BURGOYNE (parish)
This parish is in the county of Evelyn, one of 37 counties in Victoria. Evelyn was one of the first counties proclaimed in 1849 and it was surveyed by J. P. Taylor in 1856. By 1890 all Victorian parish boundaries had been gazetted. Unlike counties in the United States and the United Kingdom, Victoria's counties have no administrative or political function. They exist purely as cadastral units, used for the purposes of identifying the location of any piece of land. The Victorian counties are further divided into 2914 parishes and townships. The neighbouring parishes to Burgoyne are Tarrawarra and Tarrawarra North to the east, Yering to the south, Sutton and Queenstown to the west and Kinglake to the north.
In the Evelyn Observer 4 May 1888 George Fletcher is reported as saying that Captain Clarke named the parish of Burgoyne after General Burgoyne. Andrew Clarke (1824-1902), a British Army officer, was Victorian Surveyor General from 1853 to March 1857. General Sir John Fox Burgoyne (1782-1871) served with distinction in Europe and during his retirement advised the Australian colonies on strategies for defense.
