Emery, John
The Emery family have long been associated with Campbelltown, South Australia, and its surrounding areas. John Emery (1839-1912) spent his retirement years here, as a fruit and vegetable grower in ‘Sydenham’, Paradise, after an adventurous life overlanding cattle and managing outback stations.
John Emery was born 31 October 1839 at North Adelaide, the eldest of five brothers born between 1839 and 1847. His parents, John Emery senior and Elizabeth Emery (nee Lillywhite) arrived in South Australia 21 March 1839 on board the ship ‘Buckinghamshire’ from Springhead Farm near Storrington, Sussex, England, and later settled at Gilles Plains (Section 508). John Emery senior died of influenza in 1847, and his property was put-up for sale the following year. His widow, Elizabeth Emery, continued to live at Gilles Plains (Section 503) until her death in 1892.
John Emery was among the first six boarders at St Peter’s College, founded in 1847. He began his agricultural career on John Stead’s property, Melon Grove, Highbury (Section 812), where he learned viticulture and winemaking for two years. Melon Grove was established by John Stead in 1839 and was “thus among the first in South Australia to produce wine”.
About 1860, Messrs. C. B. Fisher & B. Rochford, the owners of Mt Schanck Station, near Mt Gambier, employed John Emery to overland cattle from Victoria, and then as a stockman on the station. During this time, he struck-up a friendship with Adam Lindsay Gordon, the famous Australian poet, who at the time was working as a horse-breaker in the south east of South Australia.
John Emery left Mt Schanck Station in about 1862, when the property sold to Mr W. J. T. Clarke, but he continued overlanding sheep from The Riverina, NSW, to South Australia for Messrs. C. B. Fisher & B. Rochford. On one trip, John Emery had upwards of 80,000 sheep in his charge. Mr C. B. Fisher was at one time considered the largest pastoralist in Australia, and he is said to have “conducted the most colossal droving operations ever known” in the history of Victoria and South Australia.
Mr Philip Levi, the brother-in-law of Charles James Fox Campbell, then appointed John Emery as the manager of both Moolooloo Station in the Flinders Ranges and Wirrealpa Station, near Blinman. In 1867, Mr E. W. Pitts, general manager for Mr C. B. Fisher, employed him as overseer at Hill River Station, near Clare, where he became the resident manager and stayed until Hill River Station sold to Mr. J. H. Angas, and the sale of all stock and effects finalised in 1877. During his time at Hill River Station, John Emery secured many prizes for wool and wheat in England and Europe.
On 24 May 1873 John Emery married widowed Mary Ann McKay (nee Butler), the daughter of Mr Patrick Butler of Clare, at Trinity Church, Adelaide. Mary Ann had a daughter from her previous marriage, called Sarah Ann McKay, who was born in 1862, and she lived with John and Mary Ann Emery. Mary Ann’s own mother had died in 1871, and her father died in 1876, but a number of her seven surviving siblings continued to live in the area between Clare and Terowie.
After he left Hill River Station in 1877, John Emery took a position with Messrs W. and R. Reid as manager of Tolarno Station, on the River Darling, NSW, and he, Mary Ann and Sarah Ann, moved there. It is on Tolarno Station that John Emery first experienced the full destructive force of feral rabbits. There also Mary Ann Emery’s daughter, Sarah Ann, married William Sandland of Tintinallogy Station on her 21st birthday in August 1883. She had a daughter, Ethel Mary Emery Sandland, in May 1884, but sadly Sarah Ann died in July 1884 and her baby died at only five months old in December 1884. John Emery and Mary Ann Emery (formerly McKay nee Butler) had no children of their own, but from the early 1880s onwards, they did care for a child, Edith Teresa Hains (called Edie), who was the daughter of Mary Ann’s sister Sarah. Sarah had died when Edie was less than two years old.
While still working for Tolarno Station John Emery purchased 17-acres of land which fronted the River Torrens in ‘Sydenham’, a locality that straddles the modern-day suburbs of Campbelltown and Paradise, and early in 1885 he and his family left Tolarno and came to Adelaide. There they had a house built on the Sydenham property which they called ‘Boolya-Appa-Ooka’ (Pelican’s Rest) and John established a garden, growing fruit such as, pears, grapes, apricots, plums, figs, peaches, oranges, and lemons, and vegetables such as, potatoes, cauliflowers, cabbages, trombones, beans, tomatoes, onions and lettuce.
According to the reminiscences of his great-nephew, Cecil Emery, written in 1985:
“The South-Western boundary of the property was a large boxthorn hedge and some tall gum trees. A post and wire fence along Junction Road formed the North-eastern boundary and the large white-painted timber gate that led into the property at the junction of Gameau Road was a well-known landmark. The Eastern boundary ran along Lincoln Road and was also a post and wire fence. A large gum-tree stood in the North-eastern corner. The white gate was about the middle of the property and a pebble and sand road almost intersected it. A dirt track led from this through an avenue of tall Duchess Pear trees to the house, which was also about the middle but well down towards the river…The house itself was substantial and solidly-built of dressed sandstone – it had an air of quality about it, in its workmanship and general appearance.”
In 1886, John Emery went back to station life on the River Darling, NSW. Messrs. Pile Brothers of Polia and Cuthero Stations, near Pooncarie, NSW, employed him to superintend their annual wool clips, and he remained there until 1891. Then he moved south again, taking over the management of Canowie Station, near Terowie, South Australia, for Sanders, James, & Co. until he retired in 1897, and lived for the rest of his life on the Sydenham property.
Mary Ann predeceased her husband on 5 December 1908, and after John’s death in 1912, the property passed to his brothers Charles and Robert Emery. Charles died in 1915, and after Robert’s death in 1935 his youngest son, Osmond Esme ‘Bill’ Emery became the owner.
During 1885, John Emery kept a diary that documents the building of the house and garden at ‘Sydenham’, Paradise. Although sometimes tersely worded, in the manner of a no-nonsense pastoralist, the diary provides a fascinating insight into the development of the property and family life in the 1880s.
Work is being undertaken by Margaret Emery, his great-great niece to transcribe and annotate the diary to make it available on this webpage.
Written and researched by Helen Thiselton (Local History Officer) and Margaret Emery. If you have any questions or comments on
If you have any comments or questions regarding the information in this local history article, please contact the Local History officer on 8366 9357 or hthiselton@campbelltown.sa.gov.au
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