John Mannion has told us already that 17 or 18 men were selected to train in Peterborough, South Australia, as railway cleaners and porters. They were chosen from a group of 62 men sent from Bonegilla to Wolseley, in South Australia, to work for South Australian Railways. The men selected for training in Peterborough had been picked because of their good English language skills.
Led by Girts Broders, the whole group of 62 had been moved rapidly on from the town of Wolseley, on the Adelaide-Melbourne line, to their own camp by the railway line at a rural locality called Bangham. They had left Bonegilla on 13 January 1948, probably reached Bangham on 14 January and were to start work on 15 January (according to the Border Chronicle of that date).
It's likely that Google's suggested bike path from Wolseley to Bangham
follows the railway line, closed to passenger traffic in 1990
The chosen 17 or 18 reached Peterborough on 23 February. At a guess, they had left Bangham either early on 23 February or on the previous Friday, 20 February. Either way, it means that they had experienced more than a month of work and rest in the Bangham camp.
Why were they in Bangham and what life like for these men?
As in other parts of Australia, different interests had built railway lines with different gauges for different purposes. Broader gauges are more expensive to build but provide better running properties of the train, higher load capacities even on poor ground, and higher speeds.
Broad gauge, 5 feet 3 inches or 1600 mm wide, and also known as Irish gauge, was used in Adelaide. Standard gauge, 4 feet 8½ inches or 1435 mm, had been legislated in South Australia in 1847, but the company building the first railway in New South Wales in the early 1850s had decided to use broad gauge. That led to South Australia (and Victoria) also ordering broad gauge trains and rolling stock.
Meanwhile, the original NSW engineer resigned and the new one persuaded all around him to use standard gauge instead. The NSW Parliament passed an Act declaring that standard gauge was the go. It was too late to cancel the South Australian and Victorian orders. Thus began what is now known as Australia’s “gauge muddle”.
Of more importance to us, narrow gauge in Australia is 3 ft 6 in or 1,067 mm. This was the gauge employed when railways were built through the agricultural areas of south-east South Australia. In the long run, this had led to problems, not the least of which was connectivity with the broad gauge chosen for rail in the Adelaide area.
The South Australian Parliament's Broadening of Gauge (South-Eastern Railways) Act , which received the Governor’s assent on 30th November 1944, permitted that “the South Australian Railways Commissioner … alter from three feet six inches to five feet three inches the gauge of the lines of railway between Wolseley and Mount Gambier and between Mount Gambier and Millicent … ”
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| Portion of a 1910 map showing South Australian railway lines from Wolseley to Mt Gambier; although not shown on the map, the line from Wolseley to Melbourne had been opened in 1887; Bangham is midway between Custon and Frances in the north (top) Source: National Library nla.obj-234151847 |
The massive size of the task was illustrated in a talk given to members of the Mount Gambier Rotary Club by the Engineer in Charge of the project and reported in the Border Watch of 25 September 1948. The Engineer in Charge was EL Walpole.
His explanation of the use of narrow gauge in Australia was that most narrow gauge lines went a short distance inland from the ports, and it was never conceived that they would eventually link with the broad gauges. However, that did happen, and many broadening projects had to be carried out.
Rails for the new south-east South Australian line weighed 82 pounds to the yard (37 Kilos to 0.9 metre), twice with the previous weight, he said. The new track would consist of six lengths of 40 feet welded together, that is 240 feet or 80 yards, each weighing 6560 pounds or 2976 Kg, nearly 3 tonnes.
The rails were made in Newcastle, New South Wales, and shipped to Mile End, in Adelaide, where they were placed on special trains and taken to the re-laying site. Each train carried 48 of those 6 by 40 feet rail lengths, together weighing more than 140 tons (130 tonnes). The 130 tonnes was good for two rails on each side of one mile of new track.
