Third Government Farm

About

The Third Government Farm is a heritage-listed garden at Gilbert Road, near Old Northern Road, Castle Hill, The Hills Shire, New South Wales, Australia. It was built during 1801. It is also known as Castle Hill Heritage Park; Third Government Farm (former); Castle Hill Settlement Site; Old Government Farm Site; Castle Hill Convict Farm; Castle Hill Historic Site. The property is owned by The Hills Shire Council (Local Government). It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 22 December 2000.

Castle Hill Heritage Park is significant principally for its association with the participants in the Castle Hill convict rebellion, also known as the Second Battle of Vinegar Hill.

The Second Battle of Vinegar Hill holds a seminal, but only relatively recently recognised, place in Australian ethnic, religious and political history. The Second Battle of Vinegar Hill is the only recorded armed battle between Europeans in Australia, other than the Eureka Stockade, although there were bigger battles between Europeans and indigenous Australians up until the 1930s. The Second Battle of Vinegar Hill involved approximately 300 mainly Irish insurgents, most of whom had been transported for sedition, political activism and uprisings in Ireland, and of whom fifteen were shot, nine hanged, nine flogged (200–500 lashes each), and fifty sent in chains to Coal River (later renamed Newcastle ) for their part in the uprising. The insurgents battled with the soldiers of the New South Wales Corps and the militia.

The reasons for the uprising remain unclear. "Death or Liberty" was the catchphrase used by the insurgents during the Rebellion and the popular view has been that the uprising was a bid for freedom in response to cruel punishments and food shortages. This, however, is perhaps too narrow and simplistic a view given the demographics of the convict population. It is likely that the uprising was a largely political act of organised revolution by the largely Irish National convict population who did not recognise English authority in Ireland, and had been transported for their involvement in political uprisings in the Old Country. The view that to the Irish Defenders and the Society of the United Irishmen, all English authority was illegitimate, unjust and their natural state was to resist it, both at home and in the colonies, is a plausible, wider view of events.

It is still not certain why the uprising took place. There are few official and public records on this point dating to the Rebellion, due to age and circumstance and probably because of the potential embarrassment to Governor King whose policy to concentrate Irish political prisoners in a single remote location could have been seen by London and the Colonial Secretary as naive (which it almost certainly was). Those participants who were not executed as a deterrent were separated and dispersed after the Rebellion to ensure such group action was unlikely ever to again occur. Their story has never been adequately told.

It is fascinating, however, that such an important episode in Colonial history has gone largely unrecognised and un-commemorated for so long. This may relate to political and religious trends in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

The following important events took place on the site:

- 1801 – work commenced on the Third Government Farm, with the soil being described as the "best and most productive kind".

- 1801-2 – the bridges, long hut of 30.5 by 6.1 metres (100 by 20 ft) and watering place were referred to in a surveyors field book.

- October 1802 – Francis Peron described Castle Hill as an "infant town" consisting of "a dozen houses" with "cultivated land" and 'several handsome farms'

- 1803 – a watercolour indicated that the Government Farm area was substantially cleared with 1718 structures, tracks and associated areas under tillage. Importantly, the image shows the "long hut" with adjacent store house and mill house.

- 30 June 1803 – Governor King reported that he was constructing a stone barrack at Castle Hill of two storeys and 30.5 by 7.3 metres (100 by 24 ft).

- August 1803 – the Barracks was still under construction

- 4 March 1804 – Vinegar Hill uprising occurred, with a "house" set alight on the Government Farm.

- August 1807 – repairs to a number of buildings occurred, as well as the granary and barn reported finished.

- April 1811 – Macquarie instructed the farm be converted into an asylum and a garden fenced at rear of granary for exercise of inmates, with the building to accommodate 30 persons.

- 1817 – buildings reported in good condition (with a few repairs needed), with mention of a kitchen (separate?) and the need for partitions in the upper storey to create an internal configuration of two wards and a store room.

- March 1819 – building reported as upstairs female ward and need for partition to separate male inmates upstairs as well, store recommended. Roof and walls unplastered with damp conditions.

- November 1826 – the former asylum was converted into a church requiring a replacement roof, shingling, ladder and rail, replacement of floors, partitioning, door furniture, window repairs and glazing, clean verandah beams and new posts, whitewashing and plastering of two rooms 18.3 by 5.5 metres (60 by 18 ft) and one 13.7 by 5.5 metres (45 by 18 ft) feet.

- 1828 – former asylum land formally conveyed to the Church and Schools Corporation.