[1] The area was used by the Port Dalrymple—an early name for George Town in Northern Tasmania—Aboriginal Tasmanians until they were driven from their lands by European settlement.

The Port Dalrymple tribe ventured as far as Westbury, but mainly lived and hunted nearer the Tamar River,[4] and stone implements have been found in the Hagley area.

There is a legend that ... a mob of blacks who had committed a murder on the property sought refuge there when an avenging party of whites were on their heels.

[7] Sir Richard Dry's father came to Tasmania as an "Irish Exile" with Lt Governor Colonel William Patterson, founder of Launceston.

He was initially granted 560 acres (230 ha) near Westbury, adjacent the land owned by Richard Dry,[5] and 800 near Meander.

[10] William Bryan, builder of the first flour mill at Carrick, was granted 1,077 acres (436 ha) at Hagley in March 1825.

[14] At this time the Westbury Road was often a muddy quagmire and land, especially near Quamby bend, that is now cleared was dense forest.

[14] A doctor was practicing in the area by 1854,[15] and in 1855 a school opened in the Church of England; paid for with funds raised by local residents.

David Parry was appointed postmaster on 1 July 1855, probably operating an unofficial post office from the Hagley Inn.

[23] The Glenore school was finished in 1862, and it was accompanied by a 260-acre (110 ha) farm whose rent was to pay for a teacher and building upkeep.

[14] By that time it had a number of stores, a blacksmith, a boot maker, a saddler, a wheelwright, two churches, two schools, two hotels, a resident seamstress and a midwife.

By the late 1870s the town had gained, in addition to houses, a police station, gaol, engineering works, one steam mill run by the Noake Family[20] and another at nearby Quamby.

Route B54 (Meander Valley Road) also passes through from east to west, crossing over the Bass Highway near the western boundary.

Route C507 (Hagley Station Lane) starts at an intersection with B54 and runs south, crossing over the Bass Highway, until it exits.

Sedimentation damaged hot-water cylinders and restricted supply due to the deposits left in the water delivery system.

[60] The Presbyterian church building is still in the town, opposite the original Hagley hotel, but is now privately owned and no longer used for worship.

Land was donated by a George Scott and, at a cost of 370 pounds, a 40-by-22-foot (12.2 by 6.7 m) wooden chapel and two-roomed caretaker's cottage were built.

[70] While in England, on a trip taken for his health, Dry commissioned architect Richard Cromwell Carpenter to draw plans for a new church.

[72] The church's structure used local bluestone for the walls, freestone from Bellerive for pillars, arches and mullions, and roof slates from Great Britain.

[73] After completion of the chancel St Mary's was consecrated, by the Bishop of Tasmania Charles Henry Bromby on 24 August 1871.

The building work was funded by a bequest from Lady Dry and a Miss Jane Patterson, a St Mary's churchgoer.

[24] The Bryans left a bequest that fully funded the school until 1914, when the state's education department assumed responsibility for the building and the teacher's salary.

[80] The original school building was built in 1865, on 2 acres (0.81 ha) of land just east of the town donated by Sir Richard Dry.

In the late 1930s the school served Hagley, Carrick, Hadspen, Rosevale and these town's surrounding farms, using two buses to transport students.

In 1944 while explaining the schools philosophy he stated We give an acre for a cow or sheep willingly, while we shut our children and our chickens up in too limited spaces, and they suffer in consequence.

[19] Launceston and Western Railway soon ran into financial problems, the line closed 29 June 1872 and the company itself went bankrupt on 25 July.

Beginning in the 1990s work began on a replacement highway that would bypass all the towns between Prospect and Deloraine, including Hagley.

[88] Local residents were concerned about the impact on Hagley of the reduction in through traffic and the Westbury-Hagley Development Committee was investigating.

Its wheel house has original ironstone foundations and brick walls forming an octagonal building, a design peculiarity to accommodate the horses and driving mechanism.

It was built mostly by convict labour, using locally made clay bricks, in an American Colonial style, a single storey with a stone-flagged long veranda.