Allestree: Not convinced about Allestree's Aussie link

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When a reader came across an Allestree Beach while travelling in Australia, her curiosity drove her to ask historian Maxwell Craven about its origins and possible connection with Derby. His search uncovered some grisly tales – as Maxwell recounts here.

Allestree Beach

I HAVE, in my time as a columnist, occasionally banged on about the Allestrey family of Allestree, who must be unique in this country in having living descendants who can trace their ancestry back to a serf living in the late 12th century, who was the property “with all his brood and chattels” of the abbot and canons of the Abbey of Darley.

I was contacted recently by a reader holidaying in Australia. As she travelled on the Great Ocean Road from Melbourne to Adelaide, passing through the settlement of Portland, she spotted a sign saying “Allestree” and then “Allestree Beach”.

What Derbeian could resist such an invitation? After all, our Allestree has many delights, but no beach!

The Allestree Beach down under is renowned as a local beauty spot. The strand is a shining vista of white sand, the land behind craggy and gnarled and the wind perennially blustery.

But, at present, there is a dispute in progress which threatens to become embarrassing. Apparently, in 2002, a developer applied to Portland Council to develop the beach as a holiday condominium and was promptly rejected.

Yet, a bit over a year down the line, three years ago, the application was put in again and was approved in a record-breaking 24 hours without notification of any kind, least of all to the previous objectors.

Just like our Allestree then, I hear you say; unsympathetic redevelopment everywhere and no-one stopping it. Not quite. Something was highly irregular for both the federal and state authorities were looking very hard at this local authority’s planning regime.

Furthermore, not only was the council’s planning process frozen but applications going back to 1999 were reviewed. The Federal DPP was looking at a potential breach of common law, too.

The chief objection to any serious development of Allestree Beach was on historical grounds, for part of it, called the Convincing Ground, was the site of a massacre of indigenous people – the Aborigines – in 1832.

This was the first ever confrontation between the indigenous people and the settlers and the local descendants of the victims were naturally outraged to wake up one Saturday morning to find the Convincing Ground being dug up.

The story of the massacre centred on the beaching of a whale, which had arrived as a result of breaking free from its offshore moorings after being caught and killed by whalers the previous day.

It was the first year that whaling had been practised along that coast, so the whalers were unfamiliar with local traditions. Apparently, beached whales were considered their rightful property by the Aborigines, who assumed the whalers were going to take away the whole fish – a valuable source of food for the community.

In fact, the whalers were only removing the bones as there were no facilities to render the blubber for whale oil or recover the meat.

But the locals, not knowing this, attacked them. The whalers, equipped with firearms opened fire, killing several of the native people, who were armed only with spears. At the time, the whalers said that their actions were to “convince the Aborigines” not to interfere.

Later, in 1834, Portland was founded, becoming one of the earliest settlements in the region, and a fishery was established on the spot. But, for generations now, it has been merely a place of beauty, valued by both local communities – until the developers arrived.

The final conundrum that my reader posed was: how did the settlement get its name, enclosing a biography of Richard Allestrey – the Royalist Provost of Eton in the Civil War.

In fact, in Richard Allestrey’s time only a few bold Dutchmen had discovered the bleak and parched NW coast of Australia.

Captain Cook was over a century in the future. I suspect that the settlement was named by a person from our Allestree who had settled in the area. We are not told when it got its name, but I note that an 1841 account of the “Convincing Ground” massacre fails to name it.

That it was named after a member of the Allestrey family who, since the 17th century, have spelt their name slightly differently, I feel is distinctly less likely as the modern spelling of the family name would surely have been used.

However, it is not unlikely that various Allestreys might have migrated to Australia, for the heirs of Thomas Allestrey of Alvaston Hall were virtually tricked out of their inheritance in 1741 and the younger branches were rapidly reduced to being tenant farmers at Elvaston, Ambaston and Morley. Migration might well have seemed an attractive option.