1810 - Rose Cottage - Wilberforce
- Thomas and Jane Rose Family Society Inc - Botany Bay - Strathfield - Hawkesbury - Wilberforce -
1792 - Background to the Rose Family’s Emigration
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Captain Phillip's First Fleet arrived Jan 20th, 1788 at Botany Bay. On 26th he moved the fleet to Sydney Cove in Port Jackson as the former was unsatisfactory. His instructions were to found a settlement and cultivate the land using convict labour, and to establish a self-supporting colony. He constantly urged the Home Office in England to send out free settlers with skills and experience in farming as the situation was rapidly becoming desperate. The fledgling colony was being flooded with a labour force that had no experience in farming.
Phillip sent the "Supply" to Batavia to buy food after store-ships and the "Sirius" were lost at sea. The Supply and a hired Dutch ship brought rice, flour, meat and salt.
Later the transport "Atlantic" was sent to Calcutta for more supplies to keep the colony fed until the "Brittania" arrived with food and clothing.
Ex-convict, James Ruse, had been given the first land grant in 1791 at Parramatta, and was supporting his own family, but some of the convict "farmers" were not as successful as hoped.
Finally the British Government dispatched the Convict Transport ship, "Bellona" in 1792 with a small group of settlers and families numbering 15, of which the Rose family made up a large part. An accompanying dispatch note from the Secretary of State, Henry Dundas, stated, “I am sorry that the above settlers are as yet all that have offered themselves".
Lt. Gov. Francis Grose was now in charge. Gov. Phillip having returned to December 1792, due to ill health
Before returning to England Phillip had done a considerable amount of exploration and found an area that seemed suitable for cultivation in the vicinity of Parramatta named it "Rose Hill”. (This Rose Hill has no connection to the Rose Family Cottage, Wilberforce). Phillip had also discovered the Hawkesbury River where good alluvial soil was plentiful, but which also showed signs of periodic extensive flooding. Phillip did not pursue this option.
Some groups of people did not wait for official sanction and started to settle in the Hawkesbury area as indicated when James Ruse and Charles Williams obtained land grants in 1794, and added their number to “the list of those already established". In 1796 an official survey was commissioned by Gov. John Hunter, and it reported that 400 white people were living along the Hawkesbury and there were 400 hectares of land was under cultivation.
Wheat and corn were the chief crops grown, and poultry was the main livestock. Cabbage, pumpkin and watermelons did very well there were fruit trees, mainly stone fruits, apples and figs. It was into this stage of development of feeding the colony, that Thomas Rose (with seven children) moved to Liberty Plains, about 1802.
Click on the Image for a better view
Thomas and Jane Rose and their four children arrived in the colony on 16th Jan 1793.
They were granted land at Liberty Plains and settled in the cottage known as "Hunter's Hut".
Their fifth child John was born here as was Sarah and Henry. This area is now Strathfield in the vicinity of Shathfield Plaza.
It was to this hut that the notorious escaped convict "Black Caesar" was taken on his recapture. It was also here that the family was attacked by aborigines, the whalebone in Jane Rose's corset causing the spear to deflect and circumventing any severe injury.
This land proved not very fertile for the growing of crops so Thomas Rose decided to buy a farm in the more fertile area in the Hawkesbury district.
Thomas Rose purchased "Laurel Farm', on the Wilberforce Road from Lawrence May in 1802 which remained in the Rose Family for 11 0 years. ( See map of Wilberforce)
They built their first home on the land below the present cottage but this proved to be in the flood zone and during the disastrous flood of 1806 lost most of their possessions.
C1810 the Rose Family built the building now known as Rose Cottage.
ln latter years the Cottage was used as a temporary meeting place for church services.
The Rose family lived in this cottage till 14.7.1961 when John Rose. a bachelor descendant from Thomas '1 1, transferred it to the Mc Lachlans., who owned the hotel alongside. Bill McLachlan built the Pioneer Australiana Village with the cottage a central attraction. Later the Hawkesbury Shire Council acquired the Village.
Over the years the cottage slowly deteriorated.
On 17th Jan 1993, at the Bi-Centennial celebrations of the Arrival of the Thomas and Jane Rose family, the Council returned Rose Cottage to The Thomas and Jane Rose Family Society by handing over the deeds to the property.
Preparations for the restoration had been started before the re-ownership by the Rose Family, without a lot of success.
The cottage at this stage was made up of changes that the Rose family made during the time of their occupation but basically it was much the same as when Thomas and his family lived in it. The last occupant, John Rose, did not believe in electricity or town water.
Restoration began in earnest during 1994 and by June 1996 was almost completed,
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The Construction
The construction was very sirnple as the family needed a home in a hurry. The slab house was the easiest way to go. A unique construction method was discovered when the floor boards were removed to level the floor.
