Early Residents - James Hunter Lawson (1836-1926)

Braemar

James Lawson was born in the Scottish seaport town of Greenock on 22 April 1836. Little is known of his childhood and youth, though by the time he immigrated to Australia at the age of nineteen he had acquired the trade of cabinet-maker. He arrived in Sydney in 1855.

Two years later, on 27 November 1857, Lawson married Emma Glen in St Andrews Cathedral. The following year they had a baby daughter, also named Emma. That same year he successfully applied for a hotel licence and became the licensee of the Royal Oak Hotel at Pyrmont. By 1865 the family had grown by three more children and Lawson had re-entered the furniture trade, establishing a furniture warehouse in the centre of Sydney in partnership with another businessman.

This business expanded rapidly over the next two decades and a large factory at Newtown was added to the enterprise. Lawson was able to bring his sons into the firm when they reached maturity and in the 1884 Sands Directory the business was listed as ‘Lawson, James & Sons, Cabinet-Makers, Art Furniture Manufacturers and Carpet Warehousemen’. The eldest son James Robert, however, left in the mid-1880s and established his own business, the auctioneering firm that still bears his name.

With his increasing prosperity James Hunter, like many other Sydney businessmen at the time, decided eventually to buy land in the Blue Mountains and build a country residence. At the end of the 1880s he purchased 60 acres at Springwood, with a frontage along the Western Road (now Macquarie Road), extending east from and including the Springwood Hotel built by Frank Raymond in 1877. He completely rebuilt the old hotel and opened it in January 1891 as The Oriental.

In the orchard adjoining the hotel Lawson next began construction of a cottage that was completed in 1892 and became known as Braemar. The Lawson’s appear to have occupied Braemar for no more than a couple of years, moving sometime in the mid-1890s into another home they had built next door.

This home, Glen Lawson, became James and Emma’s permanent residence for the rest of their lives. James Hunter built extensively in Springwood and settled a large extended family around him and his wife. On the eve of a trip to Europe in May 1900, he was praised in the press for contributing to the progress of the town ‘by erecting substantial buildings that would be a credit to any district’.

The Lawson’s were active in the Presbyterian Church (some services were held on the veranda of Braemar before the Frazer Memorial Church was opened) and in the movement to establish a School of Arts in Springwood.  In 1926, following a period of gradually declining health, James Hunter died on Friday 23 April. He was 90 years old. Within 24 hours his widow, Emma, who had appeared to be in fair health, had also passed away. The couple were buried together in Rookwood Cemetery.

John Low
Taken from: The Making of a Mountain Community, A Biographical Dictionary of the Springwood District 

Braemar c1990s

Early Residents - Thomas William Garrett

Braemar c1892

 Thomas Garrett, his wife Helen and their family of three girls and four boys probably arrived in Springwood during the first half of 1898. In August of that year his name appeared for the first time in the columns of the Nepean Times, when he was elected a Vice President of the Springwood Cricket Club. He was born in Wollongong on 26 July 1858, the second son of politician and newspaper proprietor the Hon. Thomas Garrett and his first wife Mary Ann Elizabeth (nee Creagan). Educated at Newington College, he later studied law and was admitted as a solicitor in the Supreme Court, eventually becoming registrar of probates in 1890, curator of intestate estates in 1896 and public trustee in 1914. It was, however, his talent as a cricketer that brought him to a wider public notice. After showing early ability at school, he went on to play with distinction for both New South Wales and Australia.

      

In 1877 the 18-year-old Garrett was chosen to play for Australia in Melbourne against James Lillywhite’s team of professionals, a match that has come to be considered the first Test against England. He went on to tour England three times—in 1878, 1882 and 1886—and represented Australia in seven Test series at home, scoring 339 runs and taking 36 wickets. On the 1882 tour of England he played in the famous match at The Oval when Australia defeated England for the first time on English soil, provoking the Sporting Times to report the death of English cricket in its next issue. ‘The body’, it declared, ‘will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia’.

