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Newcastle, New South Wales

City in New South Wales, Australia

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The Custom House, Newcastle, NSW, 28 September 2018. Built 1877 by New South Wales Colonial Architect James Barnet and extended 1899 in similar Italianate Renaissance Revival style. Now a hotel.
Hugh Llewelyn · CC BY-SA 2.0

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Located at the mouth of the Hunter River, it is the predominant city within the Hunter Region. Famous for its coal, Newcastle is the largest coal exporting harbour in the world, exporting 143 million tonnes of coal in 2022. Beyond the city, the Hunter Region possesses large coal deposits. Geologically, the area is located in the central-eastern part of the Sydney Basin.

History

Aboriginal history

Newcastle and the lower Hunter Region were traditionally occupied by the Awabakal and Worimi Aboriginal people, who called the area Malubimba.

Based on Aboriginal-language references documented in maps, sketches and geological descriptions, eight landmarks have been officially dual-named by the NSW Geographic Names Board with their traditional Aboriginal names. They include Nobbys Head also known as Whibayganba; Flagstaff Hill also known as Tahlbihn; Pirate Point also known as Burrabihngarn; Port Hunter also known as Yohaaba; Hunter River (South Channel) also known as Coquun; Shepherds Hill also known as Khanterin; Ironbark Creek also known as Toohrnbing and Hexham Swamp also known as Burraghihnbihng.

British exploration

In June 1796, a group of fishermen from the British convict outpost at Sydney, were driven by bad weather into a harbour at what is now Newcastle. They found considerable amounts of coal lying on the ground near the beach, some of which they brought back to Sydney. The fishermen had "conducted themselves improperly" while ashore and gotten into conflict with the local Aboriginal people. Two of the fishermen were wounded, one of them fatally.

Over a year later, in September 1797, Lieutenant John Shortland explored the area and named the Hunter River. This was largely accidental, as he had been sent to the region in search of a number of convicts who had seized a vessel called Cumberland while it was sailing from Sydney Cove. Lieutenant Shortland entered what he later described as "a very fine river", which he named after New South Wales' Governor John Hunter. He returned with reports of the deep-water port and the area's abundant resources of coal and cedar.

Early coal and cedar operations

Over the next two years, influential colonists like Simeon Lord and James Underwood sent vessels and workers to the region to extract the valuable coal and cedarwood. Some of these workers skirmished with local Awabakal men, and an armed party under Henry Hacking was dispatched to investigate, which resulted in the shooting of several Aboriginal people. Coal mined from the area was the New South Wales colony's first export.

First attempt at British settlement

In 1800, fifteen convicts seized a small supply ship from the Hawkesbury River and sailed it to the mouth of the Hunter River where it was wrecked. Three of the surviving convicts became the area's first British residents when they were adopted into a local Aboriginal clan. A year later, Philip Gidley King, the Governor of New South Wales, decided to send a surveying expedition under Colonel William Paterson and Francis Barrallier to assess the feasibility of establishing an official settlement. Paterson returned with a positive account outlining the cedar and coal resources, and also the massive loads of oyster shell middens which could be utilised for much needed lime mortar.

Subsequently, later in 1801, a convict camp called King's Town (named after the governor) was established to mine coal and cut timber. The convicts, numbering under twenty, were treated harshly and mutinied twice in six months before Governor King decided to abandon the settlement in February 1802.

Newcastle convict colony

Establishment

A convict settlement was again attempted in 1804, as a place of secondary punishment for unruly convicts. The settlement was named Coal River, also Kingstown and then renamed Newcastle, after the English city. The name first appeared by the commission issued by Governor King on 15 March 1804 to Lieutenant Charles Menzies of the marine detachment on HMS Calcutta, then at Port Jackson, appointing him superintendent of the new settlement.

The first consignment, consisting of 34 convicts and a military guard, arrived at the Hunter River on 27 March 1804 in three ships: HMS Lady Nelson, the Resource and the James. The convicts were Irish rebels from the 1804 Castle Hill convict rebellion. Newcastle gained a reputation as a "hellhole" as it was a place where the most dangerous convicts were sent to dig in the coal mines as harsh punishment for their crimes. The link with Newcastle upon Tyne, England (its namesake) and also whence many of the 19th-century coal miners came, is still obvious in some of the place-names—such as Jesmond, Hexham, Wickham, Wallsend and Gateshead. Morpeth, New South Wales is a similar distance north of Newcastle as Morpeth, Northumberland is north of Newcastle upon Tyne.

In 1805, Menzies resigned as commandant, with Cadwallader Draffin being promoted to the role. He was soon found to be mentally unstable and in turn was quickly replaced by the medical officer of the settlement, Charles Throsby. Throsby brought order and discipline to the convict colony, where the prisoners were set to work securing coal, cedar and salt from sunrise to sunset.

Development

In 1808, Lieutenant William Lawson was appointed as commandant. Lawson was a member of the Rum Corps who overthrew Governor William Bligh. Associates of Bligh, such as Henry Browne Hayes were sent as convicts to Newcastle where Lawson treated them harshly. Under Lawson, the severe work of manual limeburning was commenced, where the convicts were forced to burn and carry caustic unslaked lime through seawater to load onto barges.

Lawson was replaced in 1810 and a period of relatively merciful administration followed under the command of several military officers. In early 1816, Newcastle's first school opened with seventeen pupils in attendance.

Under Captain James Wallis, commandant from 1816 to 1818, the convicts' conditions improved, and a building boom began. Captain Wallis laid out the streets of the town, built the first church of the site of the present Christ Church Cathedral, erected the old gaol on the seashore, and began work on the breakwater which now joins Nobbys Head to the mainland. The quality of these first buildings was poor, and only the (much reinforced) breakwater survives. Wallis also established a female factory on Nobbys Head for insubordinate women convicts. This scheme was short-lived due to the terrible conditions endured by the women.

