Enderslea

Statement of Significance

Enderslea, comprising a Victorian Georgian homestead, barn, food shelter, sheds, sheep dip, well and windmill on a rural property has cultural significance for the following reasons: * the place, in particular the homestead and barn, has close associations with the early development of the region * the Victorian Georgian homestead and large prominent stone barn have high aesthetic value * the place is valued by the community for its close associations with the Morley family and for its use as a social centre during the latter half of the nineteenth century * the place was the site of the first grape vines grown in the district. AESTHETIC VALUE: Enderslea, on a gentle slope above Blue Plains Creek, with its Victorian Georgian homestead and honey coloured stone barn has high aesthetic value. Both the homestead, nestling among mature trees and the prominent stone barn add to the aesthetic qualities of the landscape HISTORIC VALUE: Enderslea was one of the first properties in the Chittering district in the 1850s. The first grape vines in the district were grown on the property, planted by Charles Morley in 1887, and later Enderslea was the first place in the district to specialise in growing citrus fruit. The stone barn on Enderslea became the social centre for the district from the 1870s onward and was the site of fundraising events for the Holy Trinity Church at Chittering. Enderslea was closely associated with the Morley family, pioneers of the Chittering district, particularly with the original owners son, Henry Morley junior, the first Chairman of the Chittering Road Board in 1896. SCIENTIFIC VALUE: The place has the potential to contain archaeological material which would be useful in interpreting the lifeways of an early pioneering family who established their farm in the 1850s. The archaeological record would contain artefactual material dating from the 1850’s to the present day and would be capable of demonstrating how the lives of a rural family had changed over the years. SOCIAL VALUE: Enderslea is highly valued by the community of Chittering and the Shire Council for its close association with the Morley family and for its past use as a social centre for the district during the latter half of the nineteenth century. RARITY: The homestead is one of the few remaining original homesteads in the area, and is an uncommon structure. The barn, due to its large scale and stone construction is also unusual. The innovative design of the stone food shelter makes it an uncommon structure. REPRESENTATIVENESS: The homestead is representative of its class, that of a Victorian Georgian farmhouse complex CONDITON: Apart from the chimney of the former shepherd’s hut, which is in danger of collapsing, Enderslea is in good condition. INTEGRITY: The integrity of Enderslea is moderate. The homestead is currently unoccupied for most of the year and is used mainly as a holiday house. The property appears to be producing little agricultural output. What was a busy family home on a productive farm is now a weekend retreat. AUTHENTICITY: Apart from the rendered west wall of the barn, the authenticity of Enderslea is high. The fabric of the lace is close to its original state.

