Nambucca Heads is located on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales, around five hours drive from Sydney and about halfway between Brisbane and Sydney.
The Gumbaynggirr People
The area of Nambucca Heads is part of the traditional lands of the Gumbaynggirr people and the largest midden-shell deposit in the whole Southern Hemisphere has been found here. (
see here)
The name “Nambucca”
comes from the Aboriginal word
ngambugka, meaning “winding or crooked river”.
The first European, it is said, to make contact with the Aboriginal people of the Nambucca region, was Clement Hodgkinson in March 1841. However, Europeans may have been in the area in 1818 searching for convicts who had stolen a boat from Sydney Harbour. Also, John Oxley surveyed the estuary in 1820.
The aforementioned Hodgkinson wrote a book called "Early Days of Australia From Port Macquarie to Moreton Bay," published in England in 1844, in which he described the Aboriginal people of the area as, "inclined to be pretty friendly, and were of
great assistance in enabling us to get rapidly through the entangled briars in the bush, which they beat down with their boomerangs."
Hunting and fighting weapons included spears, shields, tomohawks, nulla nullas, boomerangs, waddys and pademelon sticks.
Food gathering
implements included digging sticks, coolamons, nets, fishing lines, water carriers, and dilly bags.
Bark canoes were used for transport and fishing on the rivers and creeks.
The area known as "Bellwood Sacred Site", in Nambucca Heads, holds special significance to the Aboriginal people of the Nambucca area.
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| Land (Sydney, NSW : 1911 - 1954), Friday 10 October 1924, Read here |
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| Nambucca Heads, N.S.W. : Muurrbay Aboriginal Language & Culture Co-operative, 2008 |
1816
The seizure of the brig Trial in Port Jackson in September 1816, by convicts, who took her to sea, hoping to escape from Australia, led to the discovery of the Macleay and Nambucca Rivers.
1842
Cedar cutters began working in the Nambucca region in 1842, but as there were no roads at the time and rafting the cedar out of the river was difficult, the enterprise was abandoned for a time. Many of the cedar cutters stayed on
to establish farms, however.
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| Cranky Tom and Dilberree near Yarrahappinni, NSW, drawn by Clement Hodgkinson around 1845, SLNSW |
1870s
The site of Nambucca
village was proclaimed in the Government Gazette of October 21, 1870. While Baillier's Gazetter (1866) described Nambucca River this way— "Nambucca River is a fine mountain stream, flowing through low swampy country, well timbered with cedar and other valuable woods. It falls into the ocean by a narrow rocky channel, about 14 miles. N. of Trial Bay; and is navigable for small vessels
that trade there for cedars, the only export...."
Jabez Buckman, in 1878, established the first sawmill in Nambucca Heads on the flats by the river on the site now known as Gordon Park. His wife, Mary Ann, was the sister of Henry Albury, who was the father of Louisa Lawson, writer, poet and suffragist and the mother of poet and writer Henry Lawson. (see
here)
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| Mary Ann Buckman 1821-1906 |
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| Jabez Buckman (1818 - 1901) |
Sawmill workers used to live in cottages overlooking "Frog Hollow", where Gordon Park now exists.
1880s |
| Timber vessels bar-bound in the Nambucca Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1871 - 1912), Saturday 3 July 1886 |
The first substantial building built in Nambucca Heads was the "First Victoria Hotel", which was constructed in 1887 and owned by a former police officer named James Byrnes. In 1964, an old pistol and a bottle containing £2,000 was discovered under the floorboards of the Victoria Hotel.
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Victoria Hotel, Nambucca Heads. State Library of NSW.
There have been two Victoria hotels at Nambucca Heads. This was the original which stood where Woolworths now exists.
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Gordon’s Commercial Hotel and McDougalls Hotel, Nambucca Heads, no longer exist.
