Map - Elliston, South Australia (Elliston)

Elliston (Elliston)
Elliston is a small coastal town in the Australian state of South Australia on the west coast of Eyre Peninsula 169 km northwest of Port Lincoln and 641 km west of Adelaide. The township is located on Waterloo Bay. At the 2006 census, Elliston had a population of 377.

The first inhabitants of the land that is now Elliston were the Nauo.

The first recorded exploration of the adjacent coastline was by Matthew Flinders in the vessel HMS Investigator (1798) from 10–13 February 1802. He named the offshore islands but did not note the presence of Waterloo Bay in his log.

Edward John Eyre explored the area on land in 1840 and 1841 on a journey to Western Australia from Port Lincoln. Originally named Waterloo Bay, the township was later named by Governor Sir William Jervois on a plan for the town on 23 November 1878. It is named after the writer and educator Ellen Liston who was born in London in 1838 and emigrated to South Australia in 1850. She was a governess working on a local property (Nilkerloo) owned by John Hamp.

Those dismissive of women's contributions to history have suggested that Jervois, who had a military background, chose to honor Sir Henry Walton Ellis (1783–1815) who was a hero of the Battle of Waterloo during which campaign he died of his wounds. However it is recorded that Jervois liked naming places after people he knew and the town was gazetted formally as Elliston in 1878 after being informally called Ellie's Town. The Sydney Morning Herald write of the town's naming after Ellen Liston:

"The honour was a combination of the wide spread respect and admiration she enjoyed in the area and Jervois' penchant for naming towns after friends and family." [Ref= https://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/elliston-20040208-gdkqis.html ]

The area was settled in the 1840s with Elliston being the central port from which the early settlers transported their wool and wheat to market. Sailing ships and later steam ships crossed Waterloo Bay's notorious reefed entrance. A number of ships foundered in the bay due to its narrow entrance and variable tides.

The Nauo people were hit extremely hard by the effects of European settlement. There was a very great deal of violence against Aboriginal people in this area (and a good deal of violence against white settlers also). The Waterloo Bay Massacre of 1869 (also known as the Elliston Massacre) occurred close to Elliston, and there are also many better-documented murders and other violent acts towards Aboriginal people in this area.

 
Map - Elliston (Elliston)
Country - Australia
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Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of 7617930 km2, Australia is the largest country by area in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east, and mountain ranges in the south-east.

The ancestors of Aboriginal Australians began arriving from south east Asia approximately 65,000 years ago, during the last ice age. Arriving by sea, they settled the continent and had formed approximately 250 distinct language groups by the time of European settlement, maintaining some of the longest known continuing artistic and religious traditions in the world. Australia's written history commenced with the European maritime exploration of Australia. The Dutch navigator Willem Janszoon was the first known European to reach Australia, in 1606. In 1770, the British explorer James Cook mapped and claimed the east coast of Australia for Great Britain, and the First Fleet of British ships arrived at Sydney in 1788 to establish the penal colony of New South Wales. The European population grew in subsequent decades, and by the end of the 1850s gold rush, most of the continent had been explored by European settlers and an additional five self-governing British colonies established. Democratic parliaments were gradually established through the 19th century, culminating with a vote for the federation of the six colonies and foundation of the Commonwealth of Australia on 1 January 1901. Australia has since maintained a stable liberal democratic political system and wealthy market economy.
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AUD Australian dollar $ 2
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EN English language
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