Binnawee Homestead

About

Binnawee Homestead is a heritage-listed disused homestead at 111 Lester's Lane, Mudgee, Mid-Western Regional Council, New South Wales, Australia. It was built from 1850 to 1900. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 9 June 2009.

Wiradjuri Land The Wiradjuri Aboriginal people lived in the Mudgee area for many thousands of years before Europeans arrived. The name Mudgee is derived from the Wiradjuri term Moothi meaning "Nest in the Hills".

Early European occupation of the area James Blackman was the first European settler to cross the Cudgegong River in 1821 followed by Lieutenant William Lawson who was then commandant of Bathurst. Lawson would later take up 6,000 acres (2,428 hectares) in the area. George and Henry Cox, sons of William Cox, were the first settlers on the Cudgegong River when they established the Menah run, 3 kilometres north of the current town. The European settlers were soon in conflict with the Wiradjuri over a range of issues including killing of livestock and animals such as kangaroos and possums which were major food sources for the indigenous people. Martial law was declared in 1824 leading to significant losses by the Wiradjuri.

While the site of Mudgee was surveyed for a village in 1823, Menah was the original settlement having a police station and a lock-up by 1833. Robert Hoddle designed the village which was gazetted in 1838. John Blackman built a slab hut, the first dwelling in Mudgee and its general store. By 1841, there were 36 dwellings, three hotels, a hospital, a post office, two stores and an Anglican church. An Anglican school was established in that decade as well.

In 1851, the population of Mudgee was 200. However, the population soon exploded with the discovery of gold in New South Wales. While no gold was found in Mudgee itself, the town prospered as gold was discovered in nearby Hargraves, Gulgong, Hill End and Windeyer, some temporarily reaching populations of 20,000... As the gold mines petered out in the latter half of the 19th century, Mudgee was sustained by the strength of its wool industry as well as the nascent wine industry established by a German immigrant, Adam Roth, in the 1850s.

Family ownership of Binnawee farm Henry Cox was the son of William Cox, who was responsible for the construction on the first road across the Blue Mountains. Henry Cox became the first grantee of the land now known as Binnawee, bought at a cost of 244 pounds and registered in 1834. This grant adjoined further of his crown grants to the east and to the north. In 1852 Henry Cox sold the Cullenbone property, including Binnawee, to William Lewis, whose father Richard Lewis had worked with Henry's father on the road construction project as Chief Superintendent. Throughout the 1850s Lewis took up several runs on the Castlereagh River. Perhaps buoyed by his prosperity, Lewis is believed to have built the Georgian two-storey homestead which was initially called "LoisAlle".

By 1862 Lewis was insolvent and all of his real estate interests seized and sold. "LoisAlle" was purchased by the Blackmen brothers of Mudgee, cousins of Lewis' wife. William Richard and Samuel Alfred Blackman, sons of Mudgee pioneers, William and Sarah Blackman, became prominent landowners in the Mudgee district. In 1869 William bought out Samuel's share in the property and lived there during the 1870s, occasionally leasing the house and portions of adjoining land.

In 1878 Blackman sold the property to George Henry Cox of Burrundulla, a prominent pastoralist in Mudgee (and nephew of the original grantee - he was also Henry Cox's son-in-law since he had married his cousin Henrietta). George Henry Cox absorbed the property into his adjoining landholding known as Piambong and the house and lands were leased. From 1883 to 1886 the house was occupied by George Henry Cox's eldest son, George Henry Frederick Cox. In the late 1890s the house was occupied by John Turner McRae, a nephew by marriage and manager of Piambong. Legal documentation in 1898 refers to him as John Turner McRae as of "Binnawee", although it is not known precisely when or by whom the property was given this name.

Shortly before his death in 1901, George Henry Cox transferred the property to his son-in-law George Stewart. In 1900 the widower Stewart and his four children took up residence at Binnawee where he was assisted by his sisters-in-law, Lucy and Alice Cox. Referred to as the "squire of Binnawee" George played a prominent role in the political, commercial and social life of the Mudgee district. He was an alderman of the Municipality of Cudgegong for twenty-one years, including four years as mayor from 1905 to 1908, and also served as a Justice of the Peace, coroner and magistrate. He was also a pillar of Mudgee's Saint John's Anglican Church.

