Benalla

Benalla is a small city located on the Broken River gateway to the High Country north-eastern region of Victoria, Australia, about 212 kilometres (130 mi) north east of the state capital Melbourne.

Benalla

is a small city located on the Broken River gateway to the High Country north-eastern region of Victoria, Australia, about 212 kilometres (130 mi) north east of the state capital Melbourne. At the 2016 census the population was 9,298.It is the administrative centre for the Rural City of Benalla local government area.

Prior to the European settlement of Australia, the Benalla region was populated by the Taungurong people, an Indigenous Australian people.

A 1906 history recounts that prior to white settlement "as many as 400 blacks would meet together in the vicinity of Benalla to hold a corrobboree".The area was first sighted by Europeans during an expedition of Hamilton Hume and William Hovell in 1824 and was noted as an agricultural settlement called "Swampy".The expedition was followed by that of Major Thomas Mitchell in 1834.Reverend Joseph Docker settled in 1838 creating a pastoral run called Benalta Run, said to be from an Aboriginal word for musk duck.

Docker's property was intended to lend its name to the new township (”Benalta“) but through a clerical error in the Sydney Survey department it became known as 'Benalla'.

An attack by indigenous people on the camp of sheepherders George and William Faithful became known as the Faithful Massacre; eight settlers were killed in the incident.Following the massacre, in 1839 a police station was established and the name of the settlement became Broken River.

The post office opened on 1 December 1844 originally named Broken River.A bridge was built over the Broken River in 1847 and the following year the town was surveyed.In 1861 it was proclaimed a town.

In 1936, the Benalla Centenary Race was held.

It was proclaimed a city in 1965.