In 1861 residents of Victoria and South Australia funded competing expeditions to cross Australia from south to north through the centre.

The Great Northern Exploration Expedition, led by Robert OHara Burke and William John Wills, won the contest for Victoria but all but one of the expeditioners, John King, perished on the return journey.

The expedition embodied Victorian ideals of scientific inquiry, human enterprise and nation building.

The names of Burke and Wills became synonymous with noble endeavour and self-sacrifice. The hardship they endured and the tragedy of deaths in the harsh and unknown centre of the continent resulted in them being celebrated in contemporary culture and ensured the event became ingrained in the Australian psyche.

Image 1: Departure of the Burke and Wills Expedition (ca. 1860-1880), Charles Summers, State Library of Victoria

Image 2: Return of Burke and Wills to Coopers Creek, Nicholas Chevalier (1868), National Library of Australia

Image 3: Burke and wills and King arriving at the Dig sign at Coopers Creek, John Longstaff