Thursday, December 31, 2009

Erskineville - Robert Henderson of Henderson Road and the gravelling of Erko Road

Robert T. Henderson - Page 15
Robert Thomas Henderson
Alderman for O'Connell in 1871-76

His father was Robert Henderson (1798-1865) whom the 'Gardeners Magazine' of February 1865 says superintended the layout of the 'once-famed gardens' of Alexander MacLeay's Elizabeth Bay House estate. His mother Elizabeth was daughter to Thomas Shepherd who operated the nursery in Chippendale from the 1830s which was known as the Government Nursery or the Darling Nursery because, as Victor Crittenden says, it was vice-regally approved by Governor Ralph Darling. (Francis Low's Directory of 1844-45 mentions a James Henderson working at the Darling Nursery.)

Robert Henderson married Elizabeth Shepherd in 1831 and started the Camellia Grove Nursery in 1838 on four acres nearby in the low lands in what was the Kingsclear grant of 1794 and now is land on the corner of Henderson Road and Park Street Erskineville. The first son Robert Thomas Henderson was born in 1837, brother Charles JBN Henderson in 1845.


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