Village defies ‘invaders’
BEING positioned at the entrance to Port Phillip Bay, Queenscliff was destined to become an important location for bay navigation and later as a focus for the defence of Melbourne during a lengthy history of invasion scares.
The entrance to Port Phillip Bay also became one of the most comprehensive collections of lighthouses throughout the Australian colonies.
The first pier to appear at Queenscliff was Fishermen’s Pier, which was built in 1857. It was not until the 1880s that a second pier, known as the Steamer Pier, was built near Fishermen’s Pier. By that time Queenscliff had become an integral part of the defences of the colony of Victoria, with the establishment of Fort Queenscliff between 1879 and 1889 largely due to the threat of Russian expansion in the southern hemisphere. By 1884 Port Phillip Heads was the most heavily defended outpost of the British Empire south of the equator.
The Steamer Pier, which later became known as Queenscliff Pier, was extended several times throughout the 1880s to cope with the steady increase in the number of excursion ferries operating between Melbourne, Geelong, Portarlington and Queenscliff.
Even the opening of the railway between Geelong and Queenscliff in 1879 did little to reduce the clamour aboard the bay ferries and if anything increased the number of tourists to the bayside resort.
This period also saw a building boom in Queenscliff, with the Palace Hotel (later renamed The Esplanade) built in 1879, the Ozone Hotel built in 1881 and the Vue Grande built in 1883.
One of the last extensions of Queenscliff Pier saw the remaining shelter shed and a new section of pier added at an angle at the end of pier to further increase the pier’s capacity. At the same time Fishermen’s Pier had also been extended and was nearly as long as Queenscliff Pier.
The lifeboat house was relocated to Queenscliff Pier in the late 1920s, and Fishermen’s Pier was demolished in the 1960s.
The advent of the motor car in the early 1900s saw the gradual decline of Queenscliff’s popularity, but the lack of interest in Queenscliff over several years and the subsequent neglect were to prove the town’s saviour, with so many of the glorious buildings from the 1800s remaining intact.
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