On the verge of the Cawdor Road, just south of the Camden town centre, is a clump of agave that has been growing there for decades. The plants have created much conjecture and is a local mystery. It is a bit hard to tell tall tales from true.
Agave plants growing the Cawdor Road verge just south of the Camden Town centre (I Willis 2024)
The stories about the agave are a type of local folklore.
Folklore develops over decades, and stories are passed down through the generations of local families. These stories add colour and movement to our local history. One source states that folklore is a
body of expressive culture shared by a particular group of people, culture or subculture. This includes oral traditions such as tales, myths, legends,[a]proverbs, poems, jokes, and other oral traditions.
It is a bit hard to separate fact from fiction around the Cawdor Road agave.
Agave plants
Agaves are a succulent and xerophytic species that form a large rosette of strong, fleshy leaves. They are native to Mexico and the southern part of the USA and have been distributed worldwide as an ornamental.
Agaves are slow-growing and are sometimes called the century plant. They reproduce from seeds or suckers that develop at the bottom of some species. The leaves have sharp spines and are fibrous. The root system is a series of rhizomes.
Agave plant growing on the verge of Cawdor Road (I Willis 2024)
One source states that agave has various uses in Central and South America, including handicrafts, food and drink preparations, ethnomedicine, and stock feed.
The 1994 Camden Significant Trees and Vegetated Landscape Study by Landarc Landscape Architects states that the Century Plant (Agave americana) was a common plant in early colonial gardens across the Cowpastures. Agave was used in the early gardens as a ‘dramatic accent plant at the entrance’ to colonial properties and gives the example of Cawdor Road agave. (Landarc Landscape Architects, Camden Significant Trees and Vegetated Landscape Study. Camden Municipal Council, Camden 1993)
The stories about the agave date back to early 1800s and the colonial frontier and the violence that took place across parts of the Cowpastures. The stories are intergenerational.
Murder and mayhem on the colonial frontier
Vic Boardman’s granddaughter Helen said, ‘Stories about the agave were verbally passed down from Pa Vic to my mum to me as a child.’
‘From my understanding, it was the site of the murder of a shepherd early on in our local history’, said Helen.
This is confirmed by a story that appeared in the Australian Town and Country Journal in 1909. A Camden resident, Thomas Herbert, recalled
Mr. Macarthur’s merino sheen arrived in I the colony about 1816, and were stationed at my father’s place at Narellan, where he had the management of them before they were taken to Camden Park, where they were removed about 1818. . The shepherd and his wiife were murdered by the blacks at a slaughter house, about 1½ mile from Camden Park, and buried there.
(Australian Town and Country Journal, 11 August 1909)
Article from the Camden-Wollondilly Times 8 July 1998 (Camden Museum archives)
The Camden-Wollondilly Times in 1998 published a similar story. The newspaper reported that the agave was the site of a shepherd’s hut, who worked on the Macarthur’s Camden Park. The newspaper article repeated the claim that the agave marked the site of the hut at which the shepherds were killed in a conflict with local indigenous people in 1816. (Vanessa Mace, ‘Prickly Story Indeed’. Camden-Wollondilly Times, 8 July 1998)
The newspaper report went on to state that the agave marked the site of a later farm cottage where the Norris family lived on Camden Park Estate. (Vanessa Mace, ‘Prickly Story Indeed’. Camden-Wollondilly Times, 8 July 1998)
There was speculation in the article that the agave could be some of the oldest plants introduced by Europeans to the Cowpastures in their colonial gardens. (Vanessa Mace, ‘Prickly Story Indeed’. Camden-Wollondilly Times, 8 July 1998)
Helen says that in Sue Williams book Elizabeth & Elizabeth mentions the attack of a stockkeeper and his wife occurring in August 1815.
Fenced off
Apparently, the Cawdor Road agave clump was much larger in the past than it is currently.
Helen said, ‘They used to have a fence around them to protect them, but this was removed some time ago. ‘
Currently the agave plants are not fenced and have no heritage protection.
The truth
We may never know the real truth about the Cawdor Road agave.
The 1998 newspaper story was generated by the attempted removal of the agave by a local resident who was trying to remove a large brown snake which resided in the clump. Their actions prompted a swift community response to protect the Cawdor Road agave.
Whatever the truth of the matter it makes for lively reading. The truth may never be known. The Cawdor Road agave still produces controversy and the stories are still being passed on to the next generation.
Agave plants growing on the Cawdor Road verge (I Willis 2024)
UOW historian Dr Ian Willis has recently published an article in Media History (UK) about the role of local newspapers in the creation of Macarthur regional identity and the mythology surrounding New South Wales colonial identity John Macarthur.
The three New South Wales market towns of Campbelltown, Camden and Picton made up the Macarthur region where several local town-based newspapers emerged in the 1880s. Local newspapers used local history to enable their readers to reflect on their past by storytelling and creating an understanding of their cultural heritage. The local press lionised the historical legacy of John Macarthur and contributed to the construction of a regional identity bearing his name through the creation of regional newspaper mastheads. The key actors in this narrative were newspaper owner-editors, their mastheads and the historical figure of Macarthur. This article uses a qualitative approach to chart the growth and changes of newspaper mastheads, their owner-editors and Macarthur mythmaking and regionalism.
The article explains the role of the local press in the creation of the Macarthur mythology and included local newspapers like the Camden News,Camden Advertiser, Macarthur Advertiser, Macarthur Chronicle, Picton Post, The District Reporter and the Campbelltown Herald.
Camden News 30 October 1968
Local newspaper editor-owners were an important part of this story and notable names included William Webb, William Sidman, George Sidman, Arthur Gibson, Syd Richardson, Jeff McGill, Lee Abrahams and Mandy Perin.
The Macarthur regional press had its own press barons most notably Syd Richardson and George Sidman who had significant influence and power across the Macarthur region.
William Sidman (Camden Images)
Then there is the New South Wales colonial identity of John Macarthur who was a great self-publicist, opportunist, rogue and local land baron. Over the last 200 years his exploits have been exaggerated into a local mythology that has become part of Australian national identity.
George Victor Sidman 1939 (Source: The Town of Camden 1939)
John Macarthur has become a local legend, a regional identity, and his name has been applied to a regional name, electoral division and lots of local business and community organisations.
For over a century, the Anzac story has been a central part of the Australian cultural identity. The contradictions that have emerged around it have shown no sign of going away. Historians have been unpacking the meaning of Anzac for decades and seem to no closer to any absolute sense.
Anzac Day Leaflet listing local services in the Federal electorate of Hume (AG)
In a packed auditorium on 20 April 2017, University of Wollongong historian Dr Jen Roberts gave the inaugural public lecture in the Knowledge Series of the University of Wollongong Alumni. Robert’s presentation called ‘Men, myth and memory’ explored the meaning of Anzac and how it is part of Australia’s cultural identity. The attentive audience was a mix of ages and interests, including past military personnel.
One old gentleman in the audience stood up in question time and announced to the audience that he felt that Dr Roberts was ‘a brave lady’ to ‘present the truth’ about the Anzac story in her evocative lecture.
The camp administration block with A Bailey in the foreground at the Narellan Military Camp in 1942. The camp was in operation between 1940 and 1944 (A Bailey).
