Early Residents - Gustav Larsen

Lauritz Gustav Larsen was born in Denmark in about 1836. This birth date was calculated from his death certificate, however calculating it from his naturalisation certificate suggests that he was born in about 1824. Axel Bech was Gustav’s nephew. They came to Australia in 1877 on the Hawkesbury and began a tobacconist’s business in Balmain. Gustav was naturalised in 1890.

In 1881 Axel married Mary Ann Hodgson, daughter of Joseph Hodgson, auctioneer, and Sarah Ann. Gustav never married. They all lived together, first in a brick two storey semi detached house in Darling Street, Balmain called Kronborg, and later they built a weatherboard iron roofed country cottage called Elsinore at Springwood, probably at the beginning of the 1880s.


Gustav Larsen died on 17 September at his Balmain residence from a cerebral tumour at the age of 58. He was buried in the Church of England section of Waverley Cemetery. It was reported that Axel and his family were Gustav’s only relatives in Australia. His property, valued at £2,304 1s 7d was left in trust to Mary Bech.

Bathurst Road (now Macquarie)
Elsinore would have been located
approx. opposite building in background.

Shirley Evans

Hon. William Lygon, 7th Earl Beauchamp

Lygon in fancy dress

What do Evelyn Waugh’s novel Brideshead Revisited; the Hon. William Lygon, 7^th Earl Beauchamp (Governor of New South Wales 1899-1901), and Hugh D. McIntosh (the controversial boxing promoter/entrepreneur and parliamentarian) have in common. More precisely, what have they to do with Springwood?  An article in the Nepean Times provided a clue. 

On 11^th March 1933 the Nepean Times related how, on Saturday 25^th February, the Right Hon. Earl Beauchamp K.C. drove the first ball when he conducted the official opening of the Bon Accord Golf Links at Springwood.[1]  Among the well-heeled guests were locals Dr and Mrs Baxter, Percy Dawson, David Rogalsky and the Blue Mountains shire president, Councillor Percy Wilson.[2]  Others guests included Hugh Lygon (Beauchamp’s son), the well known Macquarie Street specialist, Dr. Sydney Jones and wife and Mrs. White who was the sister of Sir Daniel Levy.[3]

It had been barely two years since William Lygon, who, in his bachelor days served as the Governor of New South Wales, had been outed and banished from England because of his homosexual inclinations.  Jane Mulvagh suggested, in recent years, in an article entitled ‘The Scandal that shook Brideshead,’ that Evelyn Waugh used William Lygon as his model for ‘Lord Marchmain’ and son Hugo as the model for ‘Sebastian.’ [4]  Mulvagh stated the Lygons - who provided the inspiration for the ‘doomed aristocratic family in Waugh’s novel’ – put up a united front (except for his wife) when William was outed in June 1931.[5]  William had married Lady Lettice Mary Elizabeth Grosvenor in 1902, the daughter of Earl Grosvenor and accounts of his life, despite his sexual proclivities, credit William with being a loving husband and a devoted father to his seven children.[6]

Nevertheless, fearing the outcome of the scandal on his friend, King George entrusted Lord Stanmore and two other Knights of the Garter, with the task of presenting William with very limited options.  He was advised to resign from all his official posts and leave England immediately because if he remained the assured alternative would have been imminent arrest, a trial in the House of Lords and certain imprisonment.  Homosexuality was still a criminal offence.  

William did consider suicide but eventually fled to Wiesbaden where he was convinced by members of his family to put all thoughts of ending his life aside.[7]  Sadly, William thought that his exile would be short-lived, but David Dutton observed that in the years that followed William lived a ‘somewhat pathetic peripatetic existence.’[8] Evelyn Waugh - an Oxford friend to one of William’s sons - arrived at Madresfield shortly after his departure and later immortalised the Lygons in the novel Brideshead Revisited.[9]

It would seem that William’s outing had been a long time coming however, and interestingly Mulvagh blamed Australia for his final ‘undoing.’ His sexual tendencies became common knowledge when he visited in August 1930, as part of a round round-the-world trip.[10]  Accompanying William was a servant from Madresfield and Robert Bernays - a young Liberal MP - who acted as his speechwriter both said to be his current favourites.  Unfortunately, William’s ‘varied sex-life’ was reported back to his brother-in-law, the Duke of Westminster, who then passed the news on to the King. 

