The Manor House

STATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE


The Manor House
4 Dryden St

The Manor House is of regional significance for its association with various owners, for the simple elegance of its architecture and as a landmark. It was built in 1862, according to the date scratched into one of the quoins, for John McSheehy, the first engineer with the Dundas Roads Board and later Borough ([i]), who may have designed the building. ([ii]) It seems that he never lived there but was forced to sell to his mortgagor, Samuel Pratt Winter Cooke of Murndal. ([iii]) It was occupied for several decades by Hamilton doctors including Dr J.R. Wylie in the 1870s ([iv]), Dr Arthur Bennett, a Hamilton mayor, from 1887 to 1930 ([v]) and Dr R. W. Brown in the 1960s. ([vi]) Two brothers, retired pastoralists, first John and later Donald McLellan, lived there. ([vii])


This noteworthy mid-Victorian era house of substantial scale has importance as the best example in Hamilton of a popular domestic style of the 1860s. ([viii]) It was very well built. The house uses several materials which are notable, such as slate for the roof and Grampians (Mt Sturgeon) sandstone for the quoins. ([ix]) The tall French doors opening out to the verandah and the view are especially fine not having any vertical subdivisions. Particularly interesting is the chance to compare the original timber verandah with the cast iron verandah. Most unusually for Hamilton in the nineteenth, the house is set at an angle to the street to maximise its aspect. The house remains significantly intact and is in excellent condition. It is one of the key components in its streetscape. The garden includes an important Magnolia grandiflora, Bull Bay.