Braeside Homestead is a heritage-listed homestead at Crystal Mount Road, Dalveen, Southern Downs Region, Queensland, Australia. It was built from 1870s to 1920s. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 23 August 2002.
History
The block on which Braeside Homestead is situated was taken up in 1869, during the opening of large tracts of Rosenthal run to selection in the late 1860s and early 1870s. The homestead itself was established in the mid-1870s. From 1879 to 1901 the property was developed as a model stud farm by Queensland pastoralist, politician and businessman William Allan. It is not certain who named the property, but by 1887 Braeside was identified in the local electoral roll as both the grazing property and a locality.
In the earliest years of non-indigenous settlement on the southern Darling Downs, Braeside was included within the Leslie brothers' mid-1840 ambit claim for Tulburra run, and from was part of the North British Australasian Investment Co.'s Rosenthal run, excised from Tulburra.
Under the provisions of the Alienation of Crown Lands Act of 1868, James Adam Veitch of Warwick selected two blocks along Turner Creek from Rosenthal Run in 1869. These comprised selection 286 (containing the site of Braeside Homestead – of first-class pastoral land and of second-class pastoral land) selected on 25 August 1869 and adjacent selection 295 ( of first-class pastoral land and of second-class pastoral land) selected on 15 September 1869 – making a total of . Under the conditions of selection, Veitch had to pay an annual rental of per annum on selection 286 for a period of ten years, commencing 1 July 1869, and had to make improvements. Once these conditions were satisfied, he could apply for freehold title.
The Darling Downs Bailiff for Crown Lands first inspected selection 286 on 16 December 1875, to ascertain proof of the fulfilment of the conditions of selection. At this time boundary rider Henry Steel had been in residence on the block from 1 January 1870, acting as bailiff for JA Veitch, "sheep overseer" of Glengallan. The property was stocked with 1000 sheep and 224 head of cattle, property of the selector. Improvements consisted mainly of fencing and sheep yards, and there was a two-roomed slab hut with a bark roof, chimney, verandah, and "bush furniture", which was the residence of Steel and his wife. The inspector's report and neighbours' declarations satisfied WC Hume, the Darling Downs Commissioner of Crown Lands, who in February 1876 issued Veitch with a certificate of fulfilment of the conditions of selection. The next month Veitch signed over his interest in the leases of selections 286 and 295 to South Toolburra grazier Bertie Chiverton Parr, who immediately paid off the outstanding debt and gained freehold title in July 1876. Parr likely named the property, and also appears to have acquired a number of adjacent selections which became part of Braeside.
A little over a year later, in September 1877, Parr conveyed selections 286 and 285 [totalling now , some land having been excised for roads] to Francis Henry Needham of Warwick, for the sum of . This was the value of the property when first acquired for selection in 1869, suggesting that no substantial improvement, such as a house, had been erected by this date. In February 1878 Needham registered a mortgage on the property from George Arthur Needham, which he likely raised to purchase and/or improve the property. It was possibly Needham who erected the first house (as distinguished from the earlier slab hut) on Braeside.
Needham was the second son of the Hon. Francis Henry Needham. Socially he was extremely well connected, having married Grace Gore, daughter of the late aristocrat and pioneer Darling Downs squatter St George Richard Gore, at Warwick in June 1873. Needham was resident in the Dalveen district by 22 September 1876 – whether this was at Braeside has not been established, but it is possible he was managing the property for Parr – and was influential in selecting a site for the location of the Dalveen railway station in October 1878. However, he retained title to selections 286 and 295 for less than two years before selling them for to pastoralist William Allan in July 1879.