Mulvagh suggested however, that Beauchamp’s indiscretions had not gone un-noticed even during his tenure as Governor of New South Wales.  The poet Victor J. Daley once described an evening at Government House where ‘the most striking feature of the vice-regal ménage’ was the youthfulness of its members.[11]  Dutton observed that William bestowed his patronage on local artists and writers during his time as Governor which accounted for his friendship with people like Daley and Henry Lawson.[12]

As the Nepean Times article suggests, Beauchamp’s exile eventually returned him to Sydney in 1933, and it is a little known fact that it was he who performed the official opening of Bon Accord Golf Links.[13]  The lessee of the Bon Accord property at that time was the ever controversial Hugh D. McIntosh who is perhaps better known as ‘Huge Deal McIntosh.’[14]  McIntosh established a nine-hole golf course on the property, perhaps to enhance the attraction of Bon Accord Guest House.  Percy Dawson and his brothers were the owners of the Bon Accord property, located on Hawkesbury Road, Springwood which added to their other property investments which included a chain of international jewellery shops, the Strand Arcade and Ambassadors restaurant and night club.[15]   

Frank Van Straten has written extensively about Hugh McIntosh who dabbled in boxing and bicycle race promotion, politics, theatre productions and newspapers in Australia, and a chain of milk bars in England. In 1923, convinced he would spend the rest of his life in England, McIntosh leased Broome Park, the 17^th century home of the late Earl Kitchener, and extravagantly re-laid its cricket pitch with soil from Bulli in New South Wales.[16]  McIntosh was a remarkable man; he moved easily in political, high society and theatrical circles, and rubbed shoulders with people like H.G. Wells, Nellie Melba, Anna Pavlova and Oscar Ashe, and promoted artists like Roy Rene, Mo, Ada Reeve and boxers like Jack Johnson and Tommy Burns.[17] However, the narrative of his life illustrates that McIntosh swayed constantly between bankruptcy and times of incredible wealth.

In 1927, McIntosh sought damages from Smith’s Newspapers Limited when Robert Clyde Packer was publisher.[18]  McIntosh wanted compensation for a headline that appeared in the Daily Guardian which read ‘Mr. H.D. McIntosh and how he met the Duke.’[19]  It was obviously defamatory.  Even though the offending article has yet to be found it may have referred to the Duke and Duchess of York who visited Australia in 1927.  The Daily Guardian was part of Joynton Smith’s newspaper empire. 

In 1931, McIntosh was awarded a farthing damages in another libel case he actioned against the Truth because the tome referred to him as an ‘erstwhile pie man who had blossomed into a newspaper magnate and drained the lifeblood from the Sunday Times.’[20]  He was well-known in Springwood; a one-time resident even remarked that the rafters of Bon Accord used to ‘ring’ in McIntosh’s time.[21]  It was not at all uncommon for well-known actors and actresses to attend parties held in the ballroom of Bon Accord and Rose Lindsay, wife of Norman, was particularly fond of him and invited him to her soirees.[22]

Brideshead Revisited became a book and then a television drama, William Lygon died in the Waldorf Astoria Hotel New York on 15^th November 1938, and Hugh McIntosh was practically penniless again when he died at Golders Green (an area of London), in 1942.    Bon Accord Guest House burnt down in 1937 and Bon Accord Golf Links was absorbed into what presently exists in 1942 when the council purchased the property.

After his exile William Lygon spent a great of time in Australia.  He owned an apartment at Darling Point and became the president of the Australian Sporting Club.[23] It is obvious that the Blue Mountains was familiar to Lygon because Paula Byrne mentioned a trip made there by him and son Hugh.[24] Hugh McIntosh (said to be a business associate of their father) was so well-known to the Lygon children that his name was used disparagingly among their inner circle of friends (like Waugh) as a private code for anything remotely ‘boring.’[25] The warrant for William Lygon’s arrest was lifted temporarily to enable him to bury son Hugh when he died unexpectedly in 1936, and lifted permanently shortly before he died.

Pamela Smith  

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[1] ‘Bon Accord’ Golf Links Opened by Earl Beauchamp, Nepean Times, 11.3.1933.

[2] Baxter was the local doctor, the Dawson family owned the Bon Accord property and Rogalsky was a part-time resident of Springwood.

