| Historical notes: | The original inhabitants of the Campbelltown area were mostly people of the Dharawal (sometimes referred to as Tharawal) language group, who ranged from the coast to the east, the Georges River in the west, north to Botany Bay and south to Nowra. However, Campbelltown was a meeting point with the Dharug language group (whose area extended across the Blue Mountains), and early history of the area includes references to both peoples. (Liston, Carol: Campbelltown: The Bicentennial History, 1988; www.abc.net.au/indigenous). Mount Annan, to the south-west of the Campbelltown City Centre, was known as Yandel'ora to its original owners, the Dharawal people and was an important meeting place for Aboriginal people from as far away as northern Queensland and southern Victoria. (http://www.daff.gov.au/natural-resources/landcare/publications/making_a_difference_a_celebration_ of_landcare/section_6_-_indigenous_landcare).
With the establishment of the convict colony in Sydney Harbour in 1788, the displacement of Aboriginal people began. A smallpox epidemic decimated many of the coastal clans, but was less destructive amongst the inland peoples.
Escaped cattle from the settlement moved south and bred in the Campbelltown/Camden area and after their discovery in 1795, the area became known as The Cow Pastures (or Cowpasture). In 1805, John Macarthur obtained a grant of 5,000 acres (later expanded to 10,000 acres) in the area, some of the best grazing land then known in the colony.
By 1809, 34 settlers had received grants in the newly named Minto district (named after Lord Minto, the Governor-General of India) in the northern portion of Campbelltown. Many of these early settlers were Irish, including surveyor James Meehan, who allocated himself a generous portion (now Macquarie Fields). Prominent settlers included surgeon Charles Throsby, who was allocated 600 acres (now Glenfield), Dr William Redfern (Campbellfield), Dr Robert Townson (Varroville) and Richard Brooks (Denham Court).
Though peaceful, the Dharawal bore the brunt of a punitive expedition led by Captain James Wallis in 1816. At least 14 Dharawal people were massacred at Appin, to the distress of sympathetic settlers such as Charles Throsby of Glenfield. The Appin massacre of 1816 was a devastating and tragic event for the Dharawal people and other local clans, and was a difficult period in terms of the relationship between Indigenous people and European settlers. Corroborees and other ceremonies continued under the protection of the Macarthurs of Camden, though numbers steadily declined, with diseases introduced by the Europeans also having a devastating effect on the Dharawal population.
As the district became more closely settled, a town was needed further south than Liverpool. Campbelltown was formally established in 1820 and named 'Campbelltown', in honour of Mrs Elizabeth Macquarie's maiden name of Campbell. In 1826, the town plan was formalised.
Between 1835 and 1845, the number of Aboriginal people in the Campbelltown Police District had decreased from twenty to none. However, limited tribal life continued and corroborees were still held at Camden Park and Denham Court until at least the 1850s. During 1858, approximately 200 Aboriginal people attended the celebrations at Campbelltown that were held to mark the opening of the railway line (LEP, 2016).
Campbelltown:
Permanent European settlement in the Campbelltown area had begun in 1809 as an alternative to the flood-prone Hawkesbury district. Work on a road from Sydney to Liverpool was started in 1811. It was opened in August 1814 and was soon extended further south to Appin. This road, variously known as Campbelltown Road, Appin Road or the Sydney Road, passed through Campbelltown. The section through the town was called the High Street until the last decade of the 19th century when it was renamed Queen Street (Orwell & Peter Phillips, 1995, vol.2, 1-2).
The land on which the Queen Street cottages stand was part of a grant of 140 acres to Joseph Phelps in 1816. He had been working the land for some years before receiving formal title to it. Phelps was one of the farmers of Airds and Appin who subscribed funds for a Sydney courthouse in July 1813. His grant was seized, possibly as soon as it was formally issued, by the Provost Marshal, William Gore in lieu of payment by Phelps of debts totalling 170 pounds. The land was auctioned in January 1817 to William Bradbury for 100 pounds plus twelve cattle and the grain produced from the crop growing on the land (ibid, 1995).
Immediately north of Phelps' grant, Assistant Surveyor James Meehan had informally reserved 175 acres for a village (AMCG, 1994 say 'in 1815'.) In 1816 most of the land in the area was granted, leaving a portion of 175 acres unalienated, and surrounded by several grants (AMCG, 1994, 9).
The reserved land was formally declared a town by Governor Macquarie in December 1820 and named Campbelltown in honour of his wife (Elizabeth)'s family (ibid, 1995).
William Bradbury (1774-1836) a native of Birmingham, was transported to NSW aboard the 'Guildford' in 1812. His wife Elizabeth remained in England but his daughter, Mary (1797-1852) followed her father to Australia in 1815. Bradbury had no other children in NSW, though he established a relationship with a woman named Alice and in April 1836 married a Campbelltown widow, Catherine Patrick, nee Acres (c.1801-1883). Bradbury died two months later (ibid, 1995, 2).
