Burke, Wills, King and Yandruwandha National Heritage Place

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The Burke, Wills, King and Yandruwandha National Heritage Place is a 61-hectare historic area along the Cooper Creek on the Birdsville and Strzelecki Tracks in South Australia and Queensland. It protects five important expedition sites from the Burke and Wills journey (1860–1861) and was added to the Australian National Heritage List on 22 January 2016.

Five connected sites make up the place:

- Dig Tree and Fort Wills Site (Queensland): The Dig Tree is a Coolabah tree with famous inscriptions marking dates and a buried cache of supplies. Fort Wills is the northern camp where Burke, Wills, and King tried to endure and plan their final northward run. The two sites together tell a dramatic story of arrival, endurance, and a failed return.

- Burke’s Tree (South Australia): The place where Robert O’Hara Burke died in 1861, marked by a tree and a memorial plinth.

- Wills’ Site (South Australia): The site where William John Wills died; a memorial plinth and trees mark the location.

- King’s Site (South Australia): The camp where John King was found alive after the other explorers had died, and where he lived with the Yandruwandha people for several months before rescue.

- Howitt’s Site (South Australia): The camp and landscape connected with Alfred Howitt’s relief party, which found King and retrieved Burke and Wills’s bodies for burial in Melbourne.

Why this place matters:

- It marks one of the most famous Australian explorations. Burke and Wills aimed to cross Australia from south to north, reaching the Gulf of Carpentaria, and their journey helped open up vast areas for grazing and settlement.

- The sites show how exploration depended on the help of Aboriginal people, especially the Yandruwandha, Diyari and other groups. Aboriginal guides and hosts provided food, water, and knowledge that kept the expedition alive in harsh conditions.

- The expedition helped establish the Birdsville and Strzelecki Tracks as major stock routes. It also contributed to the broader history of European exploration, settlement, and the cattle and sheep droving routes across central Australia.

- The Dig Tree and related sites symbolize both the heroic and tragic sides of exploration—ambition, hardship, and the high costs paid by those who attempted to cross the continent.

Today, all five sites are protected as historic places and are cared for as memorials. They remind visitors of the courage, cooperation, and complex relationships between European explorers and Indigenous Australians that shaped Australia’s history and landscape. The Burke, Wills, King and Yandruwandha National Heritage Place stands as a national reminder of one of the country’s defining chapters in exploration and development.