“Flaggy Creek” seems to have been quite a common name for a waterway. In the Newcastle area there is a Flaggy Creek near Glenrock, and there were at least two waterways in the Wallsend area previously known as Flaggy Creek, which have different names today.
1. Flaggy Creek- Whitebridge/Kahibah
The name “Flaggy Creek” is most commonly associated with the waterway that runs down into Glenrock Lagoon in Whitebridge.
Flaggy Creek is the waterway that runs into Glenrock Lagoon
The approximate location of this shaft is shown below.
2. Flaggy Creek – Barnsley
In the 19th century there was another Flaggy Creek, which was often referred to as being in the Wallsend district. An item from the Wallsend correspondent of the Newcastle Chronicle on 30 May 1868 refers to an accident happening to a man “at Flaggy Creek.” A land title from 1865 shows that Flaggy Ck was an alternative name for Slatey Ck in the Barnsley area.
Map from Vol-Fol-18-199 showing “Flaggy or Slatey Ck” in the Barnsley area.
By 1881 the “Slatey Ck” name seems to disappear and the “Flaggy Ck” name is used. For example a subdivision map for “Highgate near Wallsend”, shows the waterway to the west of the subdivision is named Flaggy Creek.
The creek is now the upper reaches of Ironbark Creek.
Ironbark Creek in Elermore was formerly known as Flaggy Creek.
Spot the difference
Where newspaper articles refer to a Flaggy Creek in the Wallsend district, it can be difficult to determine which creek is meant. Two pieces of information assist in this regard. Firstly, the Flaggy Creek at Elermore Vale was entirely within the borders of Wallsend Municipal Council, whereas Barnsley’s Flaggy Creek was about 3 miles to the west. Therefore a mention of Flaggy Creek in reference to Wallsend Council matters is almost certainly the Elermore Vale area. Secondly, the road to Cooranbong passed over Flaggy Creek at Barnsley, so a mention of the road to Cooranbong would indicate the Barnsley area creek.
The two Flaggy Creeks marked with red circles. Two key distinguishing features: the western one intersected with the road to Cooranbong (yellow line) , the eastern one was within Wallsend Council (shaded green).
Using these differentiators, the first unambiguous reference to the Flaggy Creek in the Barnsley area comes in 1870 …
I reached Lake Macquarie by way of Cockle Creek, the head of which is about three miles distant from the colliery township of Wallsend. Having walked from Wallsend to the creek, I was conveyed thence to the residence of Mr. Chapman, on Stony Creek (another small stream, emptying itself into the lake), in a boat belonging to that gentleman and his partner, Mr Lyster. But for this convenience I should have been compelled to ride from Wallsend on horseback, passing through the parish of Teralba, on the Coorambung-road, and proceeding thence over “Flaggy Creek,” “Cocked-hat Creek,” “Sandy Creek,” and sundry other streamlets more remarkable for their “curious nomenclature than for anything else.
Australian Town and Country Journal, 11 June 1870.
Bramcote was the original name of a subdivision in Barnsley to the west of Slatey Creek.
Plan lodgement entry for DP1145, “Bramcote”, parish of Teralba, being a subdivision of Lot 1 of DP774. Historical Land Records Viewer
The Bramcote township was advertised from 8 July 1882 through to 19 August 1882, when an auction was to be held. Rain delayed the auction until 2 September 1882.
Advertisement for sale of land at “Bramcote”. Newcastle Morning Herald and Miners’ Advocate, 19 August 1882.
The advertisement spruiks the transport amenity of Bramcote, having frontages to the Cooranbong and Wallsend roads and being at the junction of the Minmi road.
Map from Land Title associated with DP774, showing the area west of Flaggy Creek where the Bramcote subdivision was located. Vol-Fol 570-229.
The advertisement also states that Bramcote is close to “the deep waters of Cockle Creek” which is “navigable for steamers.” Measurement in Google Earth shows that Bramcote would have been about half a mile from Cockle Creek.
