Accommodation
Victorian Goldfields Cottage
The cottage is over 160 years old. It was originally a corner shop and residence, purchased from the Crown in 1859 by George C Robinson.
George sailed from England to Victoria in 1853 on the same ship as John Hiscock and family, in search of gold.
After roughing it on the goldfields in Avoca and Maryborough, George bought a share in a mine on the Ballarat goldfields and worked 12 hour shifts for many years, in dangerous conditions.
George married Mary Ann Hiscock, the eldest daughter of John Hiscock in Ballarat in 1855, and the marriage lasted over 60 years. George and wife Mary Ann later moved to nearby Sebastopol where he was a mine manager.
George did well financially and purchased the shop and cottage in Soldiers Hill in 1859 as a business and home for the Hiscock family, now his parents in law.
The shop and residence, consisting of 6 rooms, was on the north west corner of Clarendon and Lydiard St North until it was sold in 1877 to Mr Richard Ince, a tailor in Sturt St Ballarat. Ince was quite an entrepreneur. He had the shop and cottage moved up the hill to its current location. Moving timber and iron buildings was very common in gold rush towns. After moving it, he modified the large building, to be a comfortable home, with a beautiful Late Victorian facade. This is the facade you see today which is over 140 years old.
Ince built the 3 brick terrace houses between this house and the north west corner of Clarendon and Lydiard St North, in 1902.
Under the galvanised corrugated iron roof are timber shingles dating from the 1850s. Although the family room and kitchen look very modern, there are four ceilings: plasterboard, horse hair plaster, tongue and groove timber boards, and above those, there is a papered- hessian ceiling. There are also very broad timber floor boards in the front bedroom, and this was most likely the shop.
Self Guided Tours located in Australian Country Towns.
ChatTouring respectfully acknowledges the Wadawurrung and Dja Dja Warring people who are the traditional custodians of the land on which we live and work. We extend this to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.