[3] Nepean Times, 11.3.1933.

[4] Jane Mulvagh, ‘The Scandal that shook Brideshead,’ The Telegraph, 1.6.2008, , http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/3553486/The-scandal-that-shook-Brideshead, accessed 12.7.2011.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Ibid.

[7] Ibid.

[8] David Dutton, ‘William Lygon, 7^th Earl Beauchamp (1872-1938), Journal Of Liberal Democrat History, Issue 23, Summer 1999, pp. 18-20.

[9] Selina Hastings, ‘Country house high jinks,’ MailOnline, http://www.dailymail.co.uk, 4.6.2008, accessed 18.7.2011.

[10] Jane Mulvagh.

[11] Ibid.

[12] David Dutton; Cameron Hazelhurst, ‘Beauchamp, seventh Earl (1872-1938),’ Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol. 7, Melbourne University Press, 1979, pp. 235-236.

[13] Sydney Morning Herald, 25.2.1933, p. 17.

[14] Frank Van Straten, Huge Deal, The Fortunes and follies of Hugh D. McIntosh, Thomas C. Lothian, South Melbourne, 2004.

[15] Pamela Smith, ‘David Stewart Dawson,’ The Making Of A Mountain Community: A Biographical Dictionary of the Springwood District, Springwood Historians, pp. 84-85.

[16] The Register (Adelaide), 3 August 1923, p. 9, Pamela Smith, ‘Hugh Donald McIntosh,’ The Making Of A Mountain Community..., p. 214.

[17] Frank Van Straten, foreword Keith Dunstan OAM.

[18] Barrier Mine (Broken Hill), 31 March 1927, p. 4.

[19] Ibid.

[20] Advertiser and Register, (Adelaide), 12 September 1931, p. 16.

[21] Jean Davenport, Oral Taped Interview, BMCC Local Studies Collection.

[22] Mollie Fraser (nee Chapman) Oral Taped Interview, BMCC Local Studies Collection.

[23] Paula Byrne, Mad World Evelyn Waugh and the Secrets of Brideshead, Harper Press, 2010, p. 198.

[24] Ibid, p. 204.

[25] Ibid, p. 243.

Newspaper articles of interest

The Nepean Times newspaper reported on 23rd November 1912 that Inspector Childs attended the scene of a break and enter and robbery at Valley Heights Station.  Childs used the relatively new technique of fingerprinting in order to apprehend the perpetrators. 
Childs rose to the position of Commissioner of Police and when he retired in 1935, he was succeeded by W.J. MacKay.
Ref:
Nepean Times 23.11.1912

Valley Heights Station

Crossing and railway gatehouse

  HISTORY OF FINGERPRINTS IN AUSTRALIA  

In 1901, Mr. Sam McCauley, Deputy Controller of Prisons and Inspector of Prisons in New South Wales, investigated the use and classification of fingerprints at New Scotland yard and on his return recommended that fingerprinting and classification under the Henry System be introduced to New South Wales Gaols.

In 1902, fingerprinting commenced in New South Wales Gaols, and a Fingerprint Bureau was established in the Darlinghurst Gaol under the Direction of Sam McCauley. Following its successful introduction, it was recommended that the system be introduced in the other States of Australia and New Zealand.

In 1903, Senior Sergeant W.H. Childs, of the New South Wales Police Force, received training from Mr. McCauley and also spent several weeks at the Darlinghurst Gaol Bureau. In June 1903, the Prisons Department handed over approximately 6,000 copies of fingerprint impressions to the New South Wales Police Department. The New South Wales Police Fingerprint Bureau was established at the Detectives' Office of Police Headquarters, with Senior Sergeant Childs as Officer in Charge.

Ref: National Institute of Forensic Science www.nifs.com.au 

  

Newspaper articles of interest

The Nepean Times newspaper - dated 28.10.1933 - carried the following advertisement for "Bon Accord" Golf Club & Guest House, Springwood:

"The Management of the above is prepared to buy for cash suckling pigs, sows, boars, calves, poultry, vegeables etc. at current market prices.  Ring Springwood 37 or 10. J. McIntosh Proprietor."

* The newspaper article is valueable for several reasons because it suggests the status of the clientelle who came to stay at the guest house during the economic downturn of the 1930s, and that despite the hard times being experienced by the working class, the upper classes still had considerable purchasing power. It also dates the period when the McIntosh family leased the property from the Dawsons.

