When Sydney’s beachside property came with a view of a barbed wire fence

Another east coast low is unlikely to undermine Sydney’s love of coastal living which has endured through war, storms and mounds of stinking seaweed.

Barbed wire at Bondi Beach during World War II. Picture: Waverley Council

The tides had turned for Sydney beaches by 1889, when letter writers lamented that in a place “so close to the sea and the climate so warm, it is extraordinary that so little sea-bathing takes place”.

Although ocean bathing was often the only available personal hygiene for early settlers, bathing in public during daylight had been banned in NSW from the 1830s.

But 50 years later the city’s love affair with the coast was flourishing as colonial prosperity extended recreation time across social classes.

Although Sydney is bracing this weekend for a second east coast low, just two weeks after rain and king tides destroyed beachside homes at Collaroy on the northern beaches, it is unlikely to undermine the allure of coastal living which has endured through war, storms and mounds of stinking seaweed.

Storms have destroyed homes at Collaroy since the first were built in 1925, three years after the area opened to residential subdivision, while surfers at eastern beaches negotiated razor-wire mazes during WWII.

Permanent dwellings began to replace guesthouses and market gardens in Sydney’s coastal suburbs from the 1890s, even in a village named Coogee, an Aboriginal word that apparently meant “rotting seaweed” or “place of bad smells”.

A defensive boom stretched across Sydney Harbour during World War II.

Founded in October 1838 to prevent settler William Charles Wentworth from expanding his coastal holdings, by the late 19th century auctioneer and merchant Charles Moore was among several businessmen owning mansions at Coogee. Wirth’s Circus proprietor Phillip Wirth joined them in 1916, when he completed Ocean View.

After a tram line reached Rose Bay in 1903, agents promoting Roseville Estate subdivision on Old South Head Rd enthused that “40 years ago Rose Bay, the most picturesque nook of Sydney’s most beautiful harbour, was nature’s beauty spot par excellence ... greedily desired as a retreat after the cares and worries of city life.

“Those who drove through it en route to Watson’s Bay ... envied those who acquired blocks of land and erected palatial homes”, such as pastoralist James White, who “built Cranbrook at great expense”.

Land in Collaroy Beach Estate went to auction before 391 people “in the middle of a cyclonic storm” in January 1922, selling for a total £11,100. “Not even the drum-rain on the roof could drown their enthusiastic bids — having seen Collaroy under its worst conditions they were still determined to buy,” reports noted.

In May 1925 “Collaroy was practically the centre of the fierce squall which swept Sydney last night,” newspapers reported. “Cottages were unroofed and moved bodily from their foundations. Today all was chaos.”

Civilians check damage to an eastern suburbs street caused by shells fired during the Japanese midget submarine attack on Sydney Harbour in 1942.

War in the Pacific from December 1941 posed the biggest risk to dwellers along Sydney’s eastern seaboard. Despite evacuation recommendations, in January 1942, it was noted “evacuees in the Blue Mountains and elsewhere are returning in dozens. Better take one’s chance of a stray bomb, they say, than endure heat, want of water and sewerage, over crowding, and possibly bushfires”.

Military fortifications such as iron stakes, barbed concertina wire, concrete tank traps and wire coils were constructed along Bondi, Coogee and Manly beaches. At Bondi, bathers had to negotiate a maze, nicknamed the rat run, to reach the surf through one of two gates. A first-aid post at Bondi Beach Public School in the 1942-43 summer mainly treated cuts and bruises caused as bathers braved beach defences.

All windows facing the sea were blacked out, Marine Drive was closed to traffic between 8pm and 7am, and street and suburb names were removed to confuse potential invaders.

A Bellevue Hill house was damaged by Japanese submarine shells in 1942.

The city’s worst fears were realised in June 1942 when Japanese submarines breached a wartime defence boom erected across Sydney Harbour from Green Point, west of Camp Cove at Vaucluse, to Georges Head at Mosman, to land bombs at Bondi, Rose Bay and Woollahra.

Even so, by October 1942 auction prices for eastern suburbs flats and houses compared favourably to Neutral Bay or Strathfield, and in 1943 Scots College purchased the Wilson family mansion, Yandooya, built in 1912 in Cranbrook Road, Bellevue Hill, for use as a boarding house.

In January 1943 estate agents reported Bellevue Hill property sales had dropped 50 per cent in a year, but blamed the fall on “restrictive regulations and the reluctance of vendors”. They also reported strong rental demand for “all classes of property”, an observation repeated by agents at Rose Bay.

Storm in 1997 were just the latest in a long line to cause serious erosion to Collaroy beach.

As American servicemen inundated Sydney, Bondi and eastern beaches quickly became a popular destination for rest and recreation.

At Collaroy, nature remained the biggest threat, as reported in May 1944: “Occupants of eight houses along the sea front at Collaroy had a terrifying night as huge breakers tore away their land and undermined their homes.’’

As WWII ended, in June 1945 Collaroy was again cleaning up: “Two Collaroy houses have been destroyed and five others severely damaged by the heavy seas of the past few days,” newspapers reported. “Wreckage littered the sea front at Pittwater Road.”

Originally published as When Sydney’s beachside property came with a view of a barbed wire fence