| Historical notes: | Leichhardt and Glebe:
The Leichhardt area was originally inhabited by the Wangal clan of Aborigines. After 1788 diseases such as smallpox and the loss of their hunting grounds caused huge reductions in their numbers and they moved further inland. Since European settlement the foreshores of Blackwattle Bay and Rozelle Bay have developed a unique maritime, industrial and residential character - a character which continues to evolve as areas which were originally residential estates, then industrial areas, are redeveloped for residential units and parklands.
The "Eora people" was the name given to the coastal Aborigines around Sydney. Central Sydney is therefore often referred to as "Eora Country". Within the City of Sydney local government area, the traditional owners are the Cadigal and Wangal bands of the Eora. There is no written record of the name of the language spoken and currently there are debates as whether the coastal peoples spoke a separate language "Eora" or whether this was actually a dialect of the Dharug language. Remnant bushland in places like Blackwattle Bay retain elements of traditional plant, bird and animal life, including fish and rock oysters (Anita Heiss, "Aboriginal People and Place", Barani: Indigenous History of Sydney City http://www.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/barani).
With the invasion of the Sydney region, the Cadigal and Wangal people were decimated but there are descendants still living in Sydney today. All cities include many immigrants in their population. Aboriginal people from across the state have been attracted to suburbs such as Pyrmont, Balmain, Rozelle, Glebe and Redfern since the 1930s. Changes in government legislation in the 1960s provided freedom of movement enabling more Aboriginal people to choose to live in Sydney (Anita Heiss, "Aboriginal People and Place", Barani: Indigenous History of Sydney City http://www.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/barani).
The fist formal grant in the Glebe area was a 400 acre grant to Rev.Richard Johnson, the colony's first chaplain, in 1789. The Glebe (land allocated for the maintenance of a church minister) comprised rolling shale hills covering sandstone, with several sandstone cliff faces. The ridges were drained by several creeks including Blackwattle Creek, Orphan School Creek and Johnston Creek. Extensive swampland surrounded the creeks. On the shale ridges, heavily timbered woodlands contained several varieties of eucalypts while the swamplands and tidal mudflats had mangroves, swamp oaks (Casuarina glauca) and blackwattles (Callicoma serratifolia) after which the bay is named. Blackwattle Swamp was first mentioned by surveyors in the 1790s and Blackwattle Swamp Bay in 1807. By 1840 it was called Blackwattle Bay. Boat parties collected wattles and reeds for the building of huts, and kangaroos and emus were hunted by the early settlers who called the area the Kangaroo Ground. Rozelle Bay is thought to have been named after a schooner which once moored in its waters.
Johnson's land remained largely undeveloped until 1828, when the Church and School Corporation subdivided it into 28 lots, 3 of which they retained for church use (City Plan Heritage, 2005, quoting Max Solling & Peter Reynolds 'Leichhardt: On the Margins of the City', 1997, 14).
The Church of England sold 27 allotments in 1828 - north on the point and south around Broadway. The Church kept the middle section where the Glebe Estate is now. Up until the 1970s the Glebe Estate was in the possession of the Church.
On the point the sea breezes attracted the wealthy who built villas. The Broadway end attracted slaughterhouses and boiling down works that used the creek draining to Blackwattle Swamp. Smaller working-class houses were built around these industries. Abbattoirs were built there from the 1860s.
When Glebe was made a municipality in 1859 there were pro and anti-municipal clashes in the streets. From 1850 Glebe was dominated by wealthier interests.
Reclaiming the swamp, Wentworth Park opened in 1882 as a cricket ground and lawn bowls club. Rugby Union was played there in the late 19th century. The dog racing started in 1932. In the early 20th century modest villas were broken up into boarding houses as they were elsewhere in the inner city areas. The wealthier moved into the suburbs which were opening up through the railways. Up until the 1950s Sydney was the location for working class employment - it was a port and industrial city. By the 1960s central Sydney was becoming a corporate city with service-based industries - capital intensive not labour intensive. A shift in demographics occurred, with younger professionals and technical and administrative people servicing the corporate city wanting to live close by. Housing was coming under threat and the heritage conservation movement was starting. The Fish Markets moved in in the 1970s. A influx of students came to Glebe in the 1960s and 1970s. (Dr Lisa Murray, in Central Sydney, 5/8/2009).
Lyndhurst:
Lyndhurst is built on part of a grant in 1796 of 400 acres to Reverend Richard Johnson on Church of England property known as the Glebe. Trustees of the Clergy and School Lands Corporation subdivided the Glebe in 1828 and Lot 5 was sold to Charles Cowper (Historic Houses Trust, 1994) in the original 1828 auctions (Collingwood et al, 2019).
The 36 acres (Collingwood et al, 2019) of land for Lyndhurst was purchased from Cowper in 1833 by Dr James Bowman for 1500 pounds. In April NSW's foremost Greek Revival style architect John Verge selected the site and prepared designs for the residence. In May and June the plans were prepared (Historic Houses Trust 1994).
