Origins of the Names of The Towns and Cities of Tasmania
Tasmanian nomenclature owes much to the work of the early surveyors and explorers. Usually, armed with little but the sketchiest of maps, they opened up previously undiscovered or little known country. They usually named features and localities by drawing upon the names of prominent citizens from the United Kingdom or elsewhere. For example, the surveyors employed by the Van Diemen's Land Company commemorated prominent members of the Company in names such as Bischoff, River Inglis and the River Cam". The first wave of settlers, often unaware of their work, gave their name to different localities, for example, the town of Baden (in the Oatlands municipality) was formerly known as Rumney's Huts, commemorating an early settler who erected a crude dwelling in the areas. Frequently the names of pioneers or the names of their properties became place names. Sometimes this meant that a given locality had more than one name or that the same name was used for more than one locality.
Adventure Bay
Adventure Bay is the name of both a township and a geographical feature on the eastern side of Bruny Island. Abel Tasman tried to enter the bay in 1642 but was driven off by a storm. Captain Tobias Furneaux named it after his ship HMS Adventure that stayed in the bay for five days in March 1773, after being separated from Captain James Cook (left) during his second voyage in HMS Resolution in search of Terra Australis Incognita. It was later used as an anchorage by James Cook (Resolution 1777), William Bligh (HMS Bounty 1788 and 1792 HMS Providence), Bruni d'Entrecasteaux (Recherché 1792 & 1792) and Nicolas Baudin (Géographe 1802). Matthew Flinders tried to enter the bay (Norfolk 1798).
Alonnah
The main town on Bruny Island and is situated on the west coast on the southern end of Bruny Island, it was originally known as Mills Reef but was changed to Alonnah c.1909. Alonnah is part of the Aboriginal name for the island, "Lunawanna-alonnah"; the name Lunawanna being used for another town on the island.
Andover
Andover was named by Lieutenant Francis Tabart in 1831 after his arrival in Van Diemen’s Land from Andover in England. In the Spring of 1807 Charles Grimes pioneered the route through the midlands of Van Diemen’s Land. Grimes and Lieutenant Piper set out from the Tamar, and retraced Laycock’s Central Plateau route towards Hobart. On their return, upon reaching Melton Mowbray, Grimes turned northeast and discovered the Midlands Plains. Here, ‘they found a grassy, park-like country which was so open that when the first cart went through in 1809 it was not necessary to fell a single tree’.
Antill Ponds
Antill Ponds was a small township about half way between Launceston and Hobart on the main highway, well-known resting place for travellers in the days of coaches. Today there is nothing left but ruins and a railway line. Antill Ponds was named after Captain Antill at the end of 1811; it was the name given to the ponds of fresh water at the entrance to the Salt Pan Plains .
Ansons Bay
The bay was named on 5th March 1788 Lieut. Henry Lidgbird Ball during his exploratuion of the area. The name recalls George Anson (1697-1762), a British admiral (roight). In 1737, he was appointed to the Centurion which, as flagship of a fleet of six ships, was sent out ill-equipped to attack the Spanish possessions in South America. In 1751, he became first Lord of the Admiralty.
Arthur River
Arthur River is the name of both a river and a small township on the northern part of the West Coast of Tasmania. The first to be named was the river, after Sir George Arthur, Lieutenant Governor of Van Diemens Land (1824-36).
Avoca
In 1825 Colonial Government Surveyor John Helder Wedge surveyed the area and called it St Pauls Plains. Wedge led several expeditions through heavily timbered and mountainous country in the north-east and central highlands of the island, and it was on one of these trips that the area was named. But it wasn t until 1833, when a Police Barracks was built, that a township developed. Wedge laid out the town and gave it the Irish name of Avoca.
Baden
Baden was an original land grant of 320 acres to William Rumney who built a hut, the only building there for many years. In 1860 a Police Station was established, and was instrumental in proclaiming law and order in the area between Oatlands and Levendale. In 1912 a cooperative Butter Factory began production at Baden and was managed by William Wilson of Mt Seymour for most of its production life.
Bagdad
The town was named by the explorer Hugh Germain, a private in the Royal Marines. He was said to carry two books in his saddlebags while travelling: the Bible and the Arabian Nights, which he used as inspiration when he named places.
Barnes Bay
Both a geographical feature and a small township near the northern end of Bruny Island, Tasmania. During the early 19th century it was a centre for the firewood trade to Hobart and later the fruit industry, mostly apples and pears. The first vehicular ferry-service to Bruny Island began on December 13th 1954, with the Melba running from Kettering to Barnes Bay.
Barrington
The town was named either after George Barrington, 5th Viscount Barrington (1761-1829), William Keppel Barrington, 6th Viscount Barrington (1793-1867), or after George Barrington, an Irishman with a curious history.
Battery Point
An historical inner suburb on the east side of Hobart fronting onto the Derwent River. Originally called Knopwood's Point, it was later known as Battery Point because of the Mulgrave gun battery set up on the promontory to protect the citizens of Hobart. Built by Gov. Sorell in 1818 and named after Henry Phipps (1755-1831), 1st Earl of Mulgrave and Master-General of the King's Ordnance 1812-18, the guns were never fired in anger. The fort was renamed Prince of Wales Battery prior to 1857. At one time the name 'Battery Point' was changed to East Hobart but this proved unpopular and was soon changed back.
Beaconsfield
Formerly known as Cabbage Tree Hill, the namer was changed later to Brandy Creek. Finally Gov. Sir Frederick Aloysius Weld changed it to Beaconsfield in honour of the Earl of Beaconsfield, the British statesman Benjamin Disraeli.
Beauty Point
Its first name was Ilfracombe then about 1903 it was changed. The current name is reported to have been because a cow named "Beauty" was buried there around the turn of the 20th century.
Beechford
A small beach side town on the northern coast of Tasmania. A place that is yet to be 'discovered' by tourism, its name was coined by a real estate developer.
Bell Bay
The town takes its name from a bay on the eastern shore of the Tamar River.
Bellingham
Bellingham is a tiny coastal hamlet in Northern Tasmania, situated on the mouth of the Pipers River directly opposite the town of Weymouth. Originally called Pipers Heads, Bellingham was first used as a watch for sailing vessels that went up the Pipers River to Weymouth.
Bellerive
A suburb of Hobart on the Eastern Shore of the Derwent River, almost opposite Hobart. Originally it was named Kangaroo Point but was changed to Bellerive which is French for "beautiful scent". The present name appears to have been given by Gov. Franklin, it recalls its namesake on Lake Leman (Geneva). The name was officially recognised in 1832.
Berriedale
A northern suburb of Hobart about 15 Km from the city centre. It is not known how Berriedale got its name but the Berriedale Inn is on record as being opened in 1834.
Beulah
A small township on the north west coast of Tasmania south of Devonport, under the foothills of Mount Roland. Beulah is the name of the land of Israel in the Bible, and the land of peace described in John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress.
Bicheno
Recalls James Ebenezer Bicheno, British Colonial Secretary for Van Diemen's Land from 1843 to 1851. Originally known as Waubs Boat Harbour.
Binalong Bay
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Named after the southerly bay on the Bay of Fires, the name is of Aboriginal origin. It has a beach, small harbour (known as "the gulch") and a cafe. What was originally was a sheep farm, later became known as Boat Harbour, and was subsequently renamed Binalong Bay.
Bishopsbourne
Bishopsbourne's early history is based around the establishment of the Church of the Nativity and Christ College. The building of the Church and College was a long running government project. Bishopsbourne was named after the land's association with the church and bourne , which means, by the river , in this case the Liffey River. A town was originally planned out in 1845 but was not officially declared a town until the 3rd July 1866. Bishopsbourne became an important agricultural centre with public and private schools, Methodist and Anglican.
Blackwall
Named after Blackwall on the River Thames in England, it was likewise a noted shipbuilding centre. The second-largest ship built in Tasmania during the 19th century, the 547-ton barque Harpley, was launched here in 1847.
Boat Harbour
It was originally named Jacobs' Boat Harbour after Captain John Jacobs, master of small vessels owned by the Van Diemen's Land Company trading between its establishments at Circular Head and Woolnorth with Launceston between the late 1820s and the 1840s. Boat Harbour Beach is a popular tourist destination.
Boobyalla
Boobyalla was a shipping port on the coast of North-East Tasmania during the latter half of the nineteenth century. Coastal vessels ran regularly to the port from other Tasmanian ports, carting tin from the mines around nearby Mount Cameron. Little remains of Boobyalla, now a ghost town, as buildings such as the old hotel and houses were either burned down by bushfires or dismantled. Remnants of the old wharf are still visible at the edge of the silted-up Boobyalla River. Its name is of Aboriginal origin.
Bothwell
Named after the town of Bothwell in Lanarkshire, Scotland by Lieut. Gov. George Arthur in 1824. During its early years the settlement was known as Fat Doe River (subsequently renamed the Clyde River).
Boyer
A town on the eastern side of the Derwent River, opposite and slightly downstream of New Norfolk. It is named after a family who first settled in the area in the early 19th century.
Bracknell
A small rural town in northern Tasmania, the town is named after a pioneer family. All the streets in Bracknell are female names.
Branxholm
The area was first settled by James Reid Scott who named it after a small village in his native Scotland. By 1870 there were only three buildings in the valley but three years later, with the discovery of tin, a shanty town had grown up. By 1883 the town had been proclaimed.
Breadalbane
A township approximately 13 kilometres south of Launceston. Breadalbane was named by Governor Macquarie after the Earl of Breadalbane, his wife's cousin. Earlier the district was known as Cocked Hat, The Springs and Brumby's Plain. In days gone by it was situated on the Launceston to Hobart highway.
Bridport
Located on Anderson Bay, it is believed to be named after Bridport, Dorset, Britain. Streets in the northern half of Bridport have male person names and those in the southern half have female names. The first settlers moved in the mid 1830s. These included Andrew and Janet Anderson (they arrived in 1833), who gave their name to Anderson Bay
Bruny Island
Named after Admiral Bruny D'Entrecasteaux , a French Admiral who sailed the vessels La Recherch and L'Esperance on a voyage of discovery along the south coasts of Tasmania and the Australian mainland in 1792-93 in search of the French navigator La Perouse who had disappeared. D'Entrecasteaux made extensive surveys of the waters around Bruny Island in January 1793.
Brighton
A town on the Midlands Highway 28 Km from Hobart, from 1826 onwards, the township was the site of the Brighton Barracks. It was a military accommodation facility until sold off for subdivision in the early 2000s. It is not the first Tasmanian locality to have this name. Gov. Lachlan Macquarie gave the name Brighton to the nearby place known as Pontville; the name was changed in 1895.
Bronte Park
A locality on the Marlborough Highway at the southern edge of the Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park. Located north of Bronte Lagoon, an artificial lake in the Central Highlands, it is close to the geographical centre of Tasmania. It is now primarily a tourist village catering to trout fishermen, kayakers and walkers, but was established in the 1940s as accommodation for workers on the Tasmanian Hydro Electric Commission's Tungatinah Scheme, Nive River Scheme and other associated works in the vicinity.
Buckland
It was originally called Prossers Plains because it was near the Prosser River, but in 1846 Gov. Sir John Franklin renamed it in honour of Dean Buckland (1784-1856), a pioneering British geologist and Dean of Westminster Abbey (1845-1856).
Burnie
The name was changed from Emu Bay to Burnie when the town was surveyed in 1829. The name honours William Burnie, who was a director of the Van Diemen's Land Company.
Campania
Campania developed around a railway station built in 1876 on land that was formerly a section of the Campania Estate owned by James Brock, and contains several historical buildings.
Campbell Town
The town was established in 1821 by Gov. Lachlan Macquarie who had named the river here after his wife, Elizabeth Henrietta Macquarie (nee Campbell). When he established the town here in 1821, he also named it after his wife. He also named Campbelltown in NSW after her.
Cape Portland
Cape Portland is both a geographical feature and a location near the north eastern tip of Tasmania. It points west across Ringarooma Bay. It was named after the Duke of Portland by Matthew Flinders during his 1798 circumnavigation of the island in the sloop Norfolk with George Bass.
Carrick
The area was first settled in 1823, but it was 20 years later before it the town was established. The Liffey River was originally called the Penny Royal Creek, and Carrick was first called Lyttleton. The current name is thought to recall Carrick Island in County Antrim, Ireland. Carrick means 'rock'.
