Unwin's Special Survey

Plan of the farm subdivision of the Carlton Estate Date: 18--? Scale not given Notes: Includes a locality plan of area. "R. G. Bagot, 18 & 19 Eildon Chamber, Agent for the property". Vale collection SLV

In August 1840 the Colonial Office announced that any person could select 5120 acres (8 square miles) at Port Phillip for the sum of £5120. It took six months for the news to reach Australia, so that the 'Special Survey' Regulations were not advertised until 5 March 1841.

Selections were to be no nearer than five miles from a town and could not include land which had been surveyed and advertised for sale. On 17 March 1841, Frederic Wright Unwin, a Sydney solicitor, made a selection at Bulleen between the Yarra River and the Koonung Creek. The land was part of J Wood's and Major Newman's stations.

Before the Regulations were rescinded in August that year, nine special surveys had been applied for, three of which were in the vicinity of Melbourne, viz; - Unwin's in Bulleen, Dendy's at Brighton and Elgarís in Boroondara.

Unwin proceeded to subdivide his land into farms with the intention of leasing them. However by November 1842, he was complaining that his selection had not been correctly described in that its west boundary was farther than five miles from Melbourne. He prevailed upon the Government which decided in his favour. Unwin was allowed to move his selection closer to Melbourne so that his boundary took in the whole Yarra River frontage from Koonung Creek to the Township Reserve (Templestowe). The land was resurveyed and an amended deed was issued, not however to Unwin, but to one James Atkinson. The reason can only be conjecture. A long, narrow strip reverted back to the Crown because of the resurvey. Later a road (now Church Road) was put through when the 'strip' was surveyed into six-acre allotments.

Atkinson named Unwin's survey the 'Carlton'Estate' which name endured for many years. Atkinson was an attorney and land speculator and was proprietor also of a special survey at Port Fairy.

Settlers on the Carlton Estate who arrived in the 1840s include: Robert Laidlaw, Alexander Duncan, Sidney Ricardo, James Hewish, Ambrose Pullin, Thomas Hicks, Matthew Adams, Patrick Mahoney.

Along the river flats the principle activities of the settlers were cereal and potato growing - Ricardo and Laidlaw being pre-eminent. Much of the higher ground was heavily timbered, which provided an income for sawyers and was barely suitable for stock farming.

The first church services in Bulleen (Presbyterian) were held in Duncan's barn in 1847. Laidlaw built 'Spring Bank' (now 'Clarendon Eyre') in 1865. Following several bad floods, agriculture was replaced by dairy farming after 1864. It is worthy of note that the first consignment of wheat and barley from Port Phillip was exported by Duncan and Laidlaw in partnership in 1847.

In 1851, the Estate was sold to Robert Campbell the younger, a Sydney gold buyer, merchant and land speculator who, in 1855, began selling portions of the 'Carlton Estate' in small allotments. Prices were about £10 per acre.

A township was planned at the junction of Doncaster Road and High Street and was originally called 'Carlton', but became known as Kennedy's Creek after an early squatter. The land sold was mainly in Doncaster, while the remainder of the estate stayed under lease. Many early Doncaster families who bought land on the Carlton estate arrived about this time, such as Robert and David Williamson, Petty, Bogle, Corbett, Wittig, A Wilson, Baillie, Hardidge, Whitten, Tully, Berger, Smedley, Chapman, Joughin and others. Robert Williamson was the bailiff of the Carlton Estate from 1855 to 1870.

Gold was found on the Carlton Estate in 1856 (near present Feathertop Avenue) and yields were excellent for a couple of years until antimony, with which the gold was mixed, made operations unprofitable. The mine was re-opened in 1888 and worked until about 1903.

Robert Campbell died in 1887 and in the following year the Chatsworth Estate Company was formed to purchase the unsold parts of the Carlton Estate still owned by Campbell, amounting to 1475 acres. This company planned to profit from the rising value of land during one of Melbourne's greatest land booms. But whether they sold any land before the land bubble burst and the company collapsed is unknown.

Most of the 'Chatsworth Estate' remained unsold until he 1920s, being still farms held by lease, when some large parcels were sold to land developers who pegged out estates which lacked all facilities except fresh air and views!

The last piece of land belonging to the Chatsworth state was sold in 1945 for £35 per acre. Unwin had purchased the same land 104 years previously for £1 per acre.

Ken Smith writing in 1980 11 DTHS newsletter

Image: