Extract date: 05/06/2026
| Name | Thorngate |
|---|---|
| Type Designation | Road |
| Place Id | 8039 |
| Place Type | Road |
| Status | Registered |
| Date Registered | 23 February 1979 |
| Locality / Suburb | |
| Holtze | |
| Local Government Area | |
| Litchfield Council | |
| History/Origin | Named after members of the Thorngate family of Gosport, Hampshire, England, early investors in South Australia who acquired land through preliminary land orders in the late 1830s as part of the systematic colonisation of the Province of South Australia. The principal figures were William Thorngate (1792-1868) and his brother John Battey Thorngate (1795-1867), merchants of Gosport, whose investments formed part of a pattern of British absentee ownership, with land held and managed from England. William Thorngate later held extensive land in South Australia and in 1864 the Thorngates, with Emanuel Churcher, applied for land in the Northern Territory during the early period of South Australian administration. In 1867, William Thorngate settled his landholdings into a charitable trust administered with Emanuel Churcher and other trustees. The estate generated rental income for religious and philanthropic purposes in South Australia and in Britain and Ireland, including support for missionary activity, widows and clergy families, seamen's charities, almshouses, a female servants' home, dispensaries, and assistance to the poor and apprentices of Alverstoke. The estate was managed as an absentee trust from England. Following the deaths of John Battey Thorngate (1867), William Thorngate (1868), and Emanuel Churcher (1887), the estate passed through trustees, including William Emanuel Churcher (1853-1943) and George Churcher (1860-1938), who became associated with the Northern Territory holdings in the Palmerston (now Darwin) area and the Hundred of Bagot. By the early twentieth century, income from the South Australian lands was sufficient to meet the trust's obligations. After the transfer of the Northern Territory to the Commonwealth, the Northern Territory lands were released from the trust under the Thorngate Estate Ordinance 1912. Sources: THE NORTHERN TERRITORY OF AUSTRALIA. (1912, September 21). Commonwealth of Australia Gazette (National : 1901 - 1973), p. 1627. Retrieved April 24, 2026, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article232445983 THE NORTHERN TERRITORY. (1912, September 30). The Age (Melbourne, Vic. : 1854 - 1954), p. 11. Retrieved April 24, 2026, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article196252060 THORNGATE FAMILY REAPS BIG PROFITS (1943, November 27). The Mail (Adelaide, SA : 1912 - 1954), p. 7. Retrieved April 24, 2026, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article55870467 |
| Date | Gazettal | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| 23/02/1979 | NTG G8 | Naming of road. |
| 16/04/2008 | NTG G15 | Re-alignment of south-easterly end of road. |