Toponomy
The current name dates to the Victorian Gold Rush as a shortened form of Bendigo Creek goldfields, simply "Bendigo Creek" or "Bendigo's Valley". The creek was named after a famous local boxer and shepherd who had earned the nickname Bendigo in reference to the Nottingham prize-fighter William Abednego Thompson, generally known as �Bendigo Thompson�.
Its first official name was Castleton after the mining town Castleton, Derbyshire, England. Sandhurst, after the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, became the official designation for the settlement in 1854 although the nickname of "Bendigo" remained popular.
After a plebiscite in 1891 the city was renamed to the more popular "Bendigo", although the name Sandhurst has a legacy and is still used by a number of organisations such as the Sandhurst Football Club. The Roman Catholic diocese based in Bendigo is named the Diocese of Sandhurst.
Prehistory and European discovery
Before European settlement the area was occupied by the clans of the Dja Dja Wrung people. They were regarded by other tribes as being a superior people, not only because of their rich hunting grounds but because from their area came a green stone rock for their stone axes. Early Europeans described the Dja Dja Wrung as a strong, physically well-developed people and not belligerent. Nevertheless the early years of European settlement in the Mount Alexander area were bloodied by many clashes between intruder and dispossessed.
Major Mitchell passed through in 1836. Following his discovery, the first squatters arrived in 1840 to establish vast sheep runs. Bendigo Creek was part of the Mount Alexander or Ravenswood sheep run.
1850s: Gold rush boomtown
In the late spring of 1851 two women from the Ravenswood Run, Margaret Kennedy and Julia Farrell, struck gold in "The Rocks" area of Bendigo Creek, in what is now the suburb of Golden Square. They were seen with gold by a
