The Horsley complex is a heritage-listed rural estate at 52–58 Jamieson Close, Horsley Park, New South Wales, a suburb of.Sydney, Australia. It was built from 1805 to 1832, with uses as a vineyard, orchard, horse and livestock breeding farm. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 April 1999. The heritage listing for the complex covers the residence and surrounding pastoral property, also known as Horsley complex (homestead, outbuildings, garden, farm), Horsley Park, King's Gift and Horsley House.
History Establishment of the Horsley estate (1831–1839) and naming of Horsley In 1805, Governor King granted Lieutenant Colonel George Johnston of Annandale farm 2000 acres of land at Prospect, for his part in putting down a convict uprising at Castle Hill in the previous year. Johnston called the farm "King's Gift". Johnston died in 1823.
A related place is Horsley near Dapto (Wollongong), which was a grant /19 to George Weston's elder brother, William Francis Weston, known as "Mr Johnston's Meadow". William Francis Weston died in 1826 leaving a widow and five small children, and it is possible that George Weston came to Australia to advise and help his sister in law, Elizabeth around this time.
The Horsley (Fairfield) land was given by Col. Johnston to his daughter Blanche, who, on 21 May 1829, at St. James' Church, Sydney, married George Edward Nicholas Weston, a Lieutenant in the East India Company Service. Weston had a Swiss mother and his family had descendants on West Horsley Manor in Surrey in England dating back to 1066, farming large estates. It is thought Horsley (Fairfield) is named after West Horsley Manor in Surrey.
The Weston family and estate life Captain & Mrs George Weston spent the following two years in India, returning to Sydney with their two children in July 1831. In that year they took up their property, living in a large Indian tent attended by Indian servants until the house was completed.
In 1832, the homestead was built by then, together with major outbuildings (kitchen, stables, blacksmith's shop and barn).
The well-wooded land produced timber carted to sawmills for many years. The Westons' predominant interests were agriculture and raising stock, including fine bloodstock race horses. Captain Weston (from reports in the Australian between 1831 and 1841) was involved with the Cumberland Turf Club, the Australian Race Committee, fox hunting, and with contemporary political issues.
In 1839, Captain Weston was one of the promoters of a public meeting to petition the continuation of transportation of convicts to maintain the supply of low cost farm labour. An 1843 Sydney Morning Herald report noted his indignation at the loss of a convict's labour by the Governor's order, his support for neighbour William Lawson (of Greystanes) in elections to the Legislative Council in 1843 and his animosity to Hannibal Macarthur in the same election. Other 1844 Sydney Morning Herald reports show his involvement in establishing the Penrith Agricultural Society and his award for the best coaching stallion.
The Westons had eight children, 4 girls and 4 boys, 1 of whom died in infancy.
In 1837, Captain Weston had a pack of foxhounds at Horsley, and by 1838 his pastoral activities had extended beyond the limits of location, and he held a grazing lease in South-West Yass.
An 1841, sale notice in the Australian cited land near the "mansion and improving property" of Captain Weston, but the area was not closely settled then.
The Westons exported horses to India, a Sydney Morning Herald report of 29 August 1844 describing 80 horses loaded onto the Blondell bound for Calcutta, of which 31 belonged to Blanche's brothers Robert and David Johnston, and Captain Weston. Although East India Company agents left Calcutta in 1847, horse trading between the Australian colonies continued at a diminishing rate for several more years.
George Weston died at Horsley in 1856 at the age of 56 and was buried at St. Bartholemew's cemetery at Prospect. His widow Blanche continued to conduct the farm business, supported by her extended family, and employees and their families, who had been in her service for many years.
An 1871 storey in the Town & Country journal describes a garden, vineyard of about 15 acres which produced 2000 gallons of wine in 1870 and none due to blight in 1871, and Mr Frank (Francis, the youngest son, then managing the property)'s pride, his horse stock, many of which were successful race horses.
The main driveway from front gates was lined with bunya pines (from photographs these were possibly planted by 1860s/70s) terminating in two Moreton Bay figs, where it reached the crest of the hill on which the house stood. Circular carriage loop and shrubbery laid out in front (east) of house. Later a small carriage drive was laid out (along what is now the north and west site boundaries), and a planted maze.
Blanche Weston died in 1904 at the age of 98. At that time, some of her employees were the third generation of those families in service and residence at Horsley. In 1904, the main activity was again grazing, with all the wine used in the house produced on the estate, fine vineyards and orchards. A report in the Cumberland Argus 3 September 1904 notes this, and that wheat had been formerly grown but abandoned due to rust attacks years ago.
During Blanche's lifetime, there had been a number of changes to the package of land comprising Horsley and smaller adjoining grants, which had become the property of other Johnston family members or been used to negotiate exchanges with Weston land elsewhere.
Late nineteenth-century prosperity and consolidation and changes to land holdings In 1906, Blanches' widowed daughter Alice Smart successfully applied to have them all brought together under the one certificate of title, making her the owner of 2045 acres, by then traversed to the east by a section of the Sydney Water Supply Canal to Prospect Reservoir.