      

Bearded, tall and lean, Garrett was primarily recognised as a right-arm, slightly more than medium pace bowler with an ability to swing the ball either way. But he was no slouch with the bat and also proved a shrewd and successful captain of New South Wales. At the age of 38 in 1897 he scored 131 runs against a South Australian team that included the champion fast bowler Ernest Jones.

      

In 1879, Thomas married Helen Alice Maude, the daughter of sea captain John Applewhaite. Between overseas visits he fathered several children: Mary Emily was born in 1880, Lucy Alice in 1882, Maude in 1884, John H. in 1888, Eric R. in 1890 and Frederick C. in 1892.

      

The Garrett family seems to have resided in Springwood for a period of about ten years. When they first arrived in 1898 they moved into Braemar on the Western Road (now Macquarie Road). By 1908, however, the family had moved to the western end of the town, to Stanway in Railway Parade (now also part of Macquarie Road).

      

During their time in Springwood, judging by reports of their activities in the Springwood news columns of the Nepean Times, the Garretts were actively involved in the life of the community. Father and sons were members of both the cricket and rugby football clubs. Thomas served as a Vice President of both and also helped to establish a golf club in the town in 1905. In 1909–10, when Springwood Cricket Club won the Nepean District premiership, three of Thomas’s sons were in the team, one of them as captain. Records of the Springwood Progress Association list Thomas as a member in 1893–4 and again in 1905–6.

      

Mother and daughters, too, were reported in various capacities at fetes organised by both the Christ Church of England and Springwood Ladies College, where the girls attended school. Thomas Garrett also acted as honorary auditor for a number of local organisations including the Anglican Church, the Progress Association and the School of Arts.

      

Their residency came to a temporary end in 1902. On 3 May 1902 the Nepean Times announced the departure of the family, who had been residents for four years. On the day of their departure a large number of friends gathered on the railway platform to see them off and wish them well for the future. However their absence was short lived and it was announced again, via the Nepean Times (April 1903), that Tom Garrett the veteran cricketer was coming to reside again in the mountains somewhere between Valley Heights and Springwood. Helen, Lucy and Mary Elsie are listed on the 1903 electoral roll. In May 1903 the Garretts settled into Braemar once again, entering quickly into the social and sporting life of the town.

      

At some point in time after 1903 they appear to have moved back into the Crane’s residence Stanway, as a 1908 Nepean Times advertisement for Springwood Heights Estate indicates that the property subdivision was located between Hoare’s (Homedale) and Garrett’s (Stanway).

      

Over the next few years Thomas acted as the registrar for the area. Together with Mr J.D. Ewens he was auditor for the books of the Progress Association, and in 1909 he audited the books of the Springwood School of Arts Institute. During that same year the Blue Mountains Echo was full of praise for the sons of Thomas and Helen Garrett when they reported that a cricket match played between Emu Plains and Springwood resulted in a win for the later. The paper stated that the ‘Garrett brothers’ had played most successfully for Springwood.

      

While it is unclear exactly when the family left Springwood it was possibly some time in 1912, for the Garrett name does not appear in the local electorate on the 1913 Commonwealth Electoral Roll.

      

Thomas William Garrett died at Warrawee in Sydney at the age of 85 years on 6 August 1943. He was cremated at the Northern Suburbs Crematorium after a service at St James Church, Turramurra.

John Low

From: The Making Of A Mountain Community: A Biographical Dictionary of the Springwood District

Marriage - Ethel Urquhart

Photographs are a wonderful resource of information and these portray the wedding day of Ethel Mary Isabel Urquhart, grand daughter of James Hunter Lawson -  and daughter of (the late) John Ferguson Urquhart of Aberdeenshire Scotland -  who married William Earl Blanchard Chadwick in 1914, in the Frazer Memorial Presbyterian Church Springwood. Chadwick was the son of Robert Chadwick of Glenbrook, while James Hunter Lawson, who gave his grand daughter away,  lived in the cottage Glen Lawson at Springwood. The ceremony was conducted by Rev. J. McKee assisted by Rev. Ernest Ferguson. 

