The Branxton Courthouse

Branxton
Small Hunter Valley township on the New England Highway
Branxton, located 18 km north-west of Maitland, 167 km north of Sydney via Cessnock and 43 m above sea-level, is a small township in the Cessnock shire situated on the New England Highway between Maitland and Singleton. It has several older buildings which reflect the fact that it emerged (albeit slowly and undramatically) in the early to mid-19th century as the Hunter Valley was opened up beyond Maitland.

The district is thought to have been occupied by the Wanaruah people prior to white settlement. Branxton was part of William Bowen's Farmborough estate. The small settlement known as Black Creek (the name of the stream that passed through the village) was renamed Branxton in 1848 (after a town in Northumberland, England) when the land was subdivided and sales held. A village was in existence by 1860 when there were about 500 residents, a steam mill, a post office, a mechanics institute and four hotels.

About 5 km from Branxton is a road on the right leading to Kirkton (6 km over mostly gravel roads). Kirkton was granted to John Busby in 1835 (though he must have been in possession of it some years earlier) and the homestead was built at that time. While he was engaged in the engineering of the water supply in Sydney his family farmed the estate.

One son, James, studied oenology and, in the 1820s, he wrote a treatise and guidance manual on the subject and briefly taught viticulture at a Liverpool farm school. In 1831 he undertook a tour of French and Spanish vineyards which resulted in two published journals of the trip. He returned with 700 carefully wrapped cuttings of European vines, sending half to the newly established Royal Botanical Gardens in Sydney. The rest he took with him to Kirkton. He is thus considered the father of viniculture in the Hunter Valley, though he later left for New Zealand where, as Government Resident of New Zealand, he established the Treaty of Waitangi. The family graves are on the property.

Corinda is about one kilometre west of Kirkton Public School. This property, one of the earliest in the district, was granted in 1824 to Archibald Bell Jr, the son of a soldier and magistrate of some note in the colony's early history. In 1823 Bell Jr, at the age of nineteen, had forged an alternative route over the Blue Mountains from Richmond into the Hunter Valley. A road was constructed in his wake. He was awarded the property after a subsequent expedition into the valley. One of the first settlers in the area Bell was also one of the first to introduce cattle and horse teams. A horse breeder of some renown he built a two-storey house of locally-quarried sandstone and explored the tributaries of the Hunter. His homestead was later demolished and the stone was used to erect The Church of the Good Shepherd at Belford.

Things to see:  

St John's Anglican Church, Branxton

Historic Places of Interest
Just beyond the Dalwood Rd turnoff is a cemetery to the right then Elderslie Rd to Elderslie. Just past it is Branxton Inn Licensed Restaurant and Gallery, situated in a building which dates back to 1862.

Take the next left into Cessnock Rd (also known as Church St). On the left, as you go up the hill, is St John's Anglican Church, a brick building with a tower designed by J. Horbury Hunt and built 1871-79. Over the road is the courthouse, made of brick with a gabled roof, front verandah and symmetrical ancillary offices, also with verandahs. Adjacent is the police station (1880, designed by James Barnet), a symmetrical, single-storey brick building with a front verandah topped by a stepped gabled roof and pediment over the doorway.

Take the first right into Drinan St. The left turn into Bridge St will take you southwards through Rothbury and the Lower Hunter Vineyards to Cessnock.

At the end of Drinan St turn right into Clift St which will lead back to the highway. On the corner of Drinan and Clift Sts is the old Branxton Methodist (now Uniting) Church (1865). On the corner of Clift St and the highway is the Victoria Building (c.1860). Originally a general store it is now a coffee shop. Opposite Clift St, at the corner of the highway and John Rose Ave are some attractive old residences and Branxton Hardware. Brown's Garage is said to date from c.1875. There are also some older buildings on the highway between Church and Clift Sts. The Royal Federal Hotel serves good counter lunches.

Belford
8 km west of Branxton along the highway is Belford. Surveyed in 1833 and again in 1854 the village was originally known as Jump-Up Creek. Hermitage Rd heads down to the vineyards of the Lower Hunter (see entry on Pokolbin).

	Restaurants
	Wyndham Estate Restaurant Dalwood Via Branxton NSW 2334 Telephone: (02) 4938 3444