The neighbouring subdivisions of Bramcote and Highgate, separated by Slatey (Flaggy) Creek.
The third transport feature spruiked in the advertisement was that Bramcote “is within four hundred yards of the proposed Railway Connecting Waratah with Sydney.” This claim was a highly questionable one to make at this time. A number of trial surveys of different routes and various deviations for the Sydney to Newcastle railway had been made in 1879 and 1880. An 1881 map for the neighbouring Highgate subdivision shows a railway route beside Cockle Creek. However even by early 1881 it appears that the Government had settled on a more easterly route that came through the Tickhole tunnel, Cardiff and then Teralba. This led to much dissatisfaction from some, who wanted the rail line to pass through the mining townships of Lambton and Wallsend. A municipal conference was held in April 1881 to agitate for their preferred route. Despite the protestations, the Government decided on the final (current) route in May 1883, and Bramcote and Highgate lost their railway.
The location of the Bramcote subdivision (DP1145) shown on a modern map. SIX maps.
What we now know as Ash Island and Kooragang Island was once a patchwork of smaller islands. With land reclamation projects over the years, and changes in the river course, many of these islands and their names have disappeared.
In my article on Doctor John James Hill in March 2017, I wrote that while Hill St in North Lambton was possibly named after Doctor Hill, given the timing of the road naming (first mentioned in 1872) I was sceptical that was the case. However I have since found there was another Hill Street in North Lambton, that almost certainly was named after John James Hill, because it was in a subdivision of land owned by Doctor Hill. This Hill St had its name changed to Percy St in 1920.
Alderman Lightfoot … moved that the necessary procedure be taken to have the name of Hill-street, North Lambton, changed to Percy-street. It was most confusing to have two streets in the municipality bearing the same name.
Official change of name of Hill St to Percy St in Government Gazette, 24 September 1920.
Background
As I was searching through various land titles in the Historical Lands Records Viewer, I found Vol-Fol 1122-48 from 1894, that showed blocks of land between Hill St and William St in North Lambton. This was curious because today, Hill St in North Lambton is nowhere near William St in Jesmond?
The mysterious Hill and William streets on Vol-Fol 1122-48 from 1894.
The solution to the mystery is that the Hill St in this map is actually Percy St today, and the William St in the map is the east end of Michael St today.
In 1867, Daniel Jones purchased 50 acres of land between Jesmond and Lambton which he named “North Lambton” (not to be confused with the modern suburb of North Lambton).
In July 1871 Jones sold a large portion (about 16 acres) of the North Lambton subdivision to Doctor John James Hill, who then began reselling individual blocks of land.
Notice that in this map that “Frederick St” is below section E, and “William St” is below section C. Today this is Michael Street, and whereas the map from Vol-Fol 123-202 shows William St joining on to George St, this part of the street does not exist today and probably never did. This is a good reminder of the care needed to interpret old maps, particularly in land titles and deposited plans. A street marked in an old map can either be an indication of a street that has been built, or a street that is planned to be built. You have to use other evidence to decide which.
Map from Vol-Fol 123-202 overlaid into Google Earth. Historical parish map showing the one street with three differently named sections – Michael St, Frederick St, and William St. Historical Land Records Viewer
In 1873 Doctor Hill lodged Deposited Plan 96, which was a re-subdivision of the land he had bought in Sections C and E of North Lambton.
96 | Hill, J.J. | County of Northumberland | North Lambton, Lambton, Newcastle, re-subdivision of part of Sections C & E on Deposited Plan 40.
There is no map I can find of the DP96 subdivision, but presumably the purpose was to subdivide into a greater number of smaller blocks in order to maximise profit. In the new subdivision, Doctor Hill added an extra street running east-west through the middle of Section C and named it Hill St.
Hill, William, and Arthur Streets on Vol-Fol 512-82 from 1880.
