1. The context of the SA-Victoria first line.
The critical barrier for telegraph lines to reach the Victorian border was crossing the Murray River or crossing the outfall of the Murray at Lake Alexandria. Decisions to be made included:
There were two South Australian lines which crossed South Australia from Adelaide and then linked to Victoria in the 1800s:
In addition, there were two additional lines which crossed from the south-east area of South Australia to Victoria:
The links to other Colonies were:
2. The early actions to construct the line.
Charles Todd was a visionary and held the dream of linking Australia with the world (i.e. with England). His success with the Adelaide to Port line immediately led him to begin the second stage of his vision - to link Adelaide and Melbourne. He therefore called on Sir Richard McDonnell, the Colonial Governor, and informed him that the link to Melbourne was "of prime importance". At that time, the Victorian goldfields were producing significant amounts of ore, the prospectors were increasing in numbers - and many of the inhabitants of the Victorian gold fields wanted to eat South Australian flour and wheat.
On 4 April 1856 - about 6 weeks after his successful opening of the first South Australian lines to Port Adelaide and Semaphore - the Colonial Secretary moved an address in the Legislative Council requesting the Governor to communicate with the Government of Victoria as to the establishment of an electric telegraph between Melbourne and Adelaide. This motion was carried. Later that month, the Governments of Victoria and South Australia entered into an agreement to establish an inter-colonial telegraph line.
In July 1856, Todd went to Melbourne and met his counter-part Samuel McGowan. They developed a joint proposal for their respective Governments underlining the need and feasibility of a telegraphic link between the two Colonies. Their proposal was accepted immediately. All parties concerned could see that it was highly desirable for New South Wales also to be included as soon as possible. Hence the concept of a national Australia-wide telecommunications network was born.
As he returned to Adelaide, Todd detoured and personally surveyed the 300 mile route the line would follow from Portland near the Victorian border to Adelaide. It had been agreed that there would only be one South Australian station with which the Victorian lines could link - at Mount Gambier - "the intervening country, for 180 miles (in South Australia) being little better than a desert" (see p.12 of the Report). The South Australian Legislature approved Todd's recommendations and voted £20,500 to erect their component of the line.
Tenders were advertised in the Gazette and in newspapers (South Australian and those in other Colonies) on and about 18 February 1857 in the following terms:
"Electric Telegraph. - Tenders are invited and will be received at the Chief Office of the Magnetic Telegraph, Adelaide, South Australia, until Monday, the 9th March next on the part of the Government, for the erection of a line of Electric Telegraph from Adelaide to the South-eastern frontier of the colony, at or near the mouth of the Glenelg. The line will be in the three following divisions:
- From Adelaide to Port Elliott and Goolwa (about 65 miles).From Goolwa to Guichen Bay (about 145 miles).
- From Guichen Bay, via Mount Gambier, to the frontier near the mouth of the Glenelg (about 115 miles).
Persons Tendering may Tender for tho whole line, or separately for each of the foregoing divisions. The Tender should state the sum per mile for which the work will be undertaken".
The contract for the erection of the line was awarded to Mr. Thompson of O'Halloran Hill at £40 per mile for 300 miles.
3. Construction of the No. 1 line:
On 25 August 1857, the foreign press (in the guise of the Sydney Morning Herald) printed the following informative account:
"The posts for the magnetic telegraph which is to connect Adelaide with Melbourne, and, eventually, with the whole world, are already fixed for a number of miles along the South road, and also for a considerable distance north-westward, commencing at the border. In Victoria too, the work is in progress.
But the actual commencement of the connection may be considered to have been made on Saturday last, when his Excellency Sir Richard Graves MacDonnell, Governor-in-Chief of South Australia, attached the first wire to its bearing in front of the General Post Office at the corner of King William and Franklin Streets. After the connection of the wire had been completed, His Excellency came forward and, addressing the crowd beneath the platform, stated that Mr. Todd, of whose indefatigable and skillful exertions to promote the extension of telegraphic communication in South Australia he could not speak too highly, having particularly requested him to attend there on that occasion, he gladly acceded to the request; and also considered it a very great privilege, during his administration, to have inaugurated the first railway in South Australia, and now to have connected this capital with the principal cities in the neighbouring colonies by their first overland telegraph.
Insignificant as the little wire appeared which they had just seen him connect, yet along that apparently frail support the hopes, the fears, the wishes of many thousands, the expressions of joy and sorrow, as well as the countless wants and business of commerce would, he hoped, prelong be in safety transported with lightning speed to their brethren in the adjoining colonies, thus linking closer than ever those whose similarity of race and kindred institutions ought to bind together in relations of the most intimate and friendly union.