Robert’s compelling presentation left none of the alumnus present in any doubt about the contested nature of Anzac and that there is far from just one truth. Anzac is a fusion of cultural processes over many decades, and it has grown into something bigger than itself.
The Anzac acronym, meaning Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, was first used by General Sir William Birdwood, and its legal status was confirmed by the Australian Government in 1916.
The Anzac story needs to be inclusive and not exclusive, and while the current service personnel are the custodians of the Anzac mythology, it can sometimes be a heavy responsibility.
The tented lines at the Narellan Military Camp in 1941. Thousands of troops passed through the camp during its operation between 1940 and 1944 (A Bailey).
Tensions and contradictions
The Anzac story is ubiquitous across Australia. It is embedded in the heart and soul of every community in the country. Within this narrative, there are contradictions and tensions.
The war that spawned the notion of Anzac was a product of industrial modernism. While the Anzac shrines of commemoration and remembrance across Australia were a product of Interwar modernism, some were the work of Rayner Hoff. Yet these same artists and sculptors were supporters of Sydney bohemianism and its anti-war sentiments.
There are a host of other contradictions that range across issues that include gender, militarism, nationalism, racism, violence, trauma, and homophobia.
Jen Roberts argued in her lecture that the Anzac mythology and iconography point to Australian exceptionalism. She then detailed how this was not the situation. She analysed the horrors of war and how this is played out within the Anzac story.
The WW1 Memorial Gate at Macarthur Park was erected in 1922 and funded by public subscription from the Camden community, with the cenotaph in the rear (Camden Remembers)
According to Roberts, the tension within the meaning of Anzac is represented by the official state-driven narrative that stresses honour, duty and sacrifice through commemoration, remembrance and solemnity.
On the hand, the digger mythology’s unofficial story is about a man who is not a professional soldier, egalitarian, loyal to mates and a larrikin – an excellent all-around Aussie bloke.
The official/digger binary highlights the contradictions with the Anzac tradition and its meaning for the military personnel, past and present.
Gunner Bruce Guppy
In 1941 an 18-year-old country lad called Bruce Guppy from the New South Wales South Coast volunteered for service with the 7th Australian Light Horse. Guppy volunteered because his brothers had joined up, and the military looked to have better prospects than working as a dairy hand. Gunner BW Guppy had little time for jingoism or nationalism as a laconic fellow and stated, ‘life is what you make it’.
Bruce Guppy was a yarn-spinning, non-drinking, non-smoking, non-gambling larrikin who saw action in the 1942 Gona-Buna Campaign in New Guinea and later trained as a paratrooper. His anti-war views in later years never stopped him from attending every Sydney Anzac Day March with his unit, 2/1 Australian Mountain Battery, and the camaraderie they provided for him. A lifetime member of the New South Wales Returned and Services League of Australia, he never discussed his wartime service with his family until I married his daughter.
Bruce Guppy and his unit, the 2/1st Australian Mountain Battery AIF, at the 2003 Sydney Anzac Day March. Guppy is in the front row, fourth from the left (I Willis).
Guppy had five brothers who saw active service in the Pacific conflict, with one brother’s service in British Commonwealth Occupation Forces in Japan cited in Gerster’s Travels in Atomic Sunshine. Guppy would not call himself a hero, yet he willingly participated in Huskisson’s Community Heroes History Project in 2007. Guppy was something of a bush poet and, in 1995, wrote a poem called ‘An Old Soldier Remembers’, which in part says:
So it surprised no one when Bruce Guppy made the national media in 2013 when he handed Alice Guppy’s Mother’s Badge and Bar to the Australian War Memorial. Australian War Memorial director Brendan Nelson was moved by his death in 2014 and personally thanked the family for his ‘wonderful’ contribution to the nation.
For Guppy, Anzac Day embraced both meanings expressed by Roberts: The official commemorative remembering; and the larrikin enjoying the company of his mates. The purpose of the Anzac story has changed during Bruce Guppy’s lifetime and the experiences of his digger mates who served in the Second World War.
A Red Cross poster was used for patriotic fundraising purposes in 1918 during World War One. (Australian Red Cross).
While many lay claims ownership of the cultural meaning of Anzac, Roberts contends that the organic growth of the Dawn Service is an example of the natural development of Anzac and its sensibilities for different parts of Australian society.
The site and the myth
Roberts examined the two aspects of Anzac mythology – the site and the myth. She maintained that there are many claims to the ownership of the cultural meaning of Anzac. Roberts then pondered the meaning of the slaughter on the Western Front. She asked the audience to reflect on the words of Eric Bogle’s song, And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda covered by an American Celtic band, the Dropkick Murphys.
These comments contrasted with the opening address by an ex-military Alumni organiser. He maintained that the outstanding achievements of the 1/AIF celebrated in military training in Australia today are: the withdrawal of troops at Gallipoli; and the last mounted cavalry charge at Beersheba.
These views contrast with recent research about Gallipoli POWs from Turkish sources that have shown a different side of the story of the conflict.
Camden Airfield has used as a training ground for the early years of the Empire Training Scheme and used Tiger Moth aircraft. The trainee pilots then served with RAF and RAAF squadrons in Europe during World War 2 (1942 LG Fromm).
The Gallipoli peninsula is a site of pilgrimages from Australia while being the only locality in modern Turkey with an English name.
Pilgrims and memory
Roberts contrasted the small group of military pilgrims who went to the 1965 50th anniversary with the lavish all expenses tour of the 1990 75th anniversary sponsored by the Hawke Labor Federal Government. She maintains this was the start of the modern pilgrimage industry.
Roberts drew on personal experience and related anecdotes from her five visits to Gallipoli peninsular with University of Wollongong students. These young people undertook the UOW Gallipoli Study Tour, organised by her mentor, friend and sage UOW Associate-Professor John McQuilton (retired).
Widespread interest in Gallipoli pilgrimages has grown in recent times. Family historians have started searching for their own digger-relative from the First World War. They seek the kudos derived from finding a connection with the Gallipoli campaign and its mythology.
The Howard Federal Government started by promoting soft patriotism, followed by the Abbott Government promoting official celebrations of the Centenary of Anzac.
Official government involvement has unfortunately increased the jingoism of these anniversaries and the noise around the desire by some to acquire the cultural ownership of the Gallipoli site.
For example, the Australian Howard Government attempted to direct the Turkish Government on how to carry out the civil engineering roadworks on the Gallipoli peninsular.
RAAF Camden and the Central Flying School at Camden Airfield in 1941. Some of these young men served with RAF and RAAF squadrons in the European theatre during World War 2 (RAAF Historical).
Brand Anzac
Roberts dislikes the Brand Anzac, which has been used to solidify the Australian national identity. Anzacary, the commodification of the Anzac spirit, has been an area of marketing growth, with the sale of souvenirs and other ephemera. Jingoism and flag-flapping have proliferated with the rise of Australian exceptionalism from the national level to local communities.
Anzac mythology and memory tend to forget the grotesque side of war and its effects. First World War servicemen suffered shell shock (PTSD) and took to alcohol, gambling, domestic violence, divorce and suicide. They became the responsibility of those on the homefront.
The Anzac mythology disempowers and marginalises people. The legend is about nationalism, jingoism, racism, and stereotypes while at the same time offering hope, glory and answers for others. The Guppy brothers and their comrades felt they understood the meaning of Anzac.
