Largely through lack of water this settlement only lasted briefly until Collins sailed for Hobart the following year. Collins might not have stayed long but he did leave behind one of the area's local identities - William Buckley, who escaped from the Sorrento settlement. Buckley lived with the local indigenous people, mainly on the Bellarine Peninsula eventually losing the ability to speak English, and was rediscovered some 30 years later by John Batman on his way to founding Melbourne. After discovering limestone on the Nepean Peninsula, a lime-burning industry was established in the early part of the last century. Kilns were built into the cliff faces, fed with timber and limestone at the top, with the lime raked out at beach level.
Boaters can still see slight remnants of the early kilns in the cliffs above the beach.
The last named craft has given its name to a rock near the Nepean side of The Heads, of which even small trailer boats today should be careful. The need for the station was evident when the Ticonderoga, arrived from Liverpool in 1852 with 350 passengers suffering typhoid. Since then the station has housed at varying times up to 12,000 people at once. Since 1952 the Officer Cadet School of the Australian Army occupied the main buildings, which are still used today by the School of Army Health. Fear of a Russian invasion during the Crimean war, and the temptation of Victorian gold after the gold rush, prompted the fortification of Port Philip Bay.