Cox's Cottage facts for kids

Cox's Cottage is a very old house in Mulgoa, Sydney, Australia. It was built a long time ago, between 1810 and 1811. People also call it Mulgoa Cottage or The Cottage. This special house is still lived in today, making it one of the oldest continuously lived-in houses in Australia! It's listed on the New South Wales State Heritage Register because it's so important.

The Story of Cox's Cottage

Who Lived Here First?

Long ago, the Mulgowie people, also known as the Mulgoa tribe, were the first owners of the land where Cox's Cottage now stands. They lived here for thousands of years.

How the Cox Family Settled

Cox's Cottage is part of the first land given to settlers in the Mulgoa Valley. These lands were given to members of the Cox family. The first piece of land, about 30 acres (12 hectares), was given to a young boy named Edward Cox in 1809.

Edward's father, Lieutenant William Cox, was a very important person in early colonial Sydney. He is famous for building the first road over the Blue Mountains in 1814. William Cox arrived in New South Wales in 1799. He helped the colony grow in many ways, like building and farming.

The Cox family loved houses and gardens. William Cox Sr. lived at Clarendon. His sons also built their own grand homes nearby. These included Henry, George, and Edward, who built Glenmore, Winbourne, and Fernhill in Mulgoa. They all created beautiful gardens around their homes.

Building The Cottage

The Cottage was built for Lieutenant William Cox. A man named James King, a retired sergeant, helped supervise the building. It was built on land given to Edward Cox in 1809-1810. The house was probably finished around 1810-1811.

By 1815, the farm was doing well. Mrs. Cox even prepared a special meal for Governor Macquarie when he visited. For a while, James King managed the Cox family's Mulgoa properties from The Cottage. William Cox's sons, George, Henry, and Edward, also helped out sometimes.

Between 1821 and 1825, George and Henry Cox lived in The Cottage with their new wives. Later, they moved to their own houses in the Mulgoa area. Around this time, The Cottage was made bigger. It started as a simple three-room house. Another room was added, and a verandah was built all around it. This verandah changed the house from a simple English style to a colonial bungalow.

The Cottage was a central place for the Mulgoa settlement. It was also where people gathered for religious services before St. Thomas' Anglican Church was built nearby.

Edward Cox and His Family

Around 1825, Edward Cox came back from school in England. He was only four years old when he was given the land. In 1827, at age 22, Edward married Jane Maria Brooks. They lived in The Cottage for the next sixteen years.

By the late 1830s, Fernhill, which included The Cottage, was one of the main estates in the Mulgoa Valley. In 1843, Edward Cox built a much grander house called Fernhill. This new house was on a hill west of The Cottage.

Around this time, The Cottage and about 400 acres (160 hectares) of land were offered for lease. It was described as a comfortable family cottage with many rooms and a large cellar. It also had a well-stocked orchard and garden.

Award-Winning Wine

In 1847, Edward Cox won a medal for the wines he made on his property, Fernhill. He competed against his brother Henry and Sir John Jamison. The competition for the best wine was very strong. The medal was a big deal and showed how important the prize was.

Historical experts believe that the vineyard that produced the medal-winning wine was on Lot 2, a piece of land next to The Cottage. You can still see the terraced rows where the grapevines were planted in 1983.

In the early 1850s, Colonel Godfrey Mundy visited Fernhill. He was impressed by how the Cox family had changed the landscape. They removed some native trees and kept others that looked more like English trees.

Edward Cox passed away in 1863. The property then went to his oldest son, Edward King Cox. He ran a famous racehorse stud at The Cottage until 1885. Some famous horses, like Grand Flaneur, who won the 1880 Melbourne Cup, were bred there.

After Edward King Cox died, his son Alfred Edward Cox and a partner ran a dairy farm on the property from about 1897 to 1913.

New Owners and Neglect

In 1913, the property was sold to new owners. Then, in 1920, H. J. Davey bought it. Mrs. Davey and Mrs. Love ran the dairy farm until about 1969. After that, The Cottage was leased to a Mr. Sheehan until 1972.

For many years, The Cottage was not well cared for. It started to fall apart. Luckily, Miss Valerie Cox, a descendant of the family, made a donation to the National Trust of Australia. This money helped get rid of termites and board up the windows, giving the house some protection.

