On This Day

1914-1918 > WW1

April 15, 1918

Australian-born Squadron Leader H. R. Busteed, demonstrated the landing of aircraft using arrester cables on HMS FURIOUS. Busteed conceived and perfected the technique.

CMDR A. G. H. Bond, RAN, assumed command of the Australian Torpedo Boat Destroyer Flotilla at Brindisi, Italy.

HMS VENDETTA, (destroyer), participated in the raid in the Kattegat by British light forces.

April 13, 1918

CMDR W. H. F. Warren, RAN, commander of the Australian Torpedo Boat Destroyer Flotilla, accidentally drowned at Brindisi, Italy, the day before his DSO award was received at the Flotilla base. CMDR A. G. H. Bond, RAN, assuned command of the Australian Torpedo Boat Flotilla at Brindisi, Italy.

April 10, 1918

Two Italian destroyers collided and sank during a storm in the Mediterranean. The Allied destroyers HMAS TORRENS and HMS REDPOLE were dispatched to rescue survivors. During the rescue operation 18 year old Ordinary Seaman L. R. A. Moore, from TORRENS, was washed overboard and drowned.

April 1, 1918

The RNAS was abolished and naval air support was provided by the RAF, but several Australians served with distinction in the British RNAS.

March 26, 1918

HMAS Psyche decommissioned for the last time. Psyche remained moored in Sydney Harbour and was eventually sold as a timber lighter on 21 July 1922. She later sank in Salamander Bay, Port Stephens.
HMS WATERHEN, was launched at Palmer’s Yard, England. The destroyer was transferred to the RAN in 1933, and became part of the “Scrap Iron Flotilla” in WWII.

March 8, 1918

A Sopwith 1½ Strutter aircraft was successfully launched from HMAS AUSTRALIA, (battle-cruiser).

February 28, 1918

Recruiting commenced for the RAN Brigade (RANB) Naval Guard Section. The RANB had been formed in 1917, and applied retrospectively from 1914 to appropriate Naval personnel.They were given their own specially designed naval button. They were ex Navy or Army personnel who were used to guard wharves and shipping in Australian ports, as well as Naval Dockyards. Prior to this the guards had been provided by the Army. This organisation was demobilized in late 1919 after the bulk of the 1st AIF had returned to Australia from overseas service. In 1920 the RANB personnel became RANR.

February 8, 1918

The Australian Government purchased Williamstown Dockyard from the State of Victoria, a dockyard that had served the Colonial Victorian Naval Forces up until Federation in 1901 and was used as the Williamstown Naval Depot by the Australian Navy up until this purchase.

January 31, 1918

MIDN E.F. Cunningham, RAN was drowned when the submarine HMS K17, in which he was serving, was rammed and sunk by a British warship in the North Sea. Cunningham was a member of the original 1913 entry to the RAN College and the first graduate to lose his life on active service.

January 15, 1918

C in C, China Station, received a signal which contained information solving the fate of the Burns Philp steamer MATUNGA, which disappeared mysteriously on a voyage from Sydney to Port Moresby. The signal read:- “Bottle found 9 December in sea off Toli Toli, Celebes, by natives, contained two papers forwarded to me by Consul General, Batavia. First (Begins) Prisoners on board German raider. Will reader please notify the British authorities that German raider passed Celebes this day 29 August, on her way we presume to mine Singapore, PEDRA BRANCA having previously mined Cape Town, Bombay, Colombo, North Cape, (New Zealand), Cook Strait, Gabo Island. Crews of following vessels are on board:- TURITELIA, JUMNA, WORDSWORTH, DEE, WAIRUNA, WINSLOW, BELUGA, ENCORE, and MATUNGA. She has on board 110 mines to mine, we think, Rangoon and Calcutta. She was formerly WACHENFELS of German merchant service. (Ends). Second message is a descriptive drawing of vessel, 3-island type, 1 funnel, 2 masts, several 6-inch guns, 2 on forecastle, 2 on broadsides, 1 on poop, 4 torpedo tubes 18-inch.”