Early Residents: De Carteret Lockie

Goods train in Springwood c1880s. 
Photograph shows level crossing that existed before overhead bridge.

De Carteret Lockie was Springwood’s second 'official' stationmaster.  He had been stationed at The Rock near Wagga Wagga and was appointed to replace James Tanner at Springwood in October 1885. He married Annie Batley in Orange in 1876. The couple had three sons, Horace, born in Orange; Sidney born in Bathurst and Percival born in Cootamundra. Little De Carteret was born while they were in Springwood. He was baptised by Reverend Cranswick on 6 April 1886. This event made him one of the first babies to have been christened in Christ Church, Springwood.

 Their stay in the area was short lived because De Carteret was promoted to Millthorpe in December 1886. His replacement was Harding Melville who was not appointed until August 1887.

Crime Doesn't Pay

Reported in the Northern Standard (Darwin) 12 July 1938 the arrest of several men on charges of robbing goods trains.  Detectives had been trying for some time to discover the persons responsible for the thefts.  They were thought to hide in the loaded goods trucks, and to throw the goods out along the railway line only to be collected later. 

Detective Webb secreted himself in one of the west bound goods trucks where, on its approach to Valley Heights, he witnessed goods being thrown out onto the line.  Four men leapt of the train, which was going slowly, and proceeded to run back picking up their spoils.  Webb alighted the train and with revolver drawn, pursued the thieves. When he ordered them to 'put their hands up' two obeyed but two absconded. 

Police visited homes in the Penrith and Bankstown area following the arrest of the two men at Valley Heights and a further eight men were arrested.  Another man (said to be a businessman) was taken into custody and charged with receiving. 

Ref:
Northern Standard  12 July, 1938, p. 6.

Early Residents - John Lawler

 

Like some of his business contemporaries, John Lawler purchased property in the Springwood district towards the end of the 1800s. The land in question was situated on the border of Springwood and Valley Heights and the Nepean Times (26 March 1898) reported: ‘Mr Lawler of furniture fame is building a residence near Brady’s Gates on the same side as Mr Gamson’.  

      

However, the Nepean Times correspondent was somewhat concerned, and stated on 7 May 1898 that the site Mr Lawler had chosen for his house was somewhat uneven. The home lived up to expectations despite this small obstacle and today remains one of the finest homes in the district. It is listed on the council’s heritage register. The cottage known as Eringah is located in Railway Parade, Springwood and bears the appearance of an English castle due to work carried out in the 1970s by the Bunda family who purchased the property sometime later. 


There was more drama to follow when a quarryman, working on the project, was fined for having too much powder (dynamite) on the job, and insufficient means of storage. The quarryman was obliged to appear in Penrith Court House.

      

Before building their mountain home in Springwood the Lawler’s were well established in the retailing world of Sydney. The 1875 Sands Directory listed John as owning a home named Maryville at 295 Glebe Road, Glebe. He was a bedding manufacturer by trade with premises located at 510 George Street, Sydney. According to a book written some years ago on the history of Glebe, Lawler was given credit for introducing kapok and wire mattresses to Sydney. Before the introduction of these modern materials, and depending on income, the only bedding materials available were horsehair, feathers, or straw. However, the same tome mentioned that the early wire mattresses sold by Lawler required a ‘key’ to re-tension the springs when they slackened.

      

Kapok was a highly flammable material and caused several fires at his premises. Nonetheless, Lawler’s business venture flourished. He is given the dubious credit of building the first high rise building in Sydney, and his last premises rose to a height of six storeys. The building is believed to have been the first retail store in Sydney to install a lift. Unfortunately for Lawler, this modern architectural miracle met with disaster when it was burnt to the ground, and he did not rebuild again. A fireman was killed by falling debris during the fire, and the Lawler’s bore the brunt of £40,000 in damages

      

The Sands Directory of 1885 referred to Lawler as a ‘bedding manufacturer and importer of brass and iron bedsteads’. His address was 608 George Street, but apparently he had another premises located at 6 Union Lane, Sydney. The former may have been a showroom.

