Images of people huddling in bomb shelters during World War II are often associated with London and other cities at risk from the air.
But in 1941 — despite being on the other side of the world — the threat of air bombings was very real in the minds of Tasmanians.
The Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbour at the end of that year, Singapore fell in the following February and, shortly after, Darwin was under attack.
The war had come to Australian soil.
The premier at the time, Robert Cosgrove, put Tasmanians on a war footing telling them that after Singapore, "conditions have altered materially" and warning people that they had "to face the possibility of an enemy landing on these shores".
"Singapore was such a shock, it was meant to be impregnable but it was taken and nothing seemed to stop the Japanese," said local historian and author Alison Alexander.
"They [the Japanese] had come down from China through Indochina, then Indonesia and we didn't have much by way of defence.
"People had dismissed Japan as not being a very military country and all of a sudden there they were, and being successful, so it was general alarm.
"The theory that Tasmania may be a jumping-off point for invading the mainland doesn't seem very practical, but people did think it.
"They'd had terrible stories of the London Blitz … they would never have thought of London being bombed so if London, why not Hobart?"
Japanese plane buzzes the capital
A month after the raids on Darwin, the threat did become real.
In March 1942, a Japanese plane flew an early morning reconnaissance mission up the River Derwent and over Hobart.
Called 'Glen', the collapsible plane was launched using a catapult from a submarine positioned off Tasmania's east coast.
"That was another scare, if one plane could come, there would be lots," Ms Alexander said.
The Hobart zinc works, now Nyrstar, was crucial to the war effort and seen as a potential target.
"Zinc was vital to ammunition and it [the zinc works] produced half the zinc in the British Empire," Ms Alexander said.
"They had fire pots, which were meant to cover the place in a pall of smoke, but as people said to me who were there at the time, it just would have shown the Japanese where to bomb."
There were multiple witness accounts, including from the person in charge of the anti-aircraft position at the zinc works.
"[It] was the one thing he saw in the whole war … I asked, 'Why didn't you shoot at it,' and he looked horrified and said, 'That would have given away our position.'
"So they didn't have much faith in their own shooting," she quipped.
So what was built?
Tasmanians had signed up for the Civil Defence Legion and they swung into action.
Air raid wardens were appointed, parks such as Franklin Square, were converted, schools put on alert and roads ripped up for large shelters — bunkers were even built in suburban backyards.
Alison Alexander said the state evacuation committee wrote an "extremely daunting letter" to the Hobart City Council in March 1942 saying it had to organise the evacuation of civilians to Hamilton and Westerway.
"[It] had to organise transport, accommodation, food, health, welfare and communications for up to 40,000 people."
"[It] said the occupiers of buildings had to provide shelter for people inside at the time of a raid and provide shelters for people in the streets … which from the British experience was about 10 per cent.
"There were two trenches in Franklin Square and there were a lot of other shelters as well.
"Basements were converted and surface shelters which used concrete pipes … which was an economic measure because they could be used after the war.
"There were blackouts so the Japanese bombers couldn't see any light over Hobart you were not allowed to chink of light."
School drills with 'rubber between teeth'
According to a list published in The Mercury in April 1942, a shelter under Franklin Square could accommodate 900, and 18 concrete pipe shelters throughout the city — including one in Bathurst Street — would protect more than 1,000.
Covered trenches on government land, including schools would provide shelter for more than 1,000.
An article in The Mercury detailed the trenches to be built at "vulnerable" schools.
"Regular drills would be given daily to accustom the pupils to the routine to be followed in a raid."
"Headmasters of schools were asked to see that each child was equipped with wadding to be placed in the ears and suitable matter to be placed between the teeth during the period of a raid."
"A lot of people could clearly remember the rubber and having to go out a line the trenches," Ms Alexander said.
But the trenches also proved a temptation — the Mercury reported that children had been making "playgrounds" of them.
The premier had to arrange "for police supervision to safeguard trenches from molestation by children and from being used for undesirable purposes".
'Like people buying toilet rolls'
In Clarence, on Hobart's eastern shore, the plan was for people to gather at a recreation ground ready to be taken out of town.
Some slept with suitcases packed by their beds in case the call went out.
"I think it was a bit of panic, like people buying toilet rolls in COVID which now seems incomprehensible," Ms Alexander said.
"There were so many mad ideas but it was all in a hurry. People had to think up things pretty quickly.
"At the time it was scary, people's husbands and sons were going off to the army and that was fairly alarming too."
As well as slit trenches at schools and in backyards, zig-zag trenches were dug.
The father of Hobart photographer Julien Johnston was a wartime photographer with the RAAF who, along with many other roles, was involved in the processing of aerial photos of Hobart.
One of the images his father Keith was allowed to collect before they were destroyed showed the location of air raid shelters and trenches, including zig-zag trenches at the Cenotaph which were designed to minimise casualties from enemy fire.
North and north-west also on alert
An article in The Examiner in March 1942 reported on the visit to the South Burnie Recreation ground by the premier who addressed 300 members of the Civil Defence Legion who were being rallied to prepare.
He warned them about the "possibility of enemy landings on the shores of Tasmania" and the need to "adapt themselves to any emergency".
But another article in the same month was headlined: Shocking Lack of Shelters, Visitor Is Amazed
Launceston man Mr NJ Dutton had just returned from New Guinea where he had experienced several Japanese air raids.
"The people of Launceston have apparently done nothing to provide themselves with air raid shelters or to take precautions against flying glass from shop windows," the article said.
"Why something has not been done to prevent shop windows from shattering and scattering their splinters into the streets is beyond me.
"If a bomb should fall in Brisbane Street the casualties from glass splinters would probably be almost as great as from the bomb itself.
"I have seen what these Japanese bombs can do," said Mr Dutton, "and I am horrified to think what they might do in the cities and towns of Tasmania."
In Hobart, the removal of large windows was underway, including at a motor business run by Nettlefolds.
Fears of invasion were also ignited early in 1940 when it was found a German submarine was operating off the coast of Tasmania.
It had laid a minefield 30 miles south of Fort Direction at the entrance to Storm Bay, which led to the temporary closure of the river to ships.
The war in the Pacific ground on until September 1945, ending after the dropping of two atomic bombs on Japan, prompting the country's surrender.
While the horrors, devastation and loss of life still reverberate until this day, for Australia's southernmost state, the early brush with conflict was mercifully short.
"By the middle of '42 it was obvious the Japanese had been contained so it was really just the six months, and then things eased up," Ms Alexander said.
