Victoria - Colonial: 1854 - 1900.
Penola Line (No. 7 West).

 

By the mid 1860s, the situation for the basis of the future 1884 Penola line was:

Perhaps the most important network decision in relation to the two lines then called the Western Coast line and the Cross-Country Western Line was reflected in McGowan's Report for 1862 in which:

In 1866, the Penola line (as it was to be later called) from Streatham and the Narracoorte line from Streatham met at Hamilton. By then, the Penola line was proceeding north-west while the Narracoorte line was planned to proceed further to the north through Harrow.

The main developments defining the Penola line were:

    1. Hamilton to Portland branch;
    2. Hamilton to Casterton;
    3. Casterton to Merino branch;
    4. Link from Casterton (Vic.) to Penola (S.A.).
    5. Hamilton to Mortlake.
    6. Mortlake to Terang.

    7. An experiment at Casterton with wireless transmission.

This map leads to the Mount Gambier-Border Town lines.

 

 This map leads to the Narracorte Line and to the Border Town line.  

 

This map leads to the Ballarat No. 8 line.
This line leads to the S.A. No.1 line. This map leads to the Southern Coast line.
  This map leads to the Mount Gambier line and to the Cape Otway line.  

 

1. Portland to Hamilton line.

Hamilton
Detail of the Portland-Hamilton line.
Taken from a map in the 1887 Annual Report.
The blue lines are the telegraph lines. 		The Portland Guardian of 13 February 1860 reported that "when Mr. Mollison proposed in the House on the 7th inst. that a telegraph line should be erected between Portland and Hamilton, the Treasurer, Mr. McCulloch, declared there were no funds for such a purpose - softening his refusal, however, by the assurance that if there should be any spare money after the Estimates had passed, the project for a telegraph line from Portland to Hamilton would receive the attention of the Government". On 20 June 1860, the same source reported "I have it on good authority that Mr. Surveyor Lindsay Clarke has received instructions from the Surveyor-General to mark out a telegraph line from Portland to Hamilton".

On 17 August, the contract for the construction of the telegraph posts and wires between Hamilton and Portland had been obtained by Mr. Richard Woolley at £44 a mile - hence an amount of £2,143 . The Gazette of 29 January 1861 advised that the original tender for the line of Telegraph between Portland and Hamilton from R. Wooley and Co had been increased by £155 12s 10d for additional work required.

Work proceeded very quickly. The Portland Guardian of 31 August 1860 reported that "the agent for the contractors had visited Portland by the last arrival of the "Queen" and the work is being promptly proceeded with. A line from Digby (close to Merino) as well as from Hamilton is likely to be erected". The line passed through Branxholme and a place referred to as Gage's Inn which is in the vicinity of where Heywood is now located. It is unclear if a line from Branxholme to Merino was constructed but it can be assumed that it was constructed in 1861 - although it does not show on the map for the lines of telegraphs in 1866. By 1861, Merino was a developing centre and had an official Post Office.

The Argus of 6 November 1860 reported from Hamilton Spectator of 3 November 1860:

"We observe that the posts are now laid down to this end of the line, and as little time will be required to put them up, we may hope ere long
to have the pleasure of announcing the telegraph to Hamilton as a "great fact".

Not all was plain sailing however. The Portland Guardian of 20 November 1860 reported the following incident which would have taken place perhaps in October:

POLICE COURT. Thursday, 20th Nov., 1860.
Before J. Blair, Esq., P.M., T. Must, Esq., J.P. 
Daniel McQuarrie, manager for R. Woolley and Co., contractors for the Telegraph line between Portland and Hamilton, charged by the Secretary of the Road Board with obstructing the main road to Heywood by allowing fallen trees to remain thereon. The said McQuarrie have received official notice to remove the same.

W. Clapham, clerk of the Road Board Board sworn, proved the offence. The road in the nine mile forest is obstructed by fallen trees being allowed to remain on the road. It is a three chain road. The trees were fallen I understand by defendants orders. The road had been cleared of all fallen timber in 1:58. The timber is lying between the telegraph posts and the metalled road. 

T. Anderson, Road Board overseer, sworn, testified to the fallen timber lying on the road along the telegraph line. Defendant said : The pegs were put down by engineers and he had to follow them and clear 40 feet round each post. He did not know the road, if the line in some parts were the outside limit, the metalled road would be three chains from the telegraph line. William Williams, overseer of works on the tramway, sworn: Did not know of any obstruction; have never been instructed myself.

A nominal penalty of 40s. was imposed, and 4s 6d costs.

