2014 Sydney: La Perouse Rock Fishing #1
La Perouse is a suburb in south-eastern Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. The suburb of La Perouse is located about 14 kilometres south-east of the Sydney central business district.
The La Perouse peninsula is the northern headland of Botany Bay. It is notable for its old military outpost at Bare Island and the Botany Bay National Park. Congwong Bay Beach, Little Congwong Beach, and the beach at Frenchmans Bay provide protected swimming areas in Botany Bay. La Perouse is one of few Sydney suburbs with a French name.
In 1877 it was decided that a fort was to be built on the island. Botany Bay was considered the back door into Sydney, thus making the city vulnerable to a seaborne attack. The construction of a fort on the island would reduce the odds of an attack from this entry point. Plans for the construction of a fort were drawn up by the Colonial Architects Department and tenders in 1880. Government tender for construction was awarded to John McLeod and Co, who also built the Georges Head and Middle Head fortifications.
The fort was armed with two RML 9 inch 12 ton gun, two RML 80 pounder guns, a RML 10 inch 18 ton gun in an armoured casemate and two 5 barreled 0.45 inch Nordenfelt guns.
Construction of Bare Island Fort was completed in 1885 at a cost of 34,000 pounds. Work inside the fort began in 1889.
By 1902 Bare Island was decommissioned and ceased to exist as a military fortification.
La Perouse was named after the French navigator Jean-François de Galaup, comte de Lapérouse (1741–88), who landed on the northern shore of Botany Bay west of Bare Island on the 26th January 1788.
Captain Arthur Phillip and the first fleet of convicts had arrived in Botany Bay a few days earlier. Louis XVI of France had commissioned Lapérouse to explore the Pacific.
In April 1770 James Cook's expedition had sailed onto the east coast of Australia whilst exploring the south Pacific searching for Terra Australis or ‘Land of the South’.
Upon King Louis XVI's orders, Lapérouse departed Brest, France, in command of Astrolabe and Boussole on 1 August 1785 on a scientific voyage of the Pacific Inspired by the voyages of Cook.
The expedition's naturalist and chaplain, Father Louis Receveur, died in February after a skirmish the previous December in Samoa with the inhabitants, in which Paul Antoine Fleuriot de Langle, commander of Astrolabe and 12 other members of the French expedition were killed. Receveur, injured in that skirmish, died at Botany Bay and was buried at Frenchmans Cove below the headland that is now called La Perouse, not far from the Lapérouse Museum.
In 1825 Hyacinthe de Bougainville paid for the tombstone that is on the site today. It was designed by Government Architect George Cookney (1799–1876). Receveur was the second European to be buried in Australian soil, the first being Forby Sutherland from Cook’s 1770 expedition who is buried at nearby Kurnell on the other side of the Botany Bay headlands.
The first building in the area was the round stone tower constructed in 1820-22 as accommodation for a small guard of soldiers stationed there to prevent smuggling, and the tower still stands today.
Several scenes from Mission: Impossible II (2000) were filmed in La Perouse, including Bare Island.
2014 Sydney: La Perouse Rock Fishing #1
La Perouse is a suburb in south-eastern Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. The suburb of La Perouse is located about 14 kilometres south-east of the Sydney central business district.
The La Perouse peninsula is the northern headland of Botany Bay. It is notable for its old military outpost at Bare Island and the Botany Bay National Park. Congwong Bay Beach, Little Congwong Beach, and the beach at Frenchmans Bay provide protected swimming areas in Botany Bay. La Perouse is one of few Sydney suburbs with a French name.
In 1877 it was decided that a fort was to be built on the island. Botany Bay was considered the back door into Sydney, thus making the city vulnerable to a seaborne attack. The construction of a fort on the island would reduce the odds of an attack from this entry point. Plans for the construction of a fort were drawn up by the Colonial Architects Department and tenders in 1880. Government tender for construction was awarded to John McLeod and Co, who also built the Georges Head and Middle Head fortifications.
The fort was armed with two RML 9 inch 12 ton gun, two RML 80 pounder guns, a RML 10 inch 18 ton gun in an armoured casemate and two 5 barreled 0.45 inch Nordenfelt guns.
Construction of Bare Island Fort was completed in 1885 at a cost of 34,000 pounds. Work inside the fort began in 1889.
By 1902 Bare Island was decommissioned and ceased to exist as a military fortification.
La Perouse was named after the French navigator Jean-François de Galaup, comte de Lapérouse (1741–88), who landed on the northern shore of Botany Bay west of Bare Island on the 26th January 1788.
Captain Arthur Phillip and the first fleet of convicts had arrived in Botany Bay a few days earlier. Louis XVI of France had commissioned Lapérouse to explore the Pacific.
In April 1770 James Cook's expedition had sailed onto the east coast of Australia whilst exploring the south Pacific searching for Terra Australis or ‘Land of the South’.
Upon King Louis XVI's orders, Lapérouse departed Brest, France, in command of Astrolabe and Boussole on 1 August 1785 on a scientific voyage of the Pacific Inspired by the voyages of Cook.
The expedition's naturalist and chaplain, Father Louis Receveur, died in February after a skirmish the previous December in Samoa with the inhabitants, in which Paul Antoine Fleuriot de Langle, commander of Astrolabe and 12 other members of the French expedition were killed. Receveur, injured in that skirmish, died at Botany Bay and was buried at Frenchmans Cove below the headland that is now called La Perouse, not far from the Lapérouse Museum.
In 1825 Hyacinthe de Bougainville paid for the tombstone that is on the site today. It was designed by Government Architect George Cookney (1799–1876). Receveur was the second European to be buried in Australian soil, the first being Forby Sutherland from Cook’s 1770 expedition who is buried at nearby Kurnell on the other side of the Botany Bay headlands.
The first building in the area was the round stone tower constructed in 1820-22 as accommodation for a small guard of soldiers stationed there to prevent smuggling, and the tower still stands today.
Several scenes from Mission: Impossible II (2000) were filmed in La Perouse, including Bare Island.