History
The region has been occupied by Indigenous Australians for thousands of years, notably in the west by the Kamilaroi people. In the highlands, the original languages, which are now extinct, were Anaiwan (or Nganaywana) to the south of Guyra and Ngarrabal and Marabal to the north of Guyra.
The first European to explore the New England area was English explorer John Oxley, who crossed the southern part of the New England Range near the Apsley Falls before he discovered and named Port Macquarie in 1818. In 1827 Allan Cunningham travelled north along the western edge of the Range until he reached the Darling Downs in Queensland. In 1831 Thomas Mitchell (explorer) reached Wallamoul Station near Tamworth and explored to the Namoi River then followed it to Narrabri. Moving on Mitchell found a deep, broad river which was the Gwydir. In 1832, Mitchell cut across the plains to the Gwydir River near Moree. The team then spent several weeks charting the tributaries between the Gwydir and the Barwon Rivers.
Hamilton Collins Sempill was the first settler in the New England area when he took up the 'Wolka' run in 1832, establishing slab huts where 'Langford' now stands close to Walcha. During the 1830s further squatters moved their sheep flocks onto the Northern Tablelands as they had been displaced by the Australian Agricultural Company, which dominated resources in the Hunter Valley. When the area was opened up for settlement in the 1830s, this led to the gazetting of nine pastoral districts. These districts had a small police force and a Commissioner of Crown Lands.
Australian red cedar (Toona ciliata) cutters moved into the headwaters of the Macleay River in the early 1830s to harvest the valuable trees. The ranges between Kempsey and Glen Innes yielded about 300,000 board feet (710 m3) in 1950.
Work commenced in 1838 with the use of convicts to build a road, then known as Major's Line, across the Great Dividing Range to link the wool-growing settlement of Walcha with Port Macquarie. This road was later named the Oxley Highway.
On 22 May 1839 the New England District was gazetted thus: New England District: Bounded on the east by a line north by compass from the top of Werrikimber Mountain which is at the head of the Hastings River; on the south by a line west by compass from the top of Werrikimber Mountain to the Great Dividing Range; on the west by the western extreme of the Great Dividing Range so as to include the Tableland and on the north the boundary is indefinite.
In 1840 there were 66 separate pastoral licences, in 1842 it rose to 98, 1845 – 116; and by 1848 there were 132. Only 10 new runs were registered between 1848 and 1855. In 1843 the Darling Downs district was separated from the New England.
This region ceased to be a statistical division after 1874, but the counties of Arrawatta, Clarke, Clive, Gough, Hardinge, Hawes, Sandon and Vernon approximated the region’s limits. In 1847 these counties, with the exception of Hawes and Vernon formed part of the "Unsettled District" of the colony. By 1850 all major communication routes had been forged, with little government assistance.
During the 1860s the famous bushranger, Captain Thunderbolt, robbed properties, mail coaches and hotels throughout the region. Thunderbolt was shot dead in May 1870 by Constable Walker at Kentucky Creek, near Uralla.
The population of the New England Region, including the slopes in 1957 was 143,788 and in 1971 there were 164,128 people, according to the census data. In the 2006 census the New England region had a population of 180,000 which included the local government areas of Armidale Dumaresq, Inverell, Walcha, Glen Innes Severn, Gunnedah, Guyra, Gwydir, Liverpool Plains, Moree Plains, Narrabri, Tamworth Regional and Uralla.
Read more about this topic: New England (New South Wales)
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