Cascade Claim Victory In Century-Long Tasmanian Beer War

ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact

The last barrel has been tapped. After 144 years of conflict that reshaped the island’s geography, depleted its male population on three separate occasions, and left the township of Ross permanently neutral, Cascade Brewery has claimed total victory in the Tasmanian Beer War. In a statment today, the decimated Boag’s leadership called an end to the fighting.

The war began in 1881 when James Boag & Son established brewing operations in Launceston, a provocation Cascade, then already 56 years settled in Hobart, interpreted as an act of territorial aggression. Initial engagements were conducted with muskets and light horse along the Midland Highway. Casualties in the first decade were modest.

The conflict modernised steadily with the rest of the world. By the First World War, artillery had replaced cavalry along the Central Plateau front. Trenches were dug in the area and a stalemate was endured for many years, with heavy losses on both side. The interwar period saw both breweries invest heavily in armoured tanks and by 1943 Boag’s had commissioned a small submarine fleet operating out of the Tamar River estuary. Cascade responded with a squadron of surplus Spitfires operating out of a repurposed paddock outside Kempton. The aircraft were repainted dark green.

The Cold War introduced a nuclear dimension that neither side was particularly comfortable discussing. Cascade’s alleged missile infrastructure beneath kunanyi/Mount Wellington remained unconfirmed by any official inquiry. Boag’s light armoured division spent the better part of the 1980s stationed just north of Campbell Town, a presence locals came to regard as largely ambient. The era was punctuated by a 'broken arrow' event near Bronte Lagoon, where a nuclear device was lost after a Cascade MiG-23 was shot down by small arms fire.

Diplomatic efforts over the years were numerous and uniformly unsuccessful. The 1954 Pontville Accords collapsed after three days. A 1971 ceasefire negotiated in Oatlands held for eleven weeks before a disputed delivery at a Devonport bottle shop reignited hostilities along the full northern front.

In the end, it was not military defeat that finished Boag’s but an administrative decision by Lion, the multinational that has owned both breweries since 2007. On-island production in Launceston will cease. The war, which was by that point largely a war in spirit only, has been concluded by memo.

Cascade, founded in 1824 and the oldest continuously operating brewery in Australia, accepts the victory with a sense of bittersweet closure.

A ceasefire agreement is said to be underway in Ross and the fragile peace is holding for now.

More to come.