Caveside
A small rural town situated at the base of the Great Western Tiers, its name is descriptive of its location. The town lies in an area of limestone and the ground is pitted with sinkholes, a danger to the cattle that graze the fields. To the west are two undeveloped cave complexes, Wet Caves and Honeycomb Caves, which are an attraction to cavers.
Chudleigh
Known as the Village of Roses, Chudleigh is a pretty little village located 7 km east of Mole Creek by the Great Western Tiers. The site of Chudleigh Village, then unnamed is shown as a Glebe on an 1840s map, on land reserved for the Church. John Badcock Gardiner was grahted land here in 1829. 1830. Gardiner was born at Pougill, Devon in 1800 and was married in England at Bickleigh, some 15 miles north of Chudleigh. This close connection suggests Gardiner as the person who named Chudleigh.
Claremont
An outer northern suburb of Hobart 23 Km from the city centre. Henry Bilton built 'Claremont House' c.1840 and it for it that the locality received its name. Claremont was named after the English home of Princess Charlotte Augusta of Wales, daughter of King George IV. The Western Australian town of Augusta was named in her honour. The house was used as a hospital during World War II. The estate was established by Cadbury-Fry-Pascall as a confectionary factory, village and club etc. for its employees. The name was originally given by the Earl of Clare to his property in Suffolk, UK, which he purchased in 1714. The name means 'gentle mountain'.
Clarence Plains
See Rokeby.
Cleveland
A deligthtful historic village situated on the Midlands highway between Launceston and Hobart in Tasmania. It is approximately 16 kilometres north of Campbell Town. Cleveland is named after an area and former county in the north east of England. In the 1840s, William Vane became the 1st Duke of Cleveland.
Colebrook
The area of Colebrook was originally named Jerusalem in 1824. By 1834 the name Colebrook Dale was in use and both names were used for many years. In 1828 Andrew Tolmey was granted land at Colebrook Park, one of the earliest European settlers in the area, and had completed the construction of a house by 1831. Coal was discovered in the area prior to 1820 but was not mined extensively until much later. A Probation Station was also established at Jerusalem.
Coles Bay
Recalls Silas Cole, a lonely lime burner who collected the shells from the Aboriginal middens and burnt them for lime. Whaling parties, tin and coal miners pastoralists are some of the many people who have lived and worked on the Freycinet Peninsula since European settlement.
Cooee
A a dormitory suburb of Burnie, the town takes its name from the call made by the local Aborigines in the area to one another that was heard by the early European settlers. During the 1970s Cooee proudly promoted its "Golden Mile" of new and used car lots and service stations.
Copping
It was originally named Coppington after a Capt. Richard Copping who was a magistrate and early settler in the district. He purchased a property here from George Moore in 1860 upon which he settled three of his half-brothers as tenant farmers. Captain Copping then established his own property called Rochford Hall nearby at Kellevie.
Cradoc
It was first thought to be named after the town of Cradoc in Wales but this has been questioned in recent times.
Cressy
The name is taken from the Cressy Company, a business formed in England to run the large agricultural farms and grazing enterprises in the colony. The company's first manager was knighted by King Edward 111 for his part in the Battle of Crecy, France in 1346. The town was named by the first company director Captain Bartholemew Boyle Thomas.
Currie
A town on the west coast of King Island. The ship Netherby ran onto rocks, south of the harbour mouth in 1866, and was taken into the harbour for salvaging by Capt. Archibald Currie. The harbour and later the settlement were named in his honour.
Cygnet
Derived from Port Cygnet (meaning Swan port) on whose banks it stands. It bay was named by Admiral Bruny D'Entrecasteaux in 1792 because of the number of swans seen there. Early maps of Van Diemen's Land anglicised the name to Swanport but this caused confusion with Little Swanport and Great Swanport (now Swansea). In the 1860s the town of Lovett was surveyed and named after the then Chief Draftsman, Frederick Henry Lovett. Many of the street names in the town were named after his ten children. The town was renamed Cygnet in 1915 following a pub brawl which brought infamy on the town when the two local troopers (policemen) were assaulted and one of them was murdered trying to break up the brawl.
Deddington
Deddington, and the nearby house 'Patterdale', were named after villages in Oxfordshire and the English Lakes District by the artist, John Glover. who lived there. Deddington - at one time Daedintun - means 'the place of the people of Daeda', who was probably an early Saxon lord.
Deloraine
The district was named by Thomas Scott, a relative of Sir Walter Scott. The name is taken from Sir William Deloraine, a character in Scott's 'Lay of the Last Minstrel'.
Dennes Point
Dennes Point is both a geographical feature and a small township at the northern tip of Bruny Island in Tasmania. It is named after the Denne family who first settled the area as farmers around the 1830s, although it was known as Kelly's Point up to the 1840s, being named after pioneer shipmaster and harbour pilot James Kelly.
Derby
The area had been surveyed in 1855, but was not settled or inhabited until 1874, when George Renison Bell discovered tin in the area. The Krushka brothers discovered a large lode of tin, and set up a mine (named The Brothers Mine) in the area, assuring the town's economic future. The town was known as Brother's Home, until 1897 when it was renamed Derby (believed to be after Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom).
Derwent Bridge
Today, Derwent Bridge features not only the bridge alluded to in its name spanning the Derwent River but accommodation units, and also a roadside public house.
Derwent Park
Named because of its proximity to the River Derwent. On a private voyage of exploration between 1792 and 1794, Comm. John Hayes (later Sir John) of the East India Company with two ships, the Duke of Clarence and the Duchess, spent several weeks in Southern Tasmania, during which time he named the River Derwent after the River Derwent of his birthplace Cumberland, England.
Devonport
No one is exactly sure how Devonport got its name although it is obvious that the origins must be associated with the County of Devon in southern England. One school of thought argues that Devonport was named with a sense of nostalgia for the 'old country', after the coastal town of Devonport in the county of Devon. The more likely origin is that the district around the city was called the County of Devon and that this naturally led to the port being named Devonport.
Doctors Rocks
Doctors Rocks is both a geographical feature and a district on the north west coast of Tasmania between Somerset and Wynyard. The geographical feature is a basalt outcrop on the beachfront, behind which an escarpment rises to the north west coast plateaux.
Dodges Ferry
It was named after Ralph Dodge (1791-1871) who operated a ferry service here across Pittwater from the 1820s.
Don
The river on which the town is built is believed to have been named by the surveyors of the Van Diemens Land Company after the river in England of the same name.
Doo Town
Doo Town is a holiday village within the locality of Eaglehawk Neck near Port Arthur where the house names contain doo . Doo Town was established in the 1830s as an unnamed timber station which eventually developed into a shack community. In 1935 a Hobart architect, Eric Round, placed the name plate Doo I 99 on his weekend shack. A neighbor, Charles Gibson, responded with a plate reading Doo Me then Bill Eldrige with Doo Us. Eric Round later renamed his shack Xanadoo. Other neighbours followed suit.
Dover
The original name for Dover was Port Esperance after one of the ships of the French Admiral Bruny D'Entrecasteaux. However, the name was changed to Dover and the original name was kept for the large protected inlet. It is thought Dover is named after the English seaport of that name. It is claimed that the one link between Dover in England and Dover in Tasmania is that Huon pine shipped from this area was used in the construction of Admiralty Pier at Dover.
Dunalley
It was first named East Bay Neck but was renamed Dunalley after Henry Prittie, 3rd Baron Dunalley (1807-185). Dunalley came from Kilboy in the County of Tipperary, Ireland.
Dundas
Dundas was a historical mining locality, mineral field and railway location on the western foothills of the West Coast Range in Western Tasmania. It is now part of the locality of Zeehan. The Adelaide Mine near Dundas was the location of special specimens of Crocoite and other rare minerals. Dundasite is named after Dundas.
Dysart
The name Dysart is taken from a property in the area, ‘Dysart Park’, of Mr Edward Payne (Macleod, 1988: 7). Shepton Montacute was the original name for this township. The township of Dysart was well populated during the construction of the main road and, later, the railway. Originally Dysart was at the top of Constitution Hill, and Shepton Montacute located halfway down the hill’s southern slopes. Since 1875, all of this area has been known as Dysart.
Eaglehawk Neck
Named after the geographical feature, which is a narrow strip of land only a few hundred metres wide. The Arthur Highway crosses it. Situated 83 Km from Hobart connecting the Forestier and Tasman Peninsulas. The Neck was used by the military in the days of the Port Arthur Penal System. They set up a unique guard system and used savage dogs to prevent convicts escaping to the mainland. Only a few prisoners escaped, the most notable was bushranger Martin Cash who escaped in 1843.
Elizabeth Town
The name, the christian name of Gov. Lachlan Macquarie's wife , was originally meant to be given to New Norfolk but it was given to the next town decreed because New Norfolk had been renamed.
Ellendale
A small township approximately 35 kilometres north west of New Norfolk and 10 kilometres south west of Hamilton. Before the proclamation of the township reserve the valley of the Jones River was generally known by the name of Monto's Marsh. The town was named Ellendale, after Mrs. Ellen Brown, wife of Nicholas J. Brown, who was a former Speaker of the House of Assembly and representative of the district.
Elphin
An eastern suburb of Launceston. The name is taken from "Elphin Farm" once established there and was named after Elphin village in County Roscommon, Ireland.
Epping Forest
Gov. Lachlan Macquarie, on his first trip in 1811, named the village Epping after the woodlands of Essex in England. The town was officially named "Epping Forest" in 1962, but locals knew it by that name for some years before.
Esperance Bay / Port Esperance
Originally named Rabinea by the local Aborigines before being names Porte de France in 1892 by French navigator Bruny D'Entrecasteaux during his extended stay in the area. D'Entrecasteaux named a river which flows into the bay after the ship, L'Esperance, under the command of Huon de Kermandec, whose name was given to the Huon River to the north. The bay became known as Port Esperance in the early days of European settlement.
Evandale
Named after the surveyor and explorer, George William Evans, who spent much of his later life in Van Diemen's Land. At one time he was appointed deputy-surveyor of lands in the colony.
Exeter
Named after Exeter in the county of Devon, England. The Post Office was operating under the name of Tatana until 1968 when it was changed to Exeter.
Exton
When it was first settled, Exton was called Marshy Paddock but was renamed after a Miss Exton who was an early settler from England.
Fingal
Fingal was named by land surveyor Roderick O'Connor around 1824, and was established as a convict station in 1827. The name Fingal has long been associated with the area around the Talbot family ancestral home of Malahide Castle to the north of Dublin, Ireland. The last of the Talbots, the Hon. Rose Talbot sold the castle to Dublin County Council in the 1970s. She now lives in Malahide, near Fingal in Tasmania.
Firthside
Firthside is a neighbourhood within the suburb of Kingston, in the greater Hobart area. Kingston has close ties with the Dutch community, where after 1950 many post-war immigrants moved to an area they called Little Groningen , which is today Firthside.
Flinders Island
George Bass and Matthew Flinders charted the waters around the island during their circumnavigation of Tasmania in 1798-99. Upon their return to Sydney, Gov. Phillip Gidley King named Flinders Island and Bass Strait in their honour.
Flowerdale
A rural community and a division of the Waratah-Wynyard municipality, flowerdale takes its name from the Flowerdale River. The river valley is known for its pristine hills and scenery, the name of the river is a reference to the wildflowers there.
Forestier Peninsula
Named by French explorer Nicolas Baudin on 17th February 1802. The name honours Henry Verdean Forestier (1755-1806), then French Minister for the Navy and administration under whose direction Baudin had sailed.
Forth
Previously known as Hamilton-on-Forth, the village predates the larger settlement of Devonport. James Fenton, a young man of Irish descent came to the Forth estuary in 1839 in search of arable land. Assisted by his hired male companion, he erected the first European edifice in the district, and in 1840 returned to take up permanent settlement. Like the Forth, many rivers in the north of Tasmania were given Irish names due to the predominance of Irish settlers.
Franklin
Franklin is a a small township on the western side of the Huon River in the south-east of Tasmania, between Huonville and Geeveston . Its name recalls Sir John Franklin , Governor of Tasmania from 1837 to 1843, who took up 259 ha on the banks of the Huon River. Navigator and explorer Matthew Flinders was Franklin's uncle.
Franklin Village
A small township approximately 8 kilometres south of Launceston. These days it is almost an outer suburb. In days gone by it was on the main highway between Launceston and Hobart and was originally known as Longmeadows. It was also referred to as part of the Patterson Plains district. It taikes its name from Franklin House, built in 1838 by Britton Jones, a brewer and an innkeeper.
