If you Love Your Park Lands, like we do, you might occasionally hear criticism from people who have latched onto a Park Lands myth.
In this article, we’re MYTH-BUSTING the claim that your Park Lands were intended to be a military buffer zone - to protect residents of Adelaide from an advancing 19th century army.
This original purpose has long gone, (so the argument goes) and so we should not bother to protect them from proposed developments.
Image: Shutterstock
This is simply a furphy. There is no evidence that Adelaide’s original surveyor, Colonel William Light, ever had this intention for the Park Lands. There is considerable evidence that the role of public open space was being favourably considered by social reformers in the UK at the time of colonisation, in the mid-1830’s. *
Even if, contrary to the evidence, the Park Lands were originally intended for this purpose, then that would be simply an historical anachronism.
The value of the Adelaide Park Lands today rests not solely upon the story of their beginnings, but on their world-unique status and value to South Australians today.
* Johnson, Donald (2013) “Anticipating Municipal Parks: London to Adelaide to Garden City (2013) Wakefield Press - Chapter 1 “Foundations”
Image: Shutterstock
The following article first appeared in our previous journal “Park Lands News” way back in June 2008. We have omitted the 2008 footnotes which provide supporting references but you can read the original article here.
DEBUNKING THE MILITARY THEORY
by Kyle Penick
Over the years, numerous sources have suggested or repeated the idea that because Colonel Light had a military background the Park Lands may have been created as a defensive perimeter.
Typically, this myth refers to the Park Lands as being a ‘cannon shot wide’. The originator of this fabrication is unknown but it may have started in 1838 when a letter to the editors of the South Australian Gazette and Colonial Register, signed X Q Z, was published. It stated:
“... but no doubt the Surveyor General, having been a military man, has intimated to the Resident Commissioner the necessity of having sufficient space all around the town for a double line of moats, glacis, redoubts, bastions & c & c’.”
Noted geographer Charles Fenner dismissed the theory in 1931 but it still persists on occasion in the press and remains generally unchallenged. A number of factors show the theory is false.
A. Range of Cannon in 1837
The Park Lands were surveyed to be 30 chains or 660 yards wide in most places. At the 1781 Battle of Yorktown in the American War of Independence, mobile field artillery had a range of over one mile. Advances in technology, particularly in ‘rifled’ as opposed to smooth bore barrels and changes to projectiles further increased artillery range and accuracy. By 1813, range had increased to two miles. The Park Lands were not nearly wide enough to be a ‘cannon shot wide’.
B. Congreve Rockets
Words to the US national anthem were written in 1813 during the British bombardment of Baltimore’s Fort McHenry. The verse ‘and the rockets red glare’ refers to Congreve Rockets. These were designed by the British in 1804 as an improvement to earlier weapons employed by the Indians during the Anglo-Mysore Wars 1761–99. By 1815, they had a range of up to two miles and came with explosive, incendiary or shrapnel warheads.
C. The Hospital
Light set aside nine reserves in the Park Lands. One of these was for the hospital to be located in what is now Rundle Park. The width of the Park Lands narrows at this location, meaning the hospital could be subjected to small arms fire in an engagement. If Light was planning a defensive perimeter he would not have placed structures on it or sited the hospital in such a vulnerable position.
D. Trees
Efforts were made to retain the trees on the Park Lands. This included appointing Nicholas Boys Bull as the first Superintendent of the Park Lands in October 1839 and efforts by Governor Gray in 1841. A defensive perimeter would have been clear felled so as not to provide cover.
See the other Park Lands Myth Busters https://www.adelaide-parklands.asn.au/myth-busters
