Now 76, Major Welch lives in Watsonia close to Simpson Barracks, where he retired from the army in the 1970s. He plays down his part in retrieving Barrel Number 1489 that fired on a fleeing German steamer at the start of the earlier conflict from Port Wakefield, South Australia, and Number 1317 - used on an unwitting Bass Strait freighter in the latter - from a scrapyard in Brooklyn, Victoria, where its proprietor traded it for a slouch hat. "You might say that," he says when asked if he was instrumental in bringing them back to Point Nepean in the 1960s through his contacts both in the army and the historical society, of which he was president at the time. "But like all these things there were a number of people. I filled my role."

Tomorrow is the 90th anniversary of the day in August 1914 when a shot was fired across the bow of the German steamer Pfalz as it tried to slip out of Port Phillip heads as war was declared. After a struggle over the engine-room telegraph control between the ship's master and the Melbourne pilot captain, the Pfalz returned to anchor off Williamstown and the crew was detained. The vessel was refitted as a troop transport and renamed HMT Boorara. It carried Turkish prisoners from the Dardenelles at one stage and, at the end of the war, it brought home Major Welch's father, Sydney, a gunner who had served in Belgium. The eldest of three sons of a career soldier, Major Welch talks of "one way or another being tied up with the military".

"I was even born at army expense," he says of his birth at Launceston, where his father was a serving instructor with the 16th Field Battery. He had intended to enlist in World War II but turned 18 the day after Japan surrendered in September 1945. He had to wait until March 4, 1946, when he enlisted at the then Watsonia Barracks. He served in Japan, the Korean War and with the Pacific Islands regiment in Papua New Guinea.

When he arrived at Point Nepean Officer Cadet School, where he was administration officer from 1964 to 1967, he became intrigued by the missing guns. He located serial numbers and, through contacts at Victoria Barracks and the historical society, helped to ensure their return to Fort Nepean, where they have pride of place on the old parade ground. Major Welch is author of a book called Hell to Health: The History of the Quarantine at Port Phillip Heads, 1852 to 1866. Among his extensive files, he locates a booklet, War in Port Phillip, by a former society president, A. M. Robertson. It provides a vivid account of the failed flight by the 6500- tonne Nordeutscher-Lloyd steamer Pfalz, which had arrived at Victoria Dock days earlier on her maiden voyage with red, white and black German ensign on her jackstaff.

"Fantastic as it may seem, the same gun F1 of Point Nepean Battery was later used to fire the first shot in World War II," Robertson writes, citing an official gun log describing how the freighter Woniora had entered the heads on September 4, 1939, without acknowledging the recognition signal. "A well-directed 100-pound shell caused her to swiftly establish her identity. It is true that this shot fired from barrel 1317 on the day of Australia's declaration of World War II... was not as significant as the shot from the same gun 25 years earlier. However, as the garrison was on direct orders to prevent any vessel from scuttling itself in the entrance of Port Phillip Bay, this shot was fired in 'anger' to prevent enemy attempts at this manoeuvre."