The mystery is almost as old as the building itself, as SAM NORRIS discovered.

For twenty years Maitland City Council documents have called it Wallis House. 

It’s one of three houses pioneer pastoralist Samuel Clift built on the Hunter River tributary and the National Trust lists as the Wallis House Group, supporting retention of the ‘s’.

But the more council heritage officer Clare James read about this historic residence, the greater her suspicions grew.

“As far as council was concerned we looked at recent publications and it was inconsistent with those references,” she said. 

Council listed the circa 1840 residence as Wallis House in 1993 when it tabled the first local environment plan that governs development in the city and lists heritage items for protection.

The question about the name emerged during a review of that document this year, which led to a review of the history.

In the 1970s publications the name was used interchangeably. 

University of Newcastle scholar Ross Deamer wrote a 200-page thesis in 1971 about houses erected on original land grants in the Lower Hunter.

In it he attempted to answer when the house was built.

He referred to an 1832 description of the road from Newcastle to Patrick Plains (Singleton) that referred to a bridge over Wallis Creek and small farms on either side that were allowed to cultivate there as part of the penal settlement.

Deamer inferred from this that Wallis House, as he called it, must have been built after this time because otherwise it would have warranted a mention as a conspicuous landmark.

Later in the 1970s the Mercury reported on the sale of property.

Under the headline Walli sale today? this paper reported five parties entered bids and the house was passed in at $66,000.

Clift, a convict turned farmer and grazier, had the house built for his son, William, as the third of the family’s houses beside Wallis Creek.

Bridge House predated this, erected between 1829 and 1831, which remains in family ownership. 

Anabele Day, great, great grand daughter of the family patriarch, was certain Walli House was the right title but was uncertain why.

“Who knows,” she said, standing in the dining room of Bridge House. 

“Maybe they forgot to write the ‘s’.”

The puzzle led Maitland historian Cynthia Hunter to do some further investigation of the archives.

“No one has ever really answered the question,” she said.

In 1904 Colonel Wilkinson V.D, mayor of West Maitland, wrote to the Mercury with recollections of his childhood and stories passed down from his father. The article stated the house was intended as a hotel but never licensed. 

“The first man that occupied it was named Redding,” Wilkinson wrote. “He kept a fancy shop there and made the original colours in 1862 of the Fourth Regiment of Volunteers. 

“Redding named the house Wallli, evidently dropping the ‘s’ from Wallis, [being] the creek flowing in front.”

Ms Hunter said this latest piece of information certainly seemed to fit and barring any additional information was unlikely to be challenged.

“You can never really say for sure,” she said.

In keeping with these findings council elected to change its local environment plan references to Walli House.

Council finalised the LEP review this week and has asked the Minister for Planning and Infrastructure Brad Hazzard to sign off on the document that not only protects the building but governs construction across the city. 

Ms James said it was a small detail but an important one.

“Certainly, as far as the heritage listing goes the property description and location is the critical thing,” she said.

Samuel Clift died at Bridge House in 1862, age 71, and was interred at the Glebe Burial Ground.

His sons, including Ms Day’s great grandfather, Joseph, bought Breeza Station near Gunnedah in the same year.

During that period the family drove large mobs of cattle south to Bathurst to feed the gold boom.