since the wool fetches no price, and when we have any thing to sell we find its value has fallen 70 per cent since we purchased ...'In November 1833 she wrote "farming affairs look very ill for there has been no rain for many a day" and on 12 December 1833:[1] 'George & James are both at Brownlow Hill busily engaged with their harvest, which promises to be better than was expected some little time ago.

The men have lately given them a great deal of trouble; indeed generally over the country there reigns a bad spirit among the convicts, owing to the Govrs mistaken lenient measures.

[3][1] Sidman's account of the history of the area, written in the 1930s, claims that the first home was on the flat above Mt Hunter Creek and that a stone quarry was opened on the estate, although this is not corroborated by other authors.

Von Hugel considered the farm (Glendaurel), two miles away from the new house, as having no equal of any he had seen in NSW for its 'cleanliness and orderliness`, and differing considerably from others such as Regentville, possessed paddocks cleared of stumps.

James Broadbent, in "The Australian Colonial House" writes that 'Edinglassie was a simplified, antipodean version of the rustic cottage ornes popularised by Papworth in Ackermann's Repository of Arts, Literature, Fashions & c., or his own Rural Residences [1818]'.

Both the von Hugel and Boswell accounts indicate clear connections between William Macarthur at Camden Park and the Macleays at Brownlow Hill.

Sales of plants noted in William Macarthur's notebooks indicate that during the early 1850s a number of significant additions were made to the garden, some of which are a feature of the property today.

[1] Samuel Mossman and Thomas Banister visited Brownlow Hill at this time, approaching the estate from Vanderville, the property of John Wild(e), which encompassed the village now known as The Oaks.

[1] On an 1848 visit George Macleay's niece (daughter of his sister Margaret) Annabella Boswell commented:[1][6] "I am much interested in the botanical books in the library here, and wish I knew something of botany.

It is said that many years ago a gang of bushrangers used to retreat to these rocks, where they found safety and shelter..."Sidman's account of Brownlow Hill states that in the 1850s 'the property was leased for pig raising - when much damage was done to the beautiful growth surrounding.

[1] Hardy Wilson sketched the Round House and overshadowed by a large Angophora tree for the plate "Great Apple-Oak at Cobbitty" for his book, "The Cowpasture Road" (1920).

'[1] Trevor Allen, James Broadbent and Howard Tanner mapped the garden c.1969 as part of their joint architectural thesis at the University of Sydney.

Diana Wilson (nee Downes) was born on Brownlow Hill at Glendon, married and left the farm before returning to Monk's Cottage in 1960.

The garden surrounding the Round House contains old pepper trees (Schinus molle (estimated to date from the 1850s),[9] sky flower (Duranta plumieri), wisteria and honey locusts (Gleditsia triacanthos).

Amy recalls her grandmother and husband installed an internal bathroom, verandah and concrete floor to the Round House, building a beautiful shed.

He joined the 1st Australian Tank Battalion in World War 1 and met his future wife, Joan Whitton, at a dance for officers in Melbourne (they married in 1952).

Amy's sister asked to be married on the property, so these works were done, the timber verandah was improved, the very old shed in the garden was re-stumped to make it stand up straight again.

[9][1] A recent book on Caroline Thomas notes her daughter married into the Downes family and moved from Wivenhoe, Cobbitty to Brownlow Hill.

[12][1] Brownlow Hill has an exceptionally attractive semi natural landscape and the setting of the house is one of Australia's best surviving examples of a colonial garden.

Immediately within the gates on the left is an artificially formed pond built up with a balustraded sandstone retaining wall, partly covered in dwarf creeping fig (Ficus pumila) and urns on the northern edge to carry the drive which then turns right and climbs the hill, skirts a dense bamboo thicket, then clipped hedges of box and thickets overgrown predominantly with African olives and large leaved privet.

[1] The stables/Carriage House is a fine brick building with "Marulan" sandstone lintels; vaguely Palladian (ie tripartite facade with single storied sides, pedimented centre with loft).

Behind these, overgrown thickets of largely self sown African olive (Olea africana) and large leaved privet, but containing along the edges a representative collection of common 19th century shrubbery plants and trees (Chinese elms, winter honeysuckle, geraniums, bay, photinia, dietes), A secondary service drive screened by the olives and privets links the coach house with the house.

A single specimen of native cypress, possibly Port Jackson/Oyster Bay pine (Callitris rhomboides) is to the north of the carriage loop in the "Victorian" garden.

[1] A range of shrub plantings include the now rare Italian buckthorn (Rhamnus alaternus), Cape plumbago (P.capensis), Agave species, Yucca species, roses, may bush (Spiraea cantonensis), geraniums, Oleanders (Nerium oleander), shrub honeysuckle (Lonicera fragrantissima), Himalayan jasmine (Jasminium mesnyi), laurustinus (Viburnum tinus), Photinia glabra, a bay tree (Laurus nobilis), lantana (L.camara), sky flower (Duranta plumieri), mickey mouse plant (Ochna serrulata) and Cotoneasters.

A large Marulan sandstone urn on stone pedestal still remains as does the sundial - a baluster shaped support with a brass dial bearing the inscription George Macleay 1836.

Behind the aviary are two specimens of a rare Indian medicinal plant, vasaka, (Adhatoda duvernaia/A.vasica), thought to have been introduced from India by Alexander Macleay through his correspondence with a Dr Walloch, head of the (then 1820s-30s) Calcutta Botanic Gardens.

The garden surrounding the Round House contains old pepper trees (Schinus), sky flower (Duranta plumieri), wisteria and honey locusts (Gleditsia triacanthos).

The outer garden, lane/ Loop Road and hedgerows are in need of some weed management, to retain significant views and vistas, and control spread, particularly of African olives and privet.

Brownlow Hill is firmly placed in the consciousness of the community as one of the most evocative early European estates (colonial house, garden, landscape setting) in NSW.

It also has rare surviving and intact colonial estate layout, features, farm plantings, ornamental gardens and structures which provide an important visual context for the former landscape, allowing opportunities for cultural and historical interpretation.