As he considered the present a favorable opportunity to mention some points of interest associated with telegraphic communication in these colonies, he would remind them that in February, 1854, the first electric telegraph had been commenced in Victoria and that, before the end of 1856, their enterprising neighbours had completed 255 miles of telegraph. The cost of the telegraph was, of course, very properly an object of solicitude, however much it might promote public convenience. On this head, he was enabled to afford them some very gratifying intelligence; for, whilst the cheapest line in Victoria - that from Melbourne to Sandhurst had (exclusive of stations and instruments) cost £74 per mile, the Gawler Town line, in this colony, cost but £55 per mile. We had, it was true, completed as yet only 39 miles of telegraph ; but the great use made of it by the public-who had transmitted 30,000 messages in the last sixteen months by the few miles then open - not only marked the extent to which the general convenience of the community had been promoted by such undertakings, but enabled him also to announce that, so far from the telegraph being a costly luxury, it was quite within their means, and was even becoming a source of profit to the State. Not merely were the working expenses completely defrayed, but a clear profit of 15 per cent, was even now being realised on the capital invested in the 39 miles already constructed.
It was, moreover, a cheering consideration that experience had proved the greater the extension, and the greater the number of branch lines connected with the main lines, the greater was the profit in proportion to the capital invested, as the working expenses were not thereby increased in the same ratio, so that the more they promoted the general convenience of the community either way, the more they enriched the colony. He was happy to be able to state also that, short a time as had elapsed since the overland line connecting Adelaide and Melbourne had been commenced, the posts were already erected for nearly 80 miles, and he understood that still greater progress had been made by their Victorian brethren in their approach to the South Australian eastern boundary.
He trusted, however, that the ceremony just concluded - and the little wire which it had been his good fortune to connect - was destined to usher in more than the intimate connection of Adelaide and Melbourne, and that ere long they would be able, by means of that very wire, to transmit their thoughts and wishes, not merely to Melbourne or Sydney, but to London and New York, to New Orleans and Canada - in fact, to flash their messages from that spot to the furthest extremes of the globe, realising, if not exceeding, that boast which Shakspearemakes Puck utter in Midsummer Night's Dream:
"I'll put a girdle round about the earth in forty minutes".
Less even than forty minutes might hereafter suffice to send a message from Adelaide to New York. They were aware that already the Atlantic was spanned by the electric cable, linking closer the freeborn brethren of the new and the old world and re-uniting, as it were, nations whom absurd jealousies and misunderstanding had once unfortunately separated for a time. The electric bridge between England and her East Indian possessions was even now in course of formation and, from thence to these colonies, there was every prospect of that connecting line being extended within a very few years.
A very feasible plan to effect that object had been projected, and it would hardly be doubted that it would be carried out, as it was in hands that neither wanted for ability nor capital".
The line to the south began from Green's Exchange and ran along King William Street, the Bay and South and Main roads to Glenelg and Noarlunga and then to the south-east to Willunga (39 km south of Adelaide). The prime concern was then to cover as much distance as possible in the shortest time to make the link to Melbourne. A Telegraph Office was opened at Glenelg nearly two years later.
Todd had determined that the route should go as far south as possible (i.e. to the coast) and then run south-east to Victoria. To achieve this objective, he ran the line from Willunga:
The total distance of the line was 325 miles.
In March 1857, E. C. Cracknell, then the Deputy Superintendent of Telegraphs for South Australia, left Adelaide with a complement of men, horses and equipment to help Todd survey and mark out the intended line. A few months later, The Register of 2 June 1857 reported as follows:
The Magnetic Telegraph.
"Mr. Todd has returned from his overland trip, having satisfactorily accomplished the purpose of the journey. He has pegged out the line for the telegraph along the whole of the route to its junction with the Victorian line near the mouth of the Glenelg.The contractors, it appears, are actively engaged in putting up the posts at the Adelaide end of the line and the distance between this city and the Goolwa will probably be completed and ready for use before the end of the present year, by which time, no doubt, the magnetic instruments will have been received from America.
Parties are employed in different portions of the route in making preparations for setting up the posts but it is feared that, along the swampy parts of the line, nothing can be done until after the winter. Much of the timber, we understand, will be supplied from Tasmania, under a contract entered into by Mr. Hinckley. It will be landed on the coast at spots most convenient for the purposes of Messrs. Thompson, the contractors for erecting the line of telegraph.
The Victorian portion of the line is laid out so as to serve, when necessary, as a road eighty feet in breadth; but on our side of the border, no such contingency has been kept in view. This circumstance will partially account for the greater cost per mile of the Victorian telegraph, in comparison with that of South Australia".
