"On ascending a range of hills which lay directly across our course, we had a prospect of a fine and spacious valley - our descent to it was rendered difficult by lofty, rocky hills forming deep and irregular glens, so narrow that I feared we should not be able to follow their windings, the rocks being such perpendicular masses as seemingly to debar our passage."

So, on the 18th of August, 1817, the explorer John Oxley recorded in his field book the discovery of the Wellington Valley - from the site of the Mount Arthur Reserve. Oxley and his party were the first Europeans to sight Mount Arthur, Wellesley and Duke which they named in honor of the "Iron Duke" of Wellington who two years earlier had been victorious on the field of Waterloo.

Aboriginal occupation of the area, of course, traces a history measured in tens of thousands of years.

The three peaks form the basis of the Mount Arthur reserve, which covers an area of approximately 1300 hectares set aside for public recreation.