Lavington today is a suburb of Albury. It started life however as a mining settlement, that evolved into a village that became known as ‘Black Range.’

In 1909 the name ‘Lavington’ was approved to replace the name ‘Black Range,’ a name used in many places around Australia.

In January 1858 John Lavington Evans, in an advertisement in the Sydney Morning Herald, gave his address as “Albury, Murray River, New South Wales.”

Over the next two decades the name ‘Lavington’ also appeared in local newspapers.

In 1865, Evans was one of eighteen Melbourne shareholders in a company named “The Lavington Gold Mining Company Limited,” that was investing in the Black Range goldfields.

It established in the same year a quartz-crushing machine that was opened in November by the Mayoress, Mary Blackmore, who named it the ‘Lavington.’

Nearby, Isaac Davis and John Jennings had established a hotel which they named the ‘Lavington’ after the above company.

At the end of 1868, environmental concerns were expressed regarding the action of charcoal burners near Lavington Springs, also known as Black Springs.

Advertising his Sunninghill Nursery at Lavington Springs in July 1872 was Arthur H Hill.

Joseph Box is believed to have purchased this nursery in late 1875.

Box was born at Lavington, Wiltshire, England in 1834.

He settled north-west of Albury in the early 1870s after having resided at Barwidgee, Bowmans Forest and Stanley.

He died at Porepunkah in late 1913.

In March 1873 Thomas Affleck, established his Glenmorus Mulberry Farm that was watered by the Lavington Springs.

Two years later John Howard, was advertising that he was a florist and sericulturist at Lavington near Albury.

Mid-1876 saw ‘Lavington’ used as the address of contractor John Smith, who was selling his property.  

According to the Border Post newspaper in November 1878, Lavington was “a picturesque spot situated about three miles out of town, in a north-westerly direction, on the Albury temporary common.”