Cradock is a town and locality in the Australian 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 most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...

320 kilometres north of the state capital of

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

on the

RM Williams Way RM Williams Way (route B80) is a road through the Yorke and Mid North region of South Australia connecting Clare in the south through Spalding, Jamestown and Orroroo to Hawker in the Flinders Ranges. The road was named after R. M. Williams wh ...

. The nearest town with a greater population is Hawker which is approximately 20 km away with a population of around 360. Cradock is in the

Flinders Ranges Council Flinders Ranges Council is a local government area (LGA) located in the Flinders Ranges of South Australia. The LGA is approximately 100 km from north to south, and 45 km from east to west, with a total area of 4,198 square kilometres ...

area, the state

Electoral district of Stuart Stuart is a single-member electoral district for the South Australian House of Assembly. At 323,131 km², it is a vast country district extending from the Spencer Gulf as far as the Northern Territory border in the north and the Queenslan ...

and the federal

Division of Grey The Division of Grey is an Australian electoral division in South Australia. The division was one of the seven established when the former Division of South Australia was redistributed on 2 October 1903 and is named for Sir George Grey, who wa ...

. The town was surveyed during November 1878 and proclaimed on 6 March 1879. The locality's boundaries were gazetted on 25 November 1999 and include the Government Town of Cradock and the sites of the ceased Government Towns of Charlcome and Herbert. After the South Australian government permitted settlers to go into the semi-arid lands north of

Goyder's Line Goyder's Line is a line that runs roughly east–west across South Australia and, in effect, joins places with an average annual rainfall of . North of Goyder's Line, annual rainfall is usually too low to support cropping, with the land being sui ...

Cradock was established in 1879 on a 'grassy flat' of 'strong red loam', by the Wirreanda Creek. Cradock takes its name from the then Governor of South Africa, Sir John Cradock. Soon after settlement, a school, police station, two hotels, two blacksmith shops and a saddler were operating in Cradock. The "wheat rush" was followed by the failure of four years of crops which led to an increasing despair and a loss of many of the town's population.

Historic buildings

Cradock had three churches. The stone Catholic church opened in 1883. The Wesleyan Methodist church built in 1884 was weatherboard and iron, replaced by a stone church (construction started in 1924) which was used into the 1980s, but is now a private residence. The stone Anglican church built in 1894 was used until 1958 and is also now a private residence. The historic former St Gabriel's Catholic Church designed by Thomas Burgoyne in Main Street is listed on the

South Australian Heritage Register The South Australian Heritage Register, also known as the SA Heritage Register, is a statutory register of historic places in South Australia. It extends legal protection regarding demolition and development under the ''Heritage Places Act 1993'' ...

. The town still has one hotel, the Cradock Hotel, known in earlier days as the Heartbreak Hotel.

References

left, Signs at the outskirts of town. {{authority control Far North (South Australia)