Garden Island Creek
A small community south west of Hobart, in the Huon Valley in Tasmania. The area was originally settled during the 19th Century primarily due to the large supply of good timber readily available; and the local geography which enabled vessels to go up the creek during high tide to collect the wood. As the trees were cleared, market gardens were planted in their place.
The Garden of Eden
Located on the Kentish coastal plains occupied by Devonport and Latrobe, The Garden of Eden was named after Paradise was discovered (see separate entry for Paradise). Scottish pioneer settlers gave the unusual place names of the region as they opened up the land. Since many of them had been forced off their lands by English Lords or religious persecution, it is no wonder that they viewed this place as a gift of providence.
Geeveston
Named after an Englishman, William Geeves who arrived in the colony in 1842, and settled in Geeveston in response to a request from Lady Franklin for somebody to establish a church in the district.
Geilston Bay
The inlet of Geilston Bay was named after Colonel Andrew Geils who was appointed Commander of the settlement of Hobart in 1812, upon the death of David Collins. Colonel Geils lived on property in Geilston Bay which he called "Geilston Park". As well as being the home for the Commander, the suburb once had a large apple orchard, and at another time a golf course.
Gentle Annie
Located on the Kentish coastal plains occupied by Devonport and Latrobe, Gentle Annie is said to be named by bullockies who used the term for very long drawn out hills that meant an exhausting haul for their teams.
George Town
The name was given to the townsite by Gov. Lachlan Macquarie in 1811. It honours King George III . First settled in 1804, when Lt. Colonel William Paterson landed at Outer Cove on the H.M.S. Buffalo, the settlement, it was formerly known as Port Dalrymple but was renamed George Town in 1811 when Gov Macquarie announced his plans for its use as the northern administrative capital. The first map of the town was produced in 1813, showing streets in the town centre with the same names as those used today. Although Macquarie's orders to move headquarters to George Town were never fully implemented, the town continued as an administrative post and today has the distinction of being the oldest town in Australia (Sydney and Parramatta, NSW, are older, but they are cdities).
Gladstone
A small tin and gold mining town located 139 km north east of Launceston, it is said to be named after Lord Gladstone. Gladstone is Tasmania's most north easterly township.
Glebe
An inner eastern part of Hobart. It was once referred to as Glebe Town. The name is an old English word that describes land given to the local church parish for its various uses.
Glenore
Glenore is the name originally given to the township of Whitemore. Glenmore these days, however, is marked on maps as an intersection situated approximately 12 kilometres south west of Carrick and 3 kilometres west of Whitemore in the Norfolk Plains district.
Glen Huon
A small township and surrouding area on the western side of the Huon River in the south-east of Tasmania, between Huonville and Judbury. Like the Huon River, its name recalls Huon de Kermadec, , master of L'Esperance, who surveyed the channel between Bruny Island and the mainland and the river which bears his name in 1792 during a French expedition led by Admiral Bruny D'Entrecasteaux.
Glengarry
A town in northern Tasmania, it takes its name from Glengarry in the Scottish Highlands, the ancient homeland of Clan Donald.
Glenorchy
A northern suburb of Hobart, Glenorchy has city status with the third largest population in Tasmania. It has a history dating back to the earliest days of the colony and was the name given to the district by Gov. Lachlan Macquarie on his first journey through the area in 1811. It was named after Glen Orchy, a locality in Scotland which was the home of his wife. Originally spelt Gen Orchy, it has been known as King George's Plains and O'Brien's Bridge, after Thomas O'Brien, a Norfolk Islander who was granted land there in 1813.
Gormanston
A ghost town in Tasmania on the slopes of Mount Owen, above the town of Queenstown in Tasmania's West Coast. It was built as the company town for the Mount Lyell Mining and Railway Company operations at the Iron Blow open cut copper mine and later also became the terminus of the North Mount Lyell Railway before it closed. It takes its name from a village in County Meath, Ireland.
Granton
Granton is a suburb of Hobart, capital city of Tasmania, Australia. It is the most northern suburb of the City of Glenorchy Local Government Area. It was formerly known as Black Snake, a locality visited by Gov. Macquarie on 27th November 1811 when he inspected the farms in the area. Granton takes its name from Granton Railway Station. The name of the station was selected when the railway line through the area was built to honour Charles Grant, the General Manager of the Tasmanian Government Railways. The Tasmanian Main Line Railway from Hobart to Launceston was completed in 1876. As Chief Engineer, Charles Grant was in charge of construction, then general manager until 1890 when the government absorbed the private lines into the Tasmanian Government Railways.
Grassy
One of the main towns on King Island, situated in the south east corner of the island, 29 Km from Currie. The town centred around the scheelite mine considered to have been one of the largest of its type in the world; that closed down in the early 1990s. Locals say it was named after Grassy Island, an island that is always green.
Grindelwald
A small Swiss-style Village inspired town developed just north of Launceston by a Dutch immigrant to Tasmania, Roelf Vos, after he sold his supermarket chain to Woolworths. It is named after the Swiss village of Grindelwald in the canton of Bern in Switzerland. In the 1990s, the town expanded with a new suburb named Pleasant Hills, though not in keeping with the swiss theme.
Gunns Plains
Located 20 km (a 25min drive) south of Ulverstone on the north-west coast of Tasmania. The name honours Ronald Campbell Gunn, who discovered the valley in 1860. Gunn was an explorer, a botanist, an adventurer and a public servant who collected and discovered many plants. He is remembered as the most prolific botanical collector across Tasmania for over 40 years, sending samples to Kew Gardens and the University of Scotland.
Hadspen
A small Australian town, located on the South Esk River in the north of Tasmania, just south west of Launceston. The centrepiece of the town is the historic property Entally House, the family home of Thomas Reibey who was the Premier of Tasmania from 1876 to 1877. Hadspen, the birthplace of Reibey, is believed to be named afer a locality in Somerset, England. Entally House was named after a suburb in Calcutta, India.
Hagley
William Thomas Lyttleton (1786?-1839), soldier and settler, was a distant connexion of the well-known Lyttelton family of Hagley Hall, Stourbridge, Worcestershire, England. He used the family crest on his silver, gave a family name, Westcote, to one of his sons, and the name Hagley to his property in Van Diemen's Land and to the nearby village.
Hamilton
Some sources claim that, in 1821, Gov. Lachlan Macquarie named the district Hamilton, after the South Lanarkshire town of Hamilton on Clyde in Scotland, as the Tasmanian town is also on a river named Clyde. Others sources claim that it was named by Governor Arthur. The Governor was asked to name two townships, and suggested that "as most of the gentlemen in this part of the country are Scotchmen", one township should be called Bothwell on the Upper Clyde, and the other Hamilton on the Lower Clyde.
Hampshire
A district in the north west of Tasmania inland from Burnie. It was first settled by Europeans in the late 1820s when rolling plains were mistakenly believed to be good grazing ground for sheep by the surveyors of the Van Diemen's Land Company. It was named for its similar appearance to the English county of Hampshire.
Hawley Beach
Takes its name from Hawley House, built nearby as a substantial country residence in 1878 by a retired Indian Army officer, Major Arthur Dumbleton, and named after the Dumbleton family home in 'Hawley House' in Aldershot, England, after which it was modelled.
Hayes
Named after Comm. John Hayes of the East India Company who was the first British explorer to 'discover' and chart the River Derwent. On a private voyage of exploration between 1792 and 1794, Captain John Hayes with two ships, the Duke of Clarence and the Duchess, spent several weeks in Southern Tasmania, during which time he named the River Derwent after the River Derwent of his birthplace Cumberland, England and also Risdon Cove and Mount Direction. Note The correct name of the river is the 'River Derwent' and not Derwent River as is the normal way Australian rivers were named.
Hillwood
A small town approximately 25.5 km north of Launceston, the locality's name is descriptive.
Hobart
The capital city of Tasmania it is Australia's second oldest city. Named Hobart Town after Robert Hobart, fourth Earl of Buckinghamshire , who was Secretary of State for the colonies. The word "Town" was dropped by an Act of Parliament in 1881 when it became a city. There were moves to convert the name to Hobarton but this was short lived.
Howrah
A suburb of Hobart situated on the eastern side of Bellerive, along the shores of the Derwent River. Named after "Howrah House", a property built in the 1830s on the Clarence Plains by a retired Indian Army officer. There was a place of the same name near Calcutta, India.
Huonville
The name was first given to the Huon River by Admiral Bruny D'Entrecasteaux when he visited the area in 1792. It was his second in command, Huon de Kermadec, , master of L'Esperance, who surveyed the channel between Bruny Island and the mainland and the river which bears his name.
Ida Bay
Recalls Ida Chesterman nee Driscoll, wife of Henry Chesterman who, by 1858, had founded a timber milling business in the Hastings Cave area. The bay has also been known as Wheelbarrow Bay.
Jericho
An historical village in the centre of Tasmania. Founded in 1816, it is one of the oldest townships in Australia. The land adjacent to the station was originally known as Fourteen Tree Plain and was the site of the first horse race in the colony of Van Diemens Land, held in April 1826. The name was coined by the explorer Hugh Germain, a private in the Royal Marines. He was said to carry two books in his saddlebags while travelling: the Bible and the Arabian Nights, which he used as inspiration when he named places.
Kaoota
28 km SW of Hobart, Kaoota is the site of an historic tramway that used to connect the coal mine of Kaoota with the port at Margate. The name Kaoota is of aboriginal origin, meaning dusk. It was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools.
Kamoona
Kamoona is a locality near Launcestion. The name is of aboriginal origin, and was used as the name for snake venom. The name has no significance other than it being one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools.
Karoola
A small area about 6 km outside Lilydale. Karoola means "fresh water" in the local aboriginal dialect. It was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools.
Kellevie
A location in the south east of Tasmania north of Dunalley. The origin of the name is not known.
Kelso
A locality in northern Tasmania located west of George Town. It was settled in the early 19th century and is located on Kelso Bay, a small bay on the Tamar River.
Kempton
First settled by Anthony Fenn Kemp in 1817. He was given a grant of land which is now the Mount Vernon estate. The town was first named Green Ponds after some small green water holes found near the town. The name changed to Kempton, after Anthony Fenn Kemp, when the Apsley Railway Line was put through the area.
Kentish
Surveyor Kentish first named August Plains to commemorate the time they were discovered. The name was later changed to Kentish Plains after the surveyor himself. Later Kentish Plains was changed to Kentishbury and then shortened to Kentish. It was Scottish pioneer settlers who gave the unusual place names of northern Tasmania as they opened up the land. Since many of them had been forced off their lands by English Lords or religious persecution, it is no wonder that they viewed this place as a gift of providence. Their descendants still live in the area today.
Kettering
Kettering is a town on the D'Entrecasteaux Channel approximately 35 kilometres south of Hobart and 15 kilometres east of Cygnet. Just north of Kettering at Oyster Cove, the last Tasmanian Aboriginal settlement dwelled, established in 1847. It is believed to be named after an early white settler.
King Island
Named by Capt. John Black in Harbinger on 1st January 1801 in honour of Phillip Gidley King the Governor of New South Wales at the time. Capt. Black sheltered near two small islands which he named the New Year Isles.
Kings Meadow
A southern suburb of Launceston. The name is taken from an early farm, which was named after Colonial Governor of NSW, Phillip Gidley King.
Kingston
Kingston grew from a holiday resort to a suburb of Hobart with the advent of the Southern Outlet road. Originally it was named Browns River after the noted Scottish botanist Robert Brown who explored the area a week after Hobart was founded. However, the name was changed to Kingston in 1851 by the Governor, Sir William Thomas Denison after a property there. It had been settled in 1808 by Thomas Lucas and his family, who were evacuated from Norfolk Island. He named his property 'Kingston', after the settlement on Norfolk Island. Thomas was born in Surrey, England in a village close to New Kingston, which may have influenced the naming of Kingston on Norfolk Island.
Lachlan
In 1837, Gov. Sir John Franklin founded the settlement, and used the christian name of Gov. Lachlan Macquarie for this township.
Lady Barron
The main southern town on Flinders Island 24 Km south of Whitemark. Situated in Adelaide Bay, it was named in honour of the wife of the Governor of Tasmania, 1909-1913, Sir Harry Barron.
Lake Leake
A small village on the inland lake of the same name. The lake was named after Charles Leake, an early pioneer in the Campbell Town district.