      

Lawler was born in Ireland according to the Sydney Morning Herald and was still a young man when he arrived in Australia.[1]  He is thought to have married Mary Anne Donahue daughter of John Donahue in 1866.  The couple are believed to have had several children including Frederick A. c1869,  Alfred J. c1867, William J. c1871, Catherine Josephine c1877, Mary May c1875, John L. c1874.  Mary Anne died in 1882.[2]  

He is thought to have married Sarah Elizabeth Bennett in 1884 and four more children were born.  They were:  Annie Ellen c1884, Mabel Ruth born c1886, Venetia Marie born c1888 and Elizabeth born c1890. The Sands Directory listed John Lawler & Sons, 608–12 George Street, Sydney, Mattrass (sic) Mft.  A “Public Notice” that appeared in the newspapers in 1899 stated that Lawler had conducted business in Sydney for upwards of forty years, trading as a bedding manufacturer and furniture warehouseman.[3]  The notice advertised the fact that he had transferred his business over to three of his eldest children namely Frederick Andrew, William John and Catherine Josephine Lawler.[4]  John Lawler & Sons sold a variety of furnishings that included music stools, , chairs, hallstands and whatnots to the local market but had a large export market as well.[5]

It would seem that retirement from his business may have prompted his move to Springwood.  Lawler moved easily into the civic and social life of the area when he became a permanent resident.  He joined the Progress Association and later, was appointed one of the Vice Presidents of the Cricket Club. In 1900 he was appointed as a Reserve Trustees.

      

Venetia Lawler in garden of Fels Ridge

His four youngest daughters from his second marriage were educated locally, and in 1901 Miss M. Lawler was Dux of the Springwood Ladies College. Miss A. Lawler was presented with a music medal in the same year.  It was in 1901 also when the Nepean Times reported that Miss Venetia Lawler took charge of the ‘flower stall’ at the Springwood Ladies College fete. The girls attended the school in the time of the Misses Berne.

      

Two years later Lawler purchased a considerable amount of property near Springwood railway, intending to subdivide it into smaller lots. In 1904 it was reported that he was building shops ‘not quite as big as his Sydney house’. The shops, which burnt down and were rebuilt in 1924, were located approximately where the ANZ Bank stands today. Lawler leased these to various tenants. 

Sadly, in 1902, William John Lawler, one of the sons from his first marriage, committed suicide by taking poison.[6]  It would seem that William, only twenty nine years old, was suffering depression at the time.  John Lawler appeared on the 1903 electoral roll and was described as having independent means. In 1904, Eringah was leased out and the family moved to Manly for a period of six months.  He is listed in the 1916 telephone directory and died in 1918.[7]  His estate was valued at almost eighty  thousand pounds, which was mentioned in the Sydney Morning Herald 27.4.1918.  Fifty six thousand of that amount represented property.  Sarah died in 1936.

Lawler left his estate divided between his wife, son and four daughters, with all of them having an equal share. Venetia went on to marry William Arnold Wendall of Mosman, and Elizabeth married Timothy Carroll of Toorak, Melbourne. The other two daughters remained single.

      

Despite what has been written elsewhere, Lawler did not donate Eringah to the order of the Sisters of St Joseph and in fact the home was sold c1924–5 for £3,000 to the Misses Veronica O’Brien, Mary Meskill, Mary Mulheron and Bridget Delaney. These ladies may have had some association with that order but it has not been recorded in Council documents.

      

There is also conjecture that two of Lawler’s daughters joined the order after finishing their education. It is possible that Mabel Ruth may have done so, but highly unlikely that Annie Ellen did as she owned property and a home in Springwood until c1939. The Lawler home Eringah, although much altered today, is still located in Springwood Avenue and was named The Bungalow.  There has been some suggestion that Eringah was the Irish word for castle however this is incorrect.  It would seem Eringah is a shortened version of the phrase 'erin go bragh' which has several meanings including 'Ireland forever.'  The Irish word for castle is caislea'n.  

Pamela Smith: 
Although changes have been made because of new information, the original article was taken from The Making Of A Mountain Community, A Biographical Dictionary of the Springwood District.   

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[1] Sydney Morning Herald, 6.4.1918, p. 14.

[2] Ibid, 6.11.1882, p. 1.

[3] Ibid, 11.7.1899, p. 1.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid, 23.12.1897, p. 3.

[6] The Advertiser, New South Wales, 4.6.1902, p. 7.

[7] Sydney Morning Herald, 6.4.1918, p. 14.