Governor Macquarie visited Campbelltown in January 1822. He and his party ate a 'hearty' breakfast at 'Bradbury's', indicating that Bradbury had built an inn. This was probably the inn later known as the Royal Oak, on the western side of the High Street. Macquarie noted in his journal that 'Bradbury is building a very good two storey brick house on his own farm and on a very pretty eminence immediately adjoining Campbell-Town as an inn for the accommodation the public and having asked me to give his farm a name, I have called it Bradbury Park. In 1826 Bradbury Park House was considered by William Dumaresq, inspector of roads and bridges, as the best building in Campbelltown when he reported on buildings suitable for military use (ibid, 1995, 2).
As the main street of Campbelltown, High Street or Sydney Road and later Queen Street, was at the edge of town, one side of the street was not within the town boundary while the other was. Canny traders soon realised that either side of the main road was as good as the other and leased or bought land from the grantees bordering the town proper. By the 1840s more than a few shops and hotels occupied the western side of the High Street (AMCG, 1994, 9).
The Queen Street terraces were identified by Helen Baker (Proudfoot) in the early 1960s as a unique group of two-storey late Georgian vernacular buildings which were considered to form the only surviving late-1840s streetscape within the County of Cumberland. The buildings were acquired by the Cumberland County Council and its successors, the State Planning Authority and Department of Planning, to ensure their preservation (ibid, 1995, 1).
The coming of the railway in 1858 aided in securing the commercial focus of the town on Queen Street (ibid, 1994, 9).
CBC Bank:
Joseph Phelps was granted 140 acres adjoining the future site of Campbelltown in 1816. His was one of a group of the first grants made that year. The subject property (the future 263 Queen Street) represents a small portion of the original grant. Phelps did not develop the portion of the grant that is the subject of this study. In fact no plan shows any development before 1881 (AMCG, 1994, 9).
Phelps increased his holdings to 170 acres in 1817, and that year conveyed the larger property to Thomas Clarkson. It passed through several hands up to 1870, however it appears was not developed in any way. It was presumably used for agricultural purposes (ibid, 1994, 14).
Samuel Parker, blacksmith, bought the subject property as part of a larger parcel in 1870 from Charles Morris. Parker owned the adjoining property (south side) and appears to have worked and resided on the property. What use, if any, he made of the subject site is unclear (Parker's house can be seen to the left of the bank in an 1881-83 photograph)(ibid, 1994, 14).
The Commercial Banking Company:
The Commercial Banking Company (CBC) of Sydney opened its first Campbelltown office in leased premises, McGuannes House at 286 Queen Street (across the road from no. 263) in 1874, with George L.Jones as manager. McGuannes House is separately listed on the State Heritage Register. It is owned by the Department of Environment & Planning and is at present leased as a doctor's surgery (Branch Manager's report, 100/85, 26/3/1985). AMCG (1994, 14) states that CBC bought the property (263 Queen St.) from Samuel Parker (not Morris) in 1876 and had the present building built in 1881. AMCG states that the bank's first permanent manager from 1874 was A.J.Gore, who served until he retired in 1904 (ibid, 14).
The bank moved into its own premises at 263 Queen Street in 1881. This building (built between 1874 and 1881) was designed by the Mansfield Brothers who were important Victorian architects employed by the CBC Bank on a number of projects (Branch Manager's report, 100/85, 26/3/1985) designing many bank chambers, examples surviving in many country towns (ibid, 1994, 14). It is a fine and restrained Italianate style rendered and painted building symmetrically designed about a small portico (Branch Manager's report, 100/85, 26/3/1985).
The bank sold a portion of the land it bought from Parker in 1880. The land was purchased in the name of the Queen for a new post office. That building was completed the same year as the CBC chambers (AMCG, 1994, 14).
In 1959 the bank sold off another portion of its 1876 purchase to the Commowealth of Australia, presumably for the creation of a telephone exchange (AMCG, 1994, 14).
The banking chamber has been altered, but it is understood that the building still contains a stone domed vault, and the original staircase and other joinery. There is a large yard behind the bank which contains a stable/ coach house, now used as a garage (Branch Manager's report, 100/85, 26/3/1985).
The CBC sold the bank chambers and property at 263 Queen Street in 1986, moving to new premises (as the National Australia Bank). In recent times the former bank building at 263 Queen Street has been leased by a Pancake restaurant and is today (1994) used as the offices for a local newspaper (AMCG, 1994, 19).
In 2018 a proposal to demolish the 1960s commercial building behind the bank and build a 21 storey commercial tower, was refused by teh Western Sydney Planning Panel, after a report from the NSW Heritage Council identified a risk that excavation for the proposed car-parking as part of the building's construction would damage the historic CBC bank building and labelled the proposal as overdevelopment of the site, breaching the CBD's 32m height limit (Zautsen, 2018, 5). |