 It was named by the Street Naming Committee on 23 May 1837 after William Wolryche Whitmore, a British politician who introduced the "South Australia Act 1834", also known as the "Foundation Act", to the British House of Commons.He was also one of the board of the South Australian Colonisation Commission set up by the Act.After the removal of indigenous trees during the city’s early colonial settlement, Whitmore Square was replanted in the 1850s and fenced to protect it from animals.