Radio Girl. By David Dufty. Allen and Unwin, Sydney 2020. Paperback of 301 pages. rrp $29.99. ISBN 978 1 76087 665 4 This biographical work details the life of Violet ...
Naval Historical Review
Book Review: Wyatt Earp – The Little Ship with Many Names
Wyatt Earp: The Little Ship with Many Names. By Trish Burgess. Connorcourt Publishing, Cleveland, Queensland. Paperback, 124 pages. rrp $29.95 This book review follows closely in the wake of the ...
Letter: The Palace letters
On 14 July 2020 previously secret correspondence between the then Governor General Sir John Kerr and Her Majesty the Queen was published by the National Archives of Australia 45 years ...
The Dominion Yachtsmen Scheme – Australian Volunteers in the Normandy Landings, June 1944
By Janet Roberts Billett This article follows from Part 1 by the same author on the contribution made by members of the Dominion Yachtsmen Scheme, which appeared in the December ...
Dr Frederick Wheatley, Headmaster and Cryptographer
A new book, Australian Code Breakers by James Phelps, has recently been published on the fascinating topic of wartime code breaking. As the front cover tells us this is the ...
Heart of Oak and Jolly Tars: a short reflection
By John McGrath The refrain of Heart of Oak (yes, it is Heart not Hearts) are our ships, begins: ‘Heart of oak are our ships, jolly tars are our men’. ...
Mine warfare roles for Australian Women during the Second World War
By Mike Turner During WWII many Australian women worked in new defence support roles. The mine warfare roles were manning Mine Watching Posts, manufacturing moored mines and manning the RAN ...
An Essay on the Forming of the Royal Australian Navy
By Midshipman Lloyd Skinner Lloyd Skinner attended Melbourne Grammar School, where he discovered a passion for Australian political and military history. Shortly after completing secondary education in 2019 Lloyd joined ...
RFA Bishopdale
By Greg Swinden RFA Bishopdale was a Royal Fleet Auxiliary Dale class freighting tanker that saw service during the period 1939-1959. As a freighting tanker her main role was to ...
The Ephemeral Commission of the Fremantle Naval Volunteers, Western Australia, 1879 – 1888
By Ron and Ian Forsyth New information on the Fremantle Naval Volunteers, the only naval defence force to be established in the Colony of Western Australia, is documented in our ...
MV Ramses – Blockade Runner
By Alan Bourne This paper was prepared by Alan Bourne, son of Herbert (Bill) Thomas Bourne. Herbert was christened Hubert, which he disliked, and he enlisted in the RAN under ...
Chief of Navy grants permission for the Australian White Ensign to fly over the HMAS Sydney (II) Memorial at Geraldton, WA
By LCDR Desmond Woods The HMAS Sydney (II) Memorial at Geraldton in WA has become a place of pilgrimage for 65,000 visitors each year. Some 20,000 arrive by sea on ...
Kings Cross in World War II
By Nick Hordern In 2020 we celebrate the 75th anniversary year of the opening of the Captain Cook Dock which joined Garden Island to the mainland and we gained a ...
Palm Islands – a Naval Connection
By Walter Burroughs The Palm Islands and Challenger Bay affords a large sheltered deep-water anchorage, the last such facility on Australia’s east coast before reaching the northern extremity of the ...
The Navy and the 1918-19 Influenza Pandemic
The world is currently combatting the Coronavirus 19 (COVID 19) which originated in China and has now spread throughout the globe. So far, Australia has fortunately been spared the worst ...
Finding of Akagi and Kaga focuses attention on Japan’s formidable aircraft carriers and the Darwin raid
By Tom Lewis Dr. Tom Lewis OAM is a retired naval officer, and the author of 14 books. Some of this text was drawn from Carrier Attack, published in 2013 ...
Book review: Out of Sight, Out of Mind: The Royal Australian Navy in Vietnam 1965-72
Out of Sight, Out of Mind: The Royal Australian Navy in Vietnam 1965-1972. Second Edition. By John R. Carroll. First published in 2013, this second edition has been revised with ...
Book Review: A Game of Birds and Wolves: The Ingenious Young Women Whose Secret Board Games Helped Win World War Two
A Game of Birds and Wolves: The Ingenious Young Women Whose Secret Board Games Helped Win World War Two. By Simon Parkin. Hardback and paperback, 329 pages, Hachette, 2019. From ...
The Solomon Islands and Bougainville Island
By Walter Burroughs Political upheaval After thirty five years of a political alignment between the Solomon Islands and the Republic of China (Taiwan), on 22 September 2019 it was announced ...
Training Ship Nepean and Australian Navy Cadets
Your Editor and Mrs. Burroughs were pleased to accept an invitation to attend the End of Year Parade held by TS Nepean on 30 November 2019. This is an unusual ...
Luzon: A 75th Anniversary Australian Battlefield Tour of the Philippines – Part 2
By Paul Baker On the morning of 15 December 2019, a small ceremony was held at the Australian War Memorial in the forecourt of the Maritime Academy of Asia and ...
Border and Resource Protection: Past Challenges and Future Opportunities for the Royal Australian Navy
This essay won the New Entry Officers Course 61 Naval Historical Society History Prize, awarded in December 2019. By Lieutenant Melissa Chen RAN1 Australia has unique problems and may thus ...
Appear where you are not expected
By Lieutenant Commander Chris Watson RAN1 This essay won the Smith Prize, which is open to all members of the Department of Defence in the Chief of Navy’s 2019 Essay ...
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 ...
Warrant Officer of the Navy
Handover Ceremony On 22 November 2019 a ceremony was conducted in the courtyard outside Russell Offices in Canberra to mark the handover of the important position of Warrant Officer of ...