Windsor & Richmond Gazette, Saturday, March 10, 1900 - page 1 THE "GREEN HILLS." "A town, a river, hills and trees, Blue-bounded by the boundless sky." - J. Brunton Stephens. TEN years in a man's life-time soon pass by ; he notes but few changes ; as things are to-day, so they were in the beginning at the decade. Yet, if we add other decades - even up to ten - how remote that period seems. Thus, the contrast between to-day and ten years ago - in the old town of Windsor that is - does not appear to me as very striking ; but when I come to reflect upon the changes of a century or so - what Phillip's "Green Hills" were like when that sturdy old sailor so named the low hills upon which now stands our century-old town, and the town to-day in its grime of age and iron-stone dust - the vista is a long one. And the old town looks its age - looked, the other day when I came into it after an absence of ten years, unconscionably old - older, it seemed to me, than its ancient namesake on Thames/ There the age is real. Time leaves its mark upon stone, bricks and mortar, but does not destroy as it does here. We speak of our "old Church," our "old Court ! House," our "old hotels," whereas they are as infants compared with old buildings in Windsor on Thames. Is it because of climatic influences, or that the people are careless and neglectful ? I am inclined to believe the latter, for one cannot notice how soon our people like to be :off with the old and on with the new" ; how they lack in reverence for the things that are old - books, pictures, buildings - even men and women. It is easy to understand it ; the country is still young, have young ideas - they live for the future, not for the past. History has no charm for them - the past history of the colony being too black and unworthy of remembrance. Buildings of the Macquarian period have been much admired for their massiveness rather than their architectural beauty, and are still held up as good examples to builders. Yet old buildings in Sydney, and other colonial towns, have collapsed quite early, and both workmanship and material have been found very inferior - the ! bricks soft and the mortar innocent of lime. Because in the "good old days" labour was cheap and abundant, and plenty of time given for construction, it was assumed that the work must necessarily be good ; but "good" work (work not in the "jerry" line) to-day is very much superior, for bricks are better made and burned and skilled labour very much nearer perfection. Still, such buildings as Windsor Court House, St. Matthew's Church, and the Police Barracks should be good for another century, with repairs at intervals. Neither are yet a century old - and it would be interesting to know which of all Windsor's old buildings is of that age. According to Heaton, Windsor, as Windsor dates from 1810, and therefore is not yet a "century old town." If, however, we are to believe old records, there must have been a considerable settlement at the 'Green Hills' as early as 1790, for Phillip was rowed up the river in 1789. Ruse settled on the river in 1791, and George Barrington, Chief Constable, ex-pick-pocket, gentleman of ease, etc., etc., also ow! ned land in the district as early as 1797 - in fact, his farm on the Hawkesbury was sold by auction at Parramatta on the 2nd January, 1805. Another Chief Constable, Andrew Thompson, emancipist, etc., also owned land on the Hawkesbury as early as 1796 ; and Lieut. William Cox (sometimes called "Captain" Cox) settled in the Hawkesbury district pretty early, for he was appointed Police Magistrate (Parramatta) in 1800, and removed with his family to the Hawkesbury in 1804. So that it is reasonable to suppose that Windsor's birth-date was away back in the nineties of last century. Another early settler at Windsor was James Hardy Vaux, a noted pick-pocket - also a gentleman of the Barrington type. It was in Governor King's time (1800-1806) that he was sent to the "Green Hills" as a clerk, and while holding that position he taught Dr. Arndell's four children in his leisure hours. Later on Vaux was C.P.S. at Parramatta, and in 1806 left the colony in H.M.S. Buffalo, as Captain King's private secretary. Vaux found himself a prisoner in the colony again in 1810 ; and once more in Windsor, the assigned servant of John Benn (local cognomen "Big Ben"). This Vaux was even a more noted person than either Thompson, Barrington or Holt ; felon was bred in the bone, for having got away from Benn, he became overseer of "the gang" in Sydney. Transitions were frequent with him, for he soon got 12 mon! ths for theft (put in at the "Coal River" - the Hunter) ; escaped, caught, and sent back for another 12 months ; was then pardoned, became Storekeeper's clerk, then clerk in the Secretary's office, and finally "sacked" (in 1826). "Old Government House" was built probably, by Hunter ; there is no record to show it, however, and the building has been ascribed to Macquarie - which is certainly a mistake - though it may have been built by Bligh. So with the Courthouse - its date of building is uncertain. We are told, however, that "a small Courthouse was built near the goal in 1821," which may be the building we know, or it may not. Names We Know. Of course the building of St. Matthew's Church has been duly noted and fully detailed - the reason being, no doubt, because the church authorities kept better account of their doings than officers of the civil government did of theirs ; though strange to say registers of burials in the district have not been well kept ; and it is simply disgraceful the way the dead have been interred in the past - reverently enough, perhaps, but neither order or system has obtained in their lodgements in Mother Earth. Windsor in the "Old Days" - say all through Macquarie's time, and up to Fitzroy's - must have been a pretty lively town ; for not only were there prisoners and their civil guards, but soldiers over all, with "soger ossifers" for magistrates ; Cox, Brabyn, North, to wit. Thus Windsor's streets are named after military officers, prominent civilians and noted emancipists ; thus Baker, Brabyn, Dight, Fitzgerald, Kable, North, Cox, Mileham, Palmer, Johnstone, Day, Thompson, ! Forbes, Tebbutt, Moses - together with George, Macquarie, Pitt, Cornwallis, Suffolk. Why the names of Arndell, Howe, Marsden, Fulton, Bell, Cartwright, Ridge and Primrose were not so perpetuated puzzles me. Lieutenant Primrose (73rd Regiment) formerly 'Ensign' Primrose was no doubt the ancestor of Alderman Primrose. By the bye, Earl Rosebery is a Primrose ; can there be any relationship ? Officers of the British army in the "good old days" were invariably somebodies - for the uprising of Tommy Atkins from the ranks to a Colonelcy was too awful to be thought of. Anyhow, with a detachment of infantry stationed in Windsor - the nom coms and men down at the Barracks, and the officers up at the "corner" - (now the "Royal") things must have hummed considerably ; and when the slim waisted, tight pantalooned young swells of the 73rd, 48th and 50th faced the young demoiselles of the town in a minuet, or galloped them round in a polka or waltz, matters must have been a trifle su! ltry - that is to say, in those days Windsor was not exactly a tee-tot al jam-sandwich Sunday-go-to-meeting sort of place. Anyway, does not a local poet sing ; "The giddy dancers are upon the floor. Little they think their revelries must o'er. The dawn of morning through the window peeps Whilst there a weary maiden nymph-like sleeps."