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| Nambucca Heads, NSW, Post Office (nd) The National Archives |
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| New South Wales Post Offices photo album - Nambucca Heads, NSW. (nd) The National Archives |
1890s
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| Macleay Argus (Kempsey, NSW : 1885 - 1907; 1909 - 1910; 1912 - 1913; 1915 - 1916; 1918 - 1954), Wednesday 21 December 1892 |
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| Raleigh Sun (Bellingen, NSW : 1898 - 1918), Friday 22 April 1898 |
The School of Arts was established in 1896. The later building was destroyed by fire in 1937.
1900s
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| Shipbuilding at Nambucca Heads: The Steamer Gratitude, recently Launched at Nambucca Heads.Australian Town and Country Journal (Sydney, NSW : 1870 - 1919), Saturday 26 May 1900 |
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| Nambucca Heads, N.S.W. - very early 1900s, Aussie~mobs |
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| Football Team, Nambucca Heads, NSW: June 1905. Back row: Loyd Levick, Harold Buckman, Tom Sherrin, Peter Rainey, Ben Buckman, Percy Smith, Fred Clough. Front row: Walter Smith, George Buckman, Isacc Wyatt, Keith Davis, Dick Pickett, Norman Ellis, Billy Wyatt. |
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| School children at Nambucca Heads, N.S.W. - 1909, Aussie~mobs |
An Aboriginal reserve was located on the Bellinger River (Urunga).
"On the Bellinger River, New South Wales, the reserve for the
aborigines is situated on an island at Urunga (late Bellinger
Heads), and heretofore they have lived in crude tents and huts
built of bark, canvas, or anything else they could find. The
Aborigines Board, However, have recently erected for them
five new substantial houses. These houses each contain two
rooms and fireplace, and are roofed with galvanised iron,
and floored."
Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1871 - 1912), Wednesday 25 May 1910
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| John Eichmann's store, Nambucca Heads, NSW. John Eichmann was a pioneer saw miller and store keeper, born in Prussia, Nambucca News (NSW : 1909 - 1911), Friday 23 September 1910 |
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| "A fine stamp of full-blooded Aboriginal on the Bellinger", Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1871 - 1912), Wednesday 25 May 1910 |
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| Daily Post (Hobart, Tas. : 1908 - 1918), Friday 13 May 1910 |
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| Sam Drew, well known oyster diver of Nambucca Heads, NSW, Nambucca News (NSW : 1909 - 1911), Friday 23 September 1910 |
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| Nambucca Heads, NSW, Australian Town and Country Journal (Sydney, NSW : 1870 - 1919), Wednesday 5 March 1913 |
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| Studio portrait of 1613 Acting Sergeant William Harold Whaites, 45th Battalion, of Nambucca Heads. He was killed in action, aged 26, on 23 February 1917 and has no known grave. |
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| Studio portrait of 1006 Sergeant Oswald Leaman Whaites, 1st Machine Gun Company, of Nambucca Heads, NSW.On 21 September 1917, he was killed in action whilst manning a gun at Polygon Wood, aged 22, and has no known grave. |
A book called "Nambucca Anzacs Servicemen and Women of the Nambucca District in the First World War, 1914-1918, and Beyond" by Trevor Lynch, is
a tribute to the servicemen and women from the Nambucca who went off to WWI.  |
| AT THE HEAD OF NAVIGATION ON THE NAMBUCCA RIVER. NSW, Sydney Mail (NSW : 1912 - 1938), Wednesday 24 July 1918 |
The Ellis FamilyThe Ellis Bros. sawmill at Nambucca Heads once stood on the site of where the RSL Club carpark is now located. Alfred Edwin Ellis and his brother, Hendrick Olbers Ellis, known as "H.O. Ellis" or "Harry", had initially established Ellis Brothers’ store at Bellinger Heads in the 1890s, which was managed by Charles Bryce. (Michael M.)  |
| Ellis Bros. sawmill Nambucca Heads, 1900, later the site of the RSL Club carpark. Seaheritageonline |
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| Ellis Bros. sawmill Nambucca Heads, nd. |
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| Ellis Bros Ltd Store, NSW, Nambucca News (NSW : 1909 - 1911), Friday 23 September 1910 |
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| Hendrick Olbers Ellis sitting at front, with his employees from the Bawley Point Mill. @J.M |
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| At "Devonia" Bellinger Heads, NSW |