In 1923 Stewart leased Binnawee to Dr Charles Lester and his son, Bruce, and moved to Sydney where he died in 1926. Charles Lester was born in Mudgee in 1865, and graduated from medical studies at the University of Edinburgh in 1888. He married Mary Bruce before returning to Mudgee to establish his medical practice in the early 1890s. Also a qualified pharmacist, Charles operated his medical practice and pharmacy in premises in Church Street, Mudgee, later known as Mercer's and Gawthorne's Pharmacy. Charles left Mudgee and established a practice in Macquarie Street in 1924.

Bruce Lester, also a qualified pharmacist, was a member of the 6th Light Horse Division during World War I, serving for four years in the Middle East. In 1920 he selected Kobi, a block of 225 acres adjacent to Binnawee, which was formerly part of an 1823 grant to Captain Henry Steel. In 1923 Bruce married Mabel Hume, by whom he had one son, David. Bruce and Mabel Lester lived at Binnawee which was run primarily as a sheep property with some cattle. Charles and Bruce Lester also bred racehorses, while Bruce was a competent amateur jockey, frequently riding in the Bligh Picnic Races.

In 1944 Bruce Lester became ill and, as there was a shortage of manpower due to the war, 16-year-old son David took over the management of the property. In 1948 Bruce Lester purchased the Binnawee homestead portion from George Stewart's trustees and the property was eventually expanded to some 2,500 acres (1,000 ha). In 1950 David married Mary Grant and built a new homestead on Binnawee in 1955. Gradually reduced to 120 hectares (300 acres) over the years, Binnawee retains some sheep and cattle. In partnership with their daughters - Elizabeth Ganguly, Anne Lofts, and Robyn Holdaway - David and Mary have recently planted olive groves.

Architectural context of house and homestead The historic Binnawee Homestead building is the earliest surviving two-storeyed house in the Mudgee district: Burrandulla homestead was constructed in 1864 and Havilah homestead in 1872. Bleak House in Lawson Street, Mudgee dates from c. 1860.

Binnawee Homestead is located on part of a crown grant of 976 acres (395 ha) on Macdonald's Creek at Cullenbone, several kilometres north-west of Mudgee, across the Parishes of Munna and Piambong in the County of Wellington. Although the property is operated as a working farm, the curtilage of this listing closely surrounds the group of mid-19th-century buildings, of which the focal point is the historic Binnawee Homestead.

Homestead Thought to have been constructed c. 1855, the homestead building is substantial but unpretentious. Its Georgian style owes much to earlier Australian vernacular design and it was most likely designed by the builder or copied from a pattern book.

Facing south-east with front and rear elevations of five bays, the house is a compact rectangle with a deceptively asymmetrical exterior. The fenestration of the front elevation is balanced, but at the rear the windows on both the lower and upper levels are irregularly placed to accommodate the off-centre stair. Consequently, the two rooms on the south-western corner on both the ground and first floors are relatively small.

The light red bricks are, for the most part, in good condition. The south-eastern elevation is in Flemish bond, while the rear and two sides are in colonial or garden wall bond. All windows and doors feature flat gauged arches with tuck pointing.

The steeply pitched hipped roof, which retains the original shingles under the unpainted corrugated iron, is pierced by two tall, corbelled brick chimneys servicing five fireplaces. A timber-floored verandah, 1.8 metres (5.9 ft) deep, surrounds the ground floor, while its concave profile roof is supported by flat, stop-chamfered timber columns. On the ground floor of the front elevation two sets of shuttered French doors flank each side of the central front door. All windows are six-pane sashes and featured shutters, although the windows at the front are slightly larger than those on the rear and sides. Many windows retain the original glazing and feature the remains of stencilled floral patterns.

The impressive double front doors, capped by a three-paned stencilled fanlight are painted red on the exterior. Each door features a single panel with heavy bolection mouldings and a semi-circular headed top. Stained and lacquered on the interior, each door has two panels with a semi-circular headed top on the upper panel. Both the front and rear doors have substantial drawback rimlocks.

Although the house is relatively small there is a distinction between the principal rooms at the front and secondary rooms at the rear on both floors. Although the skirtings are a standard size throughout, architraves and doors are smaller in the four rear rooms. Ceiling height is a uniform 2.88 metres (9.4 ft) metres.