Lake St Clair
Lake St Clair was named in 1835 by Surveyor-General George Frankland after the St Clair family of Loch Lomond, Scotland. Frankland also named Cradle Mountain, its name is descriptive.
Lake Tiberius
Originally known as Lemon’s Lagoon, after the bushranger, Richard Lemon, Lake Tiberias covers an area of 3,000 acres. George Stokell was the first purchaser of land on the shores of Lake Tiberias. In 1837 Stokell established the first timber mill in southern Tasmania, on the slopes of Mt Wellington. In 1840, Stokell purchased grants of 397 and 2,500 acres of land in the vicinity of Lake Tiberias. He built Lake House, a stately homestead and outbuildings, with the assistance of convict labour.
Lapoinya
A small agricultural centre on the north-west coast of Tasmania west of Wynyard. The name is Tasmanian aboriginal word for fern tree, a plant that abounds in those surviving untouched parts of the original temperate rainforest.
Latrobe
Named after Administrator Charles Joseph La Trobe ,who was acting Lieutenant-Governor of Tasmania for a few months (1846-7). When first named it was La Trobe but later changed to its present name. An important port town, boats operated from Bells Parade until the Mersey River silted up.
Launceston
Launceston was named in 1807 as the main settlement at Port Dalrymple. The name came into general use from about 1818 and also gradually became the name for the port instead of Port Dalrymple or the Tamar. Launceston was named by Gov. Phillip Gidley King in 1824 after his birthplace in Cornwall, England. It was briefly known as Patersonia, that name honouring its founder, Lieut. Gov. William Paterson. Launceston in Cornwall is pronounced 'Lownes-ton', whereas Launceston in Tasmania is pronounced "Lon-ces-ton".
Legana
A small township on the Tamar River in northern Tasmania. The name Legana is based on the Aboriginal word for fresh water since it is at the point where the Tamar River becomes fresh water. There is currently a homestead called Freshwater which was adjacent to a private jetty where early settlers traded with the local natives. This homestead, in Nobelius Drive, now operates as a Bed and Breakfast accommodation house.
Legerwood
Formerly known as Ringarooma Road, it was changed to Legerwood in 1890. After James Scott had surveyed the area for the government he returned in the early 1850s to select land here. Scott's Legerwood Estate of 3,734 acres was sold in 1903 after being divided into 38 farms of different sizes, 686 acres remained as the Legerwood Estate. It was proclaimed a town in 1939.
Lenah Valley
A suburb of Hobart. Originally named Kangaroo Valley. The word "lenah" is Aboriginal for "kangaroo".
Levendale
A small settlement 53 km north of Hobart. Due to the nearly impenetrable nature of the bush, Europeans did not settle at Levendale until the second half of the nineteenth century. Indeed, so dense was this bush that the area was originally known as The Scrub. The opening of the school on 15 April 1901 provided the local community with the chance to hold a public meeting to decide upon a new name for the area. That meeting agreed upon the name Levendale, the first part of which was derived from the name of one of the oldest farms in the district, Levenbanks, belonging to Mr. V Hodgson, and later Thomas McConnon.
Liawenee
A town in Tasmania, built near Great Lake and the River Ouse. It was founded in June 1920 as a camp for the workers at the nearby hydro-electric undertaking as well as some other towns such as Miena. Like other localities associated with the Hydro Electric schemes of the early 20th century, its name is of Aboriginal origin. Owing to its high altitude location in the far south of Australia, Liawenee is one of the few places in the continent with a subpolar oceanic climate.
Liffey
A town and river located 41 km south west of Launceston, Tasmania. The river was named by Captain William Moriarty, from Counry Kerry, Ireland after a river in Ireland which flows through the centre of Dublin.
Lilydale
A small town in northern Tasmania originally known as Germantown. The name was changed in 1887 by the Tankerville Road Trust. The district was always famous for flowers and at anniversary services there was always a fine display of Christmas lilies in the churches so the Road Trust's chairman Mr. E Kowarzic, suggested that the town should be called Lilydale. This was opposed by a number of residents who favoured Tankerville which is an old English name. One objection made was that there was a Lilydale in Victoria and letters are miscarried. Although it is 67 years since the name was changed letters are frequently sent to the wrong town.
Linda
An old ghost town in the Linda Valley in the West Coast Range of Tasmania. It was the town supporting the North Mount Lyell mine. Linda was the terminus of the North Mount Lyell Railway when it was in operation. When the McDonough and Karlson brothers discovered the Mount Lyell mine in 1882, they were accompanied by a Spaniard named Don Guzman Alfonso Vincento St. Jago de Sotomayor de la Plana who named the valley with the stream traversing it after the first name of his third love, Donna Lindamira Josephine Isabella Maria Del Pilar De Aguardiente (1853-76). Three days before their marriage, she was captured and held to ransom but was killed when Don Guzman failed to arrive with the ransom. The name given to the creek and valley was shortened by the miners to Linda, observing that the mire in the creek was sufficiently obvious to the eyes and feet without fastening it onto the name.
Lindisfarne
An eastern shore suburb of Hobart, fronting onto the Derwent River at Lindisfarne Bay. Named after 'Lindisfarne House', a property adjoining Rosny in the 1820s. It was originally named Beltana but it caused confusion with Bellerive and so was changed in 1903. Commonly known at the Holy Island, Lindisfarne is a small island off the coast of Northumberland, England. Holy Island has a recorded history from the 6th century AD; it was an important centre of Celtic Christianity under Saints Aidan of Lindisfarne, Cuthbert, Eadfrith of Lindisfarne and Eadberht of Lindisfarne. After the Viking invasions and the Norman conquest of England, a priory was re-established. A small castle was built on the island in 1550.
Longford
Located in a district known as Norfolk Plains (its first settlers were from Norfolk Island), the village was first known as Latour, but the name was later changed. It was named after a county in Ireland by the colonial surveyor, Roderic O'Connor. Marked out in 1833, Latour took its name from Col. Peter Augustus Latour (1788-1866), a former Lieut.-General of the 11th Dragoons, and a member of the English partnership which took up land in Tasmania to breed horses and other stock between 1826 and 1856. He was previously involved in the WA Company and the establishment of Australind there.
Low Head
When it was originally settled it was named Outer Harbour. Its current name is descriptive of the headland on which it stands.
Lunawanna
A small township on the western side of Bruny Island, Tasmania, facing the D'Entrecasteaux Channel. It is named after part of the Tasmanian aboriginal name for Bruny Island, Lunawanna-alonnah (a nearby township about 5 km to its north being named Alonnah).
Lutana
A northern suburb of Hobart situated on the western shore of the Derwent River. Originally named Risdon Rise, a naming competition was run by the Electrolytic Zinc Company in 1920 when they were building a housing estate to house employees of their Risdon Zince Works. Lutana was selected. It is an Aboriginal word for "moon".
Macquarie Springs
Macquarie Springs was located about one mile north of Oatlands, an area which is now known as Red Rocks. The area was named in 1811 by Governor Macquarie, who described the place as a ‘jungle with fine springs of fresh water’. Here, he ordered a military post to be set up which was soon established, and for the next 18 years Macquarie Springs was the main centre between northern and southern Van Diemen’s Land.
Magra
Said to be named after a First Fleet convict, Elizabeth Magra. Born Elizabeth Thackery, she was tried at Manchester, Lancashire on 4th May 1786 for stealing handkerchiefs with a value of 1 shilling. She was sentenced to transportation for seven years and left England with the First Fleet on the Friendship aged about 20 at that time (May 1787). Her occupation was listed as none. She died in 1856. Said to have been the first woman ashore on Botany Bay in January 1788, she made her way to Tasmania and married Samuel King. They settled in the Derwent Valley in 1808.
Mangalore
A small town in southern Tasmania between the townships of Bagdad, Tasmania and Brighton. It is named after the city of the same name in the Indian state of Karnataka. In 1498, European influence in Mangalore began when the Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama landed at the nearby St Mary's Islands. Mangalore is the principal seaport in South Kanara on the Malabar Coast, beseiged in 1983 by the forces of Tippoo Sahib.
Margate
It is said to be named after the town of Margate in England, but by whom is not recorded.
Maria Island
Named in December 1642 by Dutch explorewr Abel Tasman. The name recalls Maria Van Aelst, the wife of the the Governor-General of Batavia, Anthony Van Diemen, who had instigated Tasman's voyage which resulted in his discovery of the island of Tasmania. For many years it was asserted that Tasman had fallen in love with a daughter of Antonio Van Diemen, after whom he named the island, but Van Diemen had no daughters. In 1825 Lieut. Gov. George Arthur selected the northern end of the island to build a second penal settlement. He named it Darlington, in honour of the Governor of New South Wales, Sir Ralph Darling.
Marion Bay
Abel Tasman first anchored just north of a small island in the southern part of this large bay in 1642, and landed in the area he named Frederick Henrick Bay (now Blackman Bay). The bay was later named after the Frenchman Marc-Joseph Marion du Fresne, who arrived in his ship the "Mascarin" with the "Marquis de Castries" in March 1772. Marion s landing is the first recorded sighting and description of the Tasmanian people by Europeans, unfortunately one of the Tasmanians was shot dead by Marion s men. Marion then sailed to New Zealand where he was killed by Maori in the Bay of Islands.
Marrawah
Marrawah is the local Aboriginal name for the gum tree. Marrawah is Tasmania's westernmost settlement and the furthest settlement from Hobart (491 km). The area has several important Aboriginal sites, such as Aboriginal carvings at Mount Cameron West and Sundown Point.
Mathinna
A small town located in the north-east of Tasmania, 63 km east of Launceston. It was named after a young Aboriginal girl befriended by the Lieutenant Governor of Van Diemen's Land, Sir John Franklin and his wife, Lady Jane Franklin. The town became established as a gold mining centre shortly after gold was discovered in the area in the 1890s. Premier of Tasmania Eric Reece, was born there in 1909.
Maydena
Of Aboriginal origin, its meaning is not known. Before the village was built the rail head here was known as Junee, so named after a local cave. The 3' 6" gauge railway line was once used for hauling timber and osmiridium ore, as well as a way point for the Dam builders up at Strathgordon.
Meander
An inland town in northern Tasmania, it takes irts name from the Meander River. European squatters with their cattle first crossed the Meander River, in the spread westwards, in the mid 1820s. Until the founding of Westbury in the early 1820s the river was known as The Western River. It is assumed that the current name is descriptive of the river's path. It is thought to have been named by Gov. Frankland as it first appears on his map of 1837.
Melton Mowbray
Named after the English town of the same name. The hotel was built there in 1849 by Samuel Blackwell, a wealthy English businessman who emmigrated to Australia to establish business interests in Tasmania. He named his hotel sfter his birthplace.
Miena
Of Aboriginal origin said to mean "lagoon-like". This name would be a reference to Great Lake on the shores of which the settlement is built. Miena is one of the coldest non-alpine locations in Australia. Measurable snowfall averages 40 50 days per year and can fall in any month.
Middleton
Middleton was the maiden name of the wife of John Watson, an early settler who was a notable boat-builder here. Watson had a slipyard and sawmill in the district in the 1840s. The original town reserve was known as Long Bay, but this was never proclaimed. It was then changed to stop confusion with other occurrences of 'Long Bay' in the colony. Middleton is adjoined in the north by Garden Island Creek and Flowerpot, to the east is D'Entrecasteaux Channel and Bruny Island, and to the south by Gordon.
Milabena
A small agricultural centre on the northwest coast of Tasmania west of Wynyard. Pronounced Milla-Beena, the name is of aboriginal origin. It was fFirst listed in Walch's Almanac in 1921. 'Tuckers Hill' was an early name for Milabena.
Moina
A town situated 45 km inland from Devonport on the north-west coast of Tasmania, Moina was the site of a brief gold rush in the late nineteenth century and then one of the largest Wolfram and Bismuth mines in Tasmania. The name is thought to be either a derivation of a small crustacean of the same name found in Tasmanian waters, or a corruption of the native word for water rat. Originally a Parish name, it was first listed in Towns, Post Stations etc in Walch's Almanac 1910.
Mole Creek
A town in the upper Mersey Valley, in the central north of Tasmania, Mole Creek gets its name from the large stream which emerges from underground some 5 km south of the township. The early migrants were of British origin who reckoned holes on the creek's bank - probably platypus nests - reminded them of mole holes found in British streams. There were no moles of course, but the creek contained countless platypus, and still does, and the name has stuck. Mole Creek is well known for its honey and accounts for about 35 percent of Tasmania's honey production including Leatherwood Honey (a noted monofloral honey) which is unique to Tasmania and sold internationally.
