During colonisation in 1838, chairman of the South Australian Company, George Fife Angas, commissioned mineralogist Johann Menge to explore the area and on receiving his promising reports, purchased the seven surveys of the Barossa Range land. This began a trend of bigger land holdings, largely amongst other English settlers, one of whom was Joseph Gilbert. Gilbert established the first vineyard, Pewsey Vale, on his property in Eden Valley in 1847.

Henry Evans, son-in-law of George Fife Angas, soon followed in 1853 at Evandale, near a village known today as Keyneton. Unfortunately upon his death in 1868, Henry’s wife Sarah followed her temperance convictions and had the winemaking grapes either grafted over to currants or removed and replaced with apple trees.

While over a century has passed, much of the land in Eden Valley still remains with the families of these early settlers.