Antwerp - Culture and History

Before European settlement the area around Antwerp was characterised by mallee scrub (eucalypts), native pines, red gums and ti-tree. The local Aborigines (probably known as the Wotjoballuk) moved around the area relying on the local river, named Wimmera by Major Mitchell in 1836, for their water and living off the local fauna and flora.

The first Europeans to settle the area were George Shaw and Horatio Ellerman who arrived in 1846 and successfully applied for 130,000 acres to graze some 10,000 sheep. It was Horatio Ellerman who named his property 'Antwerp' after the city in Belgium where he was born. It is likely that Ellerman's son, Clarence Henry, who was born in 1852 was the first European child born in the Wimmera.

In 1858 two Moravian missionaries, the Reverend Hagenauer and Reverend Spieseke, arrived in Victoria to work among the Aborigines. They decided that they were most needed in the Wimmera and they chose a site about 3 km south of Antwerp station on the Wimmera River. By 1859 they had built a hut and, during that year with the assistance of the local Aborigines, they built a church. It was consecrated in 1860. At that time a local Aborigine named 'Pepper' was baptised - thus becoming the first Christian Aborigine in the Wimmera.

By the late 1880s the town was thriving because of the establishment of a large and successful eucalyptus oil distillery. The oil was extracted from the mallee by a company which called itself the Eucalyptus Mallee Oil Company. The oil was sold under the EMU brand name.

Antwerp was never a large town. The last wedding in the Ebenezer Mission church occurred as long ago as 1899 and the local school, which finally closed in 1981, rarely had more than 20-30 students. When the school finally closed it had only 12 students.