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Reverend Joseph DockerPrint Page Print this page

08-May-2014
08-May-2014
Photographs supplied by Graeme Saunders
The marble tablet commemorates the Reverend Joseph Docker (1793 - 1865), one of the earliest pioneers of the district. 

Reverend Docker migrated from England to Sydney in 1828, where he took up a colonial chaplaincy. In 1838, after reading Major Thomas Mitchell's account of Australia Felix, he decided to relocate his family to the Port Phillip district.

Docker left Sydney with his wife and five children, servants, a flock of sheep, some cattle and even a boat. They travelled through Goulburn and Yass and crossed the Murray River at Albury, or the Crossing-Place as it was known. He followed 'Mitchell’s Line' through the Port Phillip district. 

He had heard about the abandoned Bontharambo run on the Ovens River near Wangarratta. George Faithful had previously held the squatting rights there but had left when the local Indigenous people had killed his shepherds.

On his arrival at Bontharambo, Docker obtained the squatting rights and took possession of the hut. He was well known in the Port Phillip district and was said to have had a much better relationship with the Indigenous people in the area. 

Location

Address:6 The Close, Holy Trinity Cathedral, Wangaratta, 3677
State:VIC
Area:AUS
GPS Coordinates:Lat: -36.355193
Long: 146.321394
Note: GPS Coordinates are approximate.
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Details

Monument Type:Plaque
Monument Theme:People
Sub-Theme:Settlement

Dedication

Front Inscription

Sacred to the memory of the Rev. Joseph Docker of Bontharambo House in this Parish

Youngest son of William Docker Esq. of Newby, Westmoreland, England

Who died April 10. 1865

Aged 72 years.

A pioneer who in 1838 settled on the Ovens River.

Source: MA, ADB
Monument details supplied by Monument Australia - www.monumentaustralia.org.au