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Sunbury

Our History

The Sunbury area has several important local Aboriginal archaeological sites, including five earth rings, which were identified in the 1970s and 1980s, and believed to have been used for ceremonial gatherings. Records of corroborees and other large gatherings during early settlement attest to the importance of the area for Aboriginal people of the Wurundjeri tribe.

Sunbury was first settled in 1836, by George Evans and William Jackson. It was Jackson and his brother, Samuel, who named the township Sunbury, after Sunbury-on-Thames, in Surrey, England when it was established in 1857. The Post Office opened on 13 January 1858.

Sunbury's connection with the history and development of Victoria is influential because of its most famous and powerful citizen, "Big" Clarke. Clarke's role as one of the biggest squatters in the colony and his power and position within the Victorian Legislative Council were critical in the early days of Victoria. During the early days of self-government in the Colony of Victoria, post 1851, there was a continual struggle in parliament, between the Legislative Assembly and the Legislative Council for the ascendancy and control of government. It was the Council members, such as Clarke, who attempted to negate the excess of manhood suffrage, republicanism and Chartism as expressed in the Assembly, in order to protect their own squatters' agenda and position.

"Big" Clarke as a member of the Victorian 'bunyip aristocracy' also frustrated any legislative reforms to opening the lands to small farm selections. Melbourne Punch depicted Clarke in anti-squatter cartoons, such as "The man in Possession"

In 1859, "Big" Clarke was involved in a scandal around the discovery of gold on his holdings in nearby Deep Creek. Shares in the Bolinda company soared, Clarke sold his shares at the peak of the rush before the fraud was exposed. The gold assay was actually 'salted', possibly via a shotgun blast of golden pellets into the samples.

Clarke claimed the rich assay was proved when washed in a soup bowl. The ever barbed Melbourne Punch explained how this fraud work in a cartoon of a chipped Chinese Willow Pattern plate titled the "The Soup Plate".

In 1837, William "Big" Clarke, came to the area, and gained vast pastoral licences encompassing Sunbury, Clarkefield and Monegeetta. In 1874, Clarke's son, William, built a mansion, which resides on an estate named "Rupertswood", after his own son, Rupert. This estate also has access to a train station, which was used to transport bales of hay to Adelaide. Though the private station was constructed in the late 19th century the Clarkes did not pay the railways for its construction until the 1960s (Rupertswood railway Station no longer exists after the fast rail upgrade. There were two trains stopping daily during school term only, but now it is only a disused platform).

The Clarkes also had a connection to the Kelly Gang story via their police connection with Supt. Hare.

The younger William, Sir William as he was to become, was the president of the Melbourne Cricket Club, and it was through his position that the touring English cricket team came to spend Christmas of 1882 at Rupertswood. On Christmas Eve, the English team played a social game of cricket against a local team, which they won. Lady Clarke took one or more bails, burnt them, and interred the Ashes in a small purple velvet pouch, which she presented to the English Captain, Ivo Bligh. She proposed that the ashes be used as a perpetual trophy for matches between the two countries. Later the remains of the burnt bails were placed in a small urn. The Ashes have since become one of the world's most sought-after sporting trophies.

In 1922, the Clarke family sold the property to H V McKay, the owner of the Sunshine Harvester Works, whose estate subsequently onsold it in 1927 to the Salesian Catholic order. Until recently the mansion and surrounding property has been used for educational and agricultural purposes, and as a boarding school for students of both academic and agricultural endeavours (Salesian College). The mansion has now been restored, and is used for weddings and other formal functions. The school, known as Salesian College, Rupertswood, is still located on the property.

In the early 1970s the area (which was then still largely rural) became famous in Australia as the site of the Sunbury Pop Festival, which was held annually from 1972 to 1975.