Trains were loaded in such a way that after the trans-shipping at Wolseley, the first rail to be laid was on top of the train. The trans-shipping was quite a simple matter, according to Mr Walpole. Sixteen men with bars slid them across the skid platform. However, every care had to be taken, as the job could be dangerous.
No wonder Mr Walpole said that the job could be dangerous! Sixteen men handling a rail weighing nearly 3 tonnes means each man being responsible for 188 kg. That would be more than twice their own body weight for the Baltic men, who had been starving or near-starving for most of the previous 7 years.
Steel cables, 70 feet or 21 metres in long, were used to unload the rails where they were to be laid, and the system worked so that each rail fell in exactly the right position.
So apparently this was the work to which the 62 men selected at the Bonegilla camp were to be sent. I expect that the nature of the work was not explained in detail beforehand, nor were they given the opportunity to opt out.
However, and as we have heard and read many times before, they were selected because of their physiques and labouring potential, not because of their intelligence or education.
Mr Walpole stressed the need for great care in laying ballast, which we have to hope was the job our 62 were more likely to be doing as it was less dangerous and required less skill. Mr Walpole also stressed correct drainage under the rails as, on the existing line, where there was no drainage, they had found some ballast pushed 14 feet or 4 metres under the track.
Ballast was one of the greatest problems for the track. Each mile needed 2,530 imperial tons or 2,300 tonnes of stone. Obtained from Tantanoola, near Mt Gambier, an extinct volcano, the stone was of first-class quality, and was being taken to the new line in train loads of more than 250 tons or 227 tonnes.
Working six days a week, and 24 hours a day, nine of these train loads were required for one mile of track. Consisting of crushed rock of 2½ inches (6 cm) and under, the ballast was run out in 40-ton (36-tonne) hoppers, and spread with a broad gauge plough, which had been converted to narrow gauge work, and did the work of 1,000 men. Each sleeper was packed with 9 inches (23 cm) of ballast, and at the edge of the drainage shoulder, it was increased to 10 or 10½ inches (25.5-26.7 cm).
(Why the project was using a plough converted from broad to narrow gauge work to build a broad gauge line is beyond modern understanding, but that’s what the reporter for the Border Watch wrote.)
Finalising the spreading the ballast was a job for fettlers, who had to ensure that the track was in “fine fettle” before the sleepers and rails were laid. We have to hope that the men from Bonegilla were employed in this less skilled and less dangerous work.
When relaying the gauge, the existing track was jacked up, the sleepers were knocked off, and the broad gauge sleepers slipped in. The broad gauge rails were then lowered. It took anything up to an hour to place a length of 80-pound (36-Kg) rail.
During cool weather, long lengths could be run out and left until the ballast packing could be done. In warm weather, the rails would tighten up, so they could not be left exposed for very long. It was found on one new line being laid in another area that rails left over the weekend without the ballast pack had moved 10 feet (300 cm) out of alignment.
Sleepers came from Western Australia and were mainly jarrah. They weighed 200 tons (181 tonnes) to the mile, which was heavier than the rails. It took 2130 sleepers to lay a mile, and they went roughly 11 to the ton (or roughly 12 to the metric tonne).
The authorities hoped that the line would reach Naracoorte sometime in 1949, and Mount Gambier possibly two years beyond that.
As an example of the time it took to plan and carry out the work, Mr Walpole said that on the Adelaide-Perth line, planning commenced in September 1923 and the work was completed on 1 August 1927. "There were 960 men on that job, but we are working with 180, including staff. Of these 70 are Balts, and they are very fine men," concluded Mr Walpole.
Seventy men clearly is more than the original 62. While 17 or 18 had been moved on to Peterborough, and Girts Broders probably had left for Canberra, more would have been sent from Bonegilla.
One month after Mr Walpole addressed the Rotarians, the Minister for Railways was telling the Parliament in October 1948 that 30 miles (48 Km) of earthworks, 25 miles (40 Km) of bridges and culverts and a further 20 miles (32 Km) of track were ready on the 48 miles (77 Km) between Wolseley and Naracoorte. Three station yards had been completed and another two were progressing well. The Wolseley to Naracoorte section could be completed in only another 10 months, if only the Minister could get an extra 250 men.
