Victor Harbour South Australia

Victor Harbor is a city on the coast of the Fleurieu Peninsula, about 80 km south of Adelaide, South Australia. The city is the largest population centre on the peninsula, with an economy based upon agriculture, fisheries and various industries. It is also a highly popular tourist destination, with the city's population greatly expanded during the summer holidays.

History

Traditionally home of the Ramindjeri clan of the Ngarrindjeri people, the bay on which Victor Harbor sits was discovered by Matthew Flinders in the HMS Investigator in April 1802. Flinders was surveying the then unknown southern Australian coast from the west. He encountered Nicolas Baudin in the Le Geographe near the Murray Mouth several kilometers to the east of the present day location of Victor Harbor. Baudin was surveying the coast from the East for Napoleonic France. The ships returned to the bay and sheltered while the captains, who were probably unaware their countries were at war, compared notes. Flinders named the bay Encounter Bay after the meeting.

In 1837 Captain Richard Crozier who was en route from Sydney to the Swan River Colony in command of the Cruizer-class "HMS Victor", anchored just off Granite Island and named the sheltered waters in the lee of the island 'Victor Harbor' after his ship. About the same time two whaling stations were established, one at the Bluff (Rosetta Head) and the other near the point opposite Granite Island. Whale oil became South Australia’s first export. The town of Port Victor was laid out on the shores of Victor Harbor in 1863 when the horse-drawn tramway from Goolwa was extended to the harbor. The last whale was caught off Port Victor in 1872.