DYARUBBIN
The Darug, Darkinjung and Gundungurra people have lived continuously in this region, with Dyarubbin (the Hawkesbury River) serving as a fundamental source of food, resources and transportation. Dyarubbin comes from the Gundungurra word for yams.
BRITISH COLONISATION
British settlers first explored this region in 1789 and it became the third place in Australia to be colonised following Sydney and Parramatta. The new-comers referred to the elevated land west of the Hawkesbury River as ‘Richmond Hill’. Given their desperate need for food in the new colony, this fertile land was identified as a promising place for farming, and by 1799 it was the source of half the colony’s grain.
RICHMOND HILL MASSACRE
As colonists cleared land for farming, Aboriginal clans’ food supplies were depleted and they were forced to abandon their traditional hunting grounds. This created extreme hostility and frequent skirmishes. Troops were sent from Sydney to wipe out the local indigenous population which led to numerous Frontier War battles in the region, including the Richmond Hill Massacre in 1795.
BELMONT
Governor of the day, William Bligh, granted a 500 acre portion of land in Richmond (including the land that is now home to the Redbank community) to Archibald Bell, a then Junior Officer in the NSW Corps. On this property he built a grand home and named it Belmont, meaning ‘a beautiful hill’, where he and his wife Maria raised their 10 children.
A GRAND AND ENDURING MANSION
Belmont Estate was purchased by Philip Charley, one of the founding fathers of BHP. He almost entirely demolished the existing home and in its place commissioned the construction of the still standing ‘Belmont House’, an elegant Italianate sandstone mansion.
In 1951 the Brothers of St. John of God purchased Belmont House and converted it into a hospital to provide a safe place for the brothers to receive care for mental illness. To this day it is one of Sydney’s most renowned private psychiatric hospitals that provides a safe, structured and supportive place to recover.
THE PANSY LINE
The Richmond – Kurrajong railway was a 7km length of track connected to the Main Western Line. It was built after decades of lobbying to transport fruit from local orchards to Sydney, and it even helped to seed a small tourism industry. It has been colloquially referred to as the ‘Pansy’ line, for the small Z20- class tank which would run the route pulling two passenger or cattle cars.
With its small size and lack of pulling power, the tank proved slow and redundant in comparison to trucks.
Unprofitability, floods and land slips sealed its fate after only 26 years in operation.
YOBARNIE
Two properties adjoining Belmont Estate, that were also part of the historical land grant to Bell, were purchased by engineer and agriculturalist P.A. Yeomans in response to a local government grant to stimulate innovation in agricultural land management.
He named one of the properties Nevallan and the other Yobarnie. The former was used as a working farm, the latter as an experimental site for testing and refining his ideas relating to soil improvement, land regeneration and the management and distribution of water on difficult agricultural sites.
His resulting ‘Keyline’ method became an international best-practice blueprint and sowed the seeds of Permaculture. In 2013 Yobarnie was registered with the Heritage Council as a significant site.
REDBANK
The next chapter for this land is an active, healthy and connected residential community. The heritage Keyline design has been preserved and celebrated through green spines, public realm, interactive walks and interpretive signage. Water management systems are inspired by the Keyline design to catch storm water and road runoff and treat it through the existing dam system before it leaves the site. Overlooking 85 acres of heritage-protected parklands, Redbank is set to be North Richmond’s premier address — an eclectic mix of traditional family homesites and grand homestead lots.