From the early days of colonial expansion, long before the State of Victoria was declared, the road from Sydney to Melbourne was one of the most important routes in the country. Fuelled by an expansion mindset and the discovery of lands more suitable to European-style farming, many settlers and their stock travelled down to Melbourne and its surrounds for a chance at success. The journey was always a challenge, crossing as it did the tail end of the Great Dividing Range. There was one marker on the road, one hill that was notorious almost from the beginning of travellers using this route. It’s had a few names along the way — ‘Long Hill’ and ‘Big Hill’ — but the one that stuck was ‘Pretty Sally’.

A dormant volcano sitting 529 metres above sea level, Pretty Sally’s Hill (or Pretty Sally) sits between the towns of Wallan and Kilmore. The hill marked one of the most treacherous parts of the journey from Sydney to Melbourne (or back again) and the cresting of the hill became a welcome marker for travellers, something they looked forward to and somewhere from which, if the weather was clear, Melbourne could be seen in the distance. For a short but impactful time, the spot where the road crested the hill was a place of rest, company, a meal and perhaps something a little stronger.

For a short while, in the formative days of the Bylands, Wallan and Beveridge area, a kind woman named Sally Smith ran a sly grog shop on the crest of Big Hill. Sly grog shops were a staple of early settlement. While pubs and hotels were in their infancy, colonists still wanted a spot to rest and slake their thirsts so unlicensed establishments proliferated. Sometimes these were deliberately hidden from the law, such as a coffee house that sold more than coffee. Some were simply so small and remote that they never garnered any attention beyond that of those passing by their front door. Sally Smith’s house seems to have fallen into the latter category. Her operation was short-lived and there is no record of the Smiths ever applying for a liquor licence. Nor are there records of any legal trouble at the homestead on Big Hill.

The term ‘sly grog shop’ is a broad one and the Smith’s establishment would be more accurately described as a ‘house of entertainment’ to use the parlance of the time. While the description may have a lascivious ring to modern ears, in the years before the Gold Rush the term more accurately described a homestead some portion of which was given over to overnight accommodations for travellers as well as their horses, bullocks and stock. Overnight guests would need a meal and in many cases would partake of something stronger, perhaps some of the whisky the homeowner had come by. All for a fee of course.

Along with providing a welcome supplement to the household income, such houses of entertainment were a boon for people who traversed these roads often — such as mail carriers. It is from an account of a one such carrier that we have the first report of Pretty Sally’s establishment which in this case was noted for its absence. The traveller writes of his journey and his disappointment that the hospitality he had enjoyed on previous journeys was no longer present:

… commenced the ascent of the Big Hill, in the full assurance of finding a house of entertainment about half way over, which existed some fifteen months previously, under the auspices of ” Pretty Sally” but what was my chagrin to be informed that the present proprietor, Mr Budds, did not combine such a mode of augmenting his income with his agricultural and dairy pursuits, there was, therefore, no alternative but to make the best of my way to Kilmore, distant about thirteen miles, and the sun within one hour of putting on his nightcap… (The Argus, May 22 1850, p 2)

The importance of a spot to rest on this road would have been tough to overstate. Early reports of the road over Big Hill talk of torrential rain, of the wheels of bullock drays carving gutters in the muddy road, only for the next traveller up the hill to get stuck in them. ¹ Even well after travel increased and automobiles started to use the route, it was a treacherous one. What we would now call an accident blackspot, the hill was renowned for danger, resulting in headlines such as ‘Pretty Sally again’ (Kilmore Free Press , 5 September 1935, p 2) and ‘Pretty Sally Pretty Dangerous’ (Weekly Times , 27 May 1939, p 3). This may be why the reputation of Pretty Sally’s hospitality took hold so quickly. The earliest surveying maps of the area swiftly switched from the name Big Hill to Pretty Sally’s Hill as we can see in this historical plan from just a few short years after Sarah’s house of entertainment had ceased operation.

Records exist of Joseph and Sarah Smith holding a pastoral license for the area of Big Hill and Merri Creek from 1841 to 1847. ² Sally was a common diminutive of the proper name Sarah, thus the household being referred to as Pretty Sally’s.

Sally herself was in a terrible accident in 1847 when she fell from her cart and was run over by her own wheels. The report in the newspaper mentions that the accident is likely to ‘… be attended with fatal results’ (The Melbourne Argus, 10 September 1847, p 2) and indeed her injuries must have been severe. However, there are no records of a death of a Sarah or Sally Smith from 1847. A look at early death records indicates that Sally lived on until 1851, passing on in Melbourne. Below we find a Grant of Administration ³for a Sarah Smith witnessed by William Hartley Budd, who we can assume knew Sally as a long-term neighbour. The Budd family took over the license for Big Hill from the Smiths, sadly not carrying on Sally’s tradition of hospitality, as the disappointed mail carrier noted. The Budds did however open the Strangeways Hotel a short distance away, which became one of the areas longest-running hotels.

Sarah Smith’s burial record is scant, in keeping with the recordkeeping of the times. It states only that she passed away in Melbourne on March 13, 1851 and was interred the next day. And that she was 54 years old, wife and widow of Joseph Smith⁴. So few words yet the impact of the hospitality offered by Pretty Sally at the crest of the road on treacherous Big Hill has lasted long after her house of rest has gone.

Postscript

This blog post was inspired by the song ‘Pretty Sally’ by Melbourne singer-songwriter Dan Warner.

References

Payne J W (1981) Pretty Sally’s Hill: a history of Wallan, Wandong & Bylands Lowden Publishing, Kilmore Victoria.

Quillinan J (2022) Story of Bylands: the people, the places and the stories from its past self-published, Warragul.

1. ‘The Wallan Wallan District,’ Weekly Times, 20 December 1879, p 11.
2. Billis, R V (1974) Pastoral pioneers of Port Phillip , Stockland Press, Melbourne, Vic. p 141
3. A grant of administration refers to the process of divesting goods when a person dies without a will. A person’s next of kin is most usually the one who takes care of this.
4. Sarah Smith: Grant of administration, VPRS 7592/P0001, A/389, Public Records Office of Victoria.