Windback Wednesday - Wattle Park

You might know that the suburb of Wattle Park is named for Wattle Grove House, which was built by George Cook in 1850 and later occupied by George Scarfe (of Harris Scarfe & Co.). But did you know that the suburb used to be known as Ilfracombe?

It was named after the home of Dr James George Nash, South Australia’s second Colonial Surgeon, which he built halfway up a hill (just below the current location of the Wattle Park Reservoir) in the coolest section of his 40-acre property, to avoid the summer heat.

Dr Nash named the house Ilfracombe, after a beautiful seaside resort in Devon. The home was occupied by the Nash family until their return to England in 1856, after which it was leased by a series of different tenants, before being transformed into a reformatory for destitute and criminal boys in 1870.

Due to a lack of space in the house itself, the boys living at Ilfracombe were also responsible for building a dormitory on the hill behind the house. From 1877, the children were moved to Magill Orphanage, or the boys Reformatory Hulk Fitzjames. Once the children were gone, the poorly-constructed dormitory quickly fell into disrepair, and in November 1879 a picnicking party witnessed the roof being blown completely off the building. In the 1980s, Ilfracombe House and the surrounding lands were purchased by Joseph Crompton, who subdivided the land into five large allotments, leading to the creation of the estates of Bell Yett and Chiverton.

Ilfracombe House remained on its own 8-acre plot of land, and was used for various business and residential purposes, including as Head Office of Stonyfell Vineyards, but the house was eventually left vacant and fell into disrepair and demolished (and the land subdivided) in 1960. The only remaining evidence of this iconic Wattle Park home is in the naming of Ilfracombe Street.

Photograph: Ilfracombe House/Boys Reformatory, c.1870. Courtesy of the Find & Connect project website