Kersbrook, South Australia

Kersbrook is a town near Adelaide, South Australia. It is located in the Adelaide Hills Council local government area. At the 2006 census, Kersbrook had a population of 367.HistoryThe first settlers established farms in the Kersbrook area in the early 1831s due to its relatively gentle slopes. John Bowden, manager of the South Australian Company's dairy farm at Hackney, bought a 32ha section and named it Kersbrook after the Cornish farm where he was born. By 1844, Bowden was recorded as having "800 sheep, 62 cattle, one horse, 13 pigs, 16acre of wheat, eight acres of barley, plots of oats, maize and potatoes and a fruit garden".The settlement itself was created by William Carman, a blacksmith working at a copper mine near Williamstown, who took advantage of the area's location on the busy road to the Barossa Valley and in 1851 built a travellers inn called the Wheatsheaf Inn. By 1858, some settlers had arrived and Carman gave some of his land to build a town. His preferred choice of name was Maidstone after his home town in Kent, but in 1917 the town was officially renamed to Kersbrook as this was the name used by local residents and referred to the original 'Kersbrook' farm of John Bowden. It became a notable agricultural area, especially for fruit.Kersbrook is a fairly quiet rural town, where most of the old buildings still stand. In January 2015, twelve houses in the town were destroyed as a result of the 2015 Sampson Flat bushfires.