Physical Description

The place consists of a number of structures located on a rural property which collectively are know as Enderslea. These structures are: the homestead which is a single storey building constructed from rendered stone with a broken roof clad with corrugated galvanized iron; a circular stone food storage area; a stone sheep dip; a stone well, a large barn with a lean-to timber and corrugated iron stable attached to its eastern wall and a timber framed she clad with corrugated iron. To the southeast of the stone barn is a steel framed shearing shed clad with zincalume. DESCRIPTION: The highest point of the property is near Blue Plains Road and the land falls gently towards Blue Plains Creek, which is near the northern boundary and flows from east to west. The single-storey homestead is situated near the centre of the property. The homestead has an elongated rectangular plan and is aligned east-west. The walls of the house have either an undulating lime render applied over what is assumed to be random stonework or a plumb cement render. Internally the walls are plastered. The external walls of the kitchen are timber framed and clad in timber weatherboards. The floor has 150mm wide tongue-and-groove floorboards on joists and bearers. The building has sliding sash windows with small panes. The visitor approaches the homestead from the southwest, crosses under the low verandah beams of the partially enclosed south-western verandah and turns right into the kitchen, which steps out in plan to receive the verandah. The kitchen has plaster walls to the north and east, and horizontal timber ‘v’ jointed boards 100 mm wide to the south and west. Adjacent to the south wall is a Metters New Improved Stove No 1. The ceiling is fibrous cement with timber cover strips. A doorway in the north wall leads into the dining room. The floorboards in the dining room are about 150mm lower than those in the kitchen, indicating that perhaps the dining room was added at a later stage and built at a lower floor level to take advantage of a slight fall across the site. From the dining room, one can proceed west to a bedroom or east to a living room. The north wall of the bedroom is about 100mm out of plumb, and the fibrous plaster ceiling is also raking slightly so that it is at right angles with the out of plumb wall. The ceiling is interrupted by a beam which runs north-south suggesting that the current layout is not original. Perhaps the beam position coincided with a wall which was removed, resulting in a loss of stability in the north wall thus causing it to lean out. The bedroom and living rooms have sliding sash windows with six panes per sash. The dining room however has a window consisting of three vertical sashes. The central fixed sash consists of a large pane over which are two small panes. The casement windows, two each side, have the same configuration. The living room has a fireplace, unlike the other two rooms, and, like the dining room, a ceiling consisting of timber boards. The ceiling of the living room has in addition a cornice to the north and south walls formed by altering the plane of the ceiling boards from horizontal to 45 degrees. By proceeding through the living room and turning right or south, one steps onto the south-eastern verandah. The west side of the verandah is contained by the weatherboard walls of the kitchen and on the east side by a stud wall lined with chipboard and fibrous cement on the verandah side and weatherboards to the east. A strip of concrete floor about 750mm wide extends along the southern edge of the verandah, possibly formed to replace the floorboards damaged by water run off, as the ground level to the south rises above the verandah floor level. It is likely that in this location the bearers came in direct contact with the ground, as appears to be the case on the western verandah and suffered water damage. A bedroom on the south east corner of the homestead is entered from the south-eastern verandah. The bedroom is finished similarly to the main rooms with the exception of the ceiling which was installed in recent times and consists of 100mm wide timber boards. A window in the east wall has four panes in a centrally pivoting sash window. By re-entering the living room and proceeding right or east along the north verandah, one enters a bedroom on the north-east corner of the homestead. This bedroom has horizontal pressed metal ceiling and to the north, in the same plane as the verandah adjacent, a raking fibrous cement ceiling. Like the south-east bedroom, it too has a window in the wast wall with four panes in a centrally pivoting sash window. A bedroom on the north west corner of the homestead has a pair of casement windows in the north wall with five horizontal rectangular panes per sash, and dates from the 1930’s. The south wall is a stud wall with vertical board up to a quarter round dado and fibrous cement sheeting over, suggesting that his layout is not original and the original configuration was that of one large room between the north and south verandahs, similar to the bedroom, living and dining rooms. The room on the south-west corner of the homestead is a bathroom and is enclosed from the western verandah. The northern wall along the bedroom is clad in fibrous cement sheeting. Typically the verandahs have a concrete floor, 100mm by 100mm verandah posts at about 2100mm centres, supporting a verandah beam 150mm deep and 50mm wide. The rafters are at about 125mm by 20 mm boards forming a soffit, over which is the corrugated iron roof. Immediately west of the homestead is a circular wall about 4 metres in diameter and built of stone, the top of which I about 700mm above the ground level. Between the walls is a mound of sand. According to the owner of the property, the walls extend into the ground several metres, like a well with a roof over the top. No evidence remains of the roof. The purpose of the structure was to have food hung from the roof cooled by the cool air near the bottom and protected from sun and vermin. To the west of the food shelter is a corrugated iron shed which appears to date from the 1940s. About 60 metres north of the shed, near the creek, is a stone trough about 600 mm wide and four meters long, and about a metre deep in the centre, which was once used as a sheep dip. Also near the creek, north of the homestead, is a levelled area which was once a tennis court. East of the levelled area is a stone well, about four metres in diameter. Spanning across the well are two circular beams, on which rest two of the three legs of the modern windmill which pumps water from the well. Next to the well is a small modern shed ini which is housed a pump which pumps water up to a water tank on the high side of the property near Blue Plains Road. About 100 metres east-south-east of the homestead is a large stone barn c. 1859. A lean-to timber and corrugated iron stable is attached to the east wall. The barn has concrete floor, stone walls and timber roof framing supporting a corrugated zincalume roof. Circa 1950, the western wall was rendered. It appears that at about this time the concrete floor was installed, replacing the presumably original dirt floor and the new roof constructed. The original roof had gambrel ends, judging by the form of the end walls, and also as indicated by a c.1870 painting of the place. The new roof, however is lower than the original and is contained by end walls. The rendered western wall was painted in recent times by the current owner. Immediately south and east of the stone barn is a steel framed shearing shed c. 1950, clad in corrugated zincalume. About 50 metres west of the shearing shed is a brick chimney, probably the remains of the shepherd’s hut.