This “Hill St” was then renamed to Percy St in September 1920 to avoid confusion with the original Hill St above High St in Lambton. As if to graphically and ironically underline the need to reduce the confusion caused by having two Hill Streets, in one of the historical parish maps someone has added an annotation renaming the wrong Hill St! Oops.
In Hill’s subdivision of Section E in North Lambton, a narrow east-west lane was also added above Hill St. It seems that when Hill St became Percy St in 1920, that this laneway running behind the houses on the north side of Percy St came to be known as Hill St, and is marked as such on some maps.
This lane was a private road in the subdivision until Newcastle Council passed a resolution in 1991 to dedicate it as a public road, and noting that it was “also previously known as Hill Street.”
Dedication of Wall Lane (also known as Hill St) as a public road. NSW Government Gazette, 22 May 1992.
The name “Wall Lane” was in honour of the Wall family who ran the shop on the south-east corner of Arthur and Percy Streets for many years.
Vol-Fol 690-71. Purchase of land in August 1941 by George and Julia Wall of land on the corner of Hill (now Percy) and Arthur Streets.
But wait – there’s even more …
The additional extra other Hill Street
Some 500 metres away from Percy Street, opposite Jesmond Park, there is a short stretch of road today that is also named Hill Street, and also named after Doctor Hill.
Hill Street, Jesmond
This Hill Street appears in records as early as 1878, where at the Lambton Council meeting on 26 November 1878 a letter was received …
“… from the Trustees Lambton Building Society dedicating Hill & Abel Streets Jesmond to the Council.”
Dedication of Hill and Abel Streets. Lambton Council minutes of meeting on 26 November 1878.
These two streets were located on Lot 5 Section B of DP92 (Vol-Fol 163-244). This land was mortgaged to the Lambton and Building Investment Society in 1876. In November 1878 when the two streets were dedicated to Lambton Council, Doctor John James Hill was Chairman and Trustee of the Society, and Thomas Abel was Secretary.
Lot 5 of DP92 on Robert St Jesmond, mortgaged to Lambton Building and Investment Society in September 1876. Vol-Fol 163-244.
While Hill Street in Jesmond is still there in 2021, Abel Street officially ceased to exist in July 1962 when “in accordance with the provisions of the Public Roads Act, relating to Unnecessary Roads in Our State of New South Wales”, the road was closed. The eastern part of Abel Street was sold to Clarence and Annie Powell, the owners of an adjoining property, and became number 4 Hill St. (See Vol-Fol 8389-31). On the west side, the Anglican church erected a building sometime after 1974. However the transfer of ownership of that little western patch of Abel St was never officially made. This caused some confusion and a costly delay when the Anglican Church sold the property to the non-profit organisation Zara’s House in 2018.
Hill Street, Jesmond. The location of the no-longer existing Abel St is marked in green. SIX Maps.
The non-profit organisation Zara’s House now owns the block of land on the western side of Hill St, where Abel St used to be. Google Maps.A Robinson’s Street Directory (c. 1960) has three Hill Streets marked in Jesmond and North Lambton.
The many monikers of Michael
Earlier in this article I mentioned that what is Michael St today, originally was three differently named sections – Michael, Frederick, William. But that was just in the stretch of road that lay in Lambton municipality – the section of road in the Wallsend municipality had yet another name – Robroy St.
A newspaper article from 1945 titled “Postman’s Headache at Jesmond”, notes that
The street in question, before the advent of Greater Newcastle was Frederick-street from the North Lambton area to Steel-street, Jesmond, Michael-street outwards to the old Lambton-Wallsend boundary, and Rob Roy-street thence to Blue Gum road in the Jesmond area. It is stated that, although it is now all Michael-street, officially, the three names still persist with the uninitiated, and piecemeal house numbering adds to the confusion.
Coon Island in Lake Macquarie has been in the news lately, with calls for its name to be changed given the overt derogatory nature of the current name. I wholeheartedly agree that changing the name is the right thing to do.
