Telford Family of Ellinbank
Ellinbank
Ellinbank is a farming district in the foothills of the Strzelecki Ranges, about 11 km south of Warragul and about 113 km east of Melbourne.
Settlers traversed the densely forested hills from 1874, reaching their blocks via a bridle track from Drouin to the north. Originally called Warragul South, the district became known as Ellinbank because the first post office was at a property named Ellen Bank after the first settler’s wife.
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From the 1880s to the early 1900s several sawmills worked in the area, sending timber by tramline to Darnum railway station. As the country was cleared and the flat land drained, the settlers began dairying. A butter factory and a creamery operated in the area in the late 1880s, and then farmers sent cream and later whole milk to factories at Warragul.
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A school started in 1879 and a non-denominational church was constructed in 1881. An Anglican church opened in 1915. The growing community formed cricket, football and tennis clubs in the 1920s, and in 1930 a public hall was built. In 1968, the Anglican church was destroyed by fire and a new brick church was constructed on the site in 1971.
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In 1950 about 350 acres of land at Ellinbank was purchased by the State Government. Originally intended as a dairy college, a dairy research station was established with three dairies, a laboratory and administrative block, workshops and staff residences. A new research complex was built in 2005. In addition to dairying, there are some bulb and flower farms, the first of which located to the area in 1946.
The community retains the facilities of a school (22 pupils, 2014), church, hall and recreation reserve. There are Ellinbank and District football and netball leagues (1937, 1954). Ellinbank football club has won the most premierships.
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Census populations for Ellinbank have been:
Ellinbank 1921 232
1933 202
1954 221
1961 267
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Ellinbank and environs 2011 400
The above information has been copied from the website: www.victorianplaces.com.au
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Ellinbank is within the region occupied by the indigenous Woiwurrung (Wurunjeri) language group prior to the arrival of the European settlers.
It was heavily wooded with tall eucalypts (Messmate, Blackbutt and Swamp Gum ) and Blackwood trees.
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The first European settler was John Hardie from Berwickshire, Scotland. HIs granddaughter Doris Topp married Hal Gilbert in 1932 - see the page "Gilberts in Ellinbank". A year earlier, in 1931, Hal's sister Grace Gilbert married Ray Telford.
The Gilbert family had arrived in Ellinbank in 1905 and the Telfords in 1924.
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John Dempster Telford moved with his wife Lottie and offspring from Tasmania in 1924 to take up dairying at Ellinbank. The name "Glendearg" was carried on from the Table Cape farm; where the name was taken from we don't know but before leaving Scotland, J.D. Telford's grandfather William Orr worked for several years near Peebles not far from Glendearg in the Scottish borders; there is also a sheep farm near Eskdale north of Dumfries named Glendearg.
On Wednesday 25th June 1924 an auction was held to sell the property of Peter Tanberg at Gainsborough and subsequently a Clearing Sale of stock and farm equipment. Lot 2 described as 118 acres, about 40 acres flat, balance rich heavy land; creek, buildings comprise New House, 8 rooms, Cowshed. six bails dairy, Buggy House and Shed. There is no doubt this refers to the property now known as Glendearg ( Ray sometimes mentioned Tanberg as a former occupant). Lot 1, 96 acres, sold at the same auction was presumably the property to the west of Glendearg. John Telford must have purchased the remainder of his 164 acres ( southern end) at a later date.
The earliest mention of Telfords in the local paper is in December 1925 when Mrs (J.D.) Telford is named as helping with the arrangements for an annual tea party and concert of St Georges Church of England at Ellinbank.
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By the time the Telfords settled at Ellinbank the nearby town of Warragul was well established with the Shire Hall built in 1892, the 1886 Court House and the Railway Station from 1878. The earliest burials at the cemetery are from about 1883.
