugar Refining Co. in 1855 and builder of Fiona, at Darling Point, in 1864 (ibid, 2015, 5).
Thomas married Miss Ritchie, daughter of a well-known pastoralist of the western district of Victoria and had two sons (Captain Edward Knox RFA and Thomas Knox) and two daughters (Helen and Norah). Thomas Sr. trained in the Commercial Banking Company of Sydney (CBC) under Sir Thomas Dibbs (of Graythwaite, North Sydney), who had himself been taken into the bank in 1847 by Thomas's father Sir Edward Knox (1919 obituary, in Obituaries Australia/ADBonline).
Thomas was a notable personality in Sydney commercial circles, having been involved in controlling or assisting control of a number of large commercial undertakings. He furthered the widespread interests of Dalgety & Co., Ltd. developing its pastoral and agricultural interests. On his resignation as managing director in 1912, the London directors of the company offered him chairmanship of the local board of advice, a role he took until his death. He was also chairman of directors of the Permanent Trustee Company and of the United Insurance Company, Australian Gaslight Co. and Fresh Food and Ice Co. He owned an extensive rural property at Wyalong, NSW and a cattle station in the Burnett district of Queensland. He was keenly interested in the last Shackleton expedition to the south polar regions and organised a fund to install wireless telegraphy instruments on Captain Macintosh's ship, the 'Aurora', and provided some scientific apparatus to the expedition. For some years he was president of the Warrigal Club and member of the Union Club. He was a member of the Australian Jockey Club, of which his younger brother Adrian Knox was chairman. Thomas also sat on the board of directors of the Carrington Hospital (1919 obituary, in Obituaries Australia/ADBonline).
Edward Knox (1847-1933), industrialist was second son of Sir Edward Knox, founder of the Colonial Sugar Company (CSR). Edward joined CSR in 1864 as a junior clerk, took charge of its crushing mills on the Clarence River in 1870 and was appointed general manager in 1880, expanding its operations into Queensland and Fiji, building seven new mills and a refinery in Auckland, New Zealand. He became chairman and managing director of CSR in 1920 and resigned in 1932. He served on four royal commissions including one into Sydney's water supply in 1902, served as an alderman on Woollahra Municipal Council from 1887-1902, the University of Sydney's Senate (1894-1919), Sydney Grammar School trustee (1884-1924) and National Art Gallery of NSW from 1907, among other involvements. His house Rona was completed in 1883. Edward's great pleasure was sailing: in 1875 he and his brother Tom bought and raced 'Pleiades'. In 1881 he had built 'Sirocco' a ten-ton cutter, winning many races in this over 20 years (Rutledge, in ADB online).
A (an undated) photograph of the garden ('home of T.F.Knox Esq.) showed rich plantings of trees, shrubs and ground covers, including (pointed out in its caption) a border of rock lilies (Dendrobium speciosissimum, in fact, orchids) and azaleas (Rhododendron indicum cv.s) 'typical of Bellevue Hill gardens'.
A local sketch map from a 1902 Bellevue Hill Estate advertisement shows the mansions built on the Double Bay-Bellevue Hill leaseholds. It shows Leura but not a house on it - unlike 'Rona' to one side and C.Stephen's property to the other. At that time Leura's land ran all the way downhill to Victoria Road (Detail of Subdivision Plan, Bellevue Estate, 20 September 1902, WLLHC, Figure 35, in Broomham, ?2005).
The house was partially gutted by fire in January, 1909 and the wooden shingle roof replaced by terracotta shingles (WMC, local history fast-facts, 'Leura', accessed 7/8/2015). Helen Rutledge in her book 'My Grandfather's House' (Doubleday, 1986) remembered the fire which 'completely gutted' the house. She notes that it had originally been roofed with oak shingles, but after the fire was re-roofed with brown Marseilles tiles (ibid, 2015, 2).
Helen Rutledge gives a detailed account of the gardens and outlook at Leura in her book. She describes it as 'extremely beautiful'. G.Nesta Griffiths ('Some houses and people of New South Wales, 155) also noted that Leura was 'so well-known for its beautiful garden'. The house having been built on an outcrop of rock above the quarry 'forward of Rona' afforded a 'spectacular view'. 'Mrs Knox capitalised on her unyielding terrain and made a brilliant and unusual rock garden. With its winding paths and exotic planting, it was a more famous garden than that of Rona, but most memorable were the massed rock lilies (in fact orchids, Dendrobium speciosissimum: Stuart Read, pers.comm., 4/9/2015).