Progress was faster than had been expected. Indeed, at one stage Todd anticipated that communications on the Adelaide-Goolwa section could be established by mid-October. By December 1857, the Adelaide-Goolwa line was open. An interesting observation on the direction taken by the line was published on 16 December 1857:
"The Electric Telegraph, which is to be put in communication with ours (i.e. Victoria) at the border, is being proceeded with, although in many respects not in a very artistic manner. The line runs from Goolwa - alongside the road to Adelaide but it zig-zags over the hills in a manner so incomprehensible that it would greatly shock the well-ordered faculties of Mr. McGowan. Perhaps a strong conviction of the increased energy of the electric current, in the form of forked lightning, has led these worthy people into these eccentricities".
The South Australian Register noted on 3 November 1857:
"There had been a deal of heavy clearing between Willunga and Port Elliot, as all who have travelled through that district will readily suppose. The bush posts consist of stringy bark and gum saplings. In order, as far as possible, to guard against the effect of a bush fire, Mr. Todd caused the ground to be cleared over a radius of ten feet from each pole; but we fear that this will be quite ineffectual; and even to preserve this slight safe guard, it will be necessary to send men every season to renew the clearing. Unless some chemical preparation can be applied to the posts to render them incombustible, we fear that at one point or another bush fires will every summer inevitably destroy our medium of intercolonial communication".
It did not work - the Australian bush can't be tamed. During the next bushfire season, the Geelong Advertiser of 7 February 1859 announced "A heavy bush fire has been raging along the line of telegraph between Goolwa and Willunga for several days past. Nineteen posts have been burnt and all the hands available from the different stations were out endeavoring to prevent others being destroyed".
3.2: Across Lake Alexandrina and the Coorong.
Submarine cables for Goolwa and for Lake Alexandrina arrived in December 1857. The cable was relatively light - weighing only 17 cwt. to the mile. Ten miles of cable were required at £80 per mile. In Todd's Report for the first half of 1859, he reported that:
"once or twice (the cable) got injured and it was once carried away by the force of the current. Mr. Todd has therefore resolved to do away this risk and carry the wire across by driving a pile in the centre of the channel and affixing a tall pole thereto. A second wire, all the way from Adelaide to Mount Gambier is asked for in the report and has been since acceded to. For the greater part of this distance, this will be merely a duplicate wire on the existing poles but for seventy miles it will be by a new route, forming a loop line, and avoiding Lake Alexandrina altogether by crossing the Murray at the township of Wellington". (Ed note: It was too early to heed the New York directive of 1882 related to overhead versus underground/subterranean telegraph wires). |
The Murray River/Lake Alexandrina at Goolwa. Postcard image shows the extent of the water under which the submarine cable was laid. |
On 26 November 1860, the cable under the Goolwa channel was damaged and arrangements had to be made for keeping up the communication from Hindmarsh Island while the cable was examined and repaired. Such interruptions were not uncommon.
The line to Wellington was laid via Strathalbyn. Todd wanted an alternative line to that crossing Lake Alexandrina. As a Telegraph Office was not opened at Wellington until 1865, it is possible that a repeater station was established there. The line from Wellington met up with the main line at about MacGrath's Flat.
The line across the Coorong was supplied with posts from Mount Jagged.
3.3: Line from Meningie to Mount Gambier.
The Meningie - Mount Gambier portion of the line required 50 miles of posts which were ordered from Tasmania. They were landed at Guichen Bay and at Lacepede Bay. The line was also constructed from the Victorian border and again progress was rapid despite the need for heavy clearing in that region.
Supplies were difficult to purchase in South Australia and so the following were bought from Myers of Melbourne (total cost £4,500).
More details are given in the 1858 Electric Telegraphs Report to the NSW Legislative Assembly as well as in McGowan's 1856 Report (p.11-14).
The day on which the feat of electric communication between South Australia and Victoria was accomplished was Saturday, May 22nd, 1858 (Todd's Annual Report for the year to 30 June 1858). On that day, 60 messages were sent from Adelaide to Melbourne.
About 23 July 1859, the House received Message No. 13. noting that £3,600 had been added to the Estimates being half the cost of a second intercolonial telegraph wire to duplicate the first as far as Mount Gambier. This line was constructed but the Victorian line was not - much to Todd's chagrin.
Interruptions on the coastal line were common. They were reported in the press - for example, the Adelaide Observer of 8 September 1860 noted "Telegraphic communication was prevented between Guichen Bay and Adelaide during parts of Monday and the following day in consequence, it is said, of some disarrangement at Willunga Station".
The Adelaide Observer of 3 November 1860 reported that "An additional wire is to be placed on the line of telegraph between Guichen Bay and Adelaide and is to be carried on to the boundary of the colony. The alteration is now going on here. The course of the line has been slightly altered near this place and new posts have been supplied where needed".
The agreed 1858 rates are shown elsewhere.
4. A comment on the construction delays.
The South Australian Register of 15 June 1858 (page 2) commented on the construction delays as follows:
THE TELEGRAPH.