Roberts maintains that the ideas around the Anzac story belong to everyone and offer contradictions for some and realities for others.
The members of the Australian community are the ones who will make a choice about the meaning of Anzac.
One version of the story of the commemoration of the meaning of Anzac is the recently completed mural sponsored by the Camden RSL Club called ‘Operation Digger March’located at 23 Cawdor Road Camden. The full story of the mural can be found in Camden History journal March 2022 v5 n3. (I Willis, 2022)
The Camden RSL War Memorial at 23 Cawdor Road Camden is the site of the annual dawn service in the Camden township (I Willis 2022)
Updated on 23 April 2022, 16 April 2021. Updated on 27 April 2020 and re-posted as ‘Brand Anzac – meaning and myth’. Originally posted on 24 April 2017 as ‘Anzac Contradictions’
Moviemakers have always had an eye on the Camden district’s large country houses, rustic farm buildings, quaint villages and picturesque countryside for film locations.
From the 1920s the area has been used by a series of filmmakers as a setting for their movies. It coincided was an increasing interest in the area’s Englishness from poets, journalists and travel writers. They wrote stories of quaint English style villages with a church on the hill, charming gentry estates down hedge-lined lanes, where the patriarch kept contented cows in ordered fields and virile stallions in magnificent stables. This did not go unnoticed in the film industry.
One of the first was the 1921 silent film Silks and Saddles shot at Arthur Macarthur Onslow’s Macquarie Grove by American director John K Wells about the world of horse racing. The film was set on the race track on Macquarie Grove. The script called for a race between and aeroplane and racehorse. The movie showed a host good looking racing blood-stock. There was much excitement, according to Annette Onslow, when an aeroplane piloted by Edgar Percival his Avro landed on the race course used in the film and flew the heroine to Randwick to win the day. Arthur’s son Edward swung a flight in Percival’s plane and was hooked on flying for life, and later developed Camden Airfield at Macquarie Grove.
Camden film locations were sought in 1931 for director Ken G Hall’s 1932 Dad and Dave film On Our Selection based on the characters and writings of Steele Rudd. It stars Bert Bailey as Dan Rudd and was released in the UK as Down on the Farm. It was one the most popular Australian movies of all time but it was eventually shot at Castlereagh near Penrith. The movie is based on Dan’s selection in south-west Queensland and is about a murder mystery. Ken G Hall notes that of the 18 feature films he made between 1932 and 1946 his film company used the Camden area and the Nepean River valley and its beauty for location shooting. The films included On Our Selection (1936), Squatter’s Daughter (1933), Grandad Rudd (1934), Thoroughbred (1935), Orphan of the Wilderness (1936), It Isn’t Done (1936), Broken Melody (1938), Dad and Dave Come to Town (1938), Mr Chedworth Steps Out (1938), Gone to the Dogs (1939), Come Up Smiling (1939), Dad Rudd MP (1940), and Smith, The Story of Sir Charles Kingsford Smith (1946).
Camden Airfield 1930s Camden Images
The Camden district was the location of two wartime action movies, The Power and The Glory (1941) and The Rats of Tobruk (1944). The Rats of Tobruk was directed by Charles Chauvel and starred actors Chips Rafferty, Peter Finch and Pauline Garrick. The story is about three men from a variety of backgrounds who become mates during the siege at Tobruk during the Second World War. The movie was run at Camden’s Paramount movie palace in February 1945. The location for parts of the movie were the bare paddocks of Narellan Vale and Currans Hill where they were turned into a battleground to recreated the setting at Tobruk in November 1943. There were concerns at the time that the exploding ammunitions used in the movie would disturb the cows. Soldiers were supplied from the Narellan Military Camp and tanks were modified to make them look like German panzers and RAAF Camden supplied six Vultee Vengeance aircraft from Camden Airfield which was painted up to look like German Stuka bombers. The film location was later used for the Gayline Drive-In. Charles Chauvel’s daughter Susanne Carlsson who was 13 years old at the time reported that it was a ‘dramatic and interesting time’.
The second wartime movie was director Noel Monkman’s The Power and The Glory starring Peter Finch and Katrin Rosselle. The movie was made at RAAF Camden with the co-operation of the RAAF. It is a spy drama about a Czech scientist who discovers a new poison-gas and escapes to Australia rather than divulges the secret to the Nazis. Part of the plot was enemy infiltration of the coast near Bulli where an enemy aircraft was sighted and 5 Avro-Anson aircraft were directed to seek and bombed the submarine. The Wirraway aircraft from the RAAF Central Flying School acted as fighters and it was reported that the pilots were ‘good looking’ airmen from the base mess. There was a private screening at Camden’s Paramount movie theatre for the RAAF Central Flying School personnel.
Camden Park was used as a set for the internationally series of Smiley films, Smiley made in 1956 and in 1958 Smiley Gets a Gun in cinemascope. The story is about a nine-year-old boy who is a bit of rascal who grows up in a country town. They were based on books by Australian author Moore Raymond and filmed by Twentieth Century Fox and London Films. Raymond set his stories in a Queensland country town in the early 20th century and there are horse and buggies and motor cars. The town settings were constructed from scratch and shot at Camden Park, under the management of Edward Macarthur Onslow. The movies stars included Australian Chips Rafferty and English actors John McCallum and Ralph Richardson. Many old-time locals have fond memories of being extras in the movies. Smiley was released in the United Kingdom and the United States.
In 1999 Camden airfield was used as a set for the television documentary The Last Plane Out of Berlin which was the story of Sidney Cotton. Actor Geoff Morrell played the role of Cotton, who went to England in 1916 and became a pilot and served with the Royal Naval Air Service during the First World War. He is regarded as the ‘father of aerial photography’ and in 1939 was requested to make flights over Nazi Germany in 1939. Camden Airfield was ‘perfect location’ according to producer Jeff Watson because of its ‘historic’ 1930s atmosphere.
In 2009 scenes from X-Men Origins: Wolverine was filmed at Camden and near Brownlow Hill.
In 2010 filmmaker Sandra Pyres of Why Documentaries produced several short films in association for the With The Best of Intentions exhibition at The Oaks Historical Society. The films were a montage of contemporary photographs, archival footage and re-enactments by drama students of the stories of child migrants. The only voices were those of the child migrants and there were many tears spilt as the films were screened at the launch of the exhibition.
In 2011 scenes from director Wayne Blair’s Vietnam wartime true story of The Sapphires were filmed at Brownlow Hill starring Deborah Mailman, Jessica Mauboy and Chris O’Dowd. This is the true story of four young Aboriginal sisters who are discovered by a talent scout who organises a tour of American bases in Vietnam. On Brownlow Hill, a large stage was placed in the middle of cow paddock and draped with a sign that read ‘USC Show Committee presents the Sapphires’ and filming began around midnight. The cows were herded out of sight and the crew had to be careful that they did not stand of any cowpats. Apparently, Sudanese refugees played the role of African American servicemen of the 19th Infantry Division.
Camelot House early 1900s Camden Images
The romantic house of Camelot with its turrets, chimney stacks and gables, was built by racing identity James White and designed by Horbury Hunt was the scene of activity in 2006 and 2007 for the filming of scenes of Baz Luhrman’s Australia, starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman. The location shots were interior and exterior scenes which involved horse riding by Kidman and Jackman. The film is about an aristocratic woman who leaves England and follows her husband to Australia during the 1930s, and live through the Darwin bombing by the Japanese in the Second World War.