Molesworth
Named by the New Norfolk Council after Jeffrey Molesworth, who owned the property 'Bournbank' at of New Norfolk. Molesworth became the first J.P. for the district, and in 1865 was the architect for a new school-house and chapel in the village of Lachlan.
Montagu Bay
A suburb of Hobart on the eastern shore of the Derwent. The name appears to come from Algernon Sidney Montagu (1802-80), who was appointed Solicitor-General of Van Diemens Land in 1828. He bought a property of 800 acres and house of 14 rooms in the area, named Rosny House. It was believed the mansion stood on what is now Balaka Street in Rosny. Rosny House was later known as Montagu House, and was clearly marked on naval charts from 1863.
Montrose
A northern suburb of Hobart on the north side of Glenorchy. Named after the Montrose Estate owned by Robert Littlejohn; believed to have been born in Montrose in Scotland. Montrose is about 56 km south-west of Aberdeen.
Moogara
A locality 37 km from Hobart, Moogara takes its name from that of a property owned by a turn-of-the-20th century local, Barney McGuire. The word is Aboriginal for 'Journey of one day' and was given as it took Barney this long to walk from Plenty to select his property.
Moonah
A residential and commercial suburb of Hobart. Originally named South Glenorchy until 1894 when the name was given to the post office and railway station. It was a popular place with early settlers for picnics; a racecourse was also there. The name is the Aboriginal word for the gum tree. West Moonah is an area which went ahead in the early 1950s because of a housing boom. Mistakenly known locally as Springfield because the electric trams serving the area terminated in Springfield Avenue.
Moorina
A small township in the north east of Tasmania approximately 35 km east of Scottsdale. It was developed to house workers at the Morrina Hydro Electric station, which opened in 1906. Moorina is near Pioneer, a former tin mining town. Like other localities associated with the Hydro Electric schemes of the early 20th century, its name is of Aboriginal origin.
Mount Field
Mount Field is named after a visiting judge, Barron Field (1786-1846), who visited the colony in 1819-21. Being a principal officer of Lachlan Macquarie's government, Field, as was then customary, received a big grant of land, 2000 acres (809 ha) at Cabramatta in Sydney's west. In 1819 he presided at the first sitting of a Supreme Court in Van Diemen's Land. He was one of the founders of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge among the Aborigines. He re-located to Gibraltar in 1839.
Mt Seymour
The farming history of Mt Seymour dates back to 1843 when the pioneer settler, George Wilson purchased 560 acres, which was later named Mt Seymour. In 1863 a State School was opened here, with 25 boys and 17 girls enrolled. In December 1956 the school was closed and pupils taken to the Oatlands Area School.
Mowbray/ Mowbray Heights
A northern suburb of Launceston. The Newnham Creek flows through the Mowbray Golf Course on its way to the Tamar River. The name recalls a 500 acre colonial era grant here in name of Martin Mowbray Stephenson, who was born in Launceston in 1828. The Mowbray Racecourse was a substantial part of this property, and racing meets have been held there from as early as 1830. The name is of French origin, literally meaning 'mud hill'. Suburban development did not occur in Mowbray until the late 1800s when a small grid of streets was laid out on the southern slopes of the hill on the eastern side of Invermay Road and a lone street extending towards Launceston Church Grammar School. Many of its streets were named after allied soldiers and commanders who took part in World War II.
Murdunna
A small town at the head of King George Sound, a narrow bay opening off Norfolk Bay. The name Murdunna is believed to come from a local indigenous word meaning "place of the stars". Murdunna first shown in list in 1911 edition of Walch's Almanac as a post station. Murdunna school, run by aMiss A B Brown, was first shown in 1912 edition. Previously known as Clifton, the old town reserve surveyed by Thomas Wedge in 1868, though it was never proclaimed. Clifton was shown in list of Post Stations, Towns, etc in Walch's Almanac from 1884 to 1923.
Nabowla
The name is of Aboriginal origin. When the railway station first opened it was named Lisle Road Station and so was the gold mining settlement here. Lisle is an Aboriginal either meaning 'river', or being the name of the river. The name was changed to Nabowla in 1913. The Town Reserve was named Pagunta, Aboriginal word meaning 'four', but this was never proclaimed.
Naracoopa
A village on the east coast of King Island 26 Km east of Currie. At one time the settlement was known as Taroona. Naracoopa is an Aboriginal word meaning "good". Neika A suburb of to the north-west of Kingston, the name is of aborigtinal origin, meaning Hill. It was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools. In some cases these names were fitting as they appropriately described the area. New Norfolk Formerly known as The Hills, it was to here that many farmers from Norfolk Island were transferred in 1808 when their settlement was closed down, hence its name. Each settler was granted 10 acres of land for every one they held on Norfolk plus a guarantee of rations for a year. Because of their origins, their new settlement was called New Norfolk.
Newstead
A suburb of Launceston situated on the eastern side of East Launceston. Named after 'Newstead House' which was built and named by Ronald Campbell Gunn in 1855. Gunn was editor of the "Tasmanian Journal", a member of the First Parliament and, for a time, private secretary to Sir John Franklin. Because of a duplication of name on the Australian mainland the postal authorities decided to officially adopt, in June, 1919, the name "Kawallah", in lieu of Newstead, for the local post office. However, the postal differentiation of name for the same locality had not been popular, and the Postmaster General's Department agreed to change the postal name "Kawallah" back to "Newstead" in February 1961.
New Town
A northern suburb of Hobart which is both a residential and commercial district. It is a very old suburb with some historic old buildings. The early settlers started farming the area to try and feed the colony, and the new settlement they created was referred to as New Town. New Town was made a Municipality in a proclamation under the Local Government Act 1906 dated 20/8/1907 by Governor Sir Gerald Strickland. It was absorbed into greater Hobart in the 1930s. New Town Bay was shown on a Chart by Lieutenant Sir John Hayes (Bomaby Marine of the Dutch East India Company) as Stainforth Bay during his voyage of exploration in 1793. On the opposite banks of the Derwent a cove north of Cornelian Basin was originally called Stainforth's Bay, in honour of Captain Stainforth of the Bombay Marine, Ida Lee 1912.
Nile
A small township approximately 30 kilometres south east of Launceston on rich pastoral land below Ben Lomond. Nile was originally named Lymington. The village was so named after a local property called Nile Farm. The earliest record of this name found is by the Land Commissioners c 1827, however Nile Rivulet was shown as Coxs Creek on Thomas Scott's Map 1824. James Cox had a grant on the river.
No Where Else
Located on the Kentish coastal plains occupied by Devonport and Latrobe, The Garden of Eden was named after Paradise was discovered (see separate entry for Paradise). No Where Else came into being because the original road from Barrington ended in a farmers back yard. So, there was literally no where else to go! The name, given to a tract of country at the foot of Mount St. John was first recorded in 1877.
The Nook
Located on the Kentish coastal plains occupied by Devonport and Latrobe, The Nook was so named because of its geographical shape. It is tucked in beside the Badgers Range on the east and shielded from the westerly weather on the west, like a cosy nook.
Norfolk Plains
Norfolk Plains is a farming district in Tasmania which extends from Westbury, through Cressy to Campbell Town under the Western Tiers. It includes the settlements of Whitemore, Bishopsbourne, Glenore, Carrick and Hagley. A "plain" at the time of settlement was considered to be any moderately wooded area. Itsname recalls the first white settlers from Norfolk Island who moved to Van Diemen's Land in 1808 when the settlement on Norfolk Island was closed.
Nubeena
Originally the town was named Wedge Bay. Now known by the Aboriginal word for crayfish, it was an important link in the semaphore stations set up on the peninsula. Nubeena started as an outstation of the Port Arthur convict settlement and was for some years an important convict farming community. Its name first appeared in the list of Towns etc, in 1879 edition of Walch's Almanac.
Oatlands
Gov. Lachlan Macquarie and his party passed through the area in 1811. When he established a town here in June 1821, he named it 'Oatlands', after the English country seat of Frederick, Duke of York who appointed Macquarie as Governor of NSW. The town was proclaimed under the Police Act in 1865.
Orford
French sailor and adventurer, Nicolas Baudin, reached the area in 1802 and named it Port Montbazin. Orford was named after a nearby property called 'Orford' owned by Thomas Cruttenden. Cruttenden named the property after Horatio Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford because Edward Atkins Walpole (a relative of the Earl) relinquished his claim to the same land in favour of Cruttenden. Walpole established another property nearby that he called 'Strawberry Hill'. In turn 'Strawberry Hill' was named after the Walpole family estate in England.
Otago
A Hobart suburb on the eastern shore of the River Derwent, Otago takes its name from a ship that was broken up by a local shipbreaking establishment nearby on the shores of Otago Bay. The remains of the Otago (beached there in 1931) and a steel river steamer the Westralian (beached in 1937) can still be seen on the beach. The Otago was three masted iron barque that was built by A. Stephen at Glasgow, Scotland, in 1869.
Ouse
Taken from the name of the river which runs through it, which in turn is named in the 1820s after the River Ouse in Yorkshire, England. The name simply means 'water' and comes from a Celtic root seen also in the Greek 'hydor' and Gaelic 'uisge'. Ouse is the settlement where convicts James Goodwin and Thomas Connolly broke out of the South West Wilderness four weeks after their escape from Sarah Island. The Ouse River was originally known as Big River was was given its name by Gov. Sorell when he visited the area in 1820. He named the rivers Clyde and Dee on this same expedition.
Pallawah
This locality and Pallawah Hill is a name of aboriginal origin. The word was the indigenous people's own word for themselves, in much the same way that koori is used today to describe indigenous Australians that traditionally occupied modern day New South Wales and Victoria. It first appeared as a parish name in 1910.
Paradise
Located on the Kentish coastal plains occupied by Devonport and Latrobe, it is claimd that the name was selected by Reuben Austin, a land-prospecting farmer. Reuben Austin, J H Dawson, and others, were walking across a piece of ground up on George Morse's property on the foothills of Mount Roland. It was a hot, clear day and they sat down to rest beneath some giant manferns, whose long fronds formed a fringed canopy from beneath which they viewed the picturesque mountain. It glistened in the sun. Its great craggy rock face seemed so close that you could reach out and touch it with your hand. Reuben Austin remarked, "This is Paradise". The name stuck (Extract from page 16 of God Was their rock by Alan F Dyer, copy in Kentish correspondence). Scottish pioneer settlers gave the unusual place names of the region as they opened up the land. Since many of them had been forced off their lands by English Lords or religious persecution, it is no wonder that they viewed this place as a gift of providence.
Parattah
A small township located 6 km southeast of the town of Oatlands. While not populated as such, the area contains a farmhouse which was once home to Hudson Fysh, one of the founders of Qantas. The first post office serving the township opened in June 1879 and was named Oatlands Station; the post office was renamed Parattah in January 1882, using what is believed to be the area's name in the local Aboriginal dialect. Pateena Pateena, formerly known as Muddy Plains, is a small township approximately 5 km north of Longford and 15 km south west of Launceston. The children of successful land grantee, Edward Dumaresq at Mount Ireh, are said to have named Pateena, after they travelled on the SS Pateena from their schooling across Bass Strait in Melbourne.
Penguin
It is said that the locality was named by the botanist Ronald Campbell Gunn for the Fairy Penguin rookeries that are common along the less populated areas of the coast, and one in particular near the mouth of a creek near the town. Another source suggests it was named by a Van Diemen's Land Company surveyor from the creek of this name, which was a favourite haunt of fairy or little penguins. Penguin was first settled in 1861 as a timber town, and proclaimed on 25 October 1875.
Perth
Perth was originally known as The Punt, where travellers between Hobart to Launceston were carried across the Esk River. The first land grantee in the area was Thomas Massey. Massey was also the Chief District Police Constable at Launceston. Gov. Lachlan Macquarie, on his way south in 1821, was so impressed with the area that he selected it as a site for a township and named it Perth at the request of local settler David Gibson of 'Pleasant Banks'. Gibson had emigrated from Perth in Scotland and resided in Evandale.
Pig Village
One of Australia's more colourful name, Pig Village is a name recorded (rather than assigned) for a thick patch of bush on Smilers Spring Creek, about three kilometres inland from the Spiky Bridge, south of Swansea, where a village was planned but never eventuated. According to Mrs E. F. Cotton of 'Kelvedon' (the property on which the feature is located), a big sow escaped and had a succession of litters there.
