Fort Dundas was a short lived British

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was the formal name of the United Kingdom during the period when what is now the Republic of Ireland formed a part of it....

 settlement on Melville Island between 1824 and 1828 in what is now the Northern Territory

Northern Territory

The Northern Territory is a federal territory of Australia, occupying much of the centre of the mainland continent, as well as the central northern regions...

 of Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

. The establishment of the settlement caused the border of New South Wales

New South Wales

New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...

 to be moved west from the 135th meridian

135th meridian east

The meridian 135° east of Greenwich is a line of longitude that extends from the North Pole across the Arctic Ocean, Asia, the Pacific Ocean, Australasia, the Indian Ocean, the Southern Ocean, and Antarctica to the South Pole....

 to the Western Australia

Western Australia

Western Australia is a state of Australia, occupying the entire western third of the Australian continent. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Great Australian Bight and Indian Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east and South Australia to the south-east...

 border (129th meridian

129th meridian east

The meridian 129° east of Greenwich is a line of longitude that extends from the North Pole across the Arctic Ocean, Asia, Australia, the Indian Ocean, the Southern Ocean, and Antarctica to the South Pole....

).

The settlement was begun in September 1824, after ships had set out from Sydney

Sydney

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

 to colonise the northern part of Australia. It was named after Robert Dundas

Robert Dundas, 2nd Viscount Melville

Robert Dundas, 2nd Viscount Melville KT, PC, FRS was a British statesman, the son of Henry Dundas, the 1st Viscount. Dundas was the Member of Parliament for Hastings in 1794, Rye in 1796 and Midlothian in 1801. He was also Keeper of the Signet for Scotland from 1800...

, the First Lord of the Admiralty. Colonists had bad relations with the Tiwi

Tiwi people

The Tiwi people are one of the many Indigenous groups of Australia. Nearly 2,500 Tiwi live in the Bathurst and Melville Islands, which make up the Tiwi Islands....

 aborigines, tropical storms, a large distance from other settlements, and a low food supply making the efforts at settlement especially difficult. Two men were speared by aborigines. The British abandoned the effort at the fort in 1828, with the last of the settlers leaving in February 1829.

In recent years, archaeologists have excavated parts of the site.

See also

• Dundas Island
  Dundas Island (British Columbia)
  Dundas Island is an island on the North Coast of British Columbia, Canada, located on the west side of Chatham Sound to the northwest of Prince Rupert. It is the largest of a group of islands known as the Dundas Islands.-History:...
  
  , in British Columbia, Canada, named after Henry Dundas, Robert Dundas' father