Increased severity under Major Morisset

A major enquiry beginning in 1819, led by John Bigge, investigated the management of the British convict colonies in Australia. Bigge recommended that the treatment of convicts be more severe to act as an increased deterrent to crime. Major James Morisset was appointed commandant at Newcastle in 1819 and a subsequent increase in harsh punishments of the convicts occurred. Floggings and solitary confinement became more common, and unruly female convicts were placed in neck irons and worked in chain gangs. Morisset had a flogging apparatus built into his boat to act as a mobile place of punishment when he toured the farms along the Hunter River worked with convict labourers. Convicts who laboured in the cramped underground coal mines were each expected to produce up to two and a half tons of coal per day. The shafts were consistently knee-deep with water and the convicts had to remain in their wet clothing. Despite being overworked and having insufficient rations and poor housing, Morisset had the convicts carve him an ocean bath (termed the Bogey Hole) into the rock shelf near Newcastle.

Morisset also increased surveillance around Newcastle to locate and capture runaway convicts. He established a military outpost in Port Stephens at a place which is still called Soldier's Point. He also expanded the use of local Aboriginal men to act as trackers to locate, disable and sometimes kill fugitive convicts. Men such as Biraban, Burigon and Bob Barrett became well-known in this role and were reviled by the convicts. When Burigon was murdered by prisoner John Kirby, Morisset had the convict arrested and charged. Kirby was later executed.

Closure of the convict settlement

Newcastle became open to free settlement from 1822. The large agricultural corporation, the Australian Agricultural Company, took up its immense land grant north of Port Stephens in 1824, while wealthy colonists around the same time starting carving out estates along the upper Hunter River. Prisoner numbers were gradually reduced from around 1,000 to 100 (most of these were employed on the building of the breakwater), and the remaining 900 were sent to the newly-formed penal colony at Port Macquarie. The convict colony at Newcastle was closed in 1826.

Civilian government and onwards

After the closure of the convict settlement in 1826, the town was freed from the infamous influence of penal law. It began to acquire the aspect of a typical British colonial settlement, and a steady flow of colonists and their convict labourers poured into the hinterland. However, Newcastle itself initially faced a decrease in population with an observer stating in 1827, that the number of Aboriginal people in the township at least equalled that of the white population.

During the nineteenth century the formation of the Newcastle & Hunter River Steamship Company saw the establishment of regular steamship services from Morpeth and Newcastle with Sydney. The company had a fleet of freighters as well as several fast passenger vessels, including the PS Newcastle and the PS Namoi. The Namoi had first-class cabins with the latest facilities.

Because of the coal supply, small ships plied between Newcastle and Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne and Adelaide, carrying coal to gas works and bunkers for shipping, and railways. These were commonly known as sixty-milers, referring to the nautical journey between Newcastle and Sydney. These ships continued in service until recent times.

1920s to present

During World War II, Newcastle was an important industrial centre for the Australian war effort. In 1942, the Japanese planned to attack Sydney Harbour. On the early hours of 8 June, the Japanese submarine I-21 briefly shelled Newcastle. Among the areas hit within the city were dockyards, the Newcastle Steelworks, Parnell Place in the city's East End, the breakwall and Art Deco Ocean baths. There were no casualties in the attack and damage was minimal.

The Port of Newcastle remains the economic and trade centre for the resource-rich Hunter Valley and for much of the north and north-west of New South Wales. Newcastle is the world's largest coal export port and Australia's oldest and second-largest tonnage throughput port, with over 3,000 shipping movements handling cargo of 95.8 Mt per annum, of which coal exports represented 90.8 Mt in 2008–09. The volume of coal exported, and attempts to increase coal exports, are opposed by environmental groups including Newcastle-based Rising Tide Australia. These have undertaken various protests targeting the export of coal from the city, such as in 2023 when 3000 people took part in a water based blockade and 109 were arrested.

Newcastle had a shipbuilding industry with the Walsh Island Dockyard & Engineering Works, State Dockyard and Forgacs Shipyard. In recent years the only major ship-construction contract awarded to the area was the construction of the Huon-class minehunters. The era of extensive heavy industry passed when the steel works closed in 1999. Many of the remaining manufacturing industries have located themselves well away from the city itself.

Newcastle has one of the oldest theatre districts in Australia. Victoria Theatre on Perkins Street is the oldest purpose-built theatre in the country. The theatre district that occupied the area around what is now the Hunter Street Mall vanished during the 1940s. The old city centre has seen some new apartments and hotels built in recent years, but the rate of commercial and retail occupation remains low while alternate suburban centres have become more important. The CBD itself is shifting to the west, towards the major urban renewal area known as "Honeysuckle". This renewal, to run for another 10 years, is a major part of arresting the shift of business and residents to the suburbs. Commercial renewal has been accompanied by cultural renaissance. There is a vibrant arts scene in the city including a highly regarded art gallery, and an active Hunter Writers' Centre. Recent fictional representations (for example Antoinette Eklund's 'Steel River') present a new vision of the city, using the city's historic past as a backdrop for contemporary fiction.

The old central business district, located at Newcastle's eastern end, still has a considerable number of historic buildings, dominated by Christ Church Cathedral, seat of the Anglican Bishop of Newcastle. Other noteworthy buildings include Fort Scratchley, the Ocean Baths, the old Customs House, the 1920s City Hall, the 1890s Longworth Institute (once regarded as the finest building in the colony) and the 1930s art deco University House (formerly NESCA House, seen in the film Superman Returns).

On 28 December 1989, an earthquake shook Newcastle, measuring a local magnitude of 5.6 on the Richter scale. It resulted in 13 deaths, making it as one of Australia's most serious natural disasters.

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