Camelot was a hive activity for the filming of the 1950s romantic television drama A Place to Call Home produced by Channel 7 in 2012. Set in rural Australia it is the story of a woman’s journey ‘to heal her soul’ and of a wealthy family facing changes in the fictional country town of Inverness in the Bligh family estate of Ash Park. Starring Marta Dusseldorp as the mysterious Sarah and Noni Hazlehurst as the family matriarch Elizabeth, who has several powerful independently wealthy women who paralleled her role in Camden in time past on their gentry estates. The sweeping melodrama about hope and loss is set against the social changes in the 1950s and has close parallels to 1950s Camden. The ‘sumptuous’ 13 part drama series screened on television in 2013 and according to its creator Bevin Lee had a ‘large-scale narrative’ that had a ‘feature-film feel’. He maintained that is was ‘rural gothic’, set in a big house that had comparisons with British television drama Downton Abbey.
The 55-room fairytale-like mansion and its formal gardens were a ‘captivating’ setting for A Place to Call Home, according to the Property Observer in 2013. Its initial screening was watched by 1.7 million viewers in April 2013. The show used a host of local spots for film sets and one of the favourite points of conversation ‘around the water-cooler’ for locals was the game ‘pick-the-place’. By mid-2014 Channel 7 had decided to axe the series at the end of the second series. There was a strong local reaction and a petition was circulating which attracted 6000 signatures to keep the show on the air. In the end, Foxtel television produced a third series with the original caste which screened in 2015.
Camden airfield was in action again and used as a set for the Australian version of the British motoring television show Top Gear Australian in 2010. Part of the show is power laps in a ‘Bog Standard Car’ were recorded on parts of the runways and taxiways used as a test track.
Camden Showground became the set for Angelina Jolie’s Second World War drama Unbroken in 2013. The main character Louis Zamperini, a former Olympic runner, and Onslow Park were used as part of the story of his early life as a member of Torrance High School track team. The movie is about Zamperini’s story of survival after his plane was shot down during the Pacific campaign. The filming caused much excitement in the area and the local press gave the story extensive coverage, with the showground was chosen for its historic atmosphere. Camden mayor Lara Symkowiak hoped that the movie would boost local tourism and the council was supportive of the area being used as a film set. The council had appointed a film contact officer to encourage greater use of the area for film locations.
Edwina Macarthur Stanham writes that Camden Park has been the filming location for several movies, advertisements and fashion shoots since the 1950s. They have included Smiley (1956), Smiley Gets a Gun (1958), Shadow of the Boomerang (1960) starring Jimmy Little, My Brilliant Career (1978) was filmed in Camden Park and its garden and surrounds, and The Empty Beach (1985) starring Bryan Brown, House Taken Over (1997) a short film was written and directed by Liz Hughes which used lots of scenes in the house. In the 21st century, there has been Preservation (2003) described a gothic horror movie starring Jacqueline Mackenzie, Jack Finsterer and Simon Bourke which used a lot of the scenes filmed in the house.
In 2005 Danny De Vito visited Camden Park scouting for a location for a movie based on the book “The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle”. In Sleeping Beauty (2010) an Australian funded film was shot at Camden Park and the short film La Finca (2012). In September 2014 Camden Park was used as a location in the film called “The Daughter” starring Geoffrey Rush. Extensive filming took place over 3 weeks and members of the family and friends and Camden locals played the role of extras.
In September 2014 Camden Park was used as a location in the film called “The Daughter” starring Geoffrey Rush. Extensive filming took place over 3 weeks and members of the family and friends and Camden locals played the role of extras.
The Daughter Movie Set Camden Park 2014 E Stanham
In 2015 the Camden Historical Society and filmmaker Wen Denaro have combined forces to telling the story of the Chinese market gardeners who settled in Camden in the early twentieth century. The project will produce a short documentary about the Chinese market gardeners who established vegetable gardens along the river in Camden and who supplied fresh product to the Macarthur and Sydney markets.
In 2015 an episode of the Network Ten TV show of The Bachelor Australia was filmed at Camden Park in August 2015. They showed scenes of the Bachelor Sam Wood taking one of the bachelorette Sarah on a romantic date to the colonial mansion Camden Park. There were scenes of the pair in a two-in-hand horse-drawn white carriage going up and down the driveway to the Camden Park cemetery on the hill overlooking the town. There were scenes in the soft afternoon sunlight of the couple having a romantic high-tea on the verandah of Camden Park house with champagne and scones and cupcakes. In the evening there were floodlit images of the front of Camden Park house from the front lawn then scenes of the couple in the sitting room sitting of the leather sofa sharing wine, cheese and biscuits in front on an open fire and candles. Sarah is gobsmacked with the house, its setting and is ‘amazed’ by the house’s colonial interior.
In 2018 a children’s film Peter Rabbit was been filmed in the Camden district. The movie is based on Beatrix Potter’s famous book series and her iconic characters. The special effects company Animal Logic spent two days on the shoot in Camden in January 2017. The first scene features the kidnap of the rabbit hero in a sack, throwing them off a bridge and into the river. For this scene, the Macquarie Grove Bridge over the Nepean River was used for the bridge in the movie. According to a spokesman, the reason the Camden area was used was that it fitted the needed criteria. The movie producers were looking for a location that screamed of its Englishness. Camden does that and a lot more dating back to the 1820s. The movie is set in modern-day Windermere in the English Lakes District. The location did not have to have too many gum trees or other recognisable Australian plants. John and Elizabeth Macarthur would be proud of their legacy – African Olives and other goodies. Conveniently the airport also provided the location for a stunt scene which uses a bi-plane. The role of the animators is to make Australia look like England.
In August 2018 the colonial Cowpastures homestead of Denbigh at Cobbitty was the set for popular Australian drama series Doctor Doctor. The series is about the Knight family farm and the show star is Roger Corser who plays doctor Hugh Knight. He said, ‘
The homestead is a real star of the show. The front yard, the dam and barn brewery on the property are major sets – I don’t know what we would do without them.
The show follows the high-flying heart surgeon and is up to season three. Filming lasted three months and the cast checked out the possibilities of the Camden town centre. Actor Ryan Johnson said that Denbigh ‘made the show’.
Denbigh homestead was originally built by Charles Hook in 1818 and extended by Thomas and Samuel Hassell in the 1820s.
Denbigh Homestead Open Day 2015 has been used as a film set in 2018 for the TV series Doctor Doctor (I Willis)
In late 2018 the TV series Home and Away has been using the haunted house at Narellan known as Studley Park as a set for the program. The storyline followed three young characters going into the haunted house and staying overnight. They go into a tunnel and a young female becomes trapped. Tension rises and the local knock-about character comes to their rescue and he is a hero. The use of the set by the TV series producers was noted by Macarthur locals on Facebook.
Spooky Studley Park House is claimed to be one of the most haunted locations in the Macarthur region. The TV series Home & Away on 3 & 4 October 2018 certainly added to those stories by using the house as a set location. (CN Advert)
Studley Park has recently been written up in the Camden-Narellan Advertiser (4 August 2017) as one of the eight most haunted places in the Macarthur region. Journalist Ashleigh Tullis writes;
Studley Park House, Camden
This impressive house was originally built by grazier William Payne in 1889. The death of two children has earned the house its haunted reputation.