January 14, 1918

PO P. J. Kempster, DSM, died when HM Submarine G8 was lost in the North Sea. Kempster was an RAN rating on loan to the RN and had been awarded the DSM in 1917 for his bravery and devotion to duty while serving in G8.

January 3, 1918

The Minesweeping Section of the RAN, under LCDR F. J. Ranken, RNR, completed the first sweeping of a minefield in Australian waters. The field, off Cape Otway, was laid by the German raider WOLF

December 25, 1917

HMAS HUON, (torpedo boat destroyer), transported the Greek Prime Minister, M. Venizelos and his staff, from Taranto to Pireaus.

A crewman wrote: ‘As we passed the British cruisers they gave us three cheers for going to sea on Christmas Day‘.

December 18, 1917

Flight Lieutenant F. N. Fox, RNAS, flew a Sopwith Pup aircraft from the quarterdeck of HMAS AUSTRALIA, (battle-cruiser).

December 14, 1917

CAPT Dumaresq, RAN, commanding HMAS SYDNEY, (cruiser), signalled Scapa Flow Aerodrome:- ‘As DUBLIN’s pilot has to return shortly request that CAMPANIA may be asked to supply a pilot and Camel or standard Pup, complete with two mechanics to SYDNEY’.

Two days later a perplexed query came back ‘Does Camel refer to part of equipment or to a particular type of aircraft?’ SYDNEY promptly replied: ‘The machine referred to is a Sopwith Camel aeroplane. It is the test standard fighter and has succeeded the Pup’.

CAPT Dumaresq received his aircraft shortly afterwards.

December 12, 1917

HMAS AUSTRALIA, (battle-cruiser), was damaged in a collision with HMS REPULSE, (battle-cruiser).

December 8, 1917

HMAS Sydney launched the first aircraft to take off from an Australian warship. On arrival at Scapa Flow in December 1917, her Commanding Officer Captain Dumaresq, borrowed a Sopwith Pup then being operated from a fixed platform on the cruiser Dublin for use onboard Sydney (I). On 8 December 1917 the aircraft was launched successfully from Sydney’s platform in the fixed position.

November 17, 1917

HMS VENDETTA, (destroyer, later HMAS VENDETTA), participated in the light cruiser action off Heligoland.

November 16, 1917

HMAS PARRAMATTA, (torpedo boat destroyer), took in tow the torpedoed Italian transport ORIONE. While the lines were being passed to the disabled ship, a torpedo was fired by an enemy submarine that missed PARRAMATTA.

November 15, 1917

One officer and 97 ratings of the RAN Bridging Train transferred to the AIF in preference to being returned to Australia ‘for disposal’.

November 11, 1917

HMAS ENCOUNTER, (cruiser), destroyed the guns on the wreck of the German raider SEEADLER, at Mopelia Island.

November 9, 1917

HMAS ENCOUNTER, (cruiser), found the gutted wreck of the German raider SEEADLER, on Mopelia Island.

November 8, 1917

The Castle class trawler BROLGA, was requisitioned by the RAN as an auxiliary minesweeper. BROLGA, and her sister ships GUNUNDAAL and KORAAGA, operated along the NSW/Victorian coast searching for mines laid by the German raider WOLF. The vessels were manned by members of the RAN Brigade, and by early January 1918 they had swept a total of 13 mines. KORAAGA was returned to her owners in February 1918, but her sister ships were retained until 1919.

The Australian Government passed Act No. 1284, changing place names of foreign origin to patriotic names. Two NSW towns, Germantown and Krichauff, were given the names of Holbrook and Beatty, famed RN officers.

November 3, 1917

The prolific naval author, James Edmond MacDonnell, was born in Mackay, QLD. He joined the RAN in 1934, and served until 1948, reaching the rank of Acting Gunner, (Warrant Officer). During the war he served in HMAS CANBERRA, (cruiser), and HMA Ships NEPAL and NIZAM, (destroyers), and these provided the settings for many of his books. During a 30 year writing career he produced over 200 fiction books, with most concentrating on the RAN. He died at Kuluin, QLD, on 13 September 2002.

November 2, 1917

Land was allocated to the First Australian Torpedo Boat Destroyer Flotilla at Brindisi, for the cultivation of a ships’ vegetable garden.