Armistice Day is remembered as the day World War One ended, but for naval historians Britain’s greatest victory came 10 days later. Operation ZZ was the code name for the ...
History - WW1
Occasional Paper 15: Battle of Bita Paka 11 September 1914
German New Guinea, colonised in 1884, maintained a wireless station at Bitapaka in New Britain. In 1914 the station was a target for Naval Reservists and others of the Australian ...
Occasional Paper 192: Exploring a Diorama: The RAN Bridging Train at Suvla Bay during the Gallipoli Campaign
By Geoff Barnes The following story by Geoff Barnes who created a diorama of the RAN Bridging Team at Suvla Bay in 1915 was first published as a blog by ...
Book Review: Salt Horse
Salt Horse – Memoir of a Maverick Admiral, Claude Lionel Cumberlege. Published by Whittles Publishing Ltd, Dunbeath, Caithness KW6 6EG, Scotland. Admiral Claude Cumberlege RN wrote his memoirs in 1936-38, ...
Occasional Paper 183: The RAN Bridging Train – Dry Land Sailors
The Bridging Train which existed as a small but highly effective unit of the RAN operated essentially on dry land as field engineers between 1915 and 1917. They served with ...
Queensland Mining meets First Sea Lord and Strikes Oil
Prepared from inspiration provided by our Queensland member and mining engineer Colin Randall. William Knox D’Arcy and John Arbuthnot Fisher both came from families with prominent distant relatives but they ...
Book Review: Love, Oil and the Fortunes of War
Love, Oil and the Fortunes of War is a fictionalised history by Sydney-based author Paul Ashford Harris. Published by Ventura Press in 2023, a paperback edition of 288 pages and ...
Occasional Paper 164: Saving the old Parramatta
By Ross Gillett The unusual post-war career of the first Australian destroyer The first HMAS Parramatta, a River class torpedo boat destroyer (TBD), was commissioned into the Australian Fleet in ...
Occasional Paper 159: River Class Torpedo Boat Destroyers
This article was originally published in LE GROGNARD!, the newsletter of the ACT Branch of the Military Historical Society of Australia, January 2023 edition – Issue #2023/1. Tim Lyon is ...
Occasional Paper 150: Palm Island – World War Connections
By David Michael As experience continues to demonstrate, major conflict and wars not only affect those living in the immediate area of operations but regionally and often globally. These conflicts ...
Norfolk Island goes to War and New Zealand’s Aircraft Carrier
By Walter Burroughs Since 1788 Norfolk Island has been occupied and governed from the Australian mainland. As the following story unfolds, however, we shall see that for six years during ...
Book Review: Dark Secrets – The True Story of Murder in HMAS Australia
Dark Secrets – The True Story of Murder in HMAS Australia. Paperback 320 pages by Robert Hadler, published by Wilkinson, Sydney, 2020. Discounted at about $23.00 Murder in the Royal ...
‘Bimbashi’ Mcpherson: A Life in Egypt
By Walter Burroughs A casual browse through the bookshelves of opportunity shops can produce some surprises. Disorganised, with no rhyme or reason to subject matter, it is as well to ...
Mission Creep in the Dardanelles
By CMDR Max Speedy DSC RAN Rtd Captain Arthur Edward Dunn CBE RD ADC RNR was married to my great-aunt and as a result I have his voluminous papers and ...
Occasional Paper 118: In his own words: AE2’s skipper, H.G. Stoker
By Bob Hetherington Originally Published in the Australian National Maritime Museum (ANMM) Volunteers’ Quarterly newsletter ‘All Hands’, Issue 114 in March 2021. Many readers will know something of the AE2 ...
Book Review: Mutineers – A True Story of Heroes and Villains
Mutineers – A True Story of Heroes and Villains. Paperback of 320 pages by Robert Hadler, published by Wilkinson Publishing Pty Limited, Victoria 3000. Available from booksellers, rrp $28.75. The ...
Occasional Paper 111: HMAS Australia I – Post WWI and Scuttling
After returning home to Australia on 15 June 1919 after an absence of 1775 days HMAS Australia I resumed the role of RAN flagship. A year later she played the ...
Occasional Paper 110: Charles Killick, RAN Bandsman, 1918-1925
Correspondence relating to the 99th birthday of veteran bandsman, Charles Killick who served in HMAS Australia during World War 1. ...
Occasional Paper 91: Invidious Choices – The German East Asia Squadron and the RAN in the Pacific, August to December 1914
By Lieutenant Commander Desmond Woods RAN This paper was first published by the Australian Naval Institute online and in an abbreviated form the by the UK Naval Review and by ...
Letter from Frederick Merrill RAN on the sinking of the S.M.S. Königsberg
Butcher, 2nd Class Frederick Priest Merrill, R.A.N., H.M.A.S. Pioneer, wrote to his parents in Sheffield with his account of the sinking of the S.M.S. Königsberg in the Rufiji delta, German ...
Occasional Paper 82: The Kerr ‘Sydney-Emden’ Medal
This paper, was first published by the Naval Historical Society of Australia in the March 2013 edition of the Naval Historical Review. On 9 November 1914 the RAN cruiser HMAS ...
Occasional Paper 79: The Loss of HMAT Ballarat
The following are personal accounts by soldiers embarked in the transport ship HMAT Ballarat on 25 April 1917. Both stories were published on Thursday 19 July 1917 in the Bendigonian ...
Last Voyage of the Ayesha
By A. C. B. Mercer Stranded on Direction Island, in the Cocos Keeling Group, 50 German sailors and their commander from the cruiser Emden, which had been engaged by HMAS ...
Occasional Paper 58: Postcards Home
July 2019 An interest in philately has led to a collection of post cards from a century past showing the Pacific colonies of the German Empire. These help bring to ...
Occasional Paper 55: Reuben Mitchell DSM, RAN – Survivor of HMS E14
June 2019 The following story is of an Australian Able Seaman whom some military historians believe should have been awarded the Victoria Cross for his courage and compassion while under ...