Tas That Was – New Norfolk

Shortly after the British landed at Sydney Cove in 1788, Governor Arthur Phillip ordered a penal colony for hardened convicts to be established on Norfolk Island. The island was far away from mainland Australia and was difficult to reach by ship, so the colony became expensive to maintain. The decision was soon made to abandon Norfolk Island. Between 1807 and 1808, a portion of its population was relocated to ‘The Hills’, a new settlement in the Derwent Valley that later became known as New Norfolk.

In 1811, then-Governor of New South Wales Lachlan Macquarie visited the settlement – which by then had well and truly taken shape as a small town – and renamed it Elizabeth Town, after his wife (naturally). But the new name didn’t last: ‘New Norfolk’ was re-instated in 1825. A year later, the authorities officially decided not to name New Norfolk as the new capital of Van Diemen’s Land – an idea that had come up since the town was settled.

New Norfolk’s first pub, the Bush Inn, was built in 1815 and is said to be Australia’s oldest continuously licensed hotel, though some dispute this claim. The Inn was the destination of Australia’s first-ever trunk line call in 1888.

In 1818, Denis McCarty – a former convict who at the time was serving as a police constable in the Derwent Valley – built the first road between New Norfolk and Hobart. Nine years later, the mental institution Willow Court was built as a hospital for convicts who had been deemed ‘invalids’ and ‘lunatics’ by the authorities.*

While treatment for mental illnesses was rudimentary and harmful at the time**, it has since developed for the better. Willow Court didn’t keep up with this evolution, however, and soon faced criticism for its outdated facilities and treatment methods. It closed in 2001 and many of its buildings have since been re-purposed as tourist attractions, shops and accommodation.

New Norfolk continued to develop throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and has experienced significant growth and development in recent decades.

* An invalid is a person who is too ill or disabled to care for themselves. The term ‘lunatic’ was historically used to describe individuals who were mentally ill and/or exhibited erratic or disturbed behaviour on a regular basis.

** Asylums were often overcrowded, and there was frequent use of physical restraints. Practices such as bloodletting and purging were also commonplace.

New Norfolk (c.1960s)

Tas That Was is a column that includes:

• anecdotes of life in Tasmania in the past;
• historical photographs of locations in Tasmania; and/or
• documentaries about locations in Tasmania.

If you have an anecdote or photograph you’d like to share with us, please send it to submit@tasmaniantimes.com.

Callum J. Jones studied English, History, and Journalism at the University of Tasmania and lived in Western Sydney from 2022 to 2024 while working as a journalist for Professional Planner, a leading online publication for financial planners. He has written for Tasmanian Times since 2018 and has also been published in a range of other outlets, including Quadrant and the BAD Western Sydney anthologies.

Follow him on Twitter (@Callum_Jones_10) and Facebook (@callum.j.jones.creative).