The council was gazetted on 5 January 1888 under the provisions of the
District Councils Act 1887, and initially consisted of the cadastral Hundreds of
Coonatto,
Gregory,
Pinda,
Willochra and
Willowie, and part of the
Hundred of Woolundunga. It was divided into five wards (Coonatto, Pinda, Willowie, Wilmington and Willochra) on 5 June 1888, each represented by two councillors. In 1890, it lost the Hundred of Willowie and part of the Hundred of Gregory to the
District Council of Port Germein. It was a farming and grazing district badly hit by both the depression of the 1890s and the
Great Depression in the 1930s, and it was said in 1923 that the Hammond council district had "not progressed to any great extent" "owing to the long dry spells common to districts in the far north". The council underwent major boundary changes on 16 February 1933 as a result of local government amalgamations at that time: it resumed its former name of Wilmington and incorporated most of the abolished
District Council of Woolundunga, and regained the 1890 section of the Hundred of Gregory from the
District Council of Port Germein. ==Chairmen==