Cottages - Aberfeldy

The cottage known as Aberfeldy was built in the Whitecross area of North Springwood (now Winmalee) by Henry Charles Lennox Anderson in the latter part of the nineteenth century. 

H.C.L. Anderson, as he was usually called by the Nepean Times, was a truly remarkable man, with abilities which spanned the humanities as well as the sciences. He was important in the Springwood district in the last two decades of the nineteenth century when a number of orchardists were striving to grow fruit of many varieties, as one of his special interests was agricultural chemistry and he was always ready to share his knowledge.

Anderson was born to Scottish parents, Robert and Margaret (nee Hewson) when they were en route to Australia on board the Empire on 10 May 1853. His father became a police inspector. Young Henry attended Sydney Grammar School and then earned a scholarship to Sydney University where he graduated B.A. in 1873 and M.A. in 1878, winning prizes for Shakespearian scholarship and literature and also agricultural chemistry along the way. He taught at Sydney Grammar School during this time and, in 1880, he married Harriet Lily Lloyd at the Macquarie Presbyterian Church. They had three children—Henry C. L. in 1881, Margaret L. E. in 1883 and Lily W. M. in 1886.

He was also interested in the military and was a Lieutenant in the 1st Regiment, Volunteer Infantry in 1885. He was promoted to Captain in 1888 and resigned in 1892. In 1882 he became an examiner in the Department of Public Instruction and helped to reorganise curricula and examinations. He became Vice Chairman of the Board of Examiners in 1889. At some stage in the 1880s he, according the Australian Dictionary of Biography, ‘invested every shilling he had in a farm and orchard at Penrith’. In fact, his orchard was situated in Springwood along the Hawkesbury Road, near Whitecross. His cottage was called Aberfeldy, probably named after the small town of Aberfeldy in Perthshire, Scotland. He maintained his interest in agricultural chemistry, experimenting with soil analysis and methods of fertilising.

The Nepean Times reported on a very instructive lecture in The Rural on the subject of chemical and other manures:

       It should be read by all orchardists, Mr Anderson’s study and experience going far to prove that chemical manures if applied in a proper manner are productive of great and lasting good. But he states that the land must be fully tested so that its wants may be supplied without unnecessary waste of chemicals.

In February 1890 Anderson was appointed Director of the first NSW Department of Agriculture, formed as a branch of the Department of Mines. This appointment was reported in the Nepean Times and Mr H.C.L. Anderson was said, proudly, to be ‘a landholder and summer resident of this salubrious clime’. He was very active in this position, establishing and editing the Agricultural Gazette of New South Wales, and founding the Hawkesbury Agricultural College and the Wagga Wagga Experiment Farm. He instituted programmes to distribute seeds, plants and cuttings and travelling demonstrations.

In Springwood he agreed to lecture on Springwood soils and manures for fruit and arranged a lecture for the new Springwood Progress Association by Mr A. H. Benson, fruit expert. The Agricultural Gazette sang the praises of Ellison’s orchard, also on the Hawkesbury Road. Ellison, it was said, did not use animal manures.

Unfortunately, in 1893, the Department of Agriculture was virtually closed down. This was seen as a result of Anderson’s giving evidence regarding political appointments in the Department of Mines at a Royal Commission into the civil service. In September of that year he was appointed principal librarian at the Free Public Library, a position he did not want and one that paid a lower salary. Two months later, the Nepean Times reported that he had let his young orchard and sold some of his land to a gent from Sydney. His connection with Springwood did not end here, however. He had been one of the original members of a committee formed in 1888 to organise the building of the Frazer Memorial Presbyterian Church and in December he was present at a concert to raise funds for the new Church. It was a highly acclaimed musical event where members of the musical Deane family, large land owners in the district, performed to the delight of the audience. Charles Muzio Deane, the cellist, played several items, and Miss Effie and Miss Edward Deane sang. H. C. L. Anderson paid a high tribute to Miss Edward Deane who had organised the concert and performed so well.