CR Cameron was at the other extreme of the industrial relations curve from the Engineer in Charge, but he too argued that the “men appeared to be fine types and are in good physical condition”. You may remember Clyde Cameron’s name from his time as a Minister in the Whitlam Government, including as Minister for Labor and Immigration in 1974-75.
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| Clyde Cameron in 1960 Source: National Archives of Australia |
When he wrote this comment in the national newspaper of the Australian Workers Union (AWU), the Australian Worker, he was the Union’s South Australian State President/Secretary and a federal Vice-President. The AWU also is regarded as having been Australia’s most powerful union at the time, perhaps for all time. His views should have carried some weight.
To further assuage the concerns of unionists, Clyde added that “the Balts who have settled in Australia during past years proved themselves to be good unionists, and it can, therefore, be assumed that the new arrivals can be relied upon to uphold the traditions of Australian Trade Unionism.”
Indeed, on both 7 April and 5 May 1948, the Australian Worker reported that G. Broders had paid cash to the South Australian Branch of the AWU: the large sum of £39/15/- ($79.50) in the first instance. Both payments would have been Union membership fees collected from the other First Transporters.
Next: What were conditions like for these unionised refugees at the Bangham camp?
Sources
Advertiser (1948) 'Broadening S.-E. Rail Gauge, Labour shortage delays work' Adelaide, SA, 14 October, p1 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article43786966 accessed 19 April 2024.
Australian Worker (1948) 'Baltic Workers for S.A. Employed on A.W.U. Jobs' Sydney, 21 January p 8 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/146246762 accessed 19 April 2024.
Australian Worker (1948) 'Cash Received', Sydney, 7 April, p 10 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/146243770 accessed 19 April 2024.
Australian Worker (1948) 'Cash Received', Sydney, 5 May, p 11 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/146245052 accessed 19 April 2024.
Border Chronicle (1948), '62 Balts at Bangham, to help broaden rail gauge', Bordertown, SA, 15 January, p 1 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/212918125 accessed 19 April 2024.
Border Watch (1948) ‘Broad Gauge Engineer Gives Amazing Facts Of Huge Undertaking’ Mount Gambier, SA, 25 September, p 6, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/78591298 accessed 19 April 2024.
Broadening of Gauge (South-Eastern Railways) Act (No 15 of 1944), https://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdb/au/legis/sa/num_act/bogra15o1944454/ accessed 15 April 2024.
Guy, Bill (2008) ‘Clyde Robert Cameron (1913–2008)’, Labour Australia, https://labouraustralia.anu.edu.au/biography/cameron-clyde-robert-32947 accessed 17 April 2024.
National Archives of Australia, Australian News and Information Bureau, Canberra; A1200, Black and white photographic negatives and prints, single number series with 'L' [Library] prefix, 1911-1971; L36210, TITLE: Personalities - Clyde R Cameron MP (WA) CATEGORY: photograph FORMAT: b&w negative TYPE: cellulose acetate STATUS: preservation material, 1960-1960; https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/DetailsReports/PhotoDetail.aspx?Barcode=11223331 accessed 19 April 2024.
Wikipedia, ‘Clyde Cameron' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clyde_Cameron, accessed 17 April 2024.
Wikipedia 'Melbourne–Adelaide rail corridor' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melbourne%E2%80%93Adelaide_rail_corridor, accessed 19 April 2024.
Wikipedia 'Narrow Gauge Railways in Australia' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narrow-gauge_railways_in_Australia accessed 19 April 2024.
Wikipedia 'Rail Transport in New South Wales' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_New_South_Wales accessed 19 April 2024.
Wikipedia 'Rail Transport in South Australia' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_South_Australia accessed 19 April 2024.
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