General Information
Coutts Crossing (including Nymboida) is 20 km south-west of Grafton
and 669 km north-east of Sydney. Coutts Crossing has about 50 houses,
a general store and a tavern for meals & drinks. Visit the Union
Church which is shared by the Anglicans & the Uniting Church.
there is a nine-hole golf course and a sporting complex at McIntosh
Park.
Gumbaingirr Aborigines
The area was occupied by the Gumbaingirr Aborigines.
Read on.
Prior to European Settlement
Ex-convict Richard Craig, who was probably responsible for the first
European exploration and settlement of the Clarence River (see Grafton),
led a party of potential settlers from the plains near Guyra to
the Nymboida district in 1840. The principals of the trek were William
Forster & his uncle, Gregory Blaxland - the son of the famous
explorer. Apparently they became the first Europeans in the area
to be attacked by Aborigines when they set up camp at the junction
of the Orara River and Kangaroo Creek. One member of the party and
one Aborigine were killed.
The Geergarrow Property
& Kangaroo Creek
Undeterred, William Forster set up the Geergarrow property, upon
which the village of Coutts Crossing later developed. An interesting
man, he was an essayist, poet, satirist, critic and politician who
served as colonial secretary and, in 1859-60, as premier of NSW.
He was a highly independent, erudite man and a very successful pastoralist
who, in 1839, had taken part in one of the first overland expeditions
to Port Phillip (now Melbourne). On the southern boundary of the
Geergarrow property, Blaxland established the Nymboida run while
a contemporary settler, Thomas Coutts, established Kangaroo Creek
station in 1840. Coutts crossed the river at the future village
site during his excursions to South Grafton.
Conflict
In the 1840s Coutts too was involved in a great detail of conflict
with the local Aborigines who suffered from the loss of their hunting
grounds and the displacement of their traditional food sources (e.g.,
kangaroos) by sheep. They killed his sheep and three of his employees
and it is likely that Coutts and his employees had mistreated and
killed indigenous people.
Things came to a head in 1848 when local Aborigines
obtained, from Coutts, flour that had been laced with arsenic. At
least seven (some say twenty) people were poisoned and Coutts was
arrested but appears not to have been tried.
The general population of Grafton were shocked
and the Aborigines engaged in retaliatory measures. They killed
another of Coutts' shepherds and either stole 900 sheep or killed
another 2500, depending on which source is credited.
Timbergetting
This was extensively practiced in the Nymboida area and along Kangaroo
Creek from the mid-19th century. The villages of Coutts Crossing
and Nymboida developed after the 1861 Robertson Land Act enabled
the break-up of the large pastoral properties.
Agriculture
Dairying and agriculture emerged and public schools opened at Nymboida
in 1879 and at Coutts Crossing in 1913. The latter received a post
office in the 1880s. A creamery was established at Coutts Crossing
some time in the late 19th century.
Mining
The Orara Gold Field was established to the south-west of Nymboida
in 1881 and coal was first mined at Nymboida in 1909, although a
major mining operation was not established until the Second World
War. When the company closed the mine in 1975 the miners continued
to turn up for work and the company eventually handed them control
of the mine which they continued to run off their own initiative
until 1979.
Neighbouring Towns
Grafton, Nymboida, Glenreagh
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