I had to look up where the island is located, which is at the northern point of land above Swansea.
In 2020 I attended a Zoom seminar run by Newcastle Family History Society, at which Jeff Madsen explained how to navigate and search the Historical Land Records Viewer to find old land title certificates, which can contain valuable historical information, as well as the occasional map.
I had used this service before to find some old maps, but was never able to find anything when searching the Torrens (land titles) records. I learnt that the reason why I never found anything is because none of the contents are indexed. The only way you can find a land title certificate is if you know the Volume and Folio number. This is often referred to as the Vol-Fol, and is searched for by entering the numbers separated by a hyphen as shown below.
Without a Vol-Fol number, your chance of finding what you want is literally millions to one. However, having found a title certificate (that’s a story for another post), it will often contain a reference to the previous certificate, and possibly one or more references to following certificates. These links then form a ‘Chain of Title’ that shows the progressive changes of ownership and subdivision of land. Using this concept of ‘chain of title’, starting with my own property in Lambton I was able to trace the chain back to the original mineral lease granted to Morehead and Young in 1863 (Vol-Fol 2-4), and then trace the chain forward to Vol-Fol 3-156 from 1864 wherein the plan of the township of Lambton appears on page 3.
Finding this map was very exciting. It is the oldest map I had found of Lambton, more than 30 years older than what I had seen before. The map revealed a few interesting details:
It confirmed my previous suspicion that the original name for Howe St was How St, almost certainly named after Robert How, an investor in the Scottish and Australian Mining Company.
The main road from Wallsend to Newcastle was originally going to be Dickson St.
The section of Grainger St between Dickson St and Young St (Newcastle Rd now) was originally called Reservoir St.
Grainger St appears on this map as “Granger” without the ‘i’. Unlike the ‘How/Howe’ discrepancy, this is almost certainly a mis-spelling on the 1864 map. Newspaper reports and Government Gazettes overwhelmingly and from an early date spell it as “Grainger”. The street is named after “Charles Garston Grainger” which returns 454 results in Trove, whereas searching for “Charles Garston Granger” returns no results.
Map of the planned Lambton Township, 1864. Vol-Fol 3-156.
A newspaper advertisement in January 1863 promoted the sale of 96 allotments of land in the township of Lambton, at an auction to be held on 9 February 1863.
The Newcastle Chronicle and Hunter River District News, 17 January 1863.
However just a few days before the auction was to be held, it was “postponed till further notice”, with no reason given for the delay.
The Newcastle Chronicle and Hunter River District News, 4 February 1863.
In May 1864, advertisements for land sales at Lambton resumed, for an auction to be held on Wednesday 8 June 1864, but this time for 90 allotments of land. The plan of the township has 144 lots (6 rows of 24 lots) and it is not clear which of the 90 were on offer, or why.
The Newcastle Chronicle and Hunter River District News, 7 May 1864.
The auction sale took place on Wednesday 8 June 1864, and was reported on in the following Saturday’s newspaper.
The land sale advertised to take place at Lambton, on Wednesday last, and to which we drew special attention, was the means of attracting a goodly number of persons. A special train was laid on by the Company, to convey purchasers to the spot, and a liberal lunch provided to regale them on their arrival. Several allotments were disposed of by Mr. Lochhead, on the ground, at prices varying from £20 to £24, and others, not realising that amount, were bought in on the part of Messrs. Morehead and Young, and we are given to understand that many of them have been sold by private contract.
The Newcastle Chronicle and Hunter River District News, 11 June 1864.
Vol-Fol 3-156 records transfers of land in the township of Lambton. The first transfer on 18 June 1864 was for lots 13 and 14 of Section K sold to Robert Cairns, who then built the town’s first hotel, The Lambton Arms, on that site.
