John Batman

John Batman a founder of Melbourne, was born at Parramatta, New South Wales, on 21 January 1801.

His father, William Batman, came to Sydney in 1797. In 1821 John Batman, with his brother Henry, went to Tasmania and took up land in the north-east near Ben Lomond.

BATMAN'S TREATY

The Douta Galla | Batman Treaty was signed on the banks of a creek [thought to be Merri Creek] on 16 June 1835, an agreement with eight Aboriginal leaders to transfer the land of the Port Phillip area to Batman.

There were two separate treaties, very similar in nature that transferred the land to a person rather than the Crown, and its implicit recognition of Indigenous ownership and occupation of the land, prompted Governor Bourke to disallow the Treaty the same year.

On the The Bellarine Historical Society Inc. web site, John Batman landed at Indented Head and made that his base camp while he returned to Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania) for more supplies and his family. An historic marker stands where he landed.

Batman's Hill Marker

This rather odd feature marks the spot where John Batman built one of the first houses in Melbourne atop Pleasant Hill [later Batmans Hill] that was subsequently flattened to make way for Spencer Street Station [now Southern Cross Station].

9th of June 1835: "the boat went up the river to where it is very deep, 30ft - that will be the place for a village". Rex Harcourt argues that it irrelevant whether John Batman was on board that day as it was recognised from Surveyor Grimes' work in 1803 that there was only one place for a settlement in the Port Phillip area. At the falls on the Yarra River (level with Market Street).

John & Eliza Batman's House

This plaque located obscurely below Spencer Street Bridge near the corner of Flinders commemorates the house that John & Eliza built on Pleasant Hill (later Batmans Hill).

John Batman
Pioneer
21 January 1801 — 6 May 1839

Click on thumbnails below to view enlarged pic.