Population: 173 (ABS 2006)

Port Welshpool is located 191 km south-east of Melbourne via the South Gippsland Highway. Located at the north-eastern margin of Corner Inlet, it is not surprising that it initially relied almost exclusively on the ocean's marine life for its prosperity. An anchorage, apparently established offshore near Snake Island, was used by whalers as early as the 1830s.

The region was explored in the 1840s by the Gippsland Company, whose interest was stimulated by Count Paul Strzelecki's explorations of Gippsland and by the wreck of the Clonmel near the entrance of Port Albert.