By Greg Swinden If not for a newly released book and the recent death of a medal collector the name of Victoria Cross (VC) winner James Gorman would have remained ...
Publications
The Queensland Maritime Museum
The Queensland Maritime Museum (QMM) is facing an uncertain future as a number of recent unfortunate events have conspired to undermine the credibility of this important institution which until recent ...
Occasional Paper 129: Service on the Fleet Commander’s Staff, 1964: A Personal Reflection
By John Ingram The following personal reflection by Commander John Ingram OAM RAN RTD describes his experience and observations of the fateful collision between HMA Ships Melbourne and Voyager on ...
The Australian Antarctic Territory and the Australian Antarctic Research Survey Ship Nuyina
With the arrival of the new Australian Antarctic ship Nuyina at her home port of Hobart it is appropriate to look back to the beginning of our association with the ...
Remediation of the Australian Landing Helicopter Dock (ALHD) Propulsion Problems
By Phil Baldwin, CEng CMarEng FIMarEST Background In November 2007 the Australian Department of Defence procured two ALHDs through BAE Systems Australia. The platform was based on the Navantia (Spain) ...
Australia’s Search for Maritime Self-Defence: Historical Conventional Inheritance or Regional Nuclear Obeisance?
By Kate Reid-Smith In the early twentieth century, Australia’s first Chief of Navy, Vice Admiral Sir William Rooke Creswell, suggested the nation’s future path lay outside Imperial Britain. It was ...
Shipbuilding and the Australian Naval Shipbuilding College
A number of well-intentioned Government initiatives are not necessarily known in the wider community. In the case of the Naval Shipbuilding College this is a pity, as this organisation has ...
The Arthur Lunan Story: Part 1
The late Arthur Lunan maintained a diary of his wartime service in the RAN from 1941 to 1946. His brother-in-law William Moody has digitised this and added some family ...
The Remarkable Story of the Naval Heritage Flight (NHF) and the Historic Aircraft Restoration Society (HARS)
By Carl Robinson1 and Terry Hetherington2 Created in early 1985 at HMAS Albatross, the RAN Historic Flight was an ambitious project to keep a representative core of Australia’s classic navy ...
The Parker Family and their Contribution to the RAN
With the passing of His Royal Highness Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, there have been many fine tributes to his memory. A number of these mention an Australian born Private ...
Book Review: HMAS Castlemaine: The Corvette that came Home
This impressive new paperback by Kerry Hodges has 207 pages well stocked with illustrations, photographs, maps and diagrams, and was recently published by Seabooks Press. The book may be purchased ...
Book Review: Kit Muster Vol II: Uniforms, Badges and Categories of the Australian Navy 1954 – 1984.
Kit Muster Vol II: Uniforms, Badges and Categories of the Australian Navy 1954 – 1984.Available from these locations: Regimental Books (regimentalbooks.com.au) and Navy Uniforms eShop With a follow-up to his ...
Book Review: Nelson’s Folly
Nelson’s Folly by Oliver Greeves is a paperback of 408 pages, self-published in Australia in December 2020. It is available at most booksellers and via eBooks and Kindle. A fascination ...
Letter: Lieutenant Commander Ernest Thomas Lees DSO RANR
Dear Editor Regarding the article on Lieutenant Commander Ernest Thomas Lees DSO RANR in the September 2021 NHR (‘Naval Sub Lieutenant awarded the Distinguished Service Order’), I have unearthed some ...
Letter: Lew Lind
Dear Walter, Re LEW LIND Thank you for your reply, 15 September 2021, I would be honoured if you used my letter as a Letter to the Editor in your ...
Letter: A Mortar Mystery:
Hi Walter, Some time ago I photographed both the Cowra Limbo mounting and a twin 4.7in. mounting. This latter had no splinter shield but was surely a Tribal. Both items ...
Letter: Rethymnon – More on Lew Lind
Dear Walter I just wanted to thank you sincerely for your help. I seem to have involved you and members of your family considerably in the search. Perhaps you would ...
Roylen Cruises and their fleet of Fairmiles
By Walter Burroughs A visit to an Opportunity Shop browsing through other people’s junk is often time wasting. And so it was while wasting time that an unwanted, ubiquitous, one-dollar ...
How did we get USN 16-inch gun projectiles to Australia?
By Geoff Davidson In 1994 I was posted for three years to Washington DC as the RAN representative to provide weapon and ship follow-on support for the FFG ships HMA ...
Throwing a Party: The Naval Ball of 1899
Colin Randall, one of our venerable archivists, discovered some newspaper cuttings from well over a century past which perhaps reminds us of how things were done when a celebration was ...
Occasional Paper 127: Commitment, Persistence and Science; Behind the Search for HMAS Sydney II
By Commodore Bob Trotter OAM RAN & FIEAust (Retd)© Bob Trotter is an engineer and submarine specialist. He retired from the RAN in 1998 and after a period with ...
Occasional Paper 128: HMAS Nepal
By Commander Greg Swinden RAN HMAS Nepal was one of eight N Class destroyers laid down in British shipyards during 1939 for service in the Royal Navy. Five of these ...
Occasional Paper 126: A New Crane for Sydney’s Skyline
By John Jeremy Cranes are a regular feature of Sydney’s skyline, particularly the many construction cranes which, at a glance, reveal the state of the construction industry in Australia’s largest ...
Occasional Paper 125: Captain Edward Fegen and the Loss of HMS Jervis Bay
By Lloyd Skinner During the Second World War, just 23 Victoria Crosses were awarded to the servicemen of the Royal Navy. One of the courageous few awarded the honour ‘For ...
Occasional Paper 124: Arctic Sea Routes: From Dream to Reality
By Bob Hetherington The following story was first published in the Australian National Maritime Museum (ANMM) Volunteers’ Quarterly newsletter ‘All Hands’, Issue 112 in September 2020. Some dreamers always maintained ...