Page 20 - eMuse Vol.9 No.03_Classical

faint sound of something being
dragged along .
The mystery was eventually
solved with the simple discov-
ery the pattering of feet be-
longed to a fox using the veran-
da as a shortcut and who would
drag its dead prey, like rabbits,
right by the windows.
The estate of Aberglassyn is
believed by some to be an abo-
riginal sacred site and that cor-
roborees took place below the
house .

Aberglasslyn

The Hunter Region’s
House of Broken Dreams Aboriginal ceremonies were
often performed in places
which were considered to have
Aberglasslyn House c 1840 strong “spiritual energy” one
Aberglasslyn House is a herit- ing room and breakfast room. alone . could speculate that the spirits
age-listed residence and former The rest of the house was left The house included 20 spa- of the land were not happy with
boarding school at Aberglasslyn unfinished, leaving him just cious rooms, dining room, draw- a large white man’s house built
Road, Aberglasslyn, Maitland, another victim of a depression ing room, extensive cellars, out on sacred ground .
New South Wales. nicknamed “the staving forties.” buildings including a detached Could this have led to the
The saga of this once stately In 1844, Aberglassyn House kitchen but was incomplete due cursed history and ghostly
home began on 3 July 1823 when was leased by William Nichol- to the bank crash which was manifestations of Aberglassyn
Henry D. Owens received a crown son, who eventually exercised known as the “starving forties” house?
grant of 1100 acres in the Parish his option to purchase it. The which in turn led to Hobler’s Other unusual events at Ab-
of Gosford. During the next year property remained the posses- bankruptcy . erglasslyn;

Owen built a cedar and blue gum sion of Nicholson’s descendants The house has had several * Two Greyhounds killed by
cottage on the property. until 1962. owners over the decades but a swarm of bees in 1947.
By 1828 the estate and un- Hobler a stock man, gra- has stood derelict on various * A small boy named Clery’s
completed house nearly 90 feet zier and landowner came to occasions. It is said cows used leg was cut to the bone
long was sold to Sir John Jamei- the Hunter Region in 1836 and to wander through the large by the knife of a mowing
son . During the next eight years bought the property, Aber- empty rooms until the windows machine in 1888 .
the estate was let to John Dow glassyn situated five kilometres were bricked up and doors bolt- * A Durham X Cow gave birth
and during his occupation the upstream from Maitland. ed to deter vandalism . to quad calves in 1952
name “Aberglasslyn” appeared. He became a Justice of the The spacious arched cellars * Drowning of a 12 year
Aberglassyn (sometimes spelt Peace, and was letting the land were home only to a colony of old boy while his father
Aberglasslyn) house began con- to tenant farmers, played the bats . was fishing in the river in
struction by George Hobler in part of the local squire and The big empty sandstone 1920 .
c1840 and has been referred to started to build the Georgian house on top of the hill had all * Farmer was fined 10
as the Hunter’s “house of broken mansion now known as Aber- the qualities of a classic haunt- pounds for not control-
dreams”. glassyn House . ed house . ling grasshoppers in
Before Hobler could finish Situated high on a hill over- A former maid there in the 1954.
the house, he had fallen prey, looking farmland and a pictur- late 1920s remembered once Today the farmland of “Ab-
as so many of his contemporar- esque bend in the Hunter River hearing heavy footsteps within, erglasslyn” has been subdivided
ies had, to the financial depres- the house has stately charm and but a search revealed no one and is a major housing estate .
sion of the early 1840s which an old world feel. Its intended around . Yet the spooky Aberglasslyn
devastated the colony . Hobler grandeur was never quite real- Decades later, in the 1970s, Mansion maintains it’s lonely
stopped work on the house in ised in its day . a new owner one night heard vigil over the surrounding coun-
1842, filed his “Insolvent Sched- Hobler became insolvent in “ghastly footsteps and a cough- tryside .
ule” and was declared bank- 1846 and the mansion was ad- ing” but no one was visible on
rupt . vertised for sale in 1858 stating the flagstone veranda under the
Hobler had completed the that Hobler had spent upwards moonlight .
entrance hall, stair hall, draw- of 20,000 pounds on the house At other times there was the
20 eMuse March 2020