This week, with Spring well under way and the holidays rapidly approaching, Roy decided it would be a perfect week to go for a wander along the beach. Being Roy though, the beach he wanted to wander along was not close to home. We hadn't been to Newcastle recently, and he had an insatiable urge to wander along Newcastle Beach. After strolling along the beach, past the Bogey Hole and into King Edward Park in Newcastle, Roy became quite excited. Up on the top of the hill he could see an interesting looking building which we decided to investigate. The building turned out to be part of the newly heritage listed Shepherds Hill Fort.
Newcastle is a very important city to Australias history, being one of Australia's oldest cities and an important industrial hub where coal and timber were collected and metals including copper and steel were smelted. Being so important, and so rich in resources, early on in its history it became obvious that some defences for the city would be useful, and as early as 1822 a simple battery was built. This same battery was improved upon and expanded, surviving today as Fort Scratchley, which Roy has already visited. You can read about his visit by clicking here.
Fort Scratchley was not the only defence system built in Newcastle, although it is the oldest. In the 1890s a new fortification was constructed on Shepherds Hill. From this hill there are wonderful views over the beach and the ocean, making it possible to see any threats of invasion by sea and a perfect site for building coastal defences. The area takes it name from 'Sheep Pasture Hills' which is what the Hill was named in 1801 by Lieutenant Colonel Paterson who thought its grassy slopes were like England. Although no defences were mounted on the site until the 1890s, the Hill was mined for coal and a copper smelter operated in the area before this.
In the 1890s, military occupation of the site at Shepherds Hill began and there was continuous military occupation of the site from that time until the 1960s. The first part of the defences built was a disappearing gun emplacement, complete with underground rooms. The gun would be raised, fired and then lowered below ground level to be reloaded, making it discrete and protected. It couldn't fire as quickly as war ships though, making it ineffective. Today, the gun emplacement remains the only unmodified disappearing gun emplacement in NSW.
Although most of the children know about World War II and the attack on Sydney Harbour by Japanese Midget Submarines, they tend to know little about the War in Australia other than this. The curriculum focusses on the War as it happened overseas, yet there are other important places in Australia relating to the War. One such important place is the city of Newcastle, whose defences during the war were co-ordinated at Shepherds Hill Fort. In fact, the Navy, Airforce and Army all worked at Shepherds Hill Fort during the war, at the same time. Newcastle was even attacked by Japanese Submarines, just like Sydney Harbour, but Newcastle actually returned fire, the only place on the mainland of Australia known to have done so! If you would like to learn more about Shepherds Hill Fort, click here.