Edwin Rouse (1806-1862)

Photograph on ivory of Edwin Rouse (1806-1862), hand coloured simulating a miniature painting and mounted in purple velvet case. Possibly intended as a mourning object belonging to either his wife Hannah Hipkins (1819-1907) or his youngest son, Edwin Stephen (1849-1931). The design of the case, with integral stand, suggests it was an intimate keepsake intended for travelling.

Edwin Rouse was the fourth child of Richard Rouse (1774-1852), builder of Rouse Hill House in the Parramatta district of New South Wales, and his wife Elizabeth Adams (1772-1849). Born five years after his parents emigrated to New South Wales, Edwin played a key role in the establishment of his father's substantial pastoral holdings near Mudgee, including the property Guntawang. Edwin remained west of the mountains until after the death of his father, marrying Hannah Hipkins in 1840 and residing at Guntawang with their five children. After the death of his father, the family relocated to Rouse Hill House in 1855. [ref. Caroline Rouse Thornton Rouse Hill house and the Rouses 1988].

DEATH.
ROUSE-On the 10th April, at Percy Lodge, Potts' Point, Edwin
Rouse, Esq., of Rouse-hill, near Windsor, aged 56 years.

Edwin (1806-1862), inherited Rouse Hill. With his English-born wife, Hannah (nee Hipkins), Edwin brought the plain, solid Georgian house up to date. After years of living at Guntawang, the principal family property west of the mountains, Edwin and Hannah renovated Rouse Hill, probably engaging the architect-builder James Houison. They added the canopied verandah and the two storeyed service wing, installed marble chimney pieces on the ground floor and bought furniture in the fashionable Louis revival style.


It was Edwin Rouse's other land holdings, beyond the mountains, rather than the Rouse Hill House & Farm, that supported the Rouse family. This wealth was enjoyed into the next generation by Edwin's son, Edwin Stephen Rouse who, aged twelve, inherited Rouse Hill on his father's early death in 1862.


Edwin Stephen (1849-1931) married well, in 1874, and Bessie Buchanan (1843-1924) became the mistress of Rouse Hill. (His mother, Hannah, lived much of the remainder of her life in England with two of her daughters). Again the house was redecorated, in Bessie's fashionable taste for Art Decoration, while Edwin Stephen improved the estate, notably by the building of impressive stables in 1876 designed by the architect John Horbury Hunt.

watercolour

family groups
Rouse, Edwin Stephen, 1849-1931.
Rouse, Elizabeth (Lizzie), 1845-1931.
Rouse, Mary Phoebe, 1847-1931.
Rouse, Emma, 1843-1928.
Rouse, Richard, 1842-1903.