Readers of a sarcastic turn would doubtless find occasion for the exercise of their powers in the juxtaposition of our remarks yesterday on the increased uses of the telegraph with Mr. Todd's explanation, which tends to create the impression that our telegraph is of little or no use at all It would certainly be a more satisfactory basis for speculations upon extraordinary applications of the electric messenger than we have at present had we accomplished the ordinary purpose of the telegraph. But we must have patience.
We are rather hopeful of being able to communicate regularly with Melbourne by-and-by; and, if we have gone a little ahead in our speculations, the fault is characteristic of Australian enterprise. Besides, after all, the incongruity arises rather from Mr. Todd's tardiness than from our alacrity. It is not that we have gone on too fast in idea — it is that he has lagged too much behind in execution. Therefore, it is that even very sober calculations of what may be done by the aid of the telegraph are made to appear premature, if not positively absurd. We have to congratulate our readers on the effect produced by the remarks we made in reference to the telegraph on Thursday last.
Those remarks have elicited some information on the subject which was previously wrapped in the deepest mystery, both here and in Melbourne. Some days ago a post fell down between Portland and Melbourne and accounted, most opportunely, for the delay in opening the line. But with the rise of that post, our hopes fell— the hopes, that is, of those who had reason to believe the post was set up again. The majority of people probably imagine the defaulting post is still prone on the earth, an insuperable barrier to all intercommunication.
Now, however, the Adelaide folks will be undeceived and the Melbourne people enlightened. It is high time that this desirable explanation were afforded, for our neighbours at the other end of the line are becoming desperately impatient at their continued severance from us. Almost every journal we receive wonders what is the matter, and even the Governor of Victoria rates us for our slowness. Now, however, the mystery is out. On our side of the border we succumb to no vulgar obstacles like fallen posts or severed wires — the mysterious forces of nature alone can appall and overcome us. Mr. Todd is the sport of the elements. Storms assail him, rains labour to extinguish him, currents of atmospheric electricity pertinaciously thwart his purposes. All this has been elicited by our paragraph; and we trust the public will be duly grateful to us for obtaining for them some notion of "the reason why" the telegraph won't work.
There is another little matter for which we feel disposed to claim some credit, more especially as something practical may, perhaps, come of it. Mr. Todd states, as an interesting circumstance, that the electric currents from Adelaide to Guichen Bay are remarkably feeble; and, so far as we can understand, his telegram. This is the reason why he cannot get the line into work. It seems, however, that our remarks of Thursday created a current of sufficient power to transmit themselves to him. We presume this effect is due to the potency of newspaper electricity which, it seems, is forcible enough to supply the deficiency of the galvanic batteries and to overcome the resistance of atmospheric currents of opposite polarity. It would be a manifest pity to allow so powerful an agent to slumber in a latent state; and, should Mr. Todd still find his difficulties too great for him, there is more at his service.
One fact stated in Mr. Todd's telegram is satisfactory so far as it goes and encourages hope of a speedy termination of this irritating suspense. From his central position, Mr. Todd is in daily communication with both the termini of the line. The telegraph is, then, perfect throughout. The obstacles arise from defects in working, not from essential errors in construction. Even at present a daily communication from Melbourne to Adelaide, and vice versa, would be practicable, and indeed quite easy. Such daily communication probably takes place and it is only the public use of the telegraph that is suspended. We do not for a moment suppose that any gentleman who is in a position to make use of the line at present would apply his power to any improper purpose. It is not on that account, therefore, that we urge that the line should be at once thrown open, not to individuals, but to the public collectively.
Pending the result of Mr. Todd's investigation into the "interesting circumstances" which delay the general use of the line, it would be a gracious act on the part of the Government to obtain and publish daily the principal commercial items of Victorian news. The intelligence might be posted at the Exchange prior to the close of each morning's business, or printed in our columns prior to its commencement. Similar information might be daily transmitted to Melbourne. Or if the Government will permit us to use the line to this extent daily, we will relieve them of all trouble in the matter. Our arrangements are completed at both ends and await only the use of the wires to bring them into operation. We have said that this concession would be a gracious act on the part of the Government, but we think it would not only be ungracious but absolutely unjust to refuse it.
The community with whose funds the line has been constructed have a clear right to such advantages from its use as are obtainable. The regular receipt of information of general value is one of the benefits expected from the construction of the telegraph. The pecuniary return which may accrue to the public from the use of the line by private individuals is another and altogether subordinate consideration. And yet, because we cannot enjoy the second and lesser advantage, we are not permitted to possess the first and greater one.
We hope the new Commissioner of Public Works will take this matter into consideration at once. Mr. Todd's investigations may occupy a considerable time before the desired result is attained; but in the meantime Mr. Blyth may have reaped a perfect harvest of gratitude from an impatient but easily placated public".