Fingal - Culture and History

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This was published 15 years ago

Fingal - Culture and History

The beauty of the Fingal district has been an inspiration to a number of writers and poets. James McAuley, who spent a lot of time on Tasmania's east coast, wrote of Fingal in his poem 'Fingal Valley'.

The blonding summer grasses
The stubble-fields, the green,
The sheep in pools in shadow,
Mauve thistledown between.

The jagged ridge stands sharper
Without a bushfire haze;
The river winds in silence
Through wide blue hours, days.

Fingal was named, probably after Fingal's Cave in the Hebrides, by Roderic O'Connor who surveyed the area with John Helder Wedge in 1824.

Shortly after the survey, land was granted in the district and two substantial holdings were taken up by William Talbot ('Malahide' - located 2 km north of the town it is a gracious two storey stone Georgian house which was built in 1828) and James Grant ('Tullochgoram' - the property is located 5 km out of Fingal on the road to Avoca).

Fingal came into existence in 1827 when it was established as a convict station. It grew dramatically, if briefly, after the discovery of gold at Mangana, 10 km north west of Fingal, in 1852. This discovery is widely regarded as the first discovery of payable gold in Tasmania.


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