The McGowan Report for 1860 noted that "The line from Portland to Hamilton was reported completed on the 15th ultimo (15 January 1861) but from there being no funds for the erection of the requisite station buildings, it will be necessary to make some provisional arrangements for opening the communication; these I hope to complete and to have the line available within about six weeks".

The Hamilton Spectator of 23 March 1861 reported good news:

"Mr. McGowan, the General Superintendent of Telegraphs, arrived yesterday, bringing with him Mr. Shields, who is to be the operator at this station. Mr. McGowan inspected the new building intended for the Post Office and Telegraph Department and gave directions for a few necessary alterations. Although the posts are not all up, nor the line quite complete, Mr. McGowan contrived to send a message to Portland and receive an answer, thus establishing the fact of the line being in working order. It is, therefore, a matter for congratulation to the people of Hamilton and the district that this, to us, great work of telegraphic communication with our distant neighbours is so far accomplished. Mr. McGowan is a man of indomitable energy and promises that the line will be ready for public use at the new offices on Monday morning".

In 1877 - 17 years later - the Hamilton to Portland line was shifted to follow the line of railway. Tenders were called in June 1877 for contractors able to do this work.

 

2. Hamilton to Casterton.

When the Western line was being developed, the establishment of a Telegraph Office at Casterton was foreshadowed. The route for the second inter-colonial link then became closer to being a reality. Two lines were therefore constructed by separating the lines from Hexham - one north-west to Casterton and the other south to Warrnambool. It was then logical to construct the line east from Warrnambool.

The line was extended west from Hamilton to Casterton in 1865 with (finally) an intermediate telegraph station opening at Coleraine. When constructed, this line was part of the Cross-Country Western line as it was then called.

By the mid 1860s, the Mount Gambier-Portland line was at full capacity. At that stage, with a redefinition of the linkages then operating among the lines, a direct Ballarat to Casterton link was possible - and the region close to the South Australian border was all available. It then became possible to develop other South Australian stations with which to make a second or even a third intercolonial link.

The following developments took place in the Legislative Assembly in 1864:

On 29 October 1864, the Hamilton Spectator reported "The posts for the line of telegraph between Hamilton and Casterton are now going up. It is rather a pity that the contractors have selected one of the crookedest and ugliest posts of the whole lot to erect in front of the Victoria Hotel — the most prominent position of the whole town".

The Hamilton to Casterton line was completed in early 1865. As is common in so many situations, the line passed through Coleraine but the people of that place were denied a telegraph office for a further two years.

Even so, on 28 September 1867, a petition for judgement was lodged in Youn\g vs The Queen for £500 for the completion of the telegraph line from Casterton to the South Australian Border.

In 1896, two lines were dismantled and new lines erected on railway poles:

 

3. Casterton to Merino.

The Hamilton Spectator of 21 September 1878 reported on an official visit:

"Mr. Ross, M.L.C., the newly returned member for the Western Province, visited Merino last week, accompanied by Mr. Walter. The opportunity was taken to speak to him about the telegraph office which was promised for so many years. Mr. Ross has at once agreed to interest himself in it. Like Mr. Berry, he was surprised that we had no telegraph communication. I see a telegraph line is to be carried to Dimboola".

In 1879, a 12 mile branch line was extended from Casterton to Merino. That line would then have met the branch line constructed between Merino and Branxholme in 1861 (if it had been).

 

4. Anticipation of the Casterton-Penola link from the Victorian point of view.

In his 1864 Report, McGowan expressed his hopes for the line as follows:

"A .. security against absolute stoppage has been attained on the Western route by the provision of the interior line via Ballarat, Streatham, Hexham and Hamilton to Portland. This connection will be still further perfected when the extension now in progress between Hamilton and Casterton may have been completed and that line may have been extended from Casterton to Penola where it will join the line to Mount Gambier; this I hope to see accomplished within the present year".

In the Mount Gambier Border Watch of 1 July 1865, the following was reported: "Among other gossip of the day we hear that our Government talk of connecting the telegraph from Penola to Casterton. No doubt it will not take long to have a second over-land line between Adelaide and Melbourne which, in stormy weather, will be of great advantage from being exempt from many storms to which the coast line is subject".

Progress of the planning and construction of the line can be summarised as follows:

Additional and more complete details are provided elsewhere in the review of the South Australian links to and from Penola.

 

 

5. Hamilton to Mortlake.

By 1863, the telegraph line to Portland and Mount Gambier had been restructured to pass from Geelong through Colac and Camperdown and then to Warrnambool. In the Legislative Assembly of 20 November 1862, Mr. Morton gave notice that, next day, he would ask the Hon. the Postmaster-General if it was the intention of the Government to make provision on the Estimates for 1863, for the erection of telegraphic communication to Mortlake.

 

Hamilton to Hexham.

