A Blast From the Past

Unless you cross the Blue Mountains by way of Bell's Line of Road, your journey does not take you through Lithgow, but rather through the burgeoning suburban sprawl of Bowenfels, to the south and west of Lithgow proper.  The Great Western Highway, multi-laned as it passes Lithgow, swoops and dives in and out of  gullies  and river valleys, and sweeps around the shoulders of hills on its approach and its departure.

In the winter, bare oak branches and smokey fireplaces give a sense of age and permanency to the place, yet nothing is where it once was.  The Western Highway once came nowhere near Lithgow as it angled south west of Hartley before straightening to run due west across the hills as far as Campbell's River, and then cutting north into Bathurst, along the west bank of the Macquarie River.

Lithgow began to gain in significance as coal, and then iron ore, were discovered, mined, and smelted, in the late 1800's.  In 1901, the first steel poured in Australia came from the Eskbank works at Lithgow.  Around 1906, construction commenced on what was, for seven years, Australia's only blast furnace, the remains of which still stand.

It took until 1929 for the Great Western Highway to be realigned to pass close to Lithgow, and then out to Wallerawang and Portland, before climbing over Mount Lambie.  By then, the long-sighted were already contemplating the likelyhood of another Great War, and Lithgow became even more important, having had, since 1912, the Lithgow Small Arms Factory at its centre.

Thirty years after the Small Arms Factory opened, Australia was not only at war with the expected enemy - Germany - but facing assault from a Japanese military that had some of the most effective air power on the planet at the time.  The Factory - source of so much of the weaponry and ammunition that kept Australian troops in the fight - was no longer safely tucked away in the hinterland, protected by a mountain range, an army, and distance, from any seaborn assault.

By 1942 it was obvious that if a Japanese carrier force were to reach the waters off Sydney, the Small Arms Factory at Lithgow would be an obvious and easily attainable target.  If you know where to look, there are three sets of concrete bunkers and gun emplacements that were built in the hills around Lithgow, with the purpose of fending off such an assault.

Two are now derelict and over grown, lurking high on the ridges to the east - above the Zig Zag Railway near Clarence - and south - near the road to Hassan's Walls.  The other - more or less to the west - has been restored, and has three 3.7 inch guns in place.  It is thought that the guns now in the bunkers were made in Canada or Britain, as Australia manufactured only static versions of this weapon, and these ones are the mobile version.

It was hoped that the batteries would interfere with any high level bombing attack that might be launched against the town, should one penetrate that far inland without being broken up RAAF fighters (should any have been available near Sydney at the time).

The battery at Bowenfels can be reached by leaving the GWH at Kirkley Street and driving a short distance.  It is worth a short walk to stand among the concrete and masonry bunkers and gun emplacements in which the soldiers waited each day for an attack that, thankfully, never arrived.  Since its restoration, it must be one of the best presented of the World War II sites in Australia.

My grandfather travelled down from Leura to work, late in the war, in the Small Arms Factory, alongside so many other Australians - the damage that a squadron of Japanese bombers could have done to the factory and surrounding homes does not bear thinking about.

Now, small factories, homes, schools, a hospital, and retirement housing, is spreading across the hillsides around the site, which was once ensconced in cow paddocks well outside the town it was defending.  It's hard to imagine war ever coming this close to Australian homes again.