Hamilton Hume (19 June 1797 – 19 April 1873[1]) was an early explorer of the present-day Australian states of New South Wales and Victoria.

In 1824, along with William Hovell, Hume participated in an expedition that first took an overland route from Sydney to Port Phillip (near the site of present-day Melbourne).

[2] When Hume was only 17 years of age, he began exploring the country beyond Sydney with his younger brother John and an Aboriginal boy as far to the south-west as Berrima, and soon developed into a good bushman.

In 1817, Hume went on a journey with James Meehan, the deputy surveyor-general, and Charles Throsby during which Lake Bathurst and the Goulburn Plains were sighted.

But Brisbane did not accept this view of it, as in a letter to the secretary, Wilmot Horton, dated 24 March 1825 he mentions the "discovery of new and valuable country .

The party spent three days attempting to cross the Great Dividing Range at Mt Disappointment but were thwarted.

Hume shifted direction to the West then reached lower land at the future township of Broadford on the 12 December where they camped.

He led the party across the Dividing Range at Hume’s Pass, Wandong and on the 16th December, 1824 reached Port Phillip Bay at Bird Rock, Point Lillias adjacent to the future Geelong.

[6] Hovell claimed that he measured their longitude on the same day but in reality he read it off the sketch map that he and Hume had drafted themselves during the trip.

[8] Prior to this admission, Dr William Bland, who wrote the first book on the journey in 1831, invented the myth that Hovell made an error of one degree in longitude in order to protect him.

[10] Hume and Hovell each received grants of 1,200 acres (4.9 km2) of land, an inadequate reward for discoveries of great importance made by an expedition which, practically speaking, paid its own expenses.

This expedition was the first to discover an overland route from southern New South Wales to Port Phillip, on whose shores Melbourne now stands.