Hermitage Conservation Area

The stone house and outbuildings, which now only exist in ruins, were built by Mr. George Gordon Browne Leith, when he bought the property in 1855. He and his wife lived there for many years; later followed by their daughter Mrs. Alma Dick-Lauder. The home was one of many built by well-to-do British immigrants in Ancaster, but surpassed them all. The building stone was quarried locally and the red bricks came from Dundas.

In 1865, Leith sold 10 acres on the west side of Sulphur Springs to his daughter and her husband – Mr. & Mrs. Matthew Wright. Here they built a large eighteen room home. On the north side of Sulphur Springs Road, there is a mineral spring, once thought to have curative properties, which had long been used by local settlers and Indigenous people.

The Hermitage burned almost completely in October of 1934, but many of the valuables on the first floor were saved. Mrs. Lauder camped on the Hermitage grounds and then built a small house inside the ruins, and here she lived with her many animals until her death in 1942.

In 1972, the Hamilton Conservation Authority purchased 120 acres of this land in the Dundas Valley from Mr. Charles Hill. This conservation area is now part of the Dundas Valley Conservation Area.

Source:
Hamilton Conservation Authority➹