CURROWAN

Currowan, on the upper reaches of the Clyde River and adjacent to Currowan Creek, was a planned township. The site of the village was fixed in 1844 and a village plan laid out by then colonial surveyor and later ill-fated explorer, Edmund Kennedy. It was proclaimed a town on 20 March 1885.
Town allotments were offered sale in 1859. The town had a stone wharf, plenty of flat land and a good water supply.

In 1893 land was reserved for a Public School, perhaps reflecting an optimism for the town’s future, because at that time only a ‘half-time school’ was operating in the village.

However, the town never prospered. The absence of a road connection from the Braidwood district to Currowan remained an obstacle to its growth as a port (Nelligen becoming the area’s preferred port village), and floods in 1860 revealed that the town's site was flood-prone. Even so, Currowan remained a minor landing place that allowed easier access than Nelligen to gold mines in the district that were worked until 1915.

The town held a race meeting in 1901, at which time it seems the ‘town’ then consisted only of the school, some farms and a sawmill. The establishment of the Currowan Starch Factory in 1921 provided a renewed impetus to the town, but this was to be short-lived.

Currowan became a locality, under the Geographical Names Act of 1966 and nothing remains of the 'town' of Currowan today, even though some of its street names and details of town allotments still appear on modern-day maps.

On the opposite bank of Currowan Creek to the town site, "about 60 acres" of land was set aside, in April 1893, as an Aboriginal reserve. This became the Currowan Creek Aboriginal Reserve, which survived until 1956.

In June 1910, there were just three huts, with two adults and five children - three of school age - living there. They were employed at times cutting sleepers and stripping wattle bark, and three acres of land were also being cultivated for maize and vegetables.