In 1909, 14-year-old Ray Blackstone drowned in a dam near the residence. His body is believed to have been kept at the house until it was buried.
The son of acclaimed business man Arthur Adolphus Gregory died at the house in 1939 from appendicitis. His body was kept in the theatrette.
Denbigh Homestead Open Day 2015 IWillis
In 2019 movie-making in the area continues with the 4th series of Doctor Doctor. Wikipedia states of the plotline:
Doctor Doctor (also known outside of Australasia as The Heart Guy[1]) is an Australian television drama that premiered on the Nine Network on 14 September 2016.[2] It follows the story of Hugh Knight, a rising heart surgeon who is gifted, charming and infallible. He is a hedonist who, due to his sheer talent, believes he can live outside the rules.
Camden was used as one location along with the historic colonial property of Denbigh. Mediaweek stated in 2016 (Sept 9):
The regional setting for the series has proven to be a benefit for narrative and practical production reasons. While all of the hospital scenes were filmed in a hospital in the Sydney inner-city suburb of Rozelle, exterior shooting took place in Mudgee, with filming of Knight’s home was shot in Camden. In addition to $100,000 worth of support from the Regional Filming Fund, the regional setting delivers a unique authenticity to the series that it would otherwise lack.
Sometimes the local area is used a set for an advertising campaign by a fashion label or some other business. The owners of Camden Park House posted on Facebook in August 2019 that the house and garden were used as a set by the Country Road fashion brand.
Country Road fashion shoot at Camden Park House. Have a peek at Camden Park House at the Country Road page and visit us on 21/22 Sept on our annual Open Weekend. (Camden Park House)
While no specific details about plotlines or particular actors were given away, the spokesman said the production was filming on August 7 at the Narellan Jets Football Club and Grounds, Narellan Sports Hub.
In 2020 the movie release of Peter Rabbit 2 highlights part of our local area. Press reports state that the production team were impressed with the local area for Peter Rabbit and they came back for the sequel. Visual effects supervisor Will Reichelt said that the Macarthur region resembled an ‘English country vista’.
Onset: Domnhall Gleeson and Rose Byrne (picture here filming a different scene) were on set in Brownlow Hill for the production of Peter Rabbit 2. Picture: Sony Pictures Australia/Wollondilly Advertiser 2020Mar13
Living history is all around you. You just need to take a deep breath, pause for a moment and listen to the history around you speak to you.
Vista of St John’s Church from Macarthur Park in 1910. Postcard. You can still view this vista near the showground from the town’s fringe. (Camden Images)
Camden living history
In the town centre of Camden, the historic precinct’s buildings and ambience speak to you if you pause and listen.
The Camden town centre and its multi-layered history are evident in the many different building styles as you walk along the main street.
If walls could talk, they would tell an exciting story that would immerse you in the past and present. They would provide a gripping account of the central characters in the stories.
The Camden Grammar School was located in Macaria in the 1890s. Macaria is open to the public and is the home of the Alan Baker Art Gallery located at 37 John Street, Camden. (Camden Images)
Living history is storytelling
Living history allows participants to read the layers of history of an area.
Living history is like peeling off layers of paint from a wall when viewers peel back the layers of history of a site, building or place. Each layer has a special meaning – a special presence.
Lived experience leads to storytelling which is genuine and authentic.
Storytelling creates the meaning of the past and the characters of the past in the present. It allows the past to speak to the present. Storytelling and stories are at the essence of place.
The living history movement
Living historian Scott Magelssen maintains that living history museums ‘engage strategies in their performance of the past’, claiming to be ‘real history by virtue of their attention to detail’. (pp. xii-xv)
One of the early influencers of the living history movement in North America was Henry Ford who established his indoor and outdoor living museum experience in the Detroit suburb of Dearborn in Michigan, USA. Henry Ford said of his museum.
I am collecting the history of our people as written into things their hands made and used…. When we are through, we shall have reproduced American life as lived, and that, I think, is the best way of preserving at least a part of our history and tradition…
St John’s Anglican Church Camden 2018. You can visit the historic St John’s church and precinct in central Camden. The church was built in the 1840s and funded by the Macarthur family. (I Willis)
Camden storytellers peel back the layers of the history of the town and district and reveal the tales of local identities, larrikins, characters, rascals, ruffians and ratbags.
There are several layers to the Camden story, and they are
Pre-European period of the Indigenous Dharawal people when they called the area Benkennie
The Cowpastures were named by Governor Hunter in 1795, and the establishment of the Cowpastures Government Reserve. Under European control, the Indigenous Dharawal people were dispossessed and displaced from their country. The Macarthur family’s Camden Park Estate started with the 1805 grant to John Macarthur.
The Camden township was established as a private venture of the Macarthur family in 1840. The streets were named after its founders – Macarthur, Elizabeth, John, and Edward.
The English-style Camden town centre has evolved and is represented by several historical architectural styles since 1840 – Victorian, Edwardian, Inter-war, and Mid-20th century. The town was the hub of the Camden District between 1840 and 1970s
The Macarthur region (1970s +), named after the famous local Macarthur family, grew as part of Sydney’s rural-urban fringe. It is made up of Camden, Campbelltown and Wollondilly Local Government Areas.
The bullock team walking up John Street for the 2018 Camden Show. Bullock teams were once a common sight in the Camden area before the days of motorised transport. The teamster monument in John Street celebrates theie role in the history of the district. Visit the Camden Show. (M Willis)
Immerse your imagination in the past at the Camden Museum through living history.
The Camden museum tells the Camden story through displays of artefacts, objects, memorabilia and other ephemera by using a living history approach.
The displays tell a story of an earlier period and allows visitors to immerse themselves in the past in the present.
Map of the Camden district in 1939 showing the extent of the area with Camden in the east. The silver mining centre of Yerranderie is in the west. (I Willis, 1996)
Walking the past through living history
Visitors to Camden can walk through the town centre and imagine another time. A time past that can be recalled through living history.
The Camden Show is an annual celebration of things rural in the township of Camden for over 100 years. The show is held each year in the Onslow Park precinct. (Camden Show)
The country comes to the city, or the city’s fringe, at least when the 2018 Camden Show comes alive.
The flower exhibits are in the Arts and Crafts section of the 2018 Camden Show. The exhibit was located in the 1890s Camden Show Pavilion and is an ever-popular part of the annual event. (I Willis)
The Camden Show is on again in 2018, and this year makes 132 years. The two-day event attracts around 30,000 visitors to the sleepy community of Camden on the Nepean River in what were the Cowpastures.
An aerial view of the 2018 Camden Show shows the historic Camden town centre at the top of the image. Onslow Park, Camden Showground, was gifted to the Camden community by the Macarthur family of Camden Park in the early 20th century. (B Atkins)
The country festival has all the events you expect of a large regional show, from horses to pumpkins to cakes to produce.
2018 Camden Show Produce display (I Willis)
A more traditional sideshow alley exists for the Mums, Dads, and kids with the Dagwood Dogs and show bag row.
For those searching for the country flavour, that is the drovers camp, milking display, pig-racing and ever-popular rodeo.