Anderson, in his new position of librarian, displayed his usual ability by streamlining the Library, initiating new programmes and practices and building a library that was truly a State Library. He introduced the employment of women, set up educational courses for the staff, annual stocktaking and the sending of small parcels of reference books to country students. In 1896 he wrote the Guide to the Catalogues of the Reference Library which later became the Guide to the System of Cataloguing which is still the basis of cataloguing practice in the State Library. In 1901 he introduced the Dewey Decimal System of cataloguing.

Anderson became friends with David Scott Mitchell and moved out of his house attached to the library to accommodate the 10,000 books donated by Mitchell. Anderson was still having problems with the Public Service who instituted a Select Committee to enquire into his alleged abuse of postal concessions, undue preference shown to Angus & Robertsons as agents for the library and the presence of ‘decidedly blue’ books in the collection. He was totally exonerated and it was recommended that the Mitchell wing of the library be built.

After becoming Director of the State’s new Intelligence Department in 1905 and Government Statistician in 1907, he again was appointed to an agricultural position in 1908 when he became Acting Undersecretary and Director of the new, independent and stronger Department of Agriculture.

Henry Charles Lennox Anderson died in 1924.

Shirley Evans

Early Residents - Goddard Family

Henry Holt Goddard and Kathleen (nee Young) emigrated to Australia on the part sail and part steam ship called the Duke of Sutherland. They set out from Northern Ireland sailing via the Suez Canal and took on coal at Colombo. The journey took six months and they arrived in Australia in 1885. Their first home was in Maryborough, Queensland where Henry set up shop and prospered as a barber. By 1897 Kathleen had borne seven children, six boys and one girl.

In 1898 they decided to sell up and came to Sydney where Henry rented premises from a Mr Saunders who was a local quarry owner. From the Pyrmont premises Henry ran a newsagency along with a barbers shop. The children also attended school in Pyrmont. Tragedy struck the family twice before their move to Springwood when their eldest child Walter died of pneumonia and then son Bertie drowned accidentally in Black Wattle Bay. Kathleen bore another son thereafter.

These very sad events affected Henry and made him consider retirement. In 1909 the lives of the family changed when Henry saw 50 acres of land for sale advertised in the Sydney Morning Herald. The property was located at the end of Whitecross Road, adjoining land owned by St. Columba’s College. In 1910 they purchased the property, which contained the cottage Aberfeldy which had been built by H.C.L. Anderson. The Aberfeldy property contained an orchard with English Mulberry trees and persimmons, as well as a lovely flower garden. Henry sent to the Richmond River for Cecil, now the eldest son, and Stanley.

Cecil arrived in 1911 and took over the running of the Post Office until Henry moved to Springwood.  Each day Cecil took what was known as the ‘sociable’ into town and met the 10am train from Sydney. He sorted the North Springwood mail from the mailbags and delivered it on his homeward journey. Cecil was not averse to taking passengers on the ‘sociable’, and also carried the occasional message for residents who lived in the area. In 1912 Kathleen arrived in Springwood with Henry junior, her youngest child, followed eight months later by Henry senior. Following his arrival Henry took over from Cecil and remained as postmaster until 1932 when he was aged 72.

Postal Inspectors visited every month to check the records, which were then sent to Bathurst. Henry issued postal notes, stamps and so on, and at the end of every week the money was paid into Springwood Post Office where a receipt was issued. Henry Goddard senior died in 1948.

Around c1912–3, Cecil (then aged 22) and Stan (aged 18) started a firewood business. Stan purchased land from Hardman the biscuit manufacturer, near the Springwood subway, and the engine was kept there for cutting wood before it was loaded onto the train. They supplied wood to various bakers in the area, as well as to the Ritz at Leura. In 1916 the Goddard brothers expanded their enterprise by buying a timber mill and transporting the equipment from Camden to Springwood. Harry Keenan was employed as their manager. They purchased land near the then nine-hole golf course on Hawkesbury Road from J.T. Wall, who had a reputation for not handing over deeds to their respective purchasers. Percy Pickering and Mr Turnbull were locals employed by the Goddards.