Subdivision and decline of the estate In 1924 (or 1930Lucas, 1982), the estate was subdivided into 20 & 40 acre holdings, with approximately 65 acres including the homestead remaining in the possession of Miss Julia Perry, a Weston descendant (granddaughter) of Mrs. Weston).Lucas, 1982 Julia Perry (née Antill), a granddaughter of Mrs Weston, lived there until the late 1930s, when the estate passed out of the hands of the Johnston-Weston family.
Moffitt family ownership (1939) In January 1939, the property passed out of the Weston/Johnston family, being purchased by Frederic Moffitt, the father of the present (2002) owners, Mrs Helen Kerfoot and her sister Mrs June Vines. Moffitt occupied Horsley in May 1939. The barn (which was to the west of the house and at the end of the street of outbuildings) was demolished.
Before Frederic Moffit's death in 1951, he transferred the property to his wife. In 1957, two 5-acre blocks surveyed for possible sale. 5 acres was sold in 1959.
In 1960, 5 acres was sold, reducing site to 60 acres.
In 1966, Mrs Moffitt died and the property was inherited by the three remaining daughters. Helen Kerfoot, who had been living at Horsley with her mother for some years, continued to occupy the homestead portion, now with 12 acres.
In 1969, the property was surveyed and a new subdivision was laid out.
In 1972, the new subdivisions were sold. The site was reduced to 12 acres (4.45 hectares) but still included homestead, major outbuildings, driveway and most important tree plantings. New rear access to site provided via Jamison Close, also servicing new subdivisions.
Losses included: the pond, a small dam surrounded by trees immediately to the south of the front gates, and a favourite haunt of birds; the orchard on the southern slopes below the homestead and a small vineyard, originally with its own winepress, to the north; the cottage originally used by Mrs George Weston as a school for children on the property; the site of the original barn built over by a new residence.
By 1982, the site was ringed by new housing development built on the 1972 subdivisions. A poultry shed was built adjacent to the eastern boundary. The new developments were insensitive in their form and siting, and impinge on the major views of the homestead from the east and south-east approached along The Horsley Drive.
Conservation works In 1971, general external repair and restoration works were carried out to the homestead, including new corrugated iron roofing, gutters and downpipes added, the iron on the south skillion replacing the extant Morewood & Roger's patent iron (roof) tiles. General repairs and painting were done to the homestead. The office and laundry's original joinery had severely deteriorated and was repaired/renewed to its original detail.
In 1976, external restoration work was carried out to the Stables block, with financial assistance from a Federal government National Estate grant, including repairs to the roof and guttering, walls and joinery.
Description
Grounds To the north of the outbuildings and down a slope was a vineyard, with its own wine press, and on the southern slopes to the house was an orchard.
The western property boundary is marked by a row of bunya pines (Araucaria bidwillii). On the northern slope there are extensive remains of orchard terracing and a second drive.
The vineyard of Horsley extended over the surrounding hillside and was tended initially by convicts and later by a German wine dresser especially brought out for the purpose as was the custom.
Garden The garden provides an appropriate period setting for the house and is significant in its own right as well as being the setting for Horsley Homestead.
The approach is by a gently curving carriage drive through a formal avenue of bunya pines (Araucaria bidwillii) and Chir pines (Pinus roxburghii). On the crest of a hill at the western end of the avenue, the drive goes through an outer set of garden gates flanked by two huge Moreton Bay figs (Ficus macrophylla) which frame the entrance driveway to the house, groupings of plumbago (Plumbago capensis) and sweet bay (Laurus nobilis). Other trees such as jacarandas (Jacaranda mimosifolia) and Illawarra flame trees (Brachychiton acerifolius) were planted by Helen Kerfoot since the 1950s.HK/Stuart Read, pers.comm.
Closer to the house, the drive forks to form a petal shaped carriage loop which further divides to create a smaller, circular loop. The circular loop before the house's eastern front was formerly planted in a clearly visible ( photographs) quatrefoil design which today is rather overgrown shrubbery, screening the view. Contained in this loop is a number of choice plants, including a rare South African plant, the Kei apple (Carissa grandiflora), bird-of-paradise flower (Strelitzia nicolae), sweet box (Murraya paniculata), crepe myrtle (Lagerstroemia indica), Nile lilies (Agapanthus orientalis) etc.
The drive winds north of the house and around to its rear (west where it turns west into a "street" of outbuildings and further on a rear drive to the south-west out to Horsley Road. Behind the house is a later tennis court and remnant flower beds. Tree plantings in this area include a Kaffir plum (Harpephyllum afrum) north-west of the house, five rare native corkwood trees (Duboisea myoporoides), a weeping Boree or myall (Acacia pendula) to the west. Further west is another large Moreton Bay fig.
HOUSE Horsley was a pastoral holding set up to be an entirely self-sufficient community. The substantial homestead was built on the highest of a series of wooded hills in gently undulating country, with fine views in all directions.