And All So Far From Home....

Burtville
Western Australia

Main St
Burtville

Burtville is a goldfields townsite near Laverton. Gold was discovered here by prospectors Billy Frost and J. Tregurtha in 1897. Business and residential areas were laid out under the Goldfield Act by surveyor J. H. Rowe in 1901. Rowe recorded the Aboriginal name for the district as "Merolia" and the settlement was shown as such on early maps. However, the original residents determined upon calling the place Burtville in compliment to the Warden of the Mount Margaret Goldfield, then Mr. Alfred Earle Burt (1852-1945), a son of Sir Archibald Burt, first Chief Justice of the Western Australian Supreme Court. This name was in local use as early as October 1901. The townsite was gazetted as "Merolia" in 1902, but regazetted as Burtville at the request of the Progress Association later in the same year.