Butley Drive
Next time you drive down Butley Drive, you're passing over the memory of one of East Auckland's earliest homesteads, a house built from salvaged timber, visited by royalty, and eventually used as a cow barn.
Butley Drive takes its name from Butley Farm, also known as Butley Manor. The story begins in 1843, when Joseph Hargreaves built what is believed to have been one of the first European houses south of the Tāmaki River . A decade later, he used timber from that original home to construct Butley Manor itself, recycling history into history.
Hargreaves eventually sold the property to brothers Robert and Thomas Every Maclean, and under their ownership the homestead became genuinely well known. In 1869, it reportedly hosted Prince Alfred, son of Queen Victoria, on a hunting visit not bad for a farm in the eastern suburbs.
Located opposite what is now the Farm Cove Shopping Centre, Butley Manor survived well into the 20th century. But by the time Farm Cove was subdivided in the early 1970s, the once-grand homestead had fallen into severe disrepair. It was demolished, its final years spent, rather unglamorously, as a cow barn.
The street itself wasn't always called Butley Drive either. It was originally Edwin Roberts Road, before being renamed around 1985 to honour the area's heritage.
Today, little remains of Butley Manor itself, but the name Butley Drive preserves the memory of one of East Auckland’s early homesteads.