A rodeo is an ever-popular event at the 2018 Camden Show. Full of action and colour on Friday night. The cowboys proved that they were just as tough as the bulls. Have a great night. (B Atkins)
There are all the commercial stands you get at any country show, from the local tractor dealer to rainwater tanks and stock agents.
Not to be left out are all the community groups, from the scout’s rope construction to the CWA’s scones and cream.
2018 Camden Show CWA Stall (I Willis)
The local politicians want to shake your hands and get your vote.
There is a ute competition and dog championships with the general show exhibitions.
The show spills into the general town area with a shop window display and 2018 Camden Showgirl.
Two top local identities at the 2018 Camden Show. Daryl Sidman was a show steward for many years, a local businessman, and Corrine Fulford Miss Camden Showgirl 2018. They both posed for this photo in the entry of the 1890s Show Pavilion. (I Willis)
A crowd gathered in the main street for the bullock team, just like the old days when teamsters came up from the Burragorang Valley to Camden Railway Station.
The bullock team walking up John Street for the 2018 Camden Show. Bullock teams were once a common sight in the Camden area before the days of motorised transport. The teamster monument in John Street celebrates its role in the district’s history. (M Willis)
The rodeo and bull rides are all promoted with the slogan ‘Still a Country Show’.
A view of the Magistrate Court building at the UHPH Conference 2018 RMIT University at the corner of La Trobe and Russell Streets Melbourne. The city watch-house, used for holding alleged offenders until they were officially remanded or released on bail, operated on the site next to the Magistrates’ Court from 1892. (I Willis, 2018)
The eclectic mix of architecture at the RMIT La Trobe Street Campus ranged from venues that were located in magnificent Victorian colonial building used for the administration of justice to those that were examples of ultra-modern late 20th century style of architecture.
A view of one of the court rooms at the Magistrates Court Building RMIT University where some of the conference sessions were held during the conference. These court rooms provided a dramatic backdrop to the host of papers presented by conference delegates across the three day conference. (I Willis, 2018)
The Storey Meeting Hall of the Hibernian Australasian Catholic Benefit Society (1887) has been remade in modern form reliving its iconography as an important symbol of Melbourne’s social and political protest movement.
Morning and afternoon teas were taken in the alumni courtyard, which was previously the car park of the Russell Street Police Headquarters. The venue provided food for thought located next door to the Old Melbourne Gaol (1842). If these bluestone walls could speak they would tell harrowing tales from the the colourful past of the site.
A view of the Alumni Courtyard at RMIT University where the conference catering for morning and afternoon tea were held. The view of Melbourne city in the distance provides a contrast of urban development and growth for delegates. (I Willis, 2018)
The conference theme of ‘Remaking Cities’ was inspired by Melbourne as an exemplar of cities that are continually remade. Melbourne was a manufacturing centre, a site of land speculation and a place re-made on the land management practices of the Kulin nation.
The process of re-making Melbourne is underpinned by the processes of settler colonialism, speculation and taking of territory. These factors cast a long shadow of how a shared future might be achieved and the role of the planning processes within these processes.
Industrial growth and development are themes that have been central to the Australia’s nineteenth-century cities, including Melbourne, and their subsequent decline by the late 20th century. The post-manufacturing period provides a whole new set of challenges for cities like Melbourne as the financial, service and cultural sectors drive urban growth.
A view of the courtyard in the Francis Ormond Building at the RMIT University. The Francis Ormond Building is on the Register of the National Estate, classified by the National Trust, and designated a ‘notable building’ in the Melbourne City Council planning scheme. (I Willis, 2018)
This was a heady mix that was matched by the mix of 72 presentations from scholars, practitioners and community members across three separate streams. Delegates came from interstate and overseas (New Zealand) with a strong contingent of local Melbournites.
A view of some of the post-modern artwork at 330 Swanston Street, RMIT University, Building 22. The campus has much to offer the enthusiast for this style of architecture in the university setting. (I Willis, 2018)
There were sessions ranging from: planning histories; postwar campus; heritage; land speculation; music; maps; housing; rivers and wetlands; parks and gardens; museums; governance; transport; commerce; streetscapes; quarries; urban agriculture and food systems; placemaking; to Indigenous planning and policy.
The conference organising committee put out a book of abstracts and will publish the conference proceedings later this year.
A view of the Francis Ormond Building with the Pearson and Murphy’s Cafe in the foreground where patrons can take in the atmospherics offered by the Victorian style architecture while enjoying their coffee. The cafe was named after Charles Henry Pearson and William Emmett Murphy, who were key players in the original foundation of RMIT as the Working Men’s College back in 1887. (I Willis, 2018)
The entrance of The Old Melbourne Gaol in Russell Street Melbourne. Daily tours of the museum are well worth the effort where the visitor can view the cells and take in the atmospherics and witness Ned Kelly’s gallows. (I Willis, 2018)
Delegates were invited to dine beneath the gallows that famously ended the life of notorious bushranger Ned Kelly on 11 November 1880. Kelly is certainly one of the icons of Australian history and has inspired poetry, song, film, art and literature. He has variously been called a bushranger, larrikin, bushman, underdog and arguably an anarchist. The venue was heavy with the atmospherics of its history and delegates could wander in and out of the cells where they could walk the ground from the past.
The venue for the conference reception and dinner was The Old Melbourne Gaol. The venue reeks of atmosphere and for the ghoulish it is a ready site for investigating ghosts of the 133 who were hanged on the site from 1842. (I Willis, 2018)
The bluestone walls provided a ghoulish backdrop to the sounds of Melbourne trio The Orbweavers.
The conference organising committee are to be complemented on doing a grand job.
The Camden Australia Day celebrations opened with the awards at the Camden Civic Centre where the winners of the Camden Citizen of the Year were announced for 2018.
At a national level, there has been a debate about the date and the day. What does it mean? When should it be celebrated? Should it be celebrated at all?
The day, the 26th of January, is the foundation of the military penal settlement at Sydney Cove in 1788 and the anniversary of the coup d’etat against the Bligh colonial administration, popularly known as the Rum Rebellion.
By 1804, according to the National Australia Day Council, the day was being referred to as Foundation Day or First Landing Day in the Sydney Gazette.
On the 30th anniversary in 1818, Governor Macquarie declared a public holiday. In 1838, the 26th of January was celebrated as the Jubilee of the British occupation of New South Wales and the 2nd year of the Sydney Regatta that was held on the day. The annual Sydney Anniversary Regattas started in 1837.
Sydney Anniversary Day Regatta yacht race was held on the 26th of January in 1889. The day was cause for great celebration of what had been achieved by the colony of Sydney. Many tried to forget the convict origins of the day. (SLNSW)
On the centenary of the First Fleet’s arrival at Sydney Cove in 1888, the day was known as Anniversary Day or Foundation Day, and festivities were joined by Tasmania, Victoria, Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia and New Zealand. In 1915, Australia Day was shifted to the 30th of July to assist in fundraising for the Red Cross and other patriotic funds after the commencement of the Gallipoli campaign.
