'thank you'

City of Rayville.

[Image courtesy of Ted Stuckey, Apollo Bay
and District Historical Society Inc.]

On 7 November 1940 the American merchant ship City of Rayville sailed from Adelaide for Melbourne. Late on 8 November the ship was sunk off Apollo Bay, Victoria by a mine. Naval authorities ordered three minesweepers to sea but they were unable to reach the area until next morning. Fortunately, fishing boats from Apollo Bay rescued all but one crewmember.

A naval report indicated that the mines located off Apollo Bay were most likely of German origin. A British ship was sunk in a similar manner off Wilson’s Promontory the day before the Rayville was sunk.

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Naval report

[NAA A1606/1 Item E61/2/7]

The Master of the Rayville expressed his gratitude in a letter to Prime Minister Robert Menzies in which he said that ‘since the time of [their] rescue by the fishermen of Apollo Bay’ he and his crew had ‘received every consideration and courtesy from our Australian friends’.

MV Koolama sitting alongside the wharf at Fremantle
in 1941.

[AWM P00444.210]

On 20 February 1942, the day after the first bombing of Darwin, the MV Koolama was attacked by a Japanese flying boat at Cape Londonderry, the most northerly point of land in Western Australia. The Koolama transmitted a distress signal, and continued on towards Wyndham. At 1.30pm, two hours after the first attack, three Japanese bombers attacked the ship again. This second attack crippled the ship and injured three passengers. Three hours later, the captain gave the order to abandon ship. During the next week, Aborigines and staff from nearby Drysdale Mission rescued most of the passengers and crew from the beach. Others were taken to Broome by flying boat.

A plaque on the Wyndham wharf commemorates the spot where MV Koolama sank on 3 March 1942.

[DVA]

On 1 March, the badly damaged Koolama, with her captain and a skeleton crew, set off again for Wyndham. The ship limped into the small port about 24 hours later. On the morning of 3 March, Japanese aircraft attacked Broome and Wyndham. Although the air attack had caused no apparent damage to the Koolama, she nevertheless started to sink. At about 4.45 pm that afternoon, 11 days after the first attack at Cape Londonderry, the Koolama turned over in the water at Wyndham wharf. She lies there still, embedded in the mud.

Port Gregory

Koolama plaque transcript:

Wyndham Port Heritage
Koolama Wreck Site
In February 1942 the state ship ‘Koolama’ was tracked by Japanese aircraft off Cape Rulhieres, 180 km north-west of Wyndham killing one man and injuring three. Although hit, with continuous pumping the ship managed to return to Wyndham where it subsequently sank – 40 metres north of here. An attempt to refloat it in 1947 proved unsuccessful. An Australian Bicentennial project with financial assistance from the State and Commonwealth government.