The bride wore her grandmother's Limerick lace wedding veil over a gown of 'dull soft ivory satin' and Limerick lace with sprays of orange blossom. Chief bridesmaid was Miss Eileen Lawson who wore a shell-pink brocaded ninon and a mob cap.  The other bridesmaids were the Misses Lennox; Olga, Jean and Sheila Lawson, and Glennie Chadwick, who wore gold brooches and carried floral crooks the gift of the bridegroom.  William Chadwick, cousin of the groom was the best man.  The guests adjorned to Braemar after the ceremony where the wedding breakfast was served.  The newly married couple motored to the South Coast for their honeymoon.

Pamela Smith

Ref:

Blue Mountains City Council local studies collection image file.

Sydney Morning Herald 17th October, 1914, p. 8. 

Journeys

The Local Studies Collection of the Blue Mountains City Library (housed in Braemar House) has a wide variety of books relating to all things Blue Mountains, including the literature of Blue Mountains writers.  But it also has an extensive pamphlet collection (called the Vertical File), not indexed with the main library holdings , but  on a card system within Braemar.

A recent acquisition is about to be added to the file titled “Journeys”.  The material in this file is fascinating.  In the early days of the Colony, after a way across the Mountains had been discovered by the new settlers and Cox’s Road had been built, our intrepid colonials set out to explore for themselves and often to make a new life in Bathurst and beyond.   “Journeys” has copies of journals including that of Governor Macquarie kept on his inaugural trip over the Mountains and of Captain Henry Antill, one of the officials who accompanied him.

There are also journals and reports of naturalists and scientists, letters and memoirs of an artist, an early  photographer and some missionaries.  The ladies have their place in the collection too, mostly in the form of letters.  Mrs Sophia Stanger was travelling to Bathurst with her husband, Joseph, in search of work.  They had five children including an infant, about three months old.*  Her letter was addressed to “My Own Beloved Mother”.  The indefatigable Mrs Elizabeth Hawkins whose husband was to work in Bathurst, was accompanied by eight children and her mother and she was writing to her sister.  Another of the ladies, Louisa Anne Meredith, writer and botanist, was pregnant and going with her husband to visit his sheep property near Bathurst.

One of my favourites is the journal of Barron Field - his was a wonderful name for a colourful character.  He was a Judge of the Supreme Court of New South Wales from 1817 to 1824 and he included what he called “an Excursion Across the Blue Mountains” during his stay in the Colony.  He spoke of “the eternal eucalyptus, with its white bark and its scanty tin-like foliage” and “the dark casuarina tall, and exocarpus funeral” although he did deign to admire the beautiful flowers and shrubs – “the exquisite epacris, the curious grevillea, xanthorrhoea, the sceptre of Flora, Telopea the magnificent, and thysanotis** the lovely.”

And there are many more – a real treasure house of reading.  Fascinating are some early examples of travel writing published in 1890s journals such as “The Illustrated Sydney News” and “The Town and Country Journal” .  They not only promote the scenic beauty spots of the Mountains, but give useful advice for accommodation on your journey.  They also provided a vehicle for the advertising of inns, guest houses and boarding schools.  Accommodation by this time, of course, was infinitely more comfortable than the sleazy inns available to the early travellers.

The new addition is a story of more recent origin and concerns five adventurous country girls, Alma and Joyce Eurell, Molly Dunn, Beryl Burns and Daisy Transton, aged from about 21 to 23, who cycled from Leeton, in the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area, to Sydney in 1935.  The previous year they had spent two months planning to cycle to Melbourne for the Centenary Celebrations and remarkably they accomplished this in four days, despite a headwind for part of the way.