In 1927, a sale was advertised in the West Gippsland Guardian of the Dairy Herd and Plant of Mr J.D.Telford of Ellinbank. It states that “Mr Telford is giving up dairying and going in for sheep grazing”. Then a couple of years later he and Lottie moved to Bright leaving the Ellinbank farm in the joint care of Ray and brother Doug - who divided it between them, Ray taking the northernmost 80 acres ( on the Darnum - Ellinbank road, just on the edge of Gainsborough by which address it has sometimes been known) and Doug the southern part at the end of Cropley's Road.
Jack Telford died on 20th July 1931 and is buried at Bright.
In his will he leaves the 164 acre "Gainsborough property" to wife Charlotte for her lifetime then on her death to be divided equally between Raymond, Douglas and Helen (Jean); in the event Jean predeceased Lottie so the farm went to Ray and Doug; livestock, farm implements, motor vehicle and household furniture at Gainsborough to go to his wife absolutely; the 20 acre farm at "Torwood Lea", Bright to Basil: shares in Australian Iron and Steel to William.
The probate documents detail the property at Gainsborough with a value of 4467 pounds, being 164 and a bit acres, with 2 dwelling houses, sheds etc., and the property at Bright with a value of 700 pounds being 20 acres and 30 perches in area.
At Bright he had 3 cows, 1 heifer, 21 pullets, 6 old hens, a separator, churn, ladders, scythe and hedge cutter and orchard spray.
At Gainsborough there were 20 cows, 21 springers, 3 draught horses, 1 pony, 1 sow pig, 400 Leghorn fowls, mower, reaper-binder, drill, shave plough, furrow plough, harrows, milking plant, engine, separator, cream cans, cooler, incubators and brooders; and location not specified - Chevrolet motor truck, jinker, bicycle etc.
Total assets of 7335 pounds.
This raises some interesting questions - at some stage around 1929 - 30, Jack and Lottie have moved to Bright in semi-retirement to a hobby farm, leaving Ray and Doug at Ellinbank / Gainsborough. He had apparently sold the dairying stock in 1927 but in 1931 there were cows but no sheep on the property ! Maybe the sale never went through, or after Jack left, did Ray and Doug restock ?
During the period 1920 - 1929 we know that Ray spent some time away from the family farm, partly studying and partly working on other farms in Victoria. He did not always find it easy working with or for his father as he had his own ideas - one of them presumably being that cows were better than sheep. Ray enrolled at Hawkesbury Agricultural College west of Sydney in January 1920, aged 19; the family had just moved to Cressy (near Longford) from Tabe Cape. We have no record of how long he remained at the college but by 1822 he was working for Thomas Mesley in South Gippsland with the top testing Jersey herd in the state.
By 1930 he was well settled at Ellinbank having taken on the role of secretary of a committee formed to build a public hall for the district which was completed in that year - and of course he had begun courting the local School Sewing Mistress, Grace Gilbert.
Grace Matilda Gilbert married Raymond Gordon Telford on 4th July 1931 at the Ellinbank Church of England.
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From Victorian electoral rolls it is apparent that J. D. Telford's widow Lottie initially moved back to Gippsland spending some time living with her son Basil at Drouin but by 1942 she had moved to Frankston to live with daughter Jean who had purchased a property at 10 Plummer Avenue on Olivers Hill. Jean died in 1957 at the young age of 59 after suffering for years with Parkinsons Disease. Lottie then came to live with Ray and family at Ellinbank, then for a while with granddaughter June Wallace before moving to Perth WA for a few years with son Will, Alice and family; she died in September 1964 aged 89 and was cremated at Karrakatta cemetery.
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For more on the Telford and Gilbert families in Ellinbank, click below:
Photographs above show:
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"Torwood Lea" Bright, photographed in 1890 - Jack and Lottie moved there in 1929.
Bright cemetery where John Dempster is buried.
Lottie Telford nee Docker in her later years (left).
Lottie and John Dempster Telford (at right).
Olivers Hill Frankston where Lottie and daughter Jean lived for many years.
the view looking north to the Baw Baw Mountain range from Glendearg, Ellinbank.
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Gravestones of John D Telford at Bright and of his wife Charlotte (nee Docker) and daughter Jean at Warragul cemetery.