Walking down Queen Street, there is so much that catches the eye. Luscious green parklands filled with morning joggers in fluro activewear. Merchants line the streets competing for your attention and your dollar. Police cars screech out of the station while trains pull into theirs. People walk the block under the golden hue of Campbelltown’s half-lit McDonald’s arches.
But there is something more. Four buildings from another time lay dormant, waiting to tell their stories.
The Coach House, where the heroics of James Waterworth saw off more than a few desperate bushrangers. On one trip between Wollongong and Campbelltown, his quick thinking aided his escape of a group of bushrangers who had held him up on the way into Campbelltown. By biting down on the inside of his lip until it bled, and coughing profusely, he was able to feign a contagious illness which deterred the bandits.
There’s Mcguanne’s House; the dwelling of the imperious teacher Kate McGuanne, who would force students to do her chores as punishment for minor handwriting infractions.
The Railway Hotel, apart from being a lovely place to stay it’s also the perfect site to display the bodies of bushrangers who fought the law and lost, deterring Campbelltown’s young from following the path of the outlaw.
And, of course, Bursill’s Stores where you could buy the local produce, if you were cunning enough to avoid the fascinating and ferocious resident pest controller; a garden snake of over a metre in length.
These buildings tell the story of not just a town, but of a young nation in an uncertain time, trying to etch out a name for itself. Come down to Queen Street to find out more and take a glimpse at the town’s formative days and gain a new perspective of the place you live.
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