Item 04: Memoirs of a Colonial Boy by Robert Joseph Stewart, ca. 1971 - Page 465
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[Page 465]
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until an actual invasion. Strict blackout precautions were enforced all along the coastal strip. It was compulsory to fit motor vehicle headlights with sheet-metal "masks" with only a narrow horizontal slit, through which the light shone dimly and steeply downwards. To make motor cars more distinguishable in the resulting near-gloom, a three-inch-wide band had to be painted white on the edges of the fenders and along the sides. Petrol rationing began at nine gallons a month for private cars and was soon reduced to four gallons until the end of hostilities: control was by means of large coupons issued monthly at post offices, and these became as precious as pound notes. Sugar and tea were also rationed severely; each household being given a coupon book containing its quota according to the number of persons in it. Curiously enough, coffee was not rationed, probably because Australians were not great coffee drinkers; not many knowing the art of making good coffee. But now they began drinking coffee regularly, and what is more, they learnt sooner or later how to make it well, mostly with patent percolators.
The hurried coastal defence programme threw a great strain on the supply of military and civil engineering requirements, and a strict system of surveying, controlling and allocating civilian manpower was instituted. Every able-bodied man, and many women, had to be working constantly, wherever directed, at something that was essential to the war effort: in the armed forces, in the factories, on the farms, in the hospitals and schools, and in distributing food to the civilian population. Many hotels were short of staff and compelled to close down the accommodation side. Building of new houses, flats and offices, and maintenance of the existing ones, ceased for duration of the war.
In November of 1941, I was hurriedly transferred back to Victoria Barracks to be the Assistant Chief Engineer of Eastern Command, and given the special and urgent task of having very large explosive charges placed under all roads leading inland from the coast, between the Queensland and Victorian borders. The senior General Staff Officer of the Command (Colonel Gordon Wallace, a