Kirkham is a

suburb A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area. They are oftentimes where most of a metropolitan areas jobs are located with some being predominantly residential. They can either be denser or less densely populated ...

of the Macarthur Region of

Sydney Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...

in the state of

New South Wales New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a States and territories of Australia, state on the Eastern states of Australia, east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria (state), Victoria to the south, and South ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

in Camden Council. The suburb is largely undeveloped at present and possibly will remain so since much of it is on low-lying flood-prone land.

History

The area now known as Kirkham was originally home to the Muringong, southernmost of the

Darug people The Dharug or Darug people, are a nation of Aboriginal Australian clans, who share ties of kinship, country and culture. In pre-colonial times, they lived as hunters in the region of current day Sydney. The Darug speak one of two dialects o ...

. In 1805 John Macarthur established his property at Camden where he raised

merino The Merino is a list of sheep breeds, breed or group of breeds of domestic sheep, characterised by very fine soft wool. It was established in Spain near the end of the Middle Ages, and was for several centuries kept as a strict Spanish monop ...

sheep. In 1810, explorer

John Oxley John Joseph William Molesworth Oxley (1784 – 25 May 1828) was an English List of explorers, explorer and surveyor of Australia in the early period of British colonisation. He served as Surveyor General of New South Wales and is perhaps bes ...

was granted nearby, which he named ''Kirkham''. Kirkham has figured prominently in the 2013 - 2018 TV series A Place to Call Home. The fictional house known as ''Ash Park'' is actually a property called

Camelot Camelot is a legendary castle and Royal court, court associated with King Arthur. Absent in the early Arthurian material, Camelot first appeared in 12th-century French romances and, since the Lancelot-Grail cycle, eventually came to be described ...

, which is situated on Oxley's old property at Kirkham. Oxley's original home was called ''Kirkham'', after his birthplace in Yorkshire. The stables are all that remain. ''Camelot'' was designed by the Canadian-born architect

John Horbury Hunt John Horbury Hunt (1838 – 30 December 1904), often referred to as Horbury Hunt, was a Canadian-born Australian architect who worked in Sydney and rural New South Wales from 1863. Life and career Born in Saint John, New Brunswick, the son of ...

for James White, New South Wales politician and great-uncle of

Patrick White Patrick Victor Martindale White (28 May 1912 – 30 September 1990) was an Australian novelist and playwright who explored themes of religious experience, personal identity and the conflict between visionary individuals and a materialistic, co ...

. It was built circa 1888, on the site of Oxley's old Kirkham Mill, and partly on its foundations. It was originally called ''Kirkham''. The name was changed to ''Camelot'' by a new owner, Frances Faithful-Anderson, in 1900. When she saw the house, she was reminded of lines in Tennyson's poem " The Lady of Shalott", which make a reference to Camelot. The house is heritage-listed at the state and federal level.The Heritage of Australia, Macmillan Company (1981) p.2/17

People

Demographics

In the , the suburb of Kirkham had a population of 690 people. Like other suburbs in the Camden area, the people are very homogeneous with 83.3% Australian born; the other countries of birth included England 3.5%, Italy 2.0%, New Zealand 1.2%, Malta 1.2% and China 1.2%. The average personal weekly income of $1,009 is higher than the national average ($805) but the average monthly mortgage repayments ($2,800) are much higher than the national average ($1,863).

Governance

Kirkham is part of the south ward of Camden Council represented by Eva Campbell, Paul Farrow and Peter Sidgreaves. Theresa Fedeli is currently the local mayor. The suburb is contained within the federal electorate of Macarthur, represented by former ultra-marathon runner Pat Farmer ( Liberal), and the state electorate of Camden, currently held by former mayor Geoff Corrigan (

Labor Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

References

External links

* CC-By-SA">Creative_Commons_license.html" ;"title="/nowiki>Creative Commons license">CC-By-SA/nowiki> {{Sydney Camden suburbs Suburbs of Sydney Camden Council (New South Wales)