Pioneer
A tiny township located 119 km north east of Launceston and 8 km from the Tasman Highway. The town came into existence in 1877 when William Bradshaw (until 1955 the town was known as Bradshaw's Creek) discovered tin at the junction of Bradshaw's Creek and Ringarooma River. In 1882 the Pioneer Tin Mining Company was formed to work the deposit and it is from the mine that the town is named.
Pipers River
Located on the banks of the Pipers River, the river and town are named after Ensign Hugh Piper, the younger brother of Sydney military officer, public servant and landowner, Captain John Piper. In 1806 Jacob Mountgarrett and Piper were the first Europeans to pass through the area.
Plenty
Situated where the Plenty River enters the Derwent River, it was known for a time as River Plenty but was shortened to Plenty around 1938.
Pontville
The Pontville area was visited by Governor Lachlan Macquarie in 1821, and became an early garrison town, where convicts built the bridge over the Jordan River. During World Wars I and II the area had a major army camp. The town site was originally designated as Brighton by Gov. Lachlan Macquarie and the township listed in 1845. The town was proclaimed under the Local Government Act 1962, but was revoked in error as 'Brighton', that name being retained for another settlement a short distance away, and subsequently corrected as 'Pontville' in 1975. The name is the French version of the English Bridgetown.
Port Arthur
Recalls Lieut. Gov. George Arthur , who established the penal settlement here in 1830. After the penal settlement closed down it was changed to Carnavon. The name change was made in an effort to dispel the bad reputation it had gained as a cruel place, but reverted back to Port Arthur in 1927.
Port Davey
Recalls Lieut-Col. Thomas Davey, 1st Lieut. Governor of Tasmania, 1813-19. Port Davey is an inlet on the south west coast of Tasmania. It lies next to Bathurst Harbour and is sheltered from the Roaring Forties that buffet the south and west coasts of Tasmania. The name was given by sealer, pilot and Hobart Town harbourmaster, James Kelly, when he circumnavigated Tasmania in 1815-16.
Port Sorell
The settlement town on the north west coast (it came into being in 1822), it was used as the port for the Van Diemens Land Company. The town was laid out in 1834 and was used as a place with a big trade in wattle bark. In the 1840s it became the official seat of government for the district, and as such was known as Burgess, after Tasmania's Chief Police Magistrate, Francis Burgess. The settlement was part of the Police District of Westbury. By the 1850s, it was referred to as "Burgess, Port Sorell". Port Sorell was first used as the name of the local parish. It honours William Sorell (1775-1848), Lieut-Governor Van Diemens Land (Tasmania) 1816-24.
Promised Land
Scottish pioneer settlers gave the unusual place names of the region as they opened up the land. Since many of them had been forced off their lands by English Lords or religious persecution, it is no wonder that they viewed this place as a gift of providence.
Prospect / Prospect Vale
Two south western suburbs of Launceston, situated between Summerhill and Prospect Vale. Prospect was originally a small village in the Westbury Municipality and was named after an early farming property in the area. Known as Bonney's Flat in the 1830s, Prospect is adjoined by Summerhill, West Launceston, South Launceston, Kings Meadows, Youngtown, Breadalbane, Longford, and Prospect Vale. The boundary of Prospect and Prospect Vale coincides with the municipal boundary of Launceston and Meander Valley.
Punchbowl
A south eastern suburb of Launceston, a popular attraction of which is the Punch Bowl Reserve. The reserve has exotic and native trees and rhododendrons set in semi-natural bushland. It was opened up in the early 1900s and called Devils Punch Bowl.
Pyengana
Pronounced 'pine-garna', the name is from an Aboriginal word meaning 'meeting of two rivers'. The hamlet is located in the north east of Tasmania. Permanent settlement commenced around 1875 with pioneering settlers such as George and Margaret Cotton who raised a family of nine children at the property they called St Columba. It shared its name with the local waterfall down the road.
Queenstown
Believed to be named in honour of Queen Victoria, the reigning momnarch, the town was previously known as Pokana, and then Queen Crossing, a reference to a crossing of the Queen River there. According to offical records, the town was proclaimed under the Police Act in 1865, then again in April 1901, April 1902 and finally on 25th August 1903, but was officially named Queenstown on 31st August 1895, so I guess one can takes one's pick as to when it was named and why.The toqn in its present form was surveyed in 1896 by Selby Wilson, at which time its comprised of a railway station, a hotel and a cluster of huts. Within three years it had 1300 dwellings and a population of 5,000 people. The surrounding mountainous area was first explored in 1862. It was not long after that when alluvial gold was discovered at Mount Lyell, prompting the formation of the Mount Lyell Gold Mining Company in 1881.
Railton
Railton was first known as Redwater Creek and became known as Railton after the construction of a tramway line in the 1860s. Its name literally means "railway town". Railton was first surveyed in 1853 and a railway line through the town from Deloraine to Latrobe was completed in 1885. The town was proclaimed under the Police Act 1905, and then gazetted or proclaimed on 9th May 1924. It is unlikely that the name Railton has anything to do with railways. The name was used in connection with the area by 1859, when there were no trains in the area. Legend has it that the town was named after a member of the Winter family, Miss Railton Winter. Another suggestion is that its name recalls James Railton, the Post Master at Reedy Marsh (north of Deloraine) in the 1880s. The coming of the railway was important to the town, which gained a new hotel, public hall and general store. Railton today promotes itself as the "Town of Topiary".
Ravenswood
A north eastern suburb of Launceston, once part of the now disappeared St Leonards Municipality. Ravenswood is situated on the eastern side of the North Esk River. A creek that flows through the suburb is Distillery Creek. This was named because of a distillery built there in 1824 by James Tower. This distillery was in the area where Ravenswood is today.
Recherche Bay
The Recherche was one of two French survey vessels of French explorer Bruny D'Entrecasteaux who visited the area in April 1792. For the next five weeks, the expedition carried out careful boat explorations which revealed in detail the beautiful waterways and estuaries in the area. The Recherche was a 500 ton frigate under Captain Huon de Kermandec (sic, generally corupted to 'Kermandie'). It's name is the french word for 'Research'. The bay was shown on an old chart by John Hayes as 'Admiral Dantrecasteaux Bay' and first appeared on a colonial map as Recherche Bay in 1830. The Aboriginal name for this area is 'leillateah'. The bay shares its name with an archipelago of Esperance in Western Australia that was explored by D'Entrecasteaux prior to visiting Tasmania.
Renison Bell
Renison Bell is an underground tin mine and locality on the West Coast of Tasmania. In 1890 tin-bearing gossan was found near Argent River by George Renison Bell. He claimed land and formed the Renison Bell Prospecting Association.
Rhyndston
Originally, the area known as Rhyndaston was the property of a Welsh pioneer, Charles Meredith, who lived at Cambria, Swansea. Rhyndaston was a small railway town.
Riana
A small town in the North-West of Tasmania, nestled next to the Dial Range some 15 kilometres from Penguin. The name is of Aboriginal original meaning 'dance'. It is the same word used by some Tasmanian Aboriginal tribes to describe white men. Riana was proclaimed under the Police Act as a town in June 1906.
Richmond
The name was first recorded by Gov. Lachlan Macquarie. It honours Charles Lennox, 4th Duke of Richmond (1764-1819), who followed a military career and became a Major-General in 1798. The town was named by Lieut-Gov. William Sorell in 1824 after the property "Richmond Park", which was owned by David Lord, one of the first land grantees. The name is believed to be a corruption of the French riche mont which means a strong hill or fortified castle. Richmond in North Yorkshire, some 70 kilometres north of Leeds is dominated by such a structure. The town of Richmond gazetted or proclaimed on 3rd July 1866. Richmond was an important military post and convict station, strategically situated between Hobart and the East Coast and Port Arthur. Most of the building activity occurred in the 1830's and 1840's, and in those days the Richmond Packet of 26 tons, built in 1831, plied between Hobart and Richmond, sailing through Pittwater to the town wharf.
Rinadeena
A railway siding, Rinadeena is just off the Lyell Highway nestled amongst mountains such as Proprietary Peak, West Jukes Peak and Mount Jukes in west Tasmania. Rinadeena is one of the westernmost localities in Tasmania. Its name is of aboriginal origin, meaning raindrops. This may relate to it being in one of the wettest areas of the state. It was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools. In some cases these names were fitting as they appropriately described the area.
Ringarooma
The name is of Aboriginal origin. It was initially known as Krushka Town before being renamed Ringarooma in November 1888, taking on the name of a coastal town near Bridport, which was renamed Boobyalla. Krushka Town was founded by Christopher Krushka, a remarkable and adventurous Prussian-born immigrant who, at 17 years of age, became a landowner and self-made millionaire through the mining of tin. The town of Ringarooma gazetted or proclaimed on 3rd September 1888. Ringarooma was the name of a property near Rheban.
Risdon Cove
It was named by Comm. John Hayes (later Sir John) of the East India Company who was the first British explorer to 'discover' and chart the River Derwent. The name recalls William Bellamy Risdon, Hayes' second officer. On a private voyage of exploration between 1792 and 1794, Captain John Hayes with two ships, the Duke of Clarence and the Duchess, spent several weeks in Southern Tasmania, during which time he named the River Derwent after the River Derwent of his birthplace Cumberland, England and also Risdon Cove and Mount Direction.
Riverside
An outer north western suburb of Launceston. Situated chiefly on the eastern side of the West Tamar Highway. It is bordered by the Tamar River which is a marshy area. Riverside West is on the western side of the West Tamar Highway. Formerly know as Marawaylee it was renamed Riverside West in 1960 when the land was subdivided and sold as a housing estate.
Roaring Beach
A popular surfing beach and the only one on the west coast of Tasman Peninsula, which is the prevailing wind direction. It has a dangerous rip. It is accessed by road from Nubeena. The name is a reference to the powerful surf here.
Rokeby
Now known as Rokeby, Clarence Plains was named by Hayes in 1793 after his ship The Duke of Clarence. From this early name came the name of the present day city. Rokeby itself takes its name from settler George Stokell's Rokeby House which Stokell had named after the parish of Rokeby, North Riding of Yorkshire, England.
Rosebery
Named after Tom McDonald's company, the Rosebery Gold Mining Company (in turn it was named after Archibald Philip Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery, who was Prime Minister of Britain at the time), which mining Mount Black in 1893.
Rosny
A family name of Walter Angus Bethune, the holder of the original grant. The name recalls his ancestor, the Duc de Maximilien de Bethune (1560-1641), Baron du Rosney and Duc de Sully, whose home was Rosny near Mantes in France. Originally called Canadian Point, it and neighjbouring Bellerive were referred to officially as Kanmgaroo Point. John Lord, late of India, was an early landowner. He left the colony in the 1830s, selling up to Algernon Montagu.
Rosetta
A small suburb of Hobart on the northern side of Montrose. It is thought to be named after Rosetta Cottage, a privately run school around the 1820s, said to be named after the first white woman to live in the district, a Rosetta Moses, who owned property near New Town Bay. The school was run by a Mrs Bridget Stevens, who arrived in Van Diemens Land with her husband, Stephen Stevens, in July 1834 aboard 'Edward Lambe'. Rosetta Cottage was the home of Sylvester Stephen Stanford Stevens (1783-1851). There also used to be a settlement named Rosetta at the mouth of the Nile River.
Rosevale
Takes its name from Rosevale Homestead, built in 1828 by pioneer grazier William Sibley. His extensive property included Rosevale Hill and extended to the catchment of the River Clyde. Rosevale was first listed as a Post Station in 1875 edition of Walch's Almanac.
Rosevears
A farming district in the West Tamar area, it was named after a family who settled there in the early days of the colony. William Henry Rosevear arrived in Tasmania from the colony at Swan River (Perth, Western Australia) with his wife and children in 1829. He had spent most of his working life as a farmer in Cornwall, England, and, in view of his experience on the land, was granted land in the West Tamar. Rosevear was also a publican, holding the licence of the Half Way House between 1833 and 1834, and later, the Rose Inn. It trades today as the Rosevear Waterfront Tavern.
Ross
An historic town in the Midlands of the state of Tasmania, Ross is situated on the Macquarie River. On an expedition in 1821, Governor Lachlan Macquarie passed through the area and named the locality, where they had camped overnight, in honor of a parliamentary friend, Hugh M Buchanan, of Ross Priory on Loch Lomond in Scotland. The town is listed on the Register of the National Estate and is noted for its historic bridge, original sandstone buildings and convict history.