Sale of lots 13 and 14 of Section K to Robert Cairns. Vol-Fol 3-156
For quite some time as I researched Lambton history, I’ve come across references to “Tharwa Road”, which no longer exists in Lambton. I wondered whether it was a mis-spelling or variant of “Tathra Road”. Recently while perusing old maps I discovered that a 1906 real estate poster map shows that “Tharwa Road” used to be the section of Wallarah Road north of Womboin Road.
It made sense that the road had two names, for they began as two completely separate roads divided by the Lambton colliery railway. Each road was also in a different council area – Tharwa Road in the Lambton municipality, Wallarah Road in the New Lambton municipality.
As early as 1926, residents of East Lambton were agitating to have the roads connected to make a thoroughfare to New Lambton. The joining of the roads appears to have happened around 1941, with The Newcastle Sun reporting on 11 Feb 1941 …
It was decided to ask the Newcastle Council to attend to … the renumbering of Wallarah Road, which has now been extended to include Tharwa Road.
While looking at Google Earth this weekend I noticed that it was somewhat odd the way the Sydney-Newcastle train line has a big eastward loop just south of Teralba.
Why didn’t the train line just continue north-south in a relatively straight line? Consulting Parrott’s 1893 map revealed that’s exactly what the line used to do. Here’s the map overlaid onto Google Earth, with the present day path of the rail line shown in red.
So why the change, and when did it happen?
A search of Trove revealed that construction of the deviation was commenced around 1901. It was one of a number of re-alignments and deviations between Adamstown and Morisset designed to reduce the grade (steepness) of the track, and thus improve the efficiency of haulage. The Newcastle Morning Herald and Miners’ Advocate reporting on the program of rail deviations on 2 July 1901 stated that …
The grade will be 1 in 80 as against 1 in 40 and 1 in 50 on the present line. It is estimated that this deviation of the line, though a costly matter, involving as it does the expenditure of some thing between £70,000 and £80,000, will enable one engine to do work which it now takes two to do, and thus the expenditure is believed to be justifiable.
Construction of the Teralba deviation was halted in October 1901 because of a legal dispute. The deviation passed over the workings of the Pacific Co-operative Steam Coal Company, and the Railway Commissioner’s had offered £2,000 in compensation for the resumed land. The coal company thought this too little, and put in a counter claim for £25,000 compensation. Construction of the deviation recommenced in early 1902 while the legal arguments about compensation continued. In June 1902 it was reported that “the Teralba section is being pushed forward rapidly, giving employment to from 300 to 400 men”. The construction was reported as completed in April 1903.
However the argument over compensation was not completed. At an arbitration hearing in January 1903 the Railway Commissioners were ordered to pay £18,460 in compensation. The Railway Commissioners thought the award too high, and immediately asked “to have the amount of compensation settled by a jury, under the provisions of the Public Works Act of 1900.” On the other hand the Pacific Co-operative Coal Company thought the award too small, and immediately upped the ante by suing the Railway Commissioners for “£60,000 damages for the deprivation of mining rights.”
After a lengthy court case in March 1903, the jury awarded the coal company £17,609 in damages. On 11 June 1903 the coal company signed a “judgement for the amount of the verdict, with interests and costs.” But two months later in August 1903 the matter was back in the courts, where a ruling was made that the coal company “were not entitled to recover such costs.” To make matters even more complicated (as if they weren’t complicated enough), the Pacific Co-operative Steam Coal Company didn’t own the land they were mining. They leased it from the Perpetual Trustee Company for an annual fee based on the amount of coal extracted. The Perpetual Trustee Company thought that their payments would be reduced due to the resumption of land by the railway, and therefore they launched separate legal action against the Railway Commissioners for payment of compensation.
Convoluted legal proceedings continued for years, going all the way to the Privy Council in London in September 1904, other proceedings to the High Court of Australia in September 1905, and continuing in other courts until at least May 1906. With the massive amount of time spent in the courts and associated legal fees, I suspect the 3km Teralba deviation became the most expense piece of railway construction in NSW at the time.
