History of Crozier Hill and Inman Valley

Henry Inman

South Australia was colonised in 1836. Unlike the other States, it was not a penal settlement and migrants were ‘free settlers’. It was hoped that by adopting this type of migrant, a respectable society would grow in South Australia and there would be no need for an organised Police Force.

Shortly after colonisation some protection was afforded the colonists by the employment of a few retired artillery-men, special volunteer constables and a small group of marines from the H.M.S. ‘Buffalo’, which vessel had brought the Governor to the new land. The marines were found to be unsatisfactory as they were not always sober !

In early 1838 Governor Hindmarsh organised a Police Force comprising ten Foot and ten Mounted Constables. It was formally proclaimed on April 28th, 1838. In the same month, Henry Inman arrived from Tasmania to take command and he was made Inspector of Police. At this time the Force cost the Treasury forty pounds (£40) per week. When, on 17th October 1838, Governor Hindmarsh was succeeded by Governor Gawler, Inman was raised to the status of Superintendent.

Inman Valley

Located 86 kilometres south of Adelaide, Inman Valley is part of the wonderful journey that leads to the seaside town of Victor Harbor. The Inman Valley township down the hill wasn’t far behind. It’s a sleepy little place with a handful of houses, a garage and a general store.The Inman Valley Road is lined with majestic gum trees and sits between the river environment of the Coorong and bushland of the south-western Fleurieu Peninsula.

It was settled before 1842. In 1839 it was described officially as "a lovely valley, ranging from two to six miles in width, well watered and rich in soil for agriculture and herbage for pasture".
The valley was named after Henry Inman, South Australia’s first Superintendent of Police, but of course, what nobody knew back then was the enormous geological significance of the place.
The tell-tail sharp drop into the flat-bottomed U-shaped valley below gives a hint - a giant glacier of sheet ice created the landscape. A slab of half a billion-year-old riverbed rock now called Glacier Rock provided the vital clue.

In 1859, geologist Professor A.R.C. Selwyn recognised the smoothing and scratching of the rock as the grindings of a glacier. We now estimate that it was about 250 million years ago when Australia was further south and part of the great southern super-continent known as Gondwanaland.

Captain Francis Crozier

Captain Francis Crozier - Last Man Standing? - the Irishman was among the exceptional band of men who opened the doors to the unexplored regions of the Arctic and Antarctic. It was the feats of Crozier and his fellow explorers in the mid-19th century who paved the way for the more well-known exploits of men like Amundsen, Scott and Shackleton in the early years of the 20th century. There would be no heroic age of Polar exploration without men like Francis Crozier.

Francis Rawdon Moira Crozier, who was born in 1796, came from a wealthy Banbridge family. His father, George Crozier was a leading solicitor who acted for two of Ireland's most powerful land-owning families, the Downshires and Moiras. Francis, one of 13 children, was named after Francis Rawdon, the Earl of Moira.

Crozier on one of his journeys had stopped in Tasmania on his way south where he fell deeply in love with Sophy Cracroft, the flirty niece of fellow explorer Sir John Franklin, who was the island's governor. Crozier proposed marriage on several occasions but he was rejected because Sophy Cracroft refused to be a sea captain's wife. "She liked the man, but not the sailor," Franklin's wife, Jane Franklin, once confided to a friend.