Australia Day 1915 was used for fundraising for patriotic funds following the opening of the Gallipoli campaign. In 1916, Australia Day was held on 28 July. Fundraising included street collections, stalls, sports days, concerts and a host of other events. In Camden, the Red Cross raised over £600 over a three-week period with a host of patriotic activities. (AWM)
It was not until the Australian Bicentennial that all states agreed to celebrate the 26th as Australia Day rather than as a long weekend. At the time, Aboriginal Australians renamed Australia Day ‘Invasion Day’, and there has been debate about it ever since.
In 2018, the Camden town centre was the annual street parade for the Australia Day celebrations with lots of keen participants.
The town crier, Steve Wisby, led the enthusiastic crowd in a rendition of the national anthem and then a rejoinder of Aussie, Aussie, Aussie, OOyy, OOyy, OOyy.
The parade included historical groups, school groups, community groups, a number of local bands, and emergency services.
Australia Day 2018 parade with 73rd Foot Regiment Re-enactment Group passing the enthusiastic crowd at the John Street corner (I Willis)
Australia Day 2018 parade in Argyle Street Camden here showing the FJ Holden Utility driven by society VP John Wrigley accompanied by Julie Wrigley. Car courtesy of Boardman family (I Willis)
Australia Day Parade 2018 in Argyle Street here showing the float of the Camden Show Society with Miss Camden Showgirl 2018, Corinne Fulford, sitting atop the hay bails. The Camden Show is the largest festival in the local area, attracting over 30,000 visitors to the town and the Camden Showground. (I Willis)
A large crowd lined Argyle Street to watch the parade organised by the Camden Lions Club and the many community groups and businesses that took part in it.
Australia Day Parade 2018 in Camden here showing the crowd milling about the John Street corner. John Street had a number of stalls and other entertainment. (I Willis)
David has been a local businessman for many years, and he is a descendant of one of the original European colonial settler families in the Cowpastures area.
He was a councillor on Camden Council (1977-1980, 2004-2012) and a member of a number of community organisations.
The other Camden Australia Day Award winners were: Community Group of the Year — Everyone Can Dance Charity and Camden Lioness Club Community Event of the Year — The Macarthur Lions Australia Day Parade Young Sportsperson of the Year — Amy and Natalie Sligar Sportsperson of the Year — Maddison Lewis Young Citizen of the Year — Lubna Sherieff.
These people are true local identities who all have stories to tell that become part of Camden’s sense of place and contribute to the development of community identity.
The Camden Museum was open for Australia Day. By the end of the day, hundreds of visitors had inspected the museum and its wonderful collection of local artefacts and memorabilia.
Australia Day 2018. The Camden Museum was open, and here are two enthusiastic supporters and volunteers for the museum. They are Frances and Harry Warner. These two larger-than-life Camden characters have spent their life devoted to the Camden community. They have lived and worked on Camden Park Estate for decades. (I Willis)
The Camden Museum was very busy with hundreds of visitors on Australia Day 2018. Here, some visitors are watching a video while others are inspecting the displays. Visitors came from all age groups and enjoyed the museum collection. (I Willis)
The Camden Historical Society volunteer coordinator reports that there were 644 visitors to the museum on the day made up of adults and children.
The visitors were looked after by 10 society volunteers who roamed around the museum, making sure that the day went smoothly and doing a sterling job answering their many questions.
Updated on 20 January 2024, Originally posted on 26 January 2018 as ‘Australia Day in Camden’
Review: Pictorial History Campbelltown & District. By Jeff McGill. Sydney: Kingsclear Books, 2017. Pp. iv + 139. Illustrations, index, select bibliography, paper. 978-0-99444456-2-9.
Local historian takes a fresh look at the Campbelltown story
Pictorial History Campbelltown and District set out to break the stereotypes that have plagued Campbelltown for decades. Local author and photographer Jeff McGill illustrates in his new publication how the city is multi-dimensional and has many facets to its character.
The book is a fresh look at a community through local eyes and shows the community’s vibrancy, enthusiasm and strength. It illustrates how the community has endured many challenges from the dreamtime to the present.
The cover of Jeff McGill’s Pictorial History Campbelltown and District (I Willis)
McGill’s use of images peels back the layers of meaning and reveals the heart of the city. Photographs demonstrate the dynamic nature of the community and how it has changed over time.
Historical photographs are a window into the past and provide a form of expression materially different from the written or oral record. Photographs are accessible and immediate to the viewer. They are unfiltered and provide meaning to the setting of the subject.
Historical photographs show an immense amount of detail and are an archive of meaning about the past. Quite often, the viewer feels that they are intruding on a private event or function.
Author Jeff McGill signing copies of his book standing next to the publisher Catherine Warne from Kingsclear Books at the Glenalvon launch of Pictorial History Campbelltown & District on Saturday, 9 December 2017 (I Willis)
While photographic images capture a moment in time, they also have deeper meanings. Just like the writer, the photographer is trying to say something in the formatting, structure and composition of the image. What is the message that the photographer is trying to tell the viewer?
Sometimes, the photograph poses a host of other questions. Why is the street not paved? Why is the women’s dress that long? Why are people wearing those funny clothes? Why are there cows in the paddock? Why are there no electricity poles? These are all part of the composition of the photographs in this pictorial history.
Campbelltown Railway Station, which opened in 1858. What is little understood is the importance of the rail link to people living in the Illawarra until the opening of Wollongong Railway Station in 1887. There was a daily coach service running between the station and Wollongong, which still persists today. (CAHS)
Jeff McGill provides a perspective of the lived local experience of Campbelltonian and a journalist’s nose for a good story. McGill has published a number of local histories that show the hand of someone who understands the nuances of small communities.
After growing up in Campbelltown and going to school in the city, McGill worked for the large metropolitan dailies. He then returned to Campbelltown so he could write stories about interesting people rather than those based on a hard-bitten sensationalist attitude to journalism in the big smoke.
It is this attitude that shone when the Macarthur Advertiser, under McGill’s editorship, took out two national awards for the best local newspaper in Australia. He has been praised for being a passionate Campbelltonian, and it shows in Pictorial History Campbelltown & District.
The images that McGill has chosen for the book show the same characteristics that are part of successful journalism in the provincial press. Each image tells a story about local characters and identities and capture a snapshot of a time long past. McGill’s deft eye for composition and impact as a photographer is clearly demonstrated in his layout work in the book.
A procession in Queen Street in 1910 was organised by the local Waratah and Wallaby Football Club. (CAHS)
The images are drawn from a range of archives – Campbelltown City Library, the Campbelltown & Airds Historical Society, many private collections, individual photographers and the author. Many of these images are not accessible to the general public in any form, and this publication breaks ground in this area. The book is complemented by a select bibliography and index.
Some of the images show important events which had repercussions on the national stage, like the election of the Whitlam government (p. 123), the First (pp. 54-61) and the Second World Wars (pp. 81-87).
Author and photographer, Jeff McGill showing off his latest publication at the Glenalvon launch on Saturday, 9 December 2017 (I Willis)
More than just a narrative Pictorial History Campbelltown & District is an entry point to the daily lives of those living in Campbelltown. The images are accompanied by a lively story about the characters and events from Campbelltown’s past.
The city has not always received good press in the Sydney metropolitan dailies, and this publication challenges these stereotypes. This collection of images provides a human side to the local story about real people with real lives who create a vibrant community.
The Campbelltown community has many community organisations that are the basis of the city’s resilience; one of these is the Campbelltown and Airds Historical Society, which contributed a number of images to the book. The society also provided the venue for the book launch in the wonderful atmospherics provided by Campbelltown’s historic house, Glenalvon.