Rossarden
An old mining town in central Tasmania, located 19 km from Avoca and nestled at the foot of the crags of Ben Lomond. Rossarden was one of Australia's major tin producing towns. The Rossarden mine opened in 1931 and remained in operation until 1982. The town was established for the Aberfoyle Tin Mine circa 1930. Like nearby Ben Lomond, the name is of Scottish origin.
Royal George
A locality in north east Tasmania, it was a mining village, with the mine and locality named after one of the HMS Royal George ships from the 19th century. It is most likely named after the 120-gun first-rate HMS Royal George, launched in 1827 at Chatham Dockyard. Royal George was originally gazetted on 22 December 1954 as a Post Office taken from the locality of the same name.
St. Helens
The first European to explore the St. Helens area was Tobias Furneaux who sailed up the coast in 1773. He named the southern point of Georges Bay, St. Helens Point, and it is from this point that the town was subsequently named. The name is believed to be taken from St Helen's, an uninhabited island in the Isles of Scilly. These islands, which form an archipelago off the south-westernmost tip of the United Kingdom, are near Furneaux's birthplace, Swilly, Plymouth.
St Leonards
Now an eastern suburb of Launceston on the eastern side of the North Esk River, it was first opened up in 1806 for pasture under the name of Pattersons Plains. In 1866, it was proclaimed a town and named after Edward Sugden, 1st Baron St Leonards. In 1877. St Leonards had three flour mills, a cloth mill utilisig hand looms, and a distillery.
St. Marys
Prior to the 1840's the area was generally known as the St Patricks Head District, but then the property of "Cullenswood" developed as a de facto township, until in the 1860's, St. Marys took over as the capital of the Break-O'Day Plains. St Marys did not in fact exist as a name in the area until 1842. In that year, the Surveyor General proposed that a pass through which a road was being built be called St. Marys Pass (or Vale). An early reference to St. Marys Pass as an "abode" was in the baptism record of James Canham, son of James & Jane Cook at Cullenswood 4th December 1854. The town was surveyed in 1857 and shown on Sprent's map 1859 and listed in the earliest Walch's Almanac. It is said to have been named by Francis Groom after St Mary's Church, Harefield, England. Groom settled near the Break-O'-Day River about 1837-39, and called his property Harefield.
St Peter's Pass
St Peter’s Pass was named by Sergeant Daniel O’Conner who was dispatched to construct buildings at Oatlands. O’Connor acquired this land from Askin Morrison in 1829.
Saltwater River
Also known as Saltwater Creek, the locality is a former penal colony on the Tasman Peninsula. The Saltwater River area contained two penal settlements. One was an agricultural settlement, which produced vegetables, wheat, and had a piggery. The other was a coal mine, known amongst convicts for its hellish conditions. The name refers to a creek nearby. Mungarattya was the native name for Saltwater Lagoon.
Sandfly
A suburb in the Kingborough Council, it takes its name from the Sandfly Colliery Company. Sandfly is a historic area that sits between the Hobart suburbs of Longley, Allen's Rivulet, Leslie Vale and Kaoota. Previously known as Sandfly Basin. The name is thought to be taken from that of a British warship that was in Hobart at the time of the first white settlement of the district. Records indicate HMS Sandfly was in Hobart in January 1881, hoewever the first record of the name being used dates from 1868 with a person's address being given as Sandfly Road.
Sandy Bay
A southern suburb of Hobart on the shores of the Derwent River. Australia's first legal casino is situated there. Named by the Rev. Robert (Bobby) Knopwood, who is said to have applied the name descriptively. He first mentioned it in his diary in 1804, as did Gov. Collins who recorded coming ashore at the 'sandy bay' just south of Hobart Town to take shelter from a nasty southerly squall. Common usage would indicate that Secheron Point and Sandy Bay Point define the extent of the georgraphical feature. Lower Sandy Bay is on the southern side of Sandy Bay and takes in the beach from which the name originated. First named Lower Sandy Bay then it changed to Beachside, then in 1968 it was changed again to its' present name.
Savage River
The township at Savage River was constructed from 1965 to 1967 when Roy Hudson's Industrial and Mining Investigations Pty Ltd received backing to construct a mining project in the area. The locality is possibly named by surveyor Gordon Burgess after Job Savage, one of his two companions in the exploration of the country south and west of Mount Cleveland. Mr F Heazlewood was the other. Savage was a storekeeper, publican, ship captain, prospector, and piner at Pieman River prior to 1881. Another source suggests the name recalls two convicts who escaped to the area; an article on the sinking of the SS Croyden, The Hobart Mercury Wed. 21 May 1919, p. 7 claims it was named after a George Savage. Savage River and Savages hut at Corinna are shown on Roll Plan F14 by George S Lefroy dated 1882.
'Lattawinne', a Tasmanian Aboriginal word for their iron-ore black paint, was suggested as the town's name during pre-planning. The purpose-built mining village included 250 family houses, a school built for 360 students, a police station, a nurse centre, a fire station, a motel, a service station, shops and a church. The township was extensively rehabilitated during the mid to late 1990s, with houses removed and most roads dug up and vegetation replanted.
Scamander
Believed to have been named by Gov. Sir John Franklin who was a scholar with an interest in Greek culture. Like nearby Dianas's Basin, the Scamander River shown on his map of 1837. Evans (1821), Scott (1830), Cross (1832) and arrowsmith (1832) all show the watercourse, but it is not named. Scamander is the name of the river in the Legend of Troy, its floods played a major role in the Trojan War. Scamander was a river god, son of Oceanus and Tethys according to Hesiod. He was the father of Teucer and participated in the Trojan War. Scamander fought on the side of the Trojans during the Trojan War, after the Greek hero Achilles insulted him. he town was initially known as Yarmouth.
Scottsdale
Recalls the Government Surveyor, James Scott. The area around present-day Scottsdale was surveyed in 1858-59 and named 'Scotts New Country'. It had previously been variously named Cox's Creek and Cox's Paradise (after an early settler who spent much of his time telling people how beautiful the area was), Heazlewood and then Heazleton, also after an early settler Thomas Diprose Heazlewood, and Ellesmere.
Shearwater
A locality on the north-west coast of Tasmania, it lies on the Rubicon Rivulet. Approved as a suburb of Port Sorell in November 1972, it borders the Rubicon Estuary, which has been identified by BirdLife International as an Important Bird Area because of its importance for waders, especially Pied Oystercatchers. This indicates the town's name is derived from the Short-tailed Shearwater or muttonbird, seen in abundance here.
Sheffield
The locality has long been thought to have been named by Edward Curr, the Tasmanian Manager for the Van Diemen's Land Company, after Sheffield, England as he was a native of that city. As Curr had left the VDL Co. seven years before Sheffield was surveyed and was by then residing at Abbotsford, Victoria, this seems most unlikely, howver one of his employees may well have influenced the town's naming. James Powlett and his wife, Margaret, were among the first to buy and occupy town lots in the new settlement. They established its first inn, which was soon trading as the Sheffield Inn. They ran the town's first general store and post office from it, with James's brother carrying the mail on horseback between Sheffield and Latrobe. From then onwards, the settlement was known as Sheffield, with the town being officially proclaimed by that name on 20th August 1889. The name Sheffield was suggested by Surveyor James Dooley, when he laid out the town. At that time, he would have been aware that the Powletts had already selected land around the townsite, and intended to take up residence in the new township and establish an inn. It is likely that George Powlett might have approached Dooley, suggesting he name the town Sheffield, as the inn he intended to build there was to be named the Sheffield Inn.
Ship Stern Bluff
A well knoen surfing location on the south eastern coast of Tasmania, on the Tasman Peninsula. Also known as Devil's Point because of the rough seas here. The name is a reference to the shape of the cliff which resembles the stern (back) of a sailing ship.
Sisters Beach
A small town located not far from Wynyard, in Tasmania's North West. It is located within the Rocky Cape National Park on the old horse trail known as the Postman's Track that once formed the only connection between Emu Bay (now Burnie) and the Van Diemen's Land outpost of Stanley. Sisters Creek, after which it is named, is home to platypus and the profusion of smaller creeks hide an orchestra of frogs. The Sisters, or Sisters Island, is a small island off Sisters Beach, which appear to have the given the locality and the river their names.
Skelton
Skelton township was situated on the Macquarie River. The Sketon Creek flows through Ross and Norfolk Plains. The township was on or near the Skelton Castle property (which adjoins the property Barton). Skelton Castle was the estate of Captain Dixon who named it after the ship he commanded before settled on the land.
Smithton
There is some dispute about the origins of the town's name with some sources suggesting Peter Smith, a policeman who arrived in the area in 1855, while others claim that James 'Philosopher' Smith, who was responsible for the development of much of western Tasmania, was the person honoured. The former seems to have the most credence. On 1st March, 1855, Peter Smith wrote to the Surveyor-General, Hobart Town, applying for some five allotments in the township of "Duck River". The Lands Department noted on the application that there was no such township, but a few weeks later the Surveyor-General instructed that the lot be coloured as a Reserve and called Smith Township. In the Hobart Town Gazette of 1856 town lots were advertised for sale in Smithton, and it would appear that because Peter Smith was the first applicant for land in this area the Township took his name.
Snug
Believed to have come from sailors who found 'snug' anchorage for their ships. Snug River is shown simply as 'the Snug' on Thomas Scott's map dated 1824. The mountainous range west of Snug is named Snug Tiers.
Somerset
Now a satellite town of Burnie, Somerset was named in 1856 after Henry Somerset, 8th Duke of Beaufort, who had died in the previous year. In the 1860's it rivalled Burnie as a port, having had a school under the Board of Education as early as 1865. Somerset then was known as The Cam and comprised a cluster of cottages, a shop and a wharf on the western bank of the river, with a couple of homes and a licensed ferry house on the eastern shore. The main area of what is now Somerset township was then heavily forested.
Sorell
Recalls William Sorell, who was Lieut. Gov. of Van Dieman's Land between 1817 and 1824. The name was given by Gov. Lachlan Macquarie when he visited the area and selected land for a settlement in June 1821. Macquariewas accompanied by Lieut. Gov Sorell; Henry Edward Robinson, Captain, 48th Regiment, Secretary to Lieutenant Governor Sorell; Dr William Redfern and George Evans, Surveyor-General of New South Wales. The Sorell Post Office opened in 1833.
Sorell Springs
Sorell Springs used to be on the old highway between Hobart and Launceston. The road was later moved to go through Antill Ponds. Sorell Springs was renamed by Governor Lachlan Macquarie in 1821 from Tin Dish Hole which he thought unworthy. The White Hart Inn at Sorell Springs was reputedly one od the best and oldest inns between Hobart Town and Launceston, it being considered the most convenient and central Point on the road.
South Esk
A region in northern Tasmania south of Launceston through which the South Esk River flows. It incorporates townships such as Evandale, Perth and Longford. The Aboriginal word for the district is 'mangana lienta' In the early 1800s, when the area was first opened up for farming, the South Esk River and the areas around it were also known as New River. The South Esk River is the longest river in Tasmania. It was named by Colonel William Paterson on 6th December 1804 after a river in county of Forfar, Scotland. It had been previously known as the New River and Gibson's River.
Southport
Thus named because of its locality in relation to Hobart. First named Mussel Bay, being on a bay thus named by French Admiral Bruny D'Entrecasteaux, it was later changed to Southport. In 1895 the name was changed to Hythe as it had been gazetted and proclaimed as Hythe on 3rd Juily 1866 - the name of the post Office there - and then reverted to Southport again in 1969.
Spreyton
Spreyton is a small town just south of Devonport. The name was first applied as a parish name, its earliest use being recorded in 1856; it was listed as the name of a Post Station in Walch's Almanac in 1884. In 1852 S Kelcey purchased land at Spreyton, settled there and built a tidal flour mill. Spreyton Station on the Mersey & Deloraine railway line was later re-named Quoiba. Spreyton is said to be named after Spreyton, a small rural village just north of Dartmoor in Devon, England. Spreyton is famous for its connection to the tale of “Old Uncle Tom Cobley and all” who came from, and is thought to be buried in Spreyton. Some believe that if Uncle Tom Cobley did exist and did travel to Widecombe fair, he would have travelled from Spreyton. Both the English and Tasmania towns are in counties named Devon, which may explainm the origin of the Tasmanian town's name.
