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name. It is built of weatherboards of Van Diemen's Land timber, which house yet stands, and is
still rather an ornament to what is now called Barwon Terrace. In this house I had the honour of
receiving His Excellency Sir Richard Bourke, who had come hither to spy out the nakedness of
the land, and with his suite encamped on the banks of the Barwon next to my house. It is worthy
of remark that on the night of Sir Richard Bourke's arrival the district wa$ visited by an
earthquake, the shock of which was felt all over the district. Such a phenomenon has never
occurred
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since that time, but I was informed by a very old native, King Murradock, that such had been
felt before, but it was "long, long ago."
'In the month of September (1837), having finished my house and got all things comfortable for
the reception of my family, I proceeded to Van Diemen's Land to bring them over, taking my
passage by the James Watt, the first steam vessel that visited these shores, in the month of
March following (1838)! returned with my family, and having got them settled at Barwon
Terrace, I procesded to inspect the stations already formed.'
In 1838, Fred Champion, who ran one of the wooden storehouses by the beach, began
shipping wool to Van Diemen's Land, and the Woolpack Inn was built on the low cliff above
the beach, soon to become widely known as Mack's Hotel (JG Mack being the proprietor).
Meanwhile, Captain Foster Fyans, aged 46, late of the 4th (King's Own) Regiment, with whom
he had served on Norfolk Island, and ex-Commandant of the Moreton Bay penal settlement,
had been appointed Police Magistrate, Protector of Aborigines, Commissioner of Crown
Islands and dispenser of depasturising licenses in September 1837. He was asked by Sir
Richard Bourke to choose a site for the town that would be the supply and administrative centre
for the suddenly arrived community. His choice was surveyed and divided into 36 blocks, each
containing 20 lots.
On 26 October 1838, that pegged oblong of land, between the beach and the Barwon, officially
became Geelong.
But it was not until 14 February 1839 that the first three blocks were sold, the bulk of the
allotments therein going to speculators in Melbourne and Sydney, as did the lots in two blocks
sold in 1842, when Geelong's population was but 454. Local purchasers thenceforth acquired
more of what was on offer as local business prospered and the population grew. But even by
1851 several of the central blocks remained empty and unsold.
By then the population numbered 8,291, nearly half of whom were female, and most of whom
were immigrants who dwelt on the cheaper lots outside the official town. Landowners like
James Austin and Dr Thomson divided up their properties for profitable sales to immigrant
families, 4,000 of whom arrived in Geelong between 1848 and 1850.
The Geelong Advertiser, Victoria's oldest morning newspaper, first published in November
1840, noted a few years later: 'Dwellings and handsome edifices are springing up in all
directions with astounding rapidity. The limits of Chilwell, New Town, Little Scotland and
Ashby are being rapidly extended. The first named is almost the growth of a day, a few months
ago not a house was to be seen; but now, as if by magic, we behold a busy and thriving hamlet.'
In fact, more that 100 dwellings and businesses were built in Chilwell within a year. Highton and
Beimont, south of the Barwon, were also established at this time.
The handsome edifices referred to included the first stone building, Strachan's wool store
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