Lyndhurst was built between 1834 and 1837 as a 'suburban villa' with view to Blackwattle Bay.Bowman was the principal colonial surgeon (and inspector of colonial hospitals: Collingwood et al, 2019) and his wife Mary (ibid, 1994) who was a daughter of graziers John and Elizabeth Macarthur. Her dowry included 2000 merino sheep and more than 200 cattle. With water frontage to Blackwattle Bay, the mansion was similar to Verge's Camden Park but had larger service wings and differed in room arrangement (ibid, 2019). No expense was spared on its building or fitting out. The surviving papers and accounts would make Lyndhurst the best documented domestic dwelling of the period (HHT, 1984, 2-3).
In the grounds were the large service yard and balancing wings and stables designed by Verge, elaborately laid out pleasure grounds, shrubbery and the kitchen garden. (ibid, 1984: 2-3). A sketch of Lyndhurst in the distance, from Ultimo House window, 1837 by Emily Manning shows it surrounded by bush on its ridgeline, one of several wooded headlands protruding into Blackwattle Bay (Manning, 1837).
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).
Francis Newman was the gardener at Lyndhurst. He was later appointed Superintendent of the Royal Society of Tasmania's garden in Hobart, which later would be renamed the Royal Tasmanian Botanic Gardens, a post he held form 1845 until his death in 1859 (Sheridan, 2011).
Bowman and Mary had apparently placed the planning of their grounds in (Landscape Gardener and Nurseryman, Thomas) Shepherd's hands, but he died in the same year as his 'Lectures on Landscape Gardening in Australia' were published, and his vision for a fine gentleman's estate on Blackwattle Bay was never fully realised at Lyndhurst (Bligh, 1973, 55-56).
The garden was described by Shepherd in his book on 'Landscape Gardening in Australia' and Bowman was another who attended Shepherd's (untimely, 1838) funeral. William Macarthur was a provider of seeds and cuttings to Thomas (Shepherd). Bowman purchased land near Wentworth Park, not so very far from (Shepherd's) Darling Nursery (in today's Chippendale). Shepherd's description of Lyndhurst's garden says "There is another first-rate edifice, the grounds of which have been laid off with great attention to the principles of Landscape Gardening, Lyndhurst, the seat of Dr. Bowman, to which I shall direct your attention, with a view to enlighten the proprietors of land, on the capabilities of their estates. This residence is situated on the south side of a branch of the river off Port Jackson; the ground contains fifty acres of land, and is bounded by Church land, a new road, and the estate of John Betts, Esq. This estate will have an imposing effect, both internally and externally. The house has three fronts open to a mowed-grass lawn of considerable extent. The site is placed upon a flat piece of land about 200 yards from the river; the situation is commanding. The offices are enclosed within a high wall at the back of the house; and are well arranged. A tank of large dimensions has been sunk in the back yard, supplied by pipes from the roof of the house; and is built with brick and covered with cement, with a drain at the bottom. The coach house and stables are built out of sight of the house, park and pleasure grounds. A road will lead from them with a bold sweep through part of the park to the house, and also from them to a small wharf. The kitchen garden is in a valley behind the stables; it is composed of rich loam, and has been laid out in straight walks, and planted with fruit trees. The approach of the mansion enters at the south-east corner; it is seen for several hundred yards, and then takes a bold turn towards the coach sweep in front of the house without any reverse turn, which adds to its beauty. The coach sweep will form an exact oval, the whole width of the front of the house, convex in the centre, and covered with mowed grass. No clumps will be placed in the centre of the lawn, as that would lessen its bredth, but the lawn will be surrounded by a shrubbery which borders the terrace at the bottom of the paddock, will be enclosed by a post and chain fence. The shrubbery walks will branch off from the approach in front of the house, into shrubberies extending to the right and left. These will be considered part of the Landscape Garden, and will darken the glow of light which is produced by the expansion of the water. The opposite shore has a fine effect from this residence, being richly furnished with beautiful trees disposed with much natural taste among picturesque rocks. At a distance the landsacpe is heightened by gentle elevations conveying the idea of broken ground divided by water. This estate commands about a mile of frontage to the bay. It is beautifully wooded, and has a considerable extent of glade or lawn within thriving forest scenery. The house is the principal feature of the landscape. Thick masses of wood branch off from the back part of the house. This estate will present a splendid instance of what may be effected by knowledge, taste, and wealth, upon ground to all appearance unfit for improvements. It will be a model for a genteel marine residence. The indigenous trees have been preserved, and are as pleasing as if a new assortment of trees had been platned, and had grown up in their place' (Crittenden, 1992, 97-99).
The Bowmans' occupation did not last long. Dr Bowman had become involved with Macarthur brothers-in-law over the Australian Agricultural (A.A.) Company and in 1842 was experiencing financial difficulty. The Macarthurs took possession of the property and leased it to the short-lived St James'Theological College. Mary's brothers, James and William Macarthur also became indebted and the Bank of Australia took possession of it (Historic Houses Trust, 1990).
Bowman died in 1846, leaving a widow and five children. The property was bought by James and William Macarthur, who sold it to the Church of England (ibid, 2019).