Leeton is a pretty town designed by Walter Burley Griffin with a circular design of avenues and streets which were later mostly given the names of trees.  It is 585 kms from Sydney and in 1933 had a district population of 7,803 and a town population of 5,351.  In 1934/5 the Letona Cannery was the largest industrial undertaking in the Leeton district and the greatest single employer.  It became a Fruitgrowers’ Cooperative in 1935.  The Cannery building covered 17½ acres which included a building for canning and jam making, refrigeration chambers, a box making section and a storage warehouse for finished products.  There was also a plant for can making, a machine shop, steam generating boilers and railway sidings.  There were also facilities including dormitories for seasonal workers who were mainly women.  In 1932 over 500 women came for the season.  They were employed as piece workers, mainly cutting open and pitting the fruit.  Letona canned tomatoes, deciduous fruits, jam and some vegetables such as peas.

Our adventurous girls all worked at the Cannery.  They loved cycling, all had Speedwell bicycles and spent their holidays on these excursions.  In 1935 they set out on Tuesday, 17^th September.  Their departure was not described in the local newspaper, “The Murrumbidgee Irrigator” but in 1934 it was reported that co-workers lined the railway siding to cheer them on the way to Melbourne, and there were also people along the Leeton streets to farewell them.  I would think this happened again in 1935.

They made good time to Temora, arriving at tea time, despite Daisy feeling unwell all the way.  On Wednesday she had completely recovered but they found the next leg, aiming for Cowra, difficult, plagued by bad roads and Mollie’s bicycle suffering five punctures along the way.  The last one occurred at night and they were unable to mend it.  They did not have a torch and vowed to bring one on their next journey.  They walked in darkness for three miles to Koorawatha, ten miles from Cowra.  Here they spent the night.  The next day they really pushed on over one hill after another, sometimes having to walk and reached Bathurst at midnight.  Daisy and Alma went straight to bed, but Mollie, Joyce and Beryl tucked into steak and eggs.

Left to Right: Joyce Eurell, Elma Eurell, Daisy Transton
Beryl Byrnes & Molly Dunne

The next day they found the Great Western Highway “like a speedway with a billiard-table surface” and were able to spend the night at Lithgow, reaching Katoomba on Saturday at 11.30 a.m.  The Katoomba Speedwell Agent, Mr “Bill” Coventry, met them at the office of the “Katoomba Daily” and their photograph was taken.  It was said that a Speedwell Agent met them at nearly every town on the route although present day family members believe their trip was not sponsored.

We know the five girls had packed their swimming costume and planned to spend a month in Sydney, looking forward to a happy time on the surfing beaches.  They told the Katoomba journalists that the roads to Melbourne were better but “the scenery could not be compared with what they had just witnessed”. We have no further information about their journey but we may yet acquire some and it can be easily be added to the Vertical File.

*George Mackaness in “Fourteen Journeys Over the Blue Mountains of New South Wales” wrote that Sophia was travelling with triplets.  It seems likely that he was misinterpreting something Sophia included in her letter to her mother where she referred to all the advice she received from interested onlookers.  Some, she said, “were utterly astonished the young girl should have so many children, and especially three at a birth!”  John Low and I feel she was writing humorously to her mother.  Sophia, at the time of the journey, would have been 27 years old, she married Joseph in 1836 and they had a baby each year until 1841.  The three youngest were very young for such a journey in the winter and would have been very warmly swaddled against the cold making the casual observer believe they were all tiny babies.

**Thysanotis – fringed violet (Family Liliaceae)

Shirley Evans 

REFERENCES

“The Descendants of Thomas Stanger, circa 1610”   http//www.airgale.com.au/stanger-t/d7.htm

Bowmaker, A.E.  “A Brief History of Leeton”, 1968

Eurell family members

“Journeys”, Vertical File, Local Studies Collection, Blue Mountains City Library

Katoomba Daily, 1935

Mackaness, George, “Fourteen Journeys Over the Blue Mountains of New South Wales”, 1950

Murrumbidgee Irrigator, 1934, 1935

Tiffen, Robin, “Letona, the Whole Story”, 1996

Vries-Evans, Susannah, “Pioneer Women, Pioneer Land: Yesterdays’ Tall Poppies”, 1987