Cape Jervis is a headland located at the most westerly part of the

Fleurieu Peninsula The Fleurieu Peninsula () is a peninsula in the Australian state of South Australia located south of the state capital of Adelaide. History Before British colonisation of South Australia, the western side of the peninsula was occupied by the K ...

on the east coast of

Gulf St Vincent Gulf St Vincent, sometimes referred to as St Vincent Gulf, St Vincent's Gulf or Gulf of St Vincent, is the eastern of two large inlets of water on the southern coast of Australia, in the state of South Australia, the other being the larger Sp ...

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...

about west of the town of the same name,

Cape Jervis Cape Jervis is a town in the Australian state of South Australia located near the western tip of Fleurieu Peninsula on the southern end of the Main South Road approximately south of the state capital of Adelaide. It is named after the headla ...

. It is the eastern end of the opening to Gulf St Vincent. The cape is described by one source as being:

...a high bold headland having but little vegetation. It is intersected by gullies and has several cliffy projections. The W, and most prominent, of these projections, referred to as The Cape, does not present so steep a face to the sea as the other projections, but slopes down, gradually, from the heights inland, of which Tree Hill, high, ESE of Cape Jervis, is the most prominent.

It was known by local

Aboriginal Aborigine, aborigine or aboriginal may refer to: *Aborigines (mythology), in Roman mythology * Indigenous peoples, general term for ethnic groups who are the earliest known inhabitants of an area *One of several groups of indigenous peoples, see ...

people as "Parewarangk", this being a

Ngarrindjeri The Ngarrindjeri people are the traditional Aboriginal Australian people of the lower Murray River, eastern Fleurieu Peninsula, and the Coorong of the southern-central area of the state of South Australia. The term ''Ngarrindjeri'' means "belo ...

adaptation of the

Kaurna The Kaurna people (, ; also Coorna, Kaura, Gaurna and other variations) are a group of Aboriginal people whose traditional lands include the Adelaide Plains of South Australia. They were known as the Adelaide tribe by the early settlers. Kaurn ...

name ''Pariwarangga''. The

Baudin expedition to Australia The Baudin expedition of 1800 to 1803 was a French expedition to map the coast of New Holland (now Australia). Nicolas Baudin was selected as leader in October 1800. The expedition started with two ships, '' Géographe'', captained by Baudin, an ...

visited the cape after Flinders and gave it two names, "Cap D'Alembert" and "Cap De La Secheresse", with the former being the one recorded in the expedition's official log. It was named Cape Jervis by the British explorer,

Matthew Flinders Captain Matthew Flinders (16 March 1774 – 19 July 1814) was a British navigator and cartographer who led the first inshore circumnavigation of mainland Australia, then called New Holland. He is also credited as being the first person to u ...

, after

John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent Admiral of the Fleet John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent (9 January 1735 – 13 March 1823) was an admiral in the Royal Navy and Member of Parliament in the United Kingdom. Jervis served throughout the latter half of the 18th century and into ...

on 23 March 1802. A shore-based bay

whaling station Whaling is the process of hunting of whales for their usable products such as meat and blubber, which can be turned into a type of oil that became increasingly important in the Industrial Revolution. It was practiced as an organized industry a ...

, run by John Haynes, was in operation at Fishery Beach by 1842. The fishery was purchased by a Mr Baker for £126 in March 1845. By 1850 a Mr Barnett had the fishery and it was run for him by a Mr Clark. It was owned by Messrs Boord, Bennett and Johnson in 1851. That seems to have been the last year it was in operation. Since 1871, it has been the site of a

navigation aid Navigation is a field of study that focuses on the process of monitoring and controlling the movement of a craft or vehicle from one place to another.Bowditch, 2003:799. The field of navigation includes four general categories: land navigation, ...

in the form of a

lighthouse A lighthouse is a tower, building, or other type of physical structure designed to emit light from a system of lamps and lenses and to serve as a beacon for navigational aid, for maritime pilots at sea or on inland waterways. Lighthouses mar ...

. Immediately south of the lighthouse, there is a boat harbor with a jetty of length which serves as the port used by

Kangaroo Island SeaLink Kangaroo Island SeaLink is a South Australian ferry company and tour operator owned by Kelsian Group, which has plied the crossing from mainland South Australia to Kangaroo Island since 1989. From 1989 to 1994, Kangaroo Island Sealink was own ...

who operates the ferry service to

Penneshaw Penneshaw is a township in the Australian state of South Australia located on the northeast coast of the Dudley Peninsula on Kangaroo Island about south of the state capital of Adelaide. It is the island's main ferry port with regular services ...

Kangaroo Island Kangaroo Island, also known as Karta Pintingga (literally 'Island of the Dead' in the language of the Kaurna people), is Australia's third-largest island, after Tasmania and Melville Island. It lies in the state of South Australia, southwest ...

. Since 2012, the waters adjoining its shoreline are within the

Encounter Marine Park Encounter Marine Park is a marine park in South Australia. It is in the Fleurieu Peninsula in state of South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the m ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cape Jervis (headland) Jervis Jervis Jervis Jervis J Whaling stations in Australia