Requisitioning and Commissioning January 1940 HMAS Westralia was requisitioned and commissioned by the Commonwealth on 17th January, 1940 as an Armed Merchant Cruiser. Armament: 7 6-inch guns. Speed: 16 knots. ...
Ship histories and stories
One of our Destroyers: HMAS Norman journeys to Russia
Services Reconnaissance Department Memorial
Perhaps the least known of service memorials in Australia is that to the Services Reconnaissance Department which is located on Garden Island, Western Australia. It is appropriate the memorial has ...
Vampire in the Med.
The Tragedy of the Centaur
MAY 14 1988 marks the 45th anniversary of the sinking of the Australian hospital ship Centaur, with the loss of 268 lives. Tony Stephens, who was three years and eight ...
Warramunga to the Rescue of SS Starr King
DURING 1943 several Japanese submarines operated off the east coast of Australia. In all about 14 ships were torpedoed by these subs. Surface escorts for ships operating off the coast ...
Island Traders – Four and Twenty Dutchmen
HMAS Waterhen – a history
HMAS Swan (Sloop) 1937-38
HMS Driver – First Paddlewheel Ship to Circumnavigate the World
HMS DRIVER, a 180 foot paddlewheel sloop, was the first steam vessel to circumnavigate the world. The voyage took five years and commenced from Portsmouth in 1842. Her record, despite ...
HMAS Platypus & The Darwin Raid – 1942
RAN Formation – A Personal Memory
HMAS Condamine in Korea 1952-1953
CONDAMINE, one of four modified river class frigates (the others being Shoalhaven, Murchison and Culgoa) was built by the State Dockyard at Newcastle, NSW. Laid down on the 3rd of ...
Night of Shipboard Terror – HMAS Nizam
The Day the Emden Came A-Calling
(Reprinted by permission of Penang New Sunday Times, October 28, 1984) On October 28, 1914 – exactly 70 years ago today – most of the people of Penang were still ...
Sailing Ship Apprentice to Captain of the ‘Queens’
Sirius, HMS – Wreckage Recovered from First Fleet Flagship
ML 817’s New Guinea Operations
New Meaning put into the word Camouflage WARSHIP CAMOUFLAGE came in some weird and wonderful forms during WW II. But for one of the smaller ships of the RAN it ...
Messages from the Clouds Highlighted a Night of High Drama
FOR COUNTLESS GENERATIONS seamen have navigated by the stars. But it was a ‘Message from the Clouds’ that held the key to the rescue of several hundred servicemen after a ...
Kimbla – Alias ‘The Snail’
HMAS KIMBLA was laid down in 1953 and was launched by Mrs. J.W.N. Bull, wife of Captain John Bull who, at the time, was General Overseer Eastern Area. Kimbla’s launch ...
The War Cruises of I27 – Part 2
The War Cruises of I27 – Part 1
British Gunboats on the Yangtze
The following article is taken from the June and March issues of Yangtze and Sikiang Patroller, journal of the United States Yangtze River Patrol Association. A number of RAN officers ...
Naval Chapel Windows for Cruisers Unveiled
The Silent Service of HMAS Bingera
IT IS A PLEASURE to present a pictorial profile of a ship that served the Royal Australian Navy in comparative obscurity. HMAS Bingera, according to the official histories, never fired ...