Foundations
A rectangle trench was dug in the ground, and at about 3ft intervals deeper holes of 3ft (almost a meter) were dug, in which were placed rough sawn iron bark posts that were the framework of the house.
Framework
The top plates were then nailed in place and the slabs of 1ft (about 30 cm) width, were placed between these, using hand forged nails. Rose Cottage is unique because the bottoms of the ironbark posts and slabs are set directly into the soil - there are no bottom connecting plates as in normal construction. These slabs would have needed two men to lift them into place.
Wattle and Daub (22)
The gaps between the slabs were filled with daub. The inside walls were lined with wattling and filled with daub. Daub is clay, straw and possibly cow dung mixed to a thick paste with water. A thin layer of pipe clay was then smeared over the daub for a smooth finish.
Roofing (3)
The roof was of 6 inch wide ( 1Scm) she-oak shingles which are still visible in the kitchen, under the iron ronf
The Ceiling (10)
Hessian, then later calico, to make a ceiling for the parlour, was stretched and secured to the underside of the hardwood joists which supported the flooring for the attic
The Flooring
The flooring in the living room and kitchen (pit sawn 6in wide hardwood) is set directly on the ground on top of joists set in the soil. (7) The front bedroom floor was raised by using bearers and joists. (Whether this was done
then or at a later date is not known) (23)
Additions
The front rooms would have been built first with the kitchen and the back bedroom added later, using a skillion roof, probably within the year when time permitted.
Hessian, then later calico, to make a ceiling for the parlour, was stretched and secured to the underside of the hardwood joists which supported the flooring for the attic.
The attic was used as a dormitory style bedroom for the children, stairs in the main bedroom, also with a door on the eastern wall leading to an outside stairway. In this attic the family sheltered from the 1867 flood that reached the height of 'l mtr in the cottage.
The front verandah was also probably added at a later date and would have had a did floor. A flagstone floor was later added, afterwards a raised timber floor. Slabs of ironbark were used to build the sheds (37) that stored feed and machinery. A split rail fence would have been built around the house to keep the animals out of the vegetable gardens. A well was dug on land where the hotel is now. The top was constructed of handmade bricks
The Preservation
Lindsay Rose, at that time official secretary to the Governor of NSW, first nominated Rose Cottage in Jan 1977, for recognition by the Heritage Commission, as the oldest timber slab cottage still standing on it's original site.
The matter was taken up by George Rose, a descendant of Joshua, son of Thomas and Jane Rose, in 1981, after the death of Lindsay Rose.
A report on Rose Cottage, Wilberforce, was prepared by Dr Alan Roberts, Field and Research Officer for the Royal Australian Historical Society, in 1982.
In 1983, Chris Johnson, then president of the Royal Australian lnstitute of Architects (NSW), sent a letter to the Heritage Council of NSW, and recommended that a Permanent Preservation Order be placed on the cottage and surrounding grounds, as it was potentially under threat if the Australiana Pioneer Village was sold. The owners at that time were "not amenable" to the conservation of Rose Cottage. lt was also recommended that funds be made available for the preservation work.
ln 1983 Gordon Fuller of Gordon Fuller and Associates. wrote to the National Trust of Australia (NSW), stating that he had inspected Rose Cottage and recommended as a matter of urgency that the cottage and its curtilage (house yard) be classified by the Trust.
On 14th August 1985, Hon. Bob Carr, then Minister for Planning and Environment, off icia lly granted th e Permanent Conservation Order. The Rose Cottage was now on a Heritage Commission site separate from the Australiana Pioneer Village although situated within the complex.
Some repair work was undertaken by the Hawkesbury Council, who now owned the complex, but the deterioration still continued until restoration work was commenced in1994 by the Rose Family who now had ownership of the ancestral home.
Restoration Decisions
Once the restoration process had been set into motion, an assessment was necessary of what were the most important things to be done first.
Because of the heritage status of the cottage a heritage architect and builder had to be employed.
After much discussion Architect Otto Cserhalmi was commissioned and he recommended his brother l-ibi Cserhalmi to be the builder.
Otto Cserhalmi assessed, with consultation with the Rose Family Committee, what needed to be done and in what orcler' Again a lot of discussion about the changes to the cottage over the last '1 90 years – those Restoration Decisions made by the family and those by the subsequent owners - what to keep and what to demolish.
As the architect said " the building we see today has a lot of patches. For example' there are 6 or 7 different weatherboards on the outside of the building, so which of the weatherboards is historically correct' Most of them are, as theY are Part of the Rose heritage. Which do you preserve - the original' the one changed in the 1830's or the one after the floods in the '1 860's etc' Each has it's own right to be there."
It was decided to retain a sample of each change to the building and anything done after the Rose family left would be removed or redone.
