Portrait artist shave the luxury of many sittings with their subjects extending over hours, days and weeks, capturing just the right pose to illuminate expression and character. We mere scribes ...
Portrait of the Fleet Commander Rear Admiral Jonathan Mead, AM, RAN
Letter: The Kangaroo Symbol on HMA Ships
The picture of the commissioning of HMAS Hobart on the front cover of the December 2017 edition of the Naval Historical Review – particularly that of the red kangaroo symbol affixed ...
Letter: HMAS Patricia Cam families visit
The following email was recently received addressed to the President of the Naval Historical Society and your Editor from Michael Owen a Darwin based historian who operates Top End Heritage ...
Letter: HMAS Arunta and Operation Hamburger
Dear Editor The December 2017 edition of the NHR contains an article on the evacuation of Lancer Force from Timor by HMAS Arunta in January 1943. As my father was CO ...
Book Review: South Sea Argonaut – James Colnett and the Enlargement of the Pacific 1772 -1803
By Granville Allen Mawer. Published by Australian Scholarly Publishing, Melbourne, 2017. Paperback of 246 pages with black & white photographs, plans and illustrations. Available from booksellers and online from $44.00. ...
They Also Served – LCDR Norwood Pursey Morgan RAN
Three very ordinary looking cartons arrived at our office; within them lay dust covered volumes, the pages of which had not been turned in many a long day. But look ...
The Sydney Cove and her impact on early colonial exploration
In an article covering Part 1 of the Australian-Indian Relationship (NHR September 2017) mention is made of the ship Sydney Cove. While she was wrecked on her maiden voyage she ...
Lieutenant (SP) H.L. Billman, DSC, RANVR
By Hector Donohue Harold Leon (Bill) Billman had a relatively short war in the RAN of just three years, but as a bomb and mine disposal officer he was regularly ...
Officers’ Swords of the Royal Navy – A Brief History
By John McGrath Captain John McGrath, RN is a retired officer with a lifelong interest in naval swords. With Mark Barton he co-authored British Naval Swords and Swordsmanship published by Seaforth ...
Jack – The Australian Sailor Monument
By Gavin Ryan Gavin Ryan a retired RAN leading signalman is convenor and director of The Australian Sailor Pty Ltd, an important project to provide a suitable mark of respect to ...
Tales of the South Pacific, Broadway and a South Pacific World War II Museum
The South Pacific has a wondrous reputation as the home of tales from the sea, producing great characters such as Robinson Crusoe and Bligh of the Bounty. In later times ...
The Australian – Indian Relationship – Part 3
Previous editions of this magazine examined the Australian – Indian relationship from the establishment of the first Australian colony in 1788 to the conclusion of the Second World War. This ...
Another Coastwatcher – Ron (Dixie) Lee
As told to our Editor by Ron (Dixie) Lee The December edition of this magazine contained a story The Last Coastwatchersfeaturing James (Jim) Burrowes. Mention was also made of endeavours ...
Naval Health Services – an Introduction
By CDRE Liz Rushbrook, Director General, Naval Health Service I am pleased to participate in this retrospective glimpse of our Naval Health Service. The Service, like the RAN, came into ...
Australian Naval History on 9 December 2017
HMAS Darwin decommissioned ...
Letter: HMAS Platypus
Dear Editor, The article “HMAS Platypus– a Submarine Naval Base “ in the September 2017 edition of the NHR brought back memories of an earlier problem with the local residents ...
Book review: The Rag Tag Fleet (and George Franki)
By Ian W Shaw. Published by Hachette Australia, Sydney, 2017. Soft cover of 310 pages with black & white photographs. Available from booksellers and online from $32.99 but discounts readily ...
The World’s Fastest Ship
The RAN’s experience with catamaran hulls has been limited and has produced mixed results. The first experiment with catamaran hulled fibreglass minehunters, built by Carrington’s at Newcastle between 1986 and ...
Submarine Mining in the Australian Colonial and Commonwealth Armies
Dr J. K. Haken Mines and submarine mining are always associated with the Navy, but internationally and locally the early development was with the Army Engineers. Mines and underwater explosives ...
Australian Political and Military Strategies in the Second World War – to Lead or to Follow
This paper is by Mike Fogarty a former RAN officer and diplomat. In 2016, he completed an MA (Military History) at UNSW with ADFA. The war in the Pacific was ...
HMAS Arunta and Operation Hamburger
Whichever way you looked at a Tribal class destroyer, she was not just handsome, she was beautiful. The balance between hull and superstructure and the proportions of her two funnels ...
Bomb and Mine Disposal (BMD) Operations in the Pacific
By Hector Donohue During World War II, RAN personnel operated with their RN counterparts in the dangerous and demanding tasks of BMD in the waters around UK and on shore, ...
The Australian – Indian Relationship – Part 2
Like some sections of our own armed forces who fail to acknowledge a period of colonial rule over which we had no direct control, there are those within the Indian ...
Malta Revisited: Wartime Memories of HMAS Vendetta’s Malta Sojourn in World War II
We are indebted to ex Supply Assistant Gordon Hill for this wonderfully illuminating description of his wartime service in the destroyer HMAS Vendetta when based at Malta. The George Cross Island ...
HMAS Suva: the ship that shaped the future of the Australian Naval Station
By John Smith Possibly not many have heard of HMAS Suva as she had an extremely short history as a commissioned Australian warship. She did however have the distinction of wearing ...