Mount Pleasant Wines, Hunter Valley

The original Old Hill vineyard in the lower Hunter Valley was planted by Charles King in 1880 and purchased by the legendary Maurice O’Shea in 1921 together with adjoining parcels. He called the property Mount Pleasant.

Having studied oenology and viticulture at Montpellier University in France Maurice O’Shea set about crafting fine table wines from parcels of vines in the Hunter Valley. In 1932 the McWilliam family - a successful producer of fortified wines in the Riverina - acquired a half share of the winery, and the remainder in 1941, while allowing O’Shea to continue his work. This allowed for the purchase in 1946 of Rosehill (then planted to Syrah) and Lovedale (Semillon) and the creation of wines throughout the 1940s and 1950s, until his death in 1956. Maurice O’Shea remain legendary to this day. 

These are wines with ethereal balance that defied their elegance by aging for decades. Mount Pleasant returned to those glory days in the 2000s sourcing fruit from vines planted by O’Shea, while respecting his philosophy of releasing small lots of distinctly individual wines.

In 2021 McWilliams was purchased and Mount Pleasant (having already had dropped the family name from the labels several years before) is now an independent entity.

We offer the following wine from Mount Pleasant: 

• Mount Pleasant Maurice O’Shea Shiraz, Hunter Valley
• Mount Pleasant, Single Vineyard Lovedale Semillon, Hunter Valley