Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2018L00053:schedule:5:p8
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2018L00053
Segment Type: schedule
Provision Reference: sch 5 (pt 8/42)
Character Range: 508495–511565

Australia's naval and maritime history. It was Australia's first naval dockyard for the Royal Australian Navy (1913-21) and continued to support and build ships for the Navy through two World Wars, Korea and Vietnam. It retains extensive fabric associated with ship building (including the Fitzroy and Sutherland docks). The place demonstrates the principal characteristics of a long running dockyard and ship building complex including evidence of key functions, structures and operational layout. Cockatoo Island contains the nation's most extensive and varied record of shipbuilding and has the potential to enhance our understanding of maritime and heavy industrial processes in Australia from the mid nineteenth century.
Official Values:
Criterion A: Events, Processes
Cockatoo Island is a convict industrial settlement and pre and post-federation shipbuilding complex. It is important in the course of Australia's cultural history for its use as a place of convict hard labour, secondary punishment and for public works, namely its history and contributions to the nation as a dockyard.
Fitzroy Dock is outstanding as the only remaining dry dock built using convict and prisoner labour and it is one of the largest convict-era public works surviving in Sydney. The dock was the earliest graving dock commenced in Australia and was one of the largest engineering projects completed in Australia to that time. Convicts excavated 580,000 cubic feet of rock creating 45 foot (14 metre) sandstone cliffs that extended around the site just to prepare the area for the dock, a huge technical achievement in itself.
The dockyard's lengthy 134 years of operation and its significance during both world wars, and in Australia's naval development and service as the Commonwealth dockyard all contribute to its outstanding value to the nation. It is the only surviving example of a 19th century dockyard in Australia to retain some of the original service buildings including the pump house and machine shop. The powerhouse, constructed in 1918, contains the most extensive collection of early Australian electrical, hydraulic power and pumping equipment in Australia.
The surviving fabric related to convict administration includes the prisoners' barracks, hospital, mess hall, military guard and officers' room, free overseers' quarters and the superintendent's cottage. Evidence of convict hard labour includes the sandstone buildings, quarried cliffs, the underground silos and the Fitzroy Dock.
Cockatoo Island's dockyard, through its contribution to Australia's naval and maritime history, demonstrates outstanding significance to the nation. Fitzroy Dock is the oldest surviving dry dock in Australia operating continuously for over 134 years (1857-1991). The dockyard has direct associations with the convict era, Australia's naval relationship with its allies (particularly Britain during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries) and Australia's naval development, especially during the First and Second World Wars. Cockatoo Island's development into Australia's