History

Assessment 1999 Construction: 1853; 1859 - 70 Alterations/additions: 1940 Architect/builder: not known The homestead at Enderslea was built in a series of stages by Henry Morley Snr. He settled on the property at Chittering in 1853 and commenced building the homestead. The first stage was a single-storey, four roomed house which was added to in three stages. A site plan drawn in 1870, shows that most of the buildings associated with the property were built by this stage. Between 1859 – 1870 Morley hired fourteen ticket-of-leave men and it is thought that these men provided the labour force to construct most of the buildings on the property. The stone barn was built in 1859 and apparently the barn was used for various fundraising events in the district. Henry Morley dies in 1876 and the property was left to his widow Sarah. After her death in 1884, the property passed to their two sons, Charles & Henry. Henry Morley jnr became an influential citizen in the district, becoming Chairman of the first Road Board in 1896. The property remained in the Morley family until 1927 when it was sold. In 1931, Elizabeth Ogden purchased the property and made additions to the main house and constructed a corrugated iron shed. After her death in 1949, Enderslea passed to a relative who made renovations to the barn. Enderslea was purchased by the Clarke family in 1975. History The first title deeds in the Chittering Brook region were issued to William Locke Brockman and George Fletcher Moore in 1843, however they did not settle in the district. During the next twenty years, ten, twenty and forty acre blocks of land were surveyed along the Avon River Valley. The first settlers of the region were George Sewell, John Spice, John O’Neil and Henry Morley. They all settled on large parcels of land in the 1950s and 1860s. The area became and agricultural district and at first focused on livestock, hay and chaff cutting. After the 1920s, it become predominantly a citrus growing district. Henry Morley senior was born in 1802 and arrived in the Swan River Colony with his wife Sarah and their two daughters, Jane and Joannah, on the Wanstead, on 30 January 1830. He immigrated to settle and farm land in the colony. The family grew by another six children over the next fifteen years. They moved on to land at Upper Swan and planted vegetables, fruit trees and bred a few animals. By the late 1840s, Henry Morley was looking for more land on which to establish a second and bogger farm. In 1851, he helped survey the Blue Plains Road near Lake Chittering and the Chittering Brook (now known as the Brockman River). Soon afterwards he decided to move his family to Chittering which was about 40 kilometres north of his property at Upper Swan. In 1853, Morley paid £76 for Swan locations 166,167,168, 169 and 186, totalling 76 acres near Chittering Brook. Five years later he was granted an additional 15 acres for £15, comprising Swan locations 165 & 187. By 1869, Morley qualified as a juror as he owned property valued over £1,500. The homestead at Chittering was built in stages beginning in 1853, the first part being a single storey four roomed house that according to physical appearance (ie door heights) seems to be added to in three stages. The other buildings in the area were built by 1870 as a drawing dated from that year shows a homestead with many large and small buildings surrounding it. Other evidence that suggests that the majority of buildings were constructed in the late 1850 and 1860s includes the fact that Morley hired fourteen Ticket of Leave men on occasions for building purposes from 1859 – 1870. There is little recorded information about the construction of Enderslea, except that of the stone barn which was used in the latter half of the nineteenth century as a ‘community centre’. The impressive stone barn was built in 1859. “ it measured 20m by 10 m and its thick walls are built of stone and pug… the barn floor also originally had a wooden floor” When the Holy Trinity Church in Chittering was being built in 1886 – 87, tea meetings, bazaars and other fund-raising events, including a magic lantern show were held in the barn. A description of a fundraising tea that raised £19.19.6 stated “… in the evening a dance too place in Mr Morley’s (jnr) barn, a magnificent stone building where the young folk engaged themselves till early morning with dancing, songs and recitation..” Henry Morley died on 6 December 1876 at Enderslea, leaving the Chittering property to his widow Sarah. After her death in 1884, it passed to their sons, Charles and Henry who expanded the property. By the turn of the century there were four separate Morley farms between John O’Neill’s ‘Clarina’ and Lake Chittering. Charles Morley was recorded to be the first man in the district to plant grape vines and to own a mechanical tree grubbing machine. Henry Morley junior was also an influential citizen of Chittering and was Chairman of the first Chittering Road Board in 1869. Enderslea was passed down to Walter Morley after Henry Morley’s death I 1915. By then the entire property consisted of 403 acres. The property remained in the family until1927, when it was transferred, first to Hyam Chester and Company, then to Ernest Willmott Withnell of Chittering. By that time the property had been enlarged to over one thousand acres. In 1931 Enderslea was sold to Elizabeth Ogden. It was during her ownership that additions were made to the main house and a corrugated iron shed was constructed on the property. When she died in 1949, the homestead was passed on to her relative and the executor of her estate, Wilfred Ogden, who was an orchardist. He did further renovations on the stone barn. Markings in the building material suggest it was re-roofed, a concrete slab floor was laid and parts of the wall were rendered. Since 1975, Lot 5, the land upon which the homestead is located has been owned and used by the Clarke family, primarily for holiday accommodation. The Clarkes are said to have ‘painstakingly restored’ the homestead.

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