Rescue and Revival

Since the 1970s, The Cottage has been owned by James Broadbent and his family. Dr. James Broadbent is an expert in old buildings and gardens. He has worked hard to save the house and bring the garden back to its original beauty. He started by repairing the verandah and the roof.

The Cottage is beautifully located on a small hill near Mulgoa Creek. It is one of the earliest and most important colonial houses. It still has its lovely rural setting. It was the heart of the Mulgoa settlement. It might be the oldest weatherboard house in New South Wales. It is definitely the oldest building in the Mulgoa/Wallacia Valley. It is also the oldest surviving house built by the Cox family.

What Cox's Cottage Looks Like

The Cottage Building

Cox's Cottage, built in 1810 or 1811, is probably the oldest house in Australia where people still live. Other very old houses are usually museums now. It is also likely the oldest weatherboard cottage in New South Wales.

The cottage is an early colonial bungalow. It still has its rural setting and parts of its original garden. This includes white cedar trees and "century plants," which were growing there in the mid-1800s. After 1980, more plants typical of colonial gardens were added, like Bunya Bunya pines and silky oaks.

The house has a rectangular shape. It probably reached its current look by 1820. It originally had a shingle roof, but this was replaced around 1850 with zinc-coated tiles.

The original listing for Cox's Cottage included two large pieces of land, each about 10 hectares (25 acres). The Cottage is on the northern part of one of these lots. Most of this land looks like farmland.

The Cottage faces northeast and sits at the end of a ridge. It has views along the creek to the north and over the flat areas by the river. The historical connections between Cox's Cottage, St Thomas's Church to the south, and Fernhill to the west are still clear and important.

Lot 2: The Land Next Door

Lot 2 is an undeveloped piece of land, about 10 hectares (25 acres), next to Cox's Cottage to the north. It slopes down from Mulgoa Road towards the creek.

This land has two small dams. You can still see two areas where vineyards used to be. The land mostly has pasture grasses and some weeds. Along Mulgoa Creek, there are some native trees mixed with older foreign trees like English elms. Other parts of the land have regenerating native trees.

What We Can Learn From the Land

As of 2007, experts believe the property likely holds clues about the Cox family's time there. This includes possible sites of old buildings and orchards. For example:

• Sites of early buildings: A large area south of the cottage shows signs of former farm buildings and possibly the racehorse stud.
• Site of clay pits: A clear dip in the ground west of the cottage, where clay for bricks was dug around 1810.
• Site of the vineyard: Clear terraced rows over a wide area on the slope, dating from around 1810.
• Site of a dam/weir: Possibly marked by old wooden posts from the 1800s.
• Possible site of old horse graves: No visible remains of the graves of famous horses like "Yattendon" and 'Grand Flaneur' from the 1880s.

How the Cottage Was Fixed Up

Cox's Cottage was almost falling apart when James Broadbent and his family bought it in the 1970s. He has spent many years carefully restoring the building and its landscape. He followed special rules to make sure the historical importance was kept.

Why Cox's Cottage is Important

As of 2010, Cox's Cottage is very important to the history of New South Wales. It is one of the oldest weatherboard houses in the state and probably the oldest house in Australia that is still lived in.

It is on land given to the important Cox family in the Mulgoa Valley. Cox's Cottage is special because it still looks like the original farmland around it. It shows how early settlers lived and tried farming and growing grapes in the Sydney area.

The property is also important because of its strong connection to several generations of the Cox family. They played a big part in developing farming in New South Wales. This includes William Cox, who supervised the building of the first road over the Blue Mountains.

The house itself is a good example of an early Colonial Georgian cottage. Its surrounding fields are also important because they provide an untouched farm landscape for the cottage.

Cox's Cottage is also important to many heritage groups and local community groups. They value it highly. It can also teach us a lot about history. We can learn from the old parts of the cottage and the former vineyard terraces. There might also be other hidden clues about the Cox family's time there.

Cox's Cottage is rare because it is a key part of one of the most important historical landscapes in New South Wales. This is the Mulgoa Valley landscape, which also includes Fernhill and St Thomas' Anglican Church. This area shows how early European settlers tried to change the natural land to create a specific design.

Cox's Cottage is a great example of early colonial homes and farm landscapes in the western part of the Cumberland Plain.