The Hamilton Spectator of 24 July 1863 noted the changes in strategy as follows:

"I hear that the telegraph is about being carried on from Hexham to Hamilton. How is that to be accounted for when the country from Streatham to your town is so much more favourable for its construction? The distance is much the same and the country a dead level, in manner of speaking, and above all, the road from Streatham to HamiltonThat link would be made in the context of the Narracoorte line. is part of the great western mail road. And again, in the event of connection with Ararat, what a short distance it would have to be carried on from Wickliffe. But in the event of the line being carried on as I mentioned at first, Ararat would be as far off as ever.

I trust, however, that every advantage etc will be well considered before a decision is finally arrived at. Next to a railway, the telegraph is the greatest necessary a civilized community possesses; and, though it is true, it may not always repay the expense of construction and its consequent working, for a considerable period of time in a thinly populated country, there are other advantages that more than compensate. Let alone the convenience of quickly transmitting intelligence of an important nature, who can avoid seeing what a beneficent agent it becomes in repressing crime? In my humble opinion, the circumstance of a telegraph station alone being in a neighbourhood is often as great a preventative of crime occurring as a strong body of police".

Ed: The newspaper makes no reference to the telegraphic connection having been made to Ararat in 1858 (see elsewhere).

It would appear that the Hamilton to Hexham line required demolishing the previous lines. The Gazette of 12 February notifies that a tender had been agreeed with E. L. Crowell for the removal and reconstruction of the telegraph line from Hexham to Hamilton at £37 15s 6d per mile (£833 2s).

By 1866, there was still an operational line from Raglan south to Hexham. By then, Hexham had been connected south-east to Mortlake. Another line from Hexham going north-west to Penshurst was being planned. It was therefore decided to direct the line from Hexham north-west to Hamilton

 

Hexham to Mortlake.

The Geelong to Camperdown line is discussed in the context of the Mount Gambier lines (along with the later inclusion on that line of Terang from 1871). There was therefore a gap between Camperdown and Hexham - although in McGowan's Report for 1862 he does anticipate the construction of a branch line from Hexham to Mortlake.

The Age of 21 June 1870 outlines some of the negative feelings the local electors are feeling:

"The Mortlake Despatch calls attention to the grievances of its district: "It has often been remarked that this portion of the district appears to be systematically cut off from the enjoyment of privileges in which other parts participate — it is so in respect to both our telegraphic and our postal arrangements. At the present time we have no direct telegraphic communication with either Warrnambool or Camperdown and, as the result , public suffer much inconvenience. The distance between this and Camperdown is only twenty-five miles via Terang while Warrnambool is thirty-five miles and yet a message sent from this place to either of those towns has to travel over half the colony before reaching its destination.

This ought not to be the case and we claim, for the residents of this district, that some change be made. As our business connections with the port of Warrnambool increase, it is but right that every facility should be afforded to the public for the transmission of business messages without the delay frequently caused by the existing lines being crowded. A short line to Terang would perhaps meet the case; if so, no time should be lost in representing the matter to the member for the county in order that steps may be taken to remedy the present evil in respect to our mail arrangements. We have so often referred to this subject that it is surely not the want of 'proper representation' that keeps our town and district debarred from more extensive mail communication.

The daily mail from Geelong affords much advantage to those transacting business with the city; but this cannot be taken as compensative for the loss of the mail from Hexham to Woorndo or to Darlington from this place. The idea that appears to obtain with the Government is that one large right will compensate for many small ones; hence we got a daily but lose our country mails. The district has, we affirm, a claim to increased mail accommodation. Tri-weekly mails for Lismore through to Warrnambool, and a bi-weekly from Wickliffe to Hexham or Mortlake, are necessary - and can be obtained by persistent action".

The Telegraph Office had opened at Mortlake on 17 June 1864 and created a line from Mortlake to Hamilton and beyond. It therefore formed the basis of the Penola line from Geelong. Indeed messages from Mortlake could be sent to Penola in 1867 - but the final link of the Penola line from Mortlake to Terang took another few years.

 

6. Mortlake to Terang.

The gap between Mortlake and Camperdown (opened in 1863) existed for quite some time. The Age of 21 June 1870 reported as follows:

"The Mortlake Despatch calls attention to the grievances of its district: "It has often been remarked that this portion of the district appears to be systematically cut off from the enjoyment of privileges in which other parts participate — it is so in respect to both our telegraphic and postal arrangements.