Past president of the Campbelltown & Airds Historical Society introducing proceedings at the Glenalvon launch of Pictorial History Campbelltown & District on Saturday, 9 December 2017 (I Willis)
The gathering was introduced by past president Kay Hayes, followed by publisher Catherine Warne from Kingsclear Books. Catherine outlined the history of her firm over 30 years of publishing. She said that Campbelltown pictorial history was one of the last pieces of the jigsaw of the Sydney area for her firm. She had been trying to complete her coverage of the metropolitan area for many years, and this book was the first time that she has had an author take over the design work.
Publisher Catherine Warne from Kingsclear Books introducing author Jeff McGill’s Pictorial History Campbelltown & District at the Glenalvon launch on Saturday, 9 December 2017 (I Willis)
Jeff McGill then spoke about the gestation of the book, its development and fruition with the support of many people and organisations. Jeff outlined how there were lots of images that were considered for the book, and a culling process narrowed down the selection. The chosen were those who told a story or provided the greatest meaning to the Campbelltown story.
McGill made the point that quite a number of the images came from family photograph albums that he had been given access to over many years. This was the first time that they had been published. Jeff would visit local families and be given afternoon tea, and he would copy the images from the family album.
Raconteur, author and photographer Jeff McGill on the launch of his Pictorial History Campbelltown & District at Glenalvon on Saturday, 9 December 2017 (I Willis)
Jeff McGill’s Pictorial History Campbelltown & District provides a human side to the local story about real people with real lives who create a vibrant and wonderful community. The city has broken free of many of its stereotypes and ghosts, yet it still continues to face many challenges with a positive outlook on the future.
Updated on 6 October 2023. Originally posted on 11 December 2017 as ‘Local historian takes a fresh look at the Campbelltown story’.
A little known military facility in the local area during the First World War was the Australian Light Horse Camp based on the Menangle Park racecourse in 1916.
Drunken riots at Liverpool
The establishment of the camp was the result of drunken unrest amongst the troops at the Casula and Liverpool military camps in February 1916 that was later called the Battle of Central Station. These events also contributed to the success of the campaign for 6.00pm closing in New South Wales that was not repealed until 1955.
After the soldier riots the Casula camp was closed and the ‘troops in training’ were distributed to other camps, including one at Menangle Park in February 1916.
Menangle race track
Military authorities leased the race track off the Menangle Racing Club.
The racetrack was first surveyed by military authorities in January 1916, although Campbelltown Showground had been inspected in September 1915.
Poor conditions in camp
The conditions of the Menangle camp in March 1916 were less than adequate. One correspondent to the Sydney press complained the camp was unprepared and the men had to grub out stumps and prepare the site for a permanent camp.
The writer complained that the men were busy on labouring duties when they could have been busy doing military training.
It would have been more effective, the correspondent felt, for a private contractor to clear the camp site.
The ‘discontentment’ amongst volunteers was caused by ‘wasters’ who, apparently, were quite happy for labouring duties to continue for up to 6 months.
Manoeuvres
Training involved forced marches in the local area. In mid-1916 over 1000 men, accompanied by over 100 horses, marched to Camden through Campbelltown on manoeuvres headed by a military band.
They were marched to Camden showground where they were dismissed for an hour where they had lunch.
Soldiers in training from the Menangle Army Camp on a forced march passing along Argyle Street Camden 1916 (CIPP)
The Camden press reported that it was an imposing spectacle having such a large number of troops marching through the town area. The mayor, GF Furner, welcomed the troops to Camden and he then hosted the officers at lunch.
Officers of the Light Horse Camp, Menangle. European War, November, 1917. Back Row: Lt J Kemp-Bruce, Lt F A Jacobs, Lt R T Williams, Lt H W Veness, Lt R L Gates, Lt R V Moore, Lt N Cope. Second Row: Lt C H Bate, Lt M C Bowley, Lt D Drummond, Lt G D Donkin, Lt S L Molesworth, Lt R E McClelland, Lt J Bailey, Lt C Hely, Chaplain Capt Cock. Front Row: Lt M D Russell, Capt S F Betts, Capt RH Monro, Brig-Gen G L Lee, C M G, D S O, Lt-Col R W Lenehan, V D, Lt C A Mayes, Capt R A Lovejoy, Chaplain Capt Black. (Camden Museum)
According to the notes on the photograph:
Officers of the Light Horse Camp, Menangle. European War, November, 1917.
This photo was donated from “Camelot”. The Lt Clem Bate on the left end of the middle row was a friend of the Anderson Family and he probably gave them a copy. He was the uncle of Mr Jeff Bates who was an MHR for the Camden area for many years (as well as previously an MLA). The Lt R.V. Moore in the back row is Mr Val Moore of Glenmore, Camden. The Lt Veness in the back row is the other local in the photo. He came from Menangle.
Camel Corps
In June 1916 reinforcements for the Camel Corps were posted to Menangle camp for training and exercises. The Sydney press stated the Abdul Wade of Bourke had lent 6 camels to the army for training exercises at the camp for members of the Camel Corps. Four of the animals were for riding, while the other two were pack animals. They were sent to Menangle camp by rail from Bourke under the care of an Afghan camel driver.
The Australian War Memorial states that the Imperial Camel Corps (ICC) was formed in January 1916 in order to deal with the revolt of pro-Turkish Senussi tribesmen in Egypt’s Western Desert. The first four companies were recruited from Australian infantry battalions recuperating after Gallipoli. Four battalions were eventually formed up and units saw action in Palestine in 1917 and 1918. Units were disbanded in mid-1918.
Camel Corps at Menangle Army Camp 1917 (AWM)In July 1916 a further 1000 men from the Australian Light Horse and Trench Mortar Batteries at Menangle Camp did a route march through Camden. They stopped for lunch, after which they gave a demonstration of high explosives, grenades and bomb throwing for the amusement of the local community.
In July 1916 Colonel Lenohan, the officer in charge, stated the military band played at the camp every Sunday afternoon. He reported in the Camden press that he would welcome visitors and he offered to show them around the camp.
Red Cross
In early 1916 the Menangle Red Cross decided to donate a badly needed hospital tent to the Australian Light Horse at a of cost £34. It measured 20 x 30 feet (6×10 metres) and could be partitioned off and used for several purposes, or used as a whole for a camp hospital with a capacity of 14 beds.
The press report noted that it would ‘prove a boon to those recovering from sickness, or to any one ‘off colour’ and in need of a quiet rest and medical attention’. The cost of the tent ‘considerably diminish[ed]’ the cash reserves of the small Menangle Red Cross branch but was felt that it was greatly needed by the men.
In May 1916 Brigadier General Ramaciotti inspected the camp and stated that there was a fine billiard room for 10 tables under construction and a well-appointed canteen.
The Camden and Menangle Red Cross branches supplied the camp hospital with eggs, cakes, scones, pyjamas, hand towels, pillow slips, sheets, towels, and cakes of soap in 1916 and 1917.
The men’s Red Cross branches at Menangle and Camden sent across trays and bed rests that they constructed at their carpentry workshops.
Closure
As the hostilities on the Western Front wound down there was less need for training facilities and Menangle camp closed in May 1918.
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