In 1852 the bank sold the property to the Roman Catholic Church for the establishment of St Mary's College, the most important Roman Catholic School in Sydney. St James was Australia's first theological college and produced several distinguished native born clerics. The success of it's classical department gave Bishop Broughton, Australia's first Anglican Bishop, hope that it would play a part in the emerging university movement. However, its churchmanship was considered too high and this involved a major crisis which let to it's demise. St Mary's shared a similar fate. It taught secular pupils while the English Benedictine community which provided the teaching staff formed a regular order. It had a reputation for its elaborate classical curriculum and high scholarly standards. The school began to decline in the late 1860s when competition from the country catholic schools, the irish dislike of English Benedictinism and criticism for its high fees weakened its popularity. (Historic Houses Trust 1984: 4).
c1850s estate plans show the servants' wings off the back of the house and the well in its courtyard. There were then extensive grounds down to Blackwattle Bay, stables and other outbuildings. Further outbuildings were constructed after this, and can be seen on later maps. A part of one later outbuilding survives, fronting 15 Lyndhurst Street. It can be seen in the subdivision plan of 1878 (caption, The Glebe Society, exhibition, 'Villas of Glebe and Forest Lodge, c.1870', 7/2019).
St Mary's Benedictine College closed in 1877 (Richards, 1982, 45). In 1878 and 1885 the estate was sold, subdivided and terraced houses went up. The service wings behind the house came off, the stables demolished and the grounds built upon. Morris Asher, M.P., a businessman, bought the house in 1878. For some time after this the building was run as a lying-in (maternity) hospital.
In 1890 Morris had the verandahs and porch demolished, the main staircase taked down and the interior divided into a series of small rooms and passages. Stairs were provided for each house. The houses were not successful and the interior was returned to that of one house, adding to the already confused state of the altered interior. (Historic Houses Trust 1990)
During the period 1890-1905 one of the terraces became Lyndhurst Private School run by Miss Agnes Watt. (Historic Houses Trust 1994)
Lyndhurst was purchased in 1925 by Aubrey Bartlett who owned it until its resumption for the freeway in 1972. By this time the building had long ceased to be a residence and had been given over to factory use. Buildings had been constructed against its walls and it served as a broom factory, soap factory, ice cream shop and joinery factory among others (Historic Houses Trust, 1990) and pickle factory and warehouse for leather goods.
In 1972 Lyndhurst was purchased by the NSW Department of Main Roads for demolition, to make way for a freeway (Richards, 1982, 45). (Richards, 1982, 45). Public support prompted by the Save Lyndhurst Committee for the rescue of a Verge masterpiece and a change of government led to the abandonment of the proposal and the subsequent restoration of the house by Clive Lucas, Stapleton and partners between 1979 and 1988 (Historic Houses Trust: 1994).
Following a long public campaign by bodies (including the Glebe Society and the Builders and Labourers' Federation) and a change of state government, the proposal was abandoned (ibid, 2019). The state government reversed its decision and began restoration of the architecturally and historically important house (Richards, 1982, 45).
The first brief came from the Heritage Council in 1979 to see if the wreck could be saved. The Heritage Council Restoration Steering Committee inspected Lyndhurst on 26/10/1981 and the consultant project architect, Clive Lucas was asked to prepare estimates on the cost of replacement of the stairs, porch base, chimney pieces, exterior terraces and provision of a modern kitchen and toilet facilities. It was decidced to approach the Department of Main Roads regarding possible acquisition of adjoining properties to ensure an adequate curtilage for Lyndhurst. Housing and exhibition at Lyndhurst of architectural records, particularly drawings, was considered as well as transfer of the John Verge-designed building to the Historic Houses Trust of NSW as its main office and a resource centre on historic interiors (HC, 1982).
Finance was allocated for necessary structural repairs, a temporary roof and caretakers accomodation. This halted decay and allowed for proper assessment. Initial recommendations, including restoration of the hall, dining, drawing room and library, were achieved by 1981, allowing the public to appreciate the house.
In 1983 the building was transferred to the Historic Houses Trust of NSW to complete the project to provide them with a headquarters. Attention was first paid to the interiors. The last phase of the restoration was the reconstruction of the garden. This work was finished in May 1988 (Historic Houses Trust 1990).
The weekend of 29-30 October 1988 marked the official opening of Lyndhurst as headquarters of the Historic HOuses Trust of NSW and the Conservation Resources Centre. Members of the public were invited to visit (Australian Garden Journal, 8(1), 10-11/1986, 36).
In 1990 Clive Lucas Stapleton & Partners were awarded the Greenway award by the Royal Australian Institute of Architectsfor Excellence in building restoration. (Historic Houses Trust 1990).
The property was sold before auction in 2005 to Tim Eustace and partner Salvatore Panui for $3.3m who asked Clive Lucas back to do more restoration work, adding a new kitchen and opening the property to the public occasionally. The property is back on the market in 2016 following Eustace and Panui's purchase of (also NSW State Heritaeg Register-listed) Iona, in Darlinghurst from film makers Baz Luhrmann and Catherine Martin (Macken, 2-3/4/16). |