Stanley
The Aboriginal name for the Circular Head district was Martula. Stanley was named after Edward Smith-Stanley , 13th Earl of Derby (1775-1851), the Secretary of State for the Colonies at the suggestion of James Gibson, the second manager of the Van Diemen's Land Company's Highfield Estate.
Stonehenge
Stonehenge was named by Samuel Page, known as the proprietor of coaches from early times. Page was born in 1810 and came to Van Diemen’s Land with his mother in 1823. In 1837, with his wife, he moved to Oatlands where he took over the Lake Dulverton Inn. In 1839 he opened the Oatlands Hotel, and operated his first coaching service in 1845 between Oatlands and Hobart. In 1848 Page tendered for and won the mail contract between Hobart Town and Launceston. Page became one of the great land and stockowners in the colony and at one time was grazing 63,000 sheep.
Stonor
Stonor was named in 1892 after Alan Charles Stonor, Crown Solicitor for Van Diemen’s Land in 1842. When the Main Line railway opened in 1876, a railway station at Stonor served the widely scattered farming communities of Jericho, Baden, Tunnack, Whitefoord and Woodsdale. Farm produce was hauled by horse and bullock teams to be loaded onto railway trucks at Stonor. The station was also the loading depot for butter manufactured at the Baden Butter Factory during its years of operation, as well as being an important passenger terminal for the area.
Strahan
Recalls Sir George Cumine Strahan , Governor of Tasmania, 1881-86, when the town was proclaimed. Strahan Harbour and Risby Cove form part of the north-east end of Long Bay on the northern end of Macquarie Harbour.
Strathgordon
The name literally means 'valley of the Gordon River'. Strath is a Scottish name for a broad mountain valley.
Swansea
Believed to have originated from the Black Swan Inn, a hotel at the locality in the 19th century. Swansea was originally called Great Swanport.
Swanston
Prior to 1897, Swanston was considered part of the Spring Bay municipality. It was named after Captain Charles Swanston, who played a major role in the survey of the town that was never developed, largely due to the fact that the roads connecting Oatlands and the East Coast were never completed. The history of Swanston dates back to the late 1820s when a grant of 5,050 acres was made to John Thomson, an early settler in the Bothwell district, who arrived from Scotland. Another early grant of 430 acres was made to George Marshall.
Ta Neem Er Ra
The aboriginal word for Mt. Roland and translates as open grassy plain. Probably so-called because the top of the mountain is a plateau which would have been fire-farmed by the original population.
Tamar Valley
The Tamar River is a 70 km estuarine in northern Tasmania formed by the merging of the North Esk River and South Esk Rivers at Launceston (the largest settlement) to its mouth at Low Head. It was named by Colonel William Paterson in December 1804 for the River Tamar in Great Britain which passes Launceston, Cornwall. Despite its name it is not actually a river as it is saline and tidal over its entire length.
Tanina
Tanina is located 14.74kms West of Bagdad, 15.9kms North of New Norfolk, 28.3 kms South of Bothwell. It was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools. In some cases these names were fitting as they appropriately described the area. In this case it wasn't. The word means to break wind.
Taranna
A name of Aboriginal origin. The locality, on the Tasman Peninsula, was the site of a convict probation station, and has the distinction of having the first railway in Australia powered by four convicts. Taranna was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools.
Taroona
An outer southern suburb of Hobart on the shores of the Derwent River. The name is an Aboriginal word meaning "seashell".
Tarraleah
Of Aboriginal origin, being the local Aboriginal name for the forest kangaroo. Tarraleah was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools.
Tasman Peninsula
Tasman Peninsula, like Tasman Island off its south eastern tip and Tasmania itself, were named on 9th December 1798 by Matthew Flinders during his circumnavigation of Tasmania with George Bass. The name honours its European discoverer, Abel Tasman , who sailed these waters in November 1642.
Tomahawk
A quiet beachside town in the north east of Tasmania facing Bass Strait on Ringarooma Bay. The town was established at the mouth of the Tomahawk River at the end of the 1860s when gold was discovered in the region. Initially known as Du Cane (after Governor Charles Du Cane) it was, for a short period, a very busy port.
Tooms Lake
The name of both a lake and a village in the eastern midlands of Tasmania. Tooms Lake was built across Tooms River as a water supply dam for Ross. On 6 December 1828 a massacre of Tasmanian aborigines occurred where ten were killed by nine soldiers from the 40th regiment.
Trevallyn
Trevallyn is now a suburb of Launceston situated at the junction of the Tamar and South Esk Rivers. The name of the suburb spelled backwards, Nyllavert, can be found on postal records and lists of localities; the local post office used to carry this name in the 1930s. Despite the place name no longer existing and not being officially gazetted, the name still appears in many lists and indexes of localities.
Triabunna
An Aboriginal word for the Native Hen. The town was founded in 1830 as a station of the 63rd regiment, and later the 51st regiment also called Triabunna home for a time.
Tullah
A town in the northern part of the West Coast Range, on the west coast of Tasmania, about 111 km south of Burnie. The town is roughly divided into two "suburbs", an older northern and a younger, more planned out southern. the northern half was originally a mining town called Mount Farrell, established in year 1900 after silver lead ore was discovered in the area. Tullah was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools.
Tunbridge
Tunbridge is a small historic coaching town on the Midlands Highway approximately half way between Launceston and Hobart. It was originally known as Tunbridge Wells (after the famous English spa town) taking its namw from the property settler Thomas Fleming who had migrated from Tunbridge Wells, England.
Tunnack
Tunnack is a locality on the Coal River in east Tasmania, Australia situated 49km north-northeast of Hobart and 18km from Oatlands. Its name is of aboriginal origin meaning cold. It was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools. In some cases these names were fitting as they appropriately described the area.
Turners Beach
Turners Beach is located at the western mouth into Bass Strait of the Forth River, opposite the village of Leith located on its eastern mouth. The area was officially named Turners Beach on 21st March 1961. The beach was originally known as Scott s Beach, named after the Scott family who operated a flour mill on Claytons Rivulet. One school of thought suggests that Turners Beach was named after the Turner family who lived in The Gables in the 1920s.
Tyenna
A once thriving rural community, located 81 km west of Hobart. Before the establishment of the towns of Fitzgerald and Maydena it was the resupply base for Adamsfield for osmiridium miners travelling McCullum's Track. Tyenna was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools. In some cases these names were fitting as they appropriately described the area.
Ulverstone
Named after the South Cumbrian town of Ulverston (note the different spelling) in the English Lake District when it was surveyed in 1855. No explanation exists as to reason for the selection of the name. The name is first known to have been used in 1854 when Hugh Ross McKay opened the Ulverstone Store.
Upper Castra
Upper Castra is a small village outside Ulverstone. The word castra is meant as "camp" in this context, and Upper Castra is so named because it is further inland from Castra. In 1865 Lt-Colonel Andrew Crawford initiated his scheme for land settlement at Castra in Tasmania's north-west. Fifty Anglo-Indians, including many officers, purchased land, but not many stayed. In Tasmania the term 'Anglo-Indians' appears to cover English people who resided in India (at the time part of the British Empire) then in Tasmania, those of English-Indian parentage and those who were born in India of English parents.
Waddamana
An Aboriginal word for "noisy water" or "big river". It was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools. In some cases, like Waddamana, these names were fitting as they appropriately described the area. Waddamana is a former hydro-electric town.
Waratah
Possibly named because of the abundance of the Waratah shrub (Telopea truncata) at the locality. The species of waratah found in Tasmania, which is smaller than those on the mainland, appears on the crest of the City of Hobart. The Van Diemens Land Company surveyors were responsible for naming the town.
Waverley
An eastern Launceston suburb made famous by the woollen mills after which it is named.
Wayatinah
An Aboriginal word for "a brook" or "creek".
Westbury
Westbury is a village on the old highway between Launceston and Deloraine. The site was first surveyed in 1823. The town was laid out in 1828 by the Van Diemen's Land Company and named because of it was west of Launceston. The Village Green is still in use today and is reputed to be the only traditional village green in Australia.
Westerway
A small town in southern Tasmania, 68 km west of Hobart on the Tyenna River. It was first was known as Russell or Russelldale and was named after Surgeon J J Russell, one of the party who discovered a set of waterfalls 3 km from Fenton Forest (although these not the present day Russell Falls). Due to confusion between the town of Russell and Russell Falls further up the road the towns name was changed in 1920 to Westerway. It was named by, and after, W H Westerway (1851 1930), the main resident and responsible for many developments in the area. He built an accommodation house and store where Coniston siding is now, owned the Coffee Palace at Glenora and started a livery business driving tourists to Russell Falls.
Weymouth
A small township located on the Pipers River opposite Bellingham and about 60 km from Launceston.
Whitefoord
Whitefoord was named in 1840 to commemorate John Whitefoord, the second Police Magistrate appointed to serve at Oatlands. Whitefoord was a thriving farming centre. One early settler in the district, William Brack received land grants, one of which he named Meadowbanks and there intended to establish a hotel. However, as the road to the East Coast did not eventuate, no further action was taken in applying for a hotel licence.
Whitemark
The administrative centre of Flinders Island. The original name, White Mark, came either from a white sand blow settlers used as a navigational aide, a whitish survey mark in a tree indicating a crossing between two lagoons, or a later white sandy track through the coastal scrub. Whitemark became one word when a wireless station was built in 1913, as the price of messages was calculated per word.
Whitemore
Glenore is the name originally given to the township of Whitemore.
Winnaleah
A town located in north-eastern Tasmania. It was one of many Aboriginal words on a list drawn up in 1885 by Leventhorpe Hall, Chief Draftsman of the Surveys Office, to be applied to any new towns, parishes, railway stations and schools.
Woodbridge
Originally named Peppermint Bay after the bay on the shores of D'Entrecasteaux Channel south of Hobart. As the village developed it was renamed Woodbridge in 1866 by the residents, after the name of a property and birthplace of George Miles.
Woodbury
The vast tract of open country between Antill Ponds and Mona Vale was originally named Salt Pan Plains. The name of Woodbury is attributed to the settler Robert Harrison after the township of the same name in the County of Devonshire, England. Harrison brought with him 17 fine Saxon Merino sheep, the only survivors of the 34 that left England with him. He received a land grant of 2,400 acres, naming it Woodbury. In 1828 he applied to Governor Arthur for an additional grant, after importing more ewes and rams.
Woodsdale
In 1864 Martin Bourke was the first European settler to take up land at Woodsdale. The next settlers did not take up land in the area until 187. Woodsdale was named after Mr N.A. Woods, Inspector of Roads, who laid out the road to the district in 1881. In 1884 the State School was established, and the first teacher would walk to Woodsdale from Whitefoord every day to perform his teaching duties. The first post office was opened in 1884. Prior to 1897 Woodsdale and Swanston formed part of the Spring Bay municipality.
Woodside
The first settlers arrived there in 1864, and it was named after Mr N A Woods an Inspector of Roads in the district.
Wynyard
Originally named Table Cape after the nearby geographical location named by Bass and Flinders in 1798. The town's name was changed to Wynyard about 1850. It recalls Major-General Edward Buckley Wynyard, Commander of the troops stationed at Sydney, Van Dieman's Land and New Zealand. He is the same person after whom Wynyard Park and Wynyard station in the City of Sydney are named. Three ex-convict Alexander brothers established a settlement, Alexandria, on the west, or Table Cape, side of the Inglis River in the 1850s. After the Inglis River was bridged in 1861, Alexandria began to fade and Wynyard, with better wharfing, became the district's centre of commerce.
Yolla
A rural community in north-western Tasmania. The name is a Tasmanian Aboriginal word for the Short-tailed Shearwater or muttonbird . The area was originally covered by Myrtle Beech forest, which was gradually cleared for farming.
York Plains
York Plains was named by Governor Macquarie in 1811 on his first visit through the area. The original main road passed through York Plains and rejoined today’s route near Antill Ponds. As early as 1815, before the official opening up of the Oatlands district, stockmen in charge of cattle were living at York Plains in tents. Joseph Wright was the first settler to establish a home in the area, after being granted 50 acres in 1815. An inn, situated near the present York Plains township, supplied travellers on the main road with food and liquid refreshments
Zeehan
Named after one of Dutch navigator Abel Tasman's ships, which explored the west and south coast of Tasmania in November 1642. Tasman's other ship, Heemskirk, is recalled in Mt Heemskirk nearby, the peak of which was Tasman's first landfall. Mount Zeehan was named by Matthew Flinders. Zeehan East was the name given to a Post Office on the eastern side of the town which was opened from 1890 to 1921.