An email was received from John Redman.
I read the current (December edition) Naval Historical Review with great interest, an excellent publication. Not wanting to be pedantic but I suppose that is what I am, there was continued reference to the ‘Australian Station’, there was no such command. The correct title was ‘Australia Station’. The Australian Squadron served on the Australia Station. May I suggest that the Wikipedia extract could make an interesting article for a future edition of the Review.
Please see: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia_Station
Your Editor sent John the following response. You are of course quite right in the use of the singular ‘Australia Station’ which I incorrectly addressed in the article on Baron Nickolai Miklouho-Maclay. A similar error occurs in two places in another article in the same edition relating to Commander J. M. Jackson, RN and his sixteen years service on the Australian Station. Here however I must support the author as the use of the expression ‘Australian Station’ is directly quoted from the Sydney Morning Herald of 18 March 1918. As this was at a time when journalists were all literate with a sound understanding of grammar and they were supported by pedantic sub-editors I can only assume that the term had crept into common usage. However you are right to point out the error and we need to exercise greater care.