At the present time we have no direct telegraphic communication with either Warrnambool or Camperdown and, as the result, the public suffer much inconvenience. The distance between this and Camperdown is only 25 miles via Terang while Warrnambool is 35 miles, and yet a message sent from this place to either of those towns has to travel over half the colony before reaching its destination. This ought not to be the case and we claim for the residents of this district that some change be made. As our business connections with the port of Warrnambool increase, it is but right that every facility should be afforded to the public for the transmission of business messages without the delay frequently caused by the existing lines being crowded.

A short line to Terang would perhaps meet the case; if so, no time should be lost in representing the matter to the Member for the county in order that steps may be taken to remedy the present evil in respect to our mail arrangements. We have so often referred to this subject that it is surely not the want of 'proper representation' that keeps our town and district debarred from more extensive mail communication. The daily mail from Geelong affords much advantage to those transacting business with the city; but this cannot be taken as compensative for the loss of the mail from Hexham to Woorndo or to Darlington from this place. The idea that appears to obtain with the Government is that one large right will compensate for many small ones; hence we got a daily but lose our country mails. The district has, we affirm, a claim to increased mail accommodation. Tri-weekly mails for Lismore through to Warrnambool, and a bi-weekly from Wickliffe to Horsham or Mortlake are necessary and can be obtained by persistent action".

In the Victorian Legislative Assembly on 2 October 1873, the following statement was Ordered to lie on the table:

"TELEGRAPH LINE TO SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

Mr. WILSON asked the Postmaster General whether he had under his consideration the proposition of the South Australian Government to erect a second telegraph line between that colony and Victoria and, if so, what course the Government intended to take.

Mr. LANGTON read the following memorandum from Mr. Turner the assistant Postmaster General: "No proposition, so far as I am aware, has been received from South Australia on the subject of a second telegraph line between that colony and Victoria. There are already three wires in Victoria communicating with South Australia — two via the Western district and Mount Gambier and one via Ballarat, Beaufort, Streatham, Hamilton, Casterton and Penola. A proposition which originated in this department, and which harmonises with the South Australian scheme, has been under consideration for construction of a short line from Camperdown or Terang to Mortlake and it has been decided to carry out this work; so that the South Australian business need not necessarily be transmitted by way of the coast stations. The effect of this will be that messages can then be sent between Melbourne and Adelaide via Hamilton and Casterton and along the line about to be constructed by the South Australian Government without being repeated at Mount Gambier as at present.
W. TURNER. General Post-office Oct. 2, 1873".

The Hamilton Spectator of 28 January 1874 reported: "Tenders have been invited, before the 17th February, for constructing a line of telegraph between Terang and Mortlake, via Kolora and Glenormiston. We wonder when the promised lines to Hamilton and Horsham will be commenced".

That connection completed the direct inland Penola line. This line had been easy to form (once all the chatter stopped) yet it was critical to the proper operations of telegraphic communications in Victoria. The traffic with South Australia was increasing very quickly and indeed this line was in constant for many hours each day.

In 1894 the Hamilton-Penshurst line was dismantled and replaced with an 18 mile line as too was the 13 mile line between Mortlake and Terang.

 

Wireless Telegraph

While the first coastal radio stations were being established starting with Sydney and Fremantle, another experiment was being commenced in Victoria. The Portland Guardian of 22 December 1913 reported the situation after a number of failed attempts by the residents of Strathdownie and Casterton:

"WIRELESS TELEGRAPH: The advantage of having an energetic businessman at the head of affairs in a Government department is emphasized in the promptitude with which steps have been taken to proceed with the installation of wireless telegraph stations at Casterton and Strathdownie which were authorised by the Postmaster-General (Hon. Agar Wynne) only a few days ago. Mr. Donald Macdonald, Engineer of the department, came to Casterton on Monday night and on Tuesday visited Strathdownie. He located a site near the hotel and store, which he will recommend to be purchased, and obtained other data for preparing plans for the local station. On Thursday he obtained similar data for the Casterton station, which is to be worked from a mast on top of the Post Office. It is expected these stations will be in use within the next two months. These stations, which are estimated to cost not more than about £200 each (as against from £2,500, to £3,000 expended on each of the big coastal stations), cost very little for maintenance and are being erected, partly to provide through communication with the most powerful long service station at Mt. Gambier, by which they will be controlled and partly as an experiment for inland usage".

 

The 1890 classifications.

By 1890, increased construction and a re-configuring of the linkages meant that there were three lines in lieu of the single Penola line and its branches. Those lines which were not solely for telephones were:

Line 7: Melbourne through Newport Test Box, Werribee, Geelong, Colac, Camperdown, Terang, Mortlake, Hexham, Caramut, Penshurst, Hamilton, Coleraine, Casterton, then across the S.A. border to Penola.
Line 98: Portland through Heywood, Condah Railway, Branxholme to Hamilton.
Line 107: Casterton to Merino.