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Originally Posted by Andy in West Oz

Underneath the Gardens? Never heard of that (but then I am over here in the uncivilised west!). Hmm, another thing to investigate on our east coast trip next year.

The following file is available at the Australian War Memorial:-
Accession Number: MSS1622
Name of Collection: Gash, Noel (Gunner, b: 1921)
Description: Describes location and layout of the Gun Operations Room which Gash was posted to in 1942 while serving in the Anti-Aircraft Artillery in Sydney. The room was situated in an unused railway tunnel below the Royal Botanic Gardens, along with the Search Light Operations Room and Fighter Sector RAAF. Briefly outlines the work done in the complex and the roles of personnel including women with the WAAAF and the AWAS.

and others:


No. 1 Fighter Sector Headquarters RAAF, later known as No. 101 Fighter Control Unit RAAF

St James Railway Station Sydney.

During World War II a stair case lead down the shaft from street level and into the tunnel which was secretly used as an operations bunker (Number One Fighter Sector Headquarters) by the RAAF. [1] The facilities inside the tunnel/operations bunker were connected to radar stations, weather signals, movements from airports, army and Volunteer Air Observer Corps reporting posts, air raid sirens and blackout control. A large table carried a map of the New South Wales coast and adjoining areas, on which WAAAF plotted movements of aircraft and shipping.

Many of the workers became sick from working in the tunnel, so the base was eventually transferred to a picture theatre in Bankstown, (The Capital Theatre) and then to an underground facility in Condell Park (the Bankstown Bunker). The staircase that spiralled down the shaft and into the operations facilities was destroyed by fire in the 1960s. The shaft was covered at street level after WW2. When looking up from inside the shaft, thin cracks of sunlight can be seen around the edges of the former entrance.
Tours of the tunnels have at times been run by the Australian Railway Historical Society, with the approval of the State Rail Authority. Many others have visited them unofficially (and illegally), by walking down the used subway tracks until passages leading between the used and disused tunnels are reached.

"I enlisted in 1942 as a Stenographer but became seconded, along with about 50 other girls from all over Australia, to the first Fighter Sector to be set up. Firstly we were sent to New Lambton in Newcastle where we moved into the local school. We were trained here and then later posted to Sydney to work with the Americans who had just arrived. "We marched each day up to Macquarie Street and down a hundred wooden steps into the railway tunnel between St. James and the Quay where Fighter Sector had been set up. There were no trains there in the tunnel at that time. Here we worked eight hour shifts day and night with the Army, Navy and Airforce and we had a squadron of fighter planes located at Bankstown. We were connected to Radar Stations along the coast and to V.A.O.C. (Volunteer Air Observer Corps) by direct line.
"We knew a lot about unidentified aircraft and ships sunk off the coast of Australia, but were sworn to secrecy. Actually we were on duty when the Japanese submarines were in the harbour and were anxious that their target may have been to come through the Botanical Gardens and throw grenades into Fighter Sector to disrupt Sydney's defence. They were in the harbour for a long time and one fired a torpedo which resulted in the deaths of some cadets on the training ship Kuttabul. One submarine was destroyed by depth charges, one became entangled in the boom across Sydney harbour and blew itself up, and the other escaped but never reached Japan."
EILA M.C. FOX (FORMERLY ACW EILA PICKUP)