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| SS Our Elsie, owned by the Ellis Bros. |
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| Home of Norman Ellis Left and H. O. Ellis at Nambucca Heads, NSW. (JM) |
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| Ted Smith, outside his Nambucca House, NSW, about 1930 |
1920s
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| Timber is hauled by a team of bullocks in the Nambucca River District, circa 1923. P.D. |
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| The Congaiinni Ferry, at Taylor's Ann, Nambucca River. NSW, Sydney Mail (NSW : 1912 - 1938), Wednesday 28 October 1925 ( in 1935 ferry services across the Nambucca River at Macksville were replaced by a road bridge) |
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| These girls are members of the Nambucca Heads Branch of the Junior Bed Cross,- and are very enthusiastic, having raised a substantial sum of money by their efforts. Sydney Mail (NSW : 1912 - 1938), Wednesday 30 June 1926 |
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| Bullock team pulling mail van - Nambucca, NSW, circa 1928. State Library of NSW |
1930s
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| COASTAL STEAMER ASHORE AT NAMBUCCA HEADS, The North Coast steamer Nambucca, aground on a reef opposite the breakwater with which she collided during a southerly squall late on Thursday afternoon.Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), Monday 23 November 1931 |
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| View over Nambucca Heads, New South Wales, from Australian National Maritime Museum on The Commons. n.d |
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| View over Nambucca Heads, New South Wales, circa 1930s, Australian National Maritime Museum on The Commons |
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| School of Arts, Nambucca, NSW, 1934 |
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| The original Nambucca Heads Surf Club, circa 1934 |
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| Bullock team, Nambucca Heads, NSW, Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), Tuesday 1 October 1935 |
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WRECK OF THE NAMBUCCA. Last view of the coastal steamer Nambucca, just before she broke up
in a wild surge of foam off Nambucca Heads, N.S.W. The crew, after an anxious night, reached shore in an open boat. Chronicle (Adelaide, SA : 1895 - 1954), Thursday 24 May 1934 |
1940s and WWII
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| Nambucca and Bellinger News (NSW : 1911 - 1945), Friday 6 November 1942 |
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| Macleay Argus (Kempsey, NSW : 1885 - 1907; 1909 - 1910; 1912 - 1913; 1915 - 1916; 1918 - 1954), Tuesday 29 April 1947 |
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| Frank John Partridge, VC (29 November 1924 – 23 March 1964) was an Australian soldier, farmer, quiz show champion, and a recipient of the Victoria Cross. Partridge left at 13 to work on the family's dairy and banana farm at Upper Newee Creek, Nambucca, NSW. After being discharged, Partridge returned to the family farm. He lived with his father in a dirt-floored farmhouse, and in his spare time devoted himself to self-education, reading Encyclopædia Britannica by the light of a kerosene lamp. |
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| View of Nambucca Heads, NSW. N.D |
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| Coffs Harbour Advocate (NSW : 1907 - 1942; 1946 - 1954), Friday 12 November 1948 |
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| DESERTED PILOT STATION NAMBUCCA HEADS, NSW, THE MOTIVE OF ARCHITECTURE (30 November 1949) |
1950s
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| The location where Woolworths is now. The building called the Commercial hotel existed, ater became the Pacific Cafe, Nambucca Heads, NSW, 1950 |
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| Nambucca Heads, NSW, 1950 |
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Nambucca Heads Theatre, NSW, built 1952. Demolished
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1960s
The Original Nippers
In 1961 the Rotary Club at Nambucca Heads organised a public meeting about forming a surf lifesaving club for local youngsters with a system of accreditation. This club was the first and original Nippers, which has evolved into a huge movement.
1970s
In 1974, Nambucca HeadsBowling Club was officially opened.
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| Motel Miramar in Nambucca Heads, N.S.W. - 1970s, Aussie~mobs |
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| Postcard, Nambucca Heads, NSW |
