On This Day
1914-1918 > WW1
On This Day - 1914-1918
- November 25, 1918
HMAS PARRAMATTA, (torpedo boat destroyer), entered the Black Sea. PARRAMATTA was employed as a dispatch boat between Sevastopol and Constantinople.
- November 22, 1918
HMS TASMANIA was launched at Beardmore’s Yard, UK. The destroyer was transferred to the RAN in 1919.
- November 21, 1918
HMA Ships AUSTRALIA, (battle cruiser), SYDNEY, and MELBOURNE, (cruisers), were present at the surrender of the German Fleet in the Firth of Forth, Scotland.
AUSTRALIA led the Port Division of the British Fleet, while MELBOURNE and SYDNEY were in their normal places in the 2nd light cruiser squadron.
- November 17, 1918
HMAS PARRAMATTA, (torpedo boat destroyer), received on board two released POWs taken when HMAS AE2, (submarine), was sunk in the Sea of Marmara.
- November 13, 1918
HMAS PARRAMATTA, (torpedo boat destroyer), stood off the Sultan’s Palace at Constantinople, as a unit of the British and French Fleet occupying the Turkish capital.
- November 11, 1918
Germany signed the Armistice to end WWI. The RAN lost the submarines AE1 and AE2 during the war. Over 240 RAN personnel lost their lives during the war, both within Australia and overseas. Recorded in the diary of HMAS SYDNEY, (cruiser), was the following triumphant message; Admiral Beatty sent a signal to the Grand Fleet to splice the main brace. A tot of rum was served out to the ship’s company, the first time since the ship was commissioned. Fireworks displays and all kinds of whistles in fact anything that a sound could be got out of was under way.
The Commonwealth Naval Dockyard at Cockatoo Island, Sydney, refitted 250 transports, and docked over 500 vessels during WWI.
- October 30, 1918
HMAS HUON, (torpedo boat destroyer), landed Allied peace delegates at the Turkish port of Smyrna.
- October 29, 1918
The Australian hospital ship KAROOLA repatriated British POWs released by Turks at Beirut and Tripoli. On 3 October 1915, she took off the crew of the Highland Warrior, torpedoed off Spain, and stood by while the transport’s cargo of bullion was removed.
- October 28, 1918
HMA Ships PARRAMATTA, YARRA, and TORRENS, (torpedo boat destroyers), provided cover for the landing of Allied troops at Dedeagach, in the Dardanelles.
- October 25, 1918
HMAS SWAN, (torpedo boat destroyer), rescued the crew of an aircraft which had force-landed in the Mediterranean. The aircraft had been operating with a Japanese destroyer flotilla escorting a convoy from Port Said to Salonika.