Early Victorian brick villa built along the Barwon River in the 1850s for Johnathon Porter O'Brien, a wealthy merchant and banker, and his wife, Ann.
Jonathan and Ann filled their new home with mahogany furniture, damask curtains, Bohemian glass, Dresden china, a piano, two music boxes, card-tables, paints, chess and backgammon boards. The extensive library comprised a Cyclopaedia of Medicine and Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice.
There was also a cellar stocked with wine and spirits, a conservatory filled with plants, sculptures, a collection of coral, and two canaries in brass cages.
The couple lived in the house for only a year.
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