The Goddard brothers used a bullock team, rather than horses, due to their prowess in the bush. The mill supplied timber for buildings locally and across the mountains, because the nearest mill in those early days was at Kingswood. An article in the Blue Mountains Echo (29 June 1917) reported that Messrs Lacey and Goddard had secured a number of repeat orders for firewood from the upper mountains. Fuel merchants in those regions said that the wood supplied by the Goddards was the finest burning timber. The article said that ‘bakers wood’ was a speciality, and the firm would also execute orders for ‘post and rail’ of standard quality. The Goddards operated the mill until 1923, and sold it to Eric Turnbull in 1927.

The 1927 Springwood telephone directory lists Goddard and Nichols as builders. The 1932 directory only listed Stan, with his address given as De Chair Avenue, Springwood. He married Nellie E. Mills, the daughter of George William and Martha Mills, in 1918. George Mills was the chief gardener for the Fels family. Stan and Nellie’s daughter Meryl was born in 1921 at Penrith, in a hospital run by a Mrs Pullman, who was related to the Ellison family. Meryl, who recorded her early memories on tapes held in the City Library Springwood, could remember being brought up in a close-knit family, and of the community spirit engendered when anyone needed help. She was taught to swim by her grandfather, who she said was a good breast-stroke swimmer, at Mahogany Swamp.

The family attended the Methodist or Presbyterian Churches for Sunday school, according to convenience, even though they were christened as Anglicans. Meryl attended the stone-built Springwood public school, located in the main street (now the northern car park). Mrs Farnsworth was one of her teachers. Later she went to high school in Penrith before attending Summerhayes Typing College. Meryl related that she was ‘horse mad’, and as a child used to ride one of the family cows around until her parents finally bought her a horse. She remembered going by horse and sulky every Saturday night, out to Aberfeldy where the younger members of the family would play grab with their grandfather. Later in the evening the adults would play a game of 7s and before making tea her grandmother would don a set of headphones to listen to the crystal wireless set. As children they were amused at the facial expressions she would pull and would not be content until she related what she had heard that night on the radio.

Henry and Kathleen Goddard’s only daughter Lillie (?) married Charlie Lacey who had the first taxi business in Springwood using a 1910 Oldsmobile. They bought the Whitecross property.

Cecil Goddard died in 1970 at the age of 80. He was survived by sons Cecil and Bruce and daughters Iris and Violet.

Pamela Smith - taken from The Making Of A Mountain Community, A Biographical Dictionary of the Springwood District 

Henry, Stan & Cecil Goddard



Cottages - "Aberfeldy"

Aberfeldy is said to mean ‘over the fields’ in the Scottish language however a search of The Dictionary of the Scots language failed to corroborate that assumption. 

Given that the cottage was built by Henry Charles Lennox Anderson c1890, it is much more likely that the origin came from the small market town of the same name located in the Highlands of Scotland.  Anderson was said to have been granted the 50 acre property - located in the vicinity of present-day Whitecross Road Winmalee - for services rendered in the Sudan War.  That must be taken at face value however because the entry for him in the Australian Dictionary of Biography does not mention any war service.

In 1906 Aberfeldy was rented by a Mr. Cook who is thought to have been the post-man.  Henry Goddard purchased the cottage in 1911.  The Goddard family took over the postal duties, and by 1925/26 Cecil Goddard is listed as the owner of the cottage on the electoral rolls for the district.

Aberfeldy remained in the ownership of the Goddard family until after World War Two.

Ref:

Springwood Historical Society Bulletin Newsletter No. 1. 
See post on Henry Charles Lennox Anderson