Unlike Rona, no lawns were attempted, except for a tennis court away from the house on a more or less level corner. The long S-shaped drive was handsomely planted and curved round a tropical jungle of palms, bananas, ginger and bird of paradise flower (Strelitzia sp.) which was watered by the spring that once was piped across the road to water the Cranbrook horse paddock. Giant bamboos were grown between the two houses (Rona and Leura) and enhanced the view without blocking it...Neighbourly gates were set at different levels for the use of the two families (Rutledge, 53-54). When discussing the fire, Rutledge also refers to the rose bushes that grew 'beside the house' (ibid, 62).
In March 1926 Woollahra Council approved a subdivision of Leura and separately an application for a 'house and garage' on part of the Leura estate by the owner Edward Ritchie Knox. The architect was D.M.Mitchell. This property, Coonambula, became known as 22 Victoria Road (ibid, 2015, 3).
As part of the 'Knox Settlement' (referred to in the 1949 valuation lists of the NSW Dept. of the Valuer-General) the Leura estate was re-subdivided into six lots in 1949. Rona had been re-subdivided in 1948. A letter accompanying the June 1949 subdivision plan notes that under Thomas Knox's will the property 'had to be divided among several beneficiaries in accordance with certain provisions...' and 'in order to comply with these conditions...it has been necessary to prepare a subdivision.' (ibid, 2015, 3-4).
The plan dated 1945 consisted of 8 lots but re-subdivision was rejected by Council due to the 'objectionable shape of the allotments and unsatisfactory access to Lots 1 & 3'. The plan shows the footprint of Leura (house), the garage and locations of several walls, tennis court and drive. A revised subdivision plan was drawn up by Surveyors Foxall and Lines in June 1949 and approved in September 1949, creating Lot 1 (16 Victoria Rd.), Lot 2 (18 Victoria Rd.), Lot 3 (20 Victoria Rd.), Lot 4 (22 Victoria Rd. - Coonambula), Lot 5 (24 Victoria Rd. Leura: was described in 1952 and 1955 valuations as 'house, attic, storeroom and garage' consisting of 1 acre 8.5 perches, with 'access to Victoria Road by an existing driveway', Lot 6 (24A Victoria Rd. (ibid, 2015, 3-4).
In 1956, the house (Lot 5 - 24 Victoria Rd.) was purchased at auction by Cranbrook School, after the death of Miss Helen Knox in February 1956 (ibid, 2015, 4). It served as 'Street House' for 60 boarder boys, named after the then President of the School Council, Sir Kenneth Street.
Following the School Council's adoption of a proposal for development of the school by the architects Fowell, Mansfield, Jarvis and Maclauran in the early 1970s, Street House was sold c.1979. After being sold by the school the property reverted to its original name, Leura. It appears to have been transferred to M. (& B.) Levy in c.1979. It was sold again in c.1985 and reported in 'The Eastern Herald' that the new owners (who appear to be W.J.Shipton) had embarked on a substantial program of renovation' (16.1.1986, p.15, in ibid, 2015, 4).
In 1986 it was sold by property developer Bill Shipton to Ken and Christine Allen (Macken, 2016, 4: NTA, 1978, subsequent annotation on form). Woollahra Council development application records note a K. Allen in that year and in 1990 (ibid, 2015, 5).
Businessman Ken and his wife Christina Allen sold Leura prior to a proposed 10 November 2015 auction for over $30m, setting a new suburb record. The Allens held the property for over three decades and spent $7.3m on it in 1986 (Wentworth Courier, 10/11/15, 4). The Allens are now London-based (Macken, 9-10/12/2016).
SMH Domain noted the new owners, Chinese businessman and keen super yachtee, Wilson Lee and his wife Baoyu Wu have obtained the keys, and that the property sold for a Bellevue Hill auction high of $30.8m, the day before the auction. Lee is chief of China's wealth manager Noah Group, but better known locally for his super yacht Ark 323 which made the trip out here from Shanghai Noah Sailing Club last year to become the first all-Chinese crew to compete in the Sydney-Hobart Yacht Race (Macken, 2016, 4).
The property is back on the real estate market, with Ray White Double Bay, set for auction if it doesn't sell prior - with a $70m price tag (Nicholls, 2021, 20). |