Hokesville, New South Wales

{{Short description|Fake town}}

File:Hoaxville main street, 1943.jpg

Hokesville (also known as Hoaxville) was a fake town in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales, Australia built during World War II as camouflage for a RAAF weapons storage site.{{cite news |title=Fake mountain town to fool Japs |url=https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/229020264 |access-date=20 January 2024 |work=The Sun, Sydney |date=2 September 1945}}{{cite web |title=Lithgow Small Arms Factory |url=https://firearms.net.au/military/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=45&Itemid=135 |website=Military Guns Australia |access-date=20 January 2024}} It had no actual residents as such but was regularly attended by

a "floating population" of Australian military servicemen during the war.{{cite news |title=Our Wartime Suburb Discovered |url=https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/219736210 |access-date=20 January 2024 |work=Lithgow Mercury |date=3 September 1945}} The official name for the Hokesville base in reality was No. 1 Central Reserve and Army Ordnance.

Hokesville was constructed in April 1942 on the western slopes of the Blue Mountains, at a site near Marrangaroo. It was the location of a pre-existing large disused railway tunnel which the RAAF determined would be ideal for storing its stockpile of chemical weapons, including phosgene and mustard gas.{{cite news |title=Fake NSW Township was Full of Poison Gas |url=https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/47724414 |access-date=20 January 2024 |work=Army News, NT |issue=4 September 1945}} The tunnel was renovated with concrete floors, electricity and telephones.{{cite news |title=RAAF Hoax Town |url=https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/212691468 |access-date=20 January 2024 |work=Daily Telegraph and North Murchison and Pillbara Gazette |date=14 September 1945}} Real farms and homesteads lay adjacent to the site, along with an old stone church. An average of 6,000 tonnes of bombs passed in and out of the base each month, with 12,000 at its peak in May 1945.Lithgow Mercury, 3 September 1945.

Fears of reconnaissance missions or even air strikes from Japanese planes led to much effort being taken to disguise Hokesville as a functioning town. Real cattle and horses were allowed to graze in the area, and dogs were trained to guard the entrance of the tunnel.{{cite news |title=RAAF Bogus Town for War Gases, Explosives |url=https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/26146956 |access-date=20 January 2024 |work=The Mercury, Hobart |date=8 September 1945}} A fake horse was also constructed out of papier mache. Numerous fake residences featured porches set up with deck chairs. Empty buildings purporting to be that of various local business were constructed, many with elaborate entrance signs painted for them. These included Higgins & Sons Groceries, Alf Jones' Butcher (with "Alf" being a play on "AIF", the abbreviation for the Australian Imperial Force), Ryan's Hotel, the Beacon Garage complete with gas pumps and even a Hokesville branch of the YMCA.{{cite web |last1=Johnston |first1=Vic |title=Hoaxville - bogus town, 18 September 1945 |url=https://collection.sl.nsw.gov.au/record/nM70dWVY/wDPrZ7Bg737bj |website=State Library of New South Wales |publisher=Pix |access-date=20 January 2024}}

Once the war ended, the reality of Hokesville was revealed to the Australian public and photographers were invited to document the site.{{cite news |title=Hoaxville: The Town That Never Was |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-466804633/view?sectionId=nla.obj-481964733&partId=nla.obj-467098773 |access-date=20 January 2024 |work=Pix |date=22 December 1945}} The Hobart Mercury reported that the "lethal liquid and gases probably will be taken out to sea, where the ocean is particularly deep, and dumped."Hobart Mercury, 8 September 1945. In 2005, it was revealed the chemicals had in fact been buried and left at the site.{{cite news |url=http://mustardgas.org/Bases-Phantom-War-Reveals-Its-Secrets.pdf |title=Base's phantom war reveals its secrets |work=Lithgow Mercury |author=Ashworth, Len |date=7 August 2008 |access-date=5 April 2012 }}{{cite news |url=http://mustardgas.org/Chemical-Warfare-Left-Its-Legacy.pdf |title=Chemical warfare left its legacy |work=Lithgow Mercury |author=Ashworth, Len |date=9 August 2008 |access-date=5 April 2012 }} A remediation project ran from 2008 to 2010, revealing thousands of bomb cases, projectiles, fuses and other military ordnance in the soil.{{cite news |last1=Ashworth |first1=Len |title=Marrangaroo's Dark Secrets Were Brought Into the Light |url=https://www.mustardgas.org/wp-content/uploads/Marrangaroos-Dark-Secret-Were-Brought-Into-The-Light.pdf |access-date=20 January 2024 |work=Lithgow Mercury |date=10 September 2009}}{{cite web |url=http://www.defence.gov.au/id/marrangaroo/default.htm |title=Marrangaroo Army Depot Environmental Remediation Project |date=6 August 2009 |publisher=Department of Defence |access-date=5 April 2012 }}

In 2019, an art installation inspired by Hokesville was displayed as part of the Resilience in Times of Adversity: Contemporary Responses to WW2 in the Blue Mountains 1939-1950 exhibition at the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre in Katoomba.{{cite web |title=Resilience in Times of Adversity: Contemporary Responses to WW2 in the Blue Mountains 1939-1950. |url=https://www.bluemountainsgazette.com.au/story/6341769/resilience-in-adversity/ |website=Blue Mountains Cultural Centre |access-date=20 January 2024}}{{cite news |last1=Dadour |first1=Vivienne |title=Resilience in Times of Adversity Curator’s Statement |url=https://rochfordstreetreview.com/2019/08/27/resilience-in-times-of-adversity-curators-statement-vivienne-dadour/ |access-date=20 January 2024 |work=Rochford Street Review |date=20 January 2024}}