Melville & Bathurst Islands with Cobourg Peninsula. North Australia.

From the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society. In the early 1800’s the British government became interested in establishing a settlement on Australia’s northern coastline in order to facilitate trade with Asia. In 1824, Port Essington on the Cobourg Peninsula was proposed as the first such settlement, but was later passed over in favour of Fort Dundas on Melville Island and Fort Wellington at Raffles Bay. When both Fort Dundas and Fort Wellington failed within several years, the Port Essington site was revisited. As a result, a settlement, officially named Victoria, but popularly known as Port Essington, was established in 1838, consisting of 24 houses and a hospital. Not in Tooley