Restoration Work
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This decided, it was now time to decide how it was to be restored.
An archeologist, Mr Lowe, was appointed as soon as work started on the digging' This is regulation when there is work on heritage sites. Several artifacts were unearthed which are now in the possession of the Society' It was decided that the repairs to the roof and the foundations were to have priority'
The Foundations
When the flooring was removed the unique construction of the cottage was discovered' It was soon realised that the posts and the slabs were badly rotted because of the moisture. This meant that the posts and slabs would have to be replaced or repaired'. Again the problem of how much can you replace without losing the integrity of the building lt was decided to save as much of the original material as possible'
The Drainage
Drainage was a priority as the water was running under the house, rotting the timber and undermining the structure' Drainage pipes (35) were laid in trenches under the lawn which diverted the water around the cottage. The trenches and the ground between the trench and house were lined with special plastic and lawn planted over tt
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The Framework
After lots of research and searching by our Heritage Architect Otto Cserhalmi, a firm, Ciba-Geigy, was found who could provide an epoxy resin that would waterproof and harden the remaining timber footings. This was accomplished by digging around the posts and slabs and placing the damaged ends into a plastic bag of the resin and leaving them to soak, then coating the ends with a hard resin.
The slabs, after treatment, were secured to the top plate by large, heavy original handmade (forged) nails.
The Walls
The weather boards on the front (except for a few at the top) and back walls had to be replaced with new of the same style as the old as these were too rotted. (26)
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All posts had a new piece of ironbark, 6in.x 4in.x 3ft long approximately, spliced and held to the main posts by stainless steel bolts. (8)
The Flooring
After this was done, all floorboards (7) were taken up, numbered for replacement' repaired or replaced where necessary, using the original handmade nails where possible. The floorboards in the main bedroom (23) were in excellent condition and didn't need replacing.
The Windows (16)
These were removed and sent away to have the glazing and timber redone where necessary.
The Verandah
The posts (28) were also repaired by splicing a new Piece onto the bottom of the original Posts and soaking in the epoxy resin.
Wattle and Daub (22)
An expert in wattle and daub, Mr. Mark Goodchild, was employed to replace the wattle and daub lining in the two bedrooms'
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The Chimneys (33)
These were also needing urgent repair. The brickwork was first stabilised inside the kitchen using iron bands (34) Outside the brickwork was restored by filling with sacrilicial lime mortar and reset. The iron bars on the outside (34) had been placed there in earlier times
Lime Washing (36)
The timber walls inside and out and the ceilings were sanded ready for lime washing and painting.
The outside of the cottage was lime washed' the inside walls were also lime-washed'. The windows and verandah posts were all oil base painted in heritage colours, The roof and guttering painted in heritage colours using special roofing Paint.
Summary
The side walls are the original slabs (29)' The galvanised tin strips (30) were added later in place of daub used to fill the gaps created as the timber shrank.
The front wall has the original round-back slabs (25) but these had been covered with weatherboards, by the family, during the intervening Years.
The back slab rvall (1) had been replaced with horizontal boards, down through the years'. The chimneys (33) most probably started as ironbark timber structures but replaced using handmade bricks.
The roof was originally shingled but later covered with corrugated iron' In the kitchen ceiling you can view some of the shingles (3)' The parlour and bedroom showed traces of wallpaper (9) and the daub had been a pinkish colour at one time . The parlour had also been lined with horizontal boards, as was the kitchen (16).
Reference
Rose Family Society Inc
Since 1793 the Rose Family has grown to almost 30,000 recorded descendants scattered all over Australia, NZ, UK and USA. There are many thousands still unrecorded.
There is ongoing genealogy research endeavouring to trace these "lost" relations. The Rose Family Society is a very active society that meets regularly every 3 months, and the AGM is held here at Rose Cottage' Rose St Wilberforce every October. A news bulletin "Lore of the Roses" is distributed twice yearly.
The Society organised a Family Reunion Day at Rose Cottage every third year' from 1982. This has been revised to every 5 years' next reunion being held in 2007 ' A special Bicentenary Reunion was held on 16/17th January 1993.
The Society published a book on the Rose family, "Rose Family of the Bellona" in 1990 and a supplement in 1994. These are available from the Society.
The Society's main aim is the continuing conservation of the cottage which is a very important part of Australia's heritage. This in its self causes concern regarding raising funds to cover the cost of ongoing maintenance.
For information about the society or any of the publications produced by the Society' please contact::-
President - Louise Prince,
30 Boolarong Rd.
Pymble 2073
Ph
(02)91441773
Secretary - Noel Crowley
81210 Morrison Rd
Putney 2112
or
PO
Box 772
Strathfield 2135 '
The
Cottage is now open each Sunday 1Oam to 3pm'.
There will be a member of the Rose Family available to help with any inquiries.
