[2][1] Prior to European settlement the Goulburn Plains and the Wollondilly River provided native game and fish for a number of the traditional Aboriginal peoples, including the Mulwaree, Tarlo, Burra Burra, Wollondilly, Wiradjuri, Gundungurra, Dharruk, Tharawal, Lachlan, Pajong, Parramarragoo, Cookmal and Gnunawal.

In 1819 Governor Macquarie ordered the construction of the Great South Road (the basis for the Hume Highway) from Picton to the Goulburn Plains.

The route first followed the track blazed by Meehan in 1818, and ran generally to the east of the present Hume Highway alignment and via Bungonia.

From that time most traffic travelled across Boxers Creek near the present bridge site and through Goulburn to reach southern NSW and Victoria.

This program promoted a rise in the use of wheeled vehicles with a lessening of the demand for "slaves" to manually carry goods and palanquins.

By 1858 it was still described as "a scarcely formed bullock track with its tottering bridges, rugged steeps and treacherous passes" but it was nevertheless a popular road for coaches.

A system of direct surveillance was used to discourage escape until the 1820s when the sites were generally surrounded by high timber paling fences.

[1] The Towrang Stockade became the chief penal camp in the southern district of the newly founded colony of NSW from about 1838 to 1843 and was noted for its harsh discipline.

A plan by Surveyor Larmer shows the stockade laid out in a hollow square on the ridge running down to the powder magazine.

Men with short sentences were assigned to work such as looking after officer's horses and quarters, driving the bullock teams and felling trees.

Men with longer sentences were placed on the iron gang responsible for packing and rolling sections of road, building the culverts and other heavy labour.

Although Larmer made no mention of the powder magazine or the cemetery, he did note ten buildings and four portable lock ups.

It has been suggested that it was standard practise for a garrison or military unit to construct a weir on a slow moving creek once a permanent camp was decided upon.

[1] One culvert, the stockade site, powder magazine and graves are located on the northern side of the highway near to the Wollondilly River.

[10][1] The culverts are located west of the bridge and are predominately shale with wing walls and dressed sandstone voussoirs and quoins.

Archaeological work has also unearthed items including uniform buttons, pins, broken crockery, and hand forged tools, and the drainage lines of some of the huts have also been located.

The monuments, all stelae, face east and are constructed of a fine grained clay-rich sandstone somewhat delaminated and similar to "Marulan Stone".

[1] Semicircular sandstone stele with humped shoulders: A white painted metal sign within the grave site has a black inscription which reads: Sacred to the Memory of John Moxey Private soldier with 20th Regt.

Constructed as part of Thomas Mitchell's Great South Road project, the stockade is believed to have held the largest concentration of convicts in southern NSW during its operation and provides insight into the nature of convict life and labour and early road building in NSW.

[1] Towrang Convict Stockade was listed on the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 1 February 2013 having satisfied the following criteria.

The sites also have local and State significance for their part in the development of the area between Marulen and Goulburn and improved communication between Sydney and the southern settlements.

The apparent harshness of life at the stockade and numbers of convicts based there reflected implementation of the British Government requirements for harsher punishment in the colony to reinforce the threat of transport as punishment in Britain, and Darling's use of chain gangs for convicts not suitable for placement with settlers.

[1] The place is important in demonstrating aesthetic characteristics and/or a high degree of creative or technical achievement in New South Wales.

They have ability to provide insight into the nature of convict life, labour and early road building methods and the bridge and culverts demonstrate a fine level of workmanship in stone.

[1] The place has potential to yield information that will contribute to an understanding of the cultural or natural history of New South Wales.

The stockade and road formations have state significance for their ability to provide evidence of convict era technologies.

[1] The place possesses uncommon, rare or endangered aspects of the cultural or natural history of New South Wales.

The combination of bridge, road, culverts and the stockade area has state significance as a rare example of convict settlement and industry.