The land on Mount York Road was subsequently acquired by William Eyre who sold the relevant parcel to Mrs Mary Theresa Alice Kirkpatrick in March 1880. Mrs Kirkpatrick is believed to have been the wife of an Indian army officer and the family had associations with the Scottish village and estate of Closeburn Castle in Dumfriesshire, which was the ancestral seat of the Clan Kirkpatrick. It is likely that the Kirkpatrick’s built the first house on the land and was called Closeburn House from the outset.
From the 1830’s, the main road west to Bathurst used Victoria Pass, which bypassed the site of Closeburn House. But in 1909 Berghofer’s Pass was opened and was popular with the new motor vehicles which baulked at the gradient of Victoria Pass. As a result, from 1909 until the 1920s, Closeburn House lay on the main western highway, and operated as a hospitality house up to 1915. It was then sold to a nursing sister called Cooper- Mathieson, who, with the assistance of an Indian mystic, moved her home for unmarried mothers to Closeburn House.
In 1923 Hugh Dalziell, a member of the prominent Scottish farming family in the Kanimbla Valley, purchased the property in the familiar hope that the Mountain air would cure their asthmatic daughter. This hope proved in vain, the daughter died, but the parents stayed on and again opened the property as a guesthouse, restoring the good Scottish name of Closeburn House. The Dalziell’s advertised their own dairy products and poultry, and their own tennis court, of which, brick structural remnants can still be seen today, on the Mt York Road side of our car park. The painting on the right-hand side is by Hugh when he lived here at Closeburn. By 1931 Sister Cooper Mathieson was back at Closeburn, operating a ‘rest home and guest house’, but it was closed by 1934.
It was sold in 1956 to Mr Gibbs, a local Mount Victoria man who leased out the property as residential flats. The house was not well cared for in the 1960s and when Mr Lucas bought the property in 1970 it was partly derelict. Lucas did some restoration work in 1971 and again opened Closeburn House, as a guesthouse, until 1979. In 1990 Mr Peter Broome bought Closeburn and restored the building extensively in 1991.
He built a new restaurant, seating 95 guests, and did works in the gardens. He restored the name Closeburn House and opened it to the public in 1991, catering for weddings and conferences, as well as individual guests.
After changing hands in 2011 and left vacant from 2012, Closeburn House again had fallen into disrepair. After the completion of a major refurbishment and complete restoration from 2018, Closeburn House has once again re-opened as a guesthouse and is looking as good as she has ever looked.
Automated page speed optimizations for fast site performance