The Clarke Island , also known by its Indigenous name of lungtalanana , part of the Furneaux Group , is an square-kilometre 32 sq mi island in Bass Strait , south of Cape Barren Island , about 24 kilometres 15 mi off the northeast coast of Tasmania , Australia.
Banks Strait separates the island from Cape Portland on the mainland. Clarke Island is the third-largest island in the Furneaux Group, and Tasmania's eighth largest island. Off its west coast lies the shipwreck of HMS Litherland , which sank in and was discovered in Clarke Island is known to Aboriginal Tasmanians as lungtalanana.
There are many archaeological sites on the island, showing evidence of Aboriginal occupation and land use over a long period. They then lived mainly in huts around the area now known as Spike Bay. This was led by first mate Hugh Thompson, and included William Clark the supercargo , three European seamen and twelve lascars. Ill fortune struck again and they were wrecked on the mainland at the northern end of Ninety Mile Beach. Their only hope was to walk along the shore all the way to Sydney, a distance of over kilometres miles.
They had few provisions and no ammunition, and fatigue and hunger lessened their number as they marched. Along the way they encountered various Aboriginal Tasmanians , some friendly and some not. The last of the party to die on the march was killed by a man Dilba and his people near Hat Hill. Those people had a reputation around Port Jackson for being ferocious.
Matthew Flinders and George Bass had feared for their safety when they encountered Dilba the previous year. In May the three survivors of the march, William Clark, sailor John Bennet and one lascar had made it to the cove at Wattamolla [ 6 ] and, on 15 May , with their strength nearly at an end they were able to signal a boat out fishing, which took them on to Sydney.
