Pioneers articles

Nillumbik Cemetery is one of a number of Pioneer Cemeteries in the district with burials going back to its establishment in 1867.  The cemetery has been managed and maintained by Trustees since that time and it still is today.  The Trustees are volunteers who give their time to keep the cemetery in the condition they […]

George Durrant Starling and his wife Clementina left Norfolk, England and arrived in Melbourne in 1859 to start a new life, first living at Janefield, now Bundoora, where they ran a farm. They were joined ten years later by their grandsons George Davey Starling jnr. and Adrian Starling, then in 1886 their son George Davey […]

John Wilson and his wife Martha Burgess arrived in Port Phillip as bounty immigrants on the 18th February 1844 with their seven children ranging in age from 1 to 17. They left their home in Langley, Essex looking for better opportunities as so many others at the time did. Bounty immigrants were expected to begin […]

Across Diamond Creek district, when men were called to enlist during World War 1, a number of families saw more than one son depart for foreign shores. In this article are details of brothers from three local families, who departed on troop ships not knowing what really lay ahead of them. They were supported by […]

The Godber family were early Diamond Creek settlers, first recorded in the district in the 1850’s. Two sons and a daughter of Job and Mary Godber were living in Diamond Creek and had married into local families during the late 1850’s and early 1860’s. Rosamond Godber married William Wilson, who had been in the district […]