Derrinallum is a town in Victoria, Australia, located on the Hamilton Highway, in the Corangamite Shire. The town is the centre for the surrounding farming community and lies at the foot of Mount Elephant. Mount Elephant is a 380 m-high conical breached scoria cone formed by an dormant volcano. At the 2001 census, Derrinallum had a population of 266. At the 2016 census, Derrinallum had a population of 557. History The Djargurd Wurrong people are the traditional Aboriginal owners of the Derrinallum district. The Djargurd Wurrong people consist of twelve clans that traditionally shared a common language and family ties, but each clan had its own territory. For tens of thousands of years they successfully occupied the area as a semi-nomadic hunter gatherer society. During European colonisation in the 1830s, Mount Elephant was located within the territory of the clan Teerinyillum Gundidj. One known Aborigonal man from the Derrinallum clan (or Teerinyillum Gundidj) was known as "King Tom of the Mount Elephant tribe". He was painted by Robert Hawker Dowling in 1856 (National Library of Australia). King Tom was later photographed at Coranderrk Aboriginal Mission in 1877 by the photograger Fred Kruger (1831-1888). Colonial exploration of the Derrinallum district began in 1837 by the "Derwent Company". The company comprised Messers, Learmonth, Fisher, Mercer, and Swanston. They headed north from Lake Corangamite, climbed the volcanic cone of Mount Elephant, and named the mountain "Elephant Hill". The first official overland trip from Geelong to Portland was led by Fyans and Smythe in 1839, where Fyans recorded "we bend our steps across to Teron Allum Hill or elpephant". On the same trip Smythe recorded that June 2 they "started early for Lake Colac... and the native pointed out a hill to which we travelled, the name of the Mount is Terrinallum" Derrinallum was also known as The Swamp by early colonial settlers. The local indigenous tribe called the locality Djerrinallum meaning sea swallow or tern, a species that used to flock to the area in abundance. An application to build a general store set the ball rolling with the townsite being surveyed in 1866. In 1867 the village of Tooliorook was proclaimed and the first land sales were held in the nearby town of Camperdown. The Post Office opened on 7 December 1868 but was named Tooliorook until 1873. Unhappy with the name of the budding township the residents applied for a name