Part one of a two-part series
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BETWEEN Hill Top and Balmoral stands a large concrete sculpture. It is located beside Wilson Drive at the Hill Top end of the bridge over the Big Hill railway cutting.
Visitors to the area are left wondering about the origin and significance of this impressive sculpture since its plaque went missing long ago.
The Berrima District Historical Society had no information about it except that the words on the plaque had read 'Sculpture Human Endeavour: dedicated to the enterprising spirit of man'. It is recognised on the Monuments Australia website which simply lists its location.
However a NSW Railways website suggests it was to commemorate the building of the Big Hill Cutting.
This was confirmed recently when Historical Society researchers found a feature in the Southern Highland News of 19 March 1980 about the monument's dedication ceremony which occurred that month.
The sculpture was erected in honour of the railway workers who in the 1860s toiled on the cutting which was excavated for the Picton-Nattai rail line.
The newspaper provided an interview with the sculptor, Joe Enfield of Balmoral, and a description of the sculpture's erection and dedication ceremony which was attended by Mittagong Shire Council representatives and local people.
The monument's location is a reminder also of the human endeavour of the early explorers, led by John Wilson, who in 1798 trekked twice through to the Southern Highlands from Sydney.
In 1953 Wilson Drive was named in their honour. This section of road, from Colo Vale to Balmoral, is part of the route taken by the explorers during their second expedition.
Their feat will be outlined in next week's article along with the story of the sculptor.
An overview of the building of the Picton-Nattai rail line is presented here.
After years of discussion and planning, a railway from Sydney to the south was completed as far as Picton by 1863, with contractors ready to progress the line on to Nattai (Mittagong) and to Goulburn and beyond. Initially a private undertaking, the southern railway was taken over by the NSW government and it appointed John Whitton, from the UK, as Engineer-in-Chief. He would serve for 33 years, earning the title of 'Father of the Railways'.
For the Picton-Nattai section Whitton selected the least expensive route which traversed the ridge, flanked by deep gullies, on the western side of the Bargo River. He thus avoided the more direct ridge carrying the Great Southern Road (now Old Hume Highway) that would have required bridges and tunnels beyond the means of the burgeoning colony.
However, the direct route was followed when duplication of the whole line from Sydney to Albury was undertaken from 1914.
Whitton's route through the undeveloped upland south of Picton soon became dotted with the tents of navvies' encampments, dirt tracks and cart roads. Stations were constructed along the section of line at Thirlmere (1885), Couridjah (1867), Buxton (1893), Balmoral (1878), Hill Top (1878), Colo Vale (1883) and Braemar (1867).
Included were a number of smaller stops, sidings and passing loops.
Work was extremely difficult on the railway cutting at Saddleback Range, Big Hill, just north of present-day Hill Top.
Originally planned as a tunnel on a gradient of 1 in 33, it instead had to be a cutting, because in a tunnel the smoke belching from the steam engines on the upward climb would have suffocated train crews and passengers.
Excavating through solid sandstone using hand tools and dynamite, work crews toiled to create the 78 foot (23.4 metre) cutting.
Work stopped for a time after an explosion killed three workers. Their names are carved in perpetuity in the rock face. This cutting was indeed a feat of human endeavour.
It was for many years the deepest in Australia until a larger one was excavated in Tasmania.
Earthworks for the entire section of rail from Picton were completed to Nattai by October 1865. The Sydney Morning Herald of 13 June 1866 described the route: "It may be safely said that the rocks, hills, mountains, gullies and precipitous watercourses which border the line between Picton and the Gibraltar Rock - a distance of more than 30 miles - are for the most part appalling.
The country stands remote, full of rugged grandeur and unpromising desolation."
The successful completion of the line through such rugged country was a proud day for Whitton and the railway workers must have been thankful it was finished.
Moves are now afoot to install a new plaque, signage and Council plantings at the site of the 'human endeavour' sculpture monument.
To be continued
This article compiled by PHILIP MORTON is sourced from the archives of Berrima District Historical & Family History Society, Bowral Rd, Mittagong.
Phone 4872 2169.
Email bdhsarchives@gmail.com
Web: berrimadistricthistoricalsociety.org.au