Captain 'Harry' Howden, the commanding officer of HMAS
Hobart together with the deputy governor of Mocha and
his retinue on board at the port of Mocha in the Red Sea.
January 1940.

[AWM 005384]

During 1940, Australian ships were involved in two operations off the mainland of Africa. The first of these was in August 1940 when HMAS Hobart, then part of the Red Sea Force brought British troops from Aden to reinforce the beleaguered British garrison at Berbera in British Somaliland. On 8 August, some of the Hobart men flew the ship’s RAAF Walrus amphibian aircraft into action. After successfully bombing the Italian headquarters at Zeila, as well as some enemy machine gun posts, the crew landed safely in Berbera harbour.

On 9 August, three volunteers from Hobart went ashore in response to an urgent request for artillery support for the hard-pressed garrison. Petty Officer Hugh Jones from Kalgoorlie, Western Australia, Able Seaman William James Hurren from Sydney, New South Wales, and Able Seaman Hugh Charles Sweeny from Dalby, Queensland were landed with a 3-pounder Hotchkiss saluting gun on an improvised mounting, a reinforced 44-gallon drum.

'Dakar'

The cruiser HMAS Australia
in the foreground, escorts
the Vichy French cruiser
Gloire towards Casablanca
to prevent her reinforcing the
Vichy French force at Dakar.

[AWM 305255]

By early the next morning they were in position, manning the gun and dressed in military uniform on the main British defence line at Tug Argan Gap, some 60 kilometres south of Berbera. The fighting continued during the next five days but when the British evacuated between 15-19 August, the three Australian sailors were reported missing believed killed in action 15/8/40. Instead, they had been captured by the Italians, the first members of an Australian unit taken prisoner of war (POW) during World War II.

Meanwhile Captain Howden, who had been put in charge of the evacuation from British Somaliland, mustered all vessels at his disposal to evacuate more than 7,000 soldiers and civilians from the path of the Italians. After Berbera had been cleared and anything of value demolished, Hobart’s guns pounded the shores before departing and leaving British Somaliland temporarily in Italian hands.

The three POWs from HMAS Hobart were recovered from Adi Ugri in Eritrea on 29 April 1941 after Italian East Africa fell to the British. Able Seaman Hurren’s personnel file records the advice of their release:

released and now safe in Massawa. Passage to Australia will be arranged first opportunity.

[W J Hurren, A6770 NAA]