While going up the district through the old road from Port Louis through Grand River North West towards Beau Bassin, Rose Hill, Quatre Bornes, Vacoas and all the way towards Curepipe, we might take it for granted that these towns always existed as towns with landmark buildings like the Plaza in Rose Hill and the Town Hall in Curepipe.

Did you know that Cure­pipe, Rose Hill and Quatre Bornes were proclaimed as villages in 1868? Yes, you heard it right; these towns were once villages with only thousands of inhabitants. The first village in the Plaines Wilhems that was upgraded to become a town was Curepipe in 1890 with a population of around 12 000. By the end of the 19th century, Curepipe gained a lot of popularity at the expense of Port Louis that was struck with epidemics and malaria. That led the inhabitants of Port Louis to move and settle in the Central Plateau.

Some five years later, in 1895, Beau Bassin/ Rose Hill and Quatre Bornes were proclaimed towns. More than half a century later, in 1963, Vacoas and Phoenix joined in amidst earlier protest from its inhabitants who resisted the idea of paying taxes. By that time, the Plaines Wilhems district was mostly urban and its population had drastically increased and it housed around a third of the country’s entire population. With their new status and popularity, land in the new towns was sold at higher prices. The boundaries of many of the towns kept on expanding and surrounding villages were engulfed. For example Beau Bassin/ Rose Hill absorbed surrounding villages like Stanley, Plaisance, Mont Roches and Trefles.

Growth and expansion
The development of the upper Plaines Wilhems was further triggered by the migration of the higher classes along the main roads and around the railway stations. With the coming into existence of the railway line from Port Louis through Rose Hill, Quatre Bornes, Phoenix , Vacoas and Curepipe towards Mahebourg, settlements were quite a common occurrence close to these train stations.

It is also interesting to note that before these places became towns, churches were erected in the main villages along the Royal Road. The very first church of the district, that of Saint Jean was completed in 1850, that of Visitation in Vacoas was created in 1864 and Sacré Coeur in Beau Bassin was built in 1880.

Most of the towns earlier hou­sed important sugar es­tates in the regions known as La Loui­se, Stanley, Beau Séjour, Plai­sance, Cascade, Beau Bassin, Mont Roches, Roches Brunes and Trianon among others. Those were the main sugar mills in the district and earlier, in around 1830 when the district had some 8000 in­habitants, mostly slaves, there were 27 sugar mills in Plaine Wilhems that were later absorbed into bigger ones.

After the departure of the Dutch, a Prussian by the name of Wilhem Leichnig settled in the island in 1721 along with some slaves. And Plaines Wilhems was named after him. During the French occupation, those regions of the Plaines Wilhems which were not far from the harbour were the ones to be developed and inhabited. With the many rivers running in the district, there was some kind of reluctance to build roads in the district and as a matter of fact, the road from Port Louis to Mahebourg at that time did not favour the district but rather Moka and Flacq districts.

The Plaines Wilhems was also known as a place that harboured rebellious sla­ves who lived in the forests of the Upper Plaines Wilhems.