Vale Waterhen, Frank Norton, 1942.

HMAS Waterhen listing to port prior to being taken in tow and later sinking at Tobruk. Waterhen left Alexandria, Egypt, laden with troops for Tobruk on 28 June 1941. During the evening of 29 June both Waterhen and her 10th Flotilla companion, HMS Defender, were attacked by German dive-bombers. Waterhen was crippled and holed but fortunately without casualties and Defender was able to go alongside and take off the troops and the ship’s company. Despite attempts to save ‘the old chook’ as she was known, Waterhen rolled over and sank on 30 June. She was the first RAN loss from enemy action in World War II, but the fourth loss from the 10th Destroyer Flotilla. HMS Defender survived Waterhen by only a few days. On 11 July she too was bombed and sunk during her return run to Alexandria in company with HMAS Vendetta.

HMAS Perth

Mrs Mary Foster inquiring at the Prisoners of War Relatives Association Rooms, Elizabeth House, Melbourne, about filling in a radio message form for broadcasting overseas to her son Stoker Horace Foster of HMAS Perth in August 1944. The Perth was sunk by the Japanese on 1 March 1942 during the Battle of the Sunda Strait. Of the ship’s crew of 692 men, 362 men (357 Australians and five Britons) were lost in action or died soon afterwards. The remainder became prisoners of war and, of these, 107 men died through ill treatment in captivity. Because the Japanese failed to provide lists of prisoners of war to the International Red Cross, many families in Australia with relatives on the Perth were unaware of the fate of individual sailors and continued to hope for their survival throughout the remainder of the war. Stoker Horace Foster had gone down with the Perth when she sank.

Ordinary Seaman William Witheriff was one of the Yarra survivors who floated for five days on an open raft. Only thirteen of the original group were still alive when they were rescued by the crew of a Dutch submarine.The men were taken to a hospital in Colombo, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) where William described his ordeal in this letter to his parents.

HMAS Yarra was sunk on 4 March 1942,approximately 500 kilometres south of central Java (modern Indonesia). Yarra was escorting a convoy of three ships - a tanker, a small minesweeper and a depot ship - away from the fighting during the Japanese invasion of Java. Although his convoy was vastly outnumbered by the enemy warships, Yarra's commanding officer, Lieutenant-Commander Robert Rankin, positioned his ship between the convoy and the enemy and put up a brave fight. Just 90 minutes later Yarra was on fire, listing heavily to port and only just afloat. The three ships in the convoy had been sunk. Rankin ordered his crew to abandon ship and just moments later he and those on the bridge were killed by a salvo of Japanese shells.

Most of the crew abandoned their ship but Leading Seaman Ronald Taylor, the captain of the last remaining gun, disregarded the order and continued firing until he was killed and his gun silenced.

One of the Japanese destroyers picked up a boatload of survivors from the convoy but more than 100 others were left in the water. Amongst those left drifting in Carley floats were 34 of the Yarra’s crew. By the time they were eventually rescued on 9 March, only 13 of the original crew of 151 officers and men in Yarra had survived. Another 25 RAN ratings and an officer were lost in the SS Anking, one of the other vessels in the Yarra convoy.

HMAS Vampire

The destroyer HMAS Vampire lost in a Japanese air strike in the Bay of Bengal on 9 April 1942. Eight men were killed or died of wounds including the commanding officer, Commander William Moran, RAN. Survivors were picked up by the British hospital ship HMHS Vita and taken to Colombo.

During 1940-41, HMAS Vampire had served in the Mediterranean fighting against the Italian fleet and assisting in the evacuation of Allied troops from Greece and Crete. Later in 1941 she had run supplies into Tobruk harbour as part of the ‘Scrap Iron Flotilla’.

Vampire was first in action against the Japanese during the battle in which both HM Ships Repulse and Prince of Wales were sunk by Japanese aircraft off the east coast of Malaya on 10 December 1941. Just four months later, on 9 April 1942 the Australian destroyer was sunk by Japanese bombers off the coast of Ceylon (Sri Lanka). Vampire, in company with the British light aircraft carrier HMS Hermes, had sailed from the base at Trincomalee after being warned of an impending Japanese attack. Unfortunately, a Japanese reconnaissance aircraft spotted them as they returned to base next morning.

Hermes was attacked first and sank losing more than 300 of her crew. Next Vampire received a direct hit and the commanding officer, Commander William Moran, ordered his crew to abandon ship. Vampire sank soon afterwards. A British hospital ship rescued 590 survivors from both ships but Moran and seven of his crew perished.

Vampire’s successor, a Daring Class destroyer, was launched in 1959 and paid off in 1968. This second Vampire can be seen at the Australian National Maritime Museum at Darling Harbour in Sydney.

HMAS Kuttabul

The wreck of the depot ship HMAS Kuttabul, lying partly submerged at Garden Island, Sydney Harbour. Kuttabul was sunk and 19 Australian and 2 British ratings died during the Japanese midget submarine attack on Sydney Harbour during the night of 31 May-1 June 1942.

HMAS Nestor

The badly damaged destroyer HMAS Nestor had to be sunk by depth charges from HMS Javelin after bomb damage by German aircraft southwest of Crete on 16 June 1942.



HMAS Nestor was part of a Mediterranean convoy, ‘Operation Vigorous’, with five cruisers and 11 other destroyers when the convoy was attacked by German bombers on 14 June 1942. The attack continued the next day with German aircraft and E-boats (patrol boats) attacking the convoy with torpedoes and bombs. According to Petty Officer John Evans on board Nestor:

… bombs were dropping all around the ship and there were bullet holes everywhere. Doing watch in ‘B’ boiler room when a 1000 pounder hit the top of mast and exploded alongside ‘A’ boiler room.

HMS Javelin was going to tow the damaged ship into Alexandria and at 9.00 pm she put a towline across to the other vessel. By then Nestor was listing heavily to port and both her boiler rooms were full of water. Petty Officer Evans recorded in his diary:

At 0430 on 16 June the enemy bombers returned. The towrope broke twice during the night and they are trying to get another one over now. Javelin came alongside and we hopped aboard her.

0715 HMAS Nestor sunk by depth charges from Javelin.

Four members of the crew were killed during the attacks and one sailor was wounded.

HMAS Nestor was one of five ‘N’ class destroyers loaned to the Australian Government by the British. The destroyers were commissioned into the RAN and carried Australian crews although they remained the property of the British Government. After her commissioning, Nestor went straight to the Mediterranean station, where she sank the German submarine U-127 off Gibraltar, and from there to the East Indies Station in early 1942. Nestor was sunk only days after she returned to the Mediterranean in June 1942.

HMAS Nereus

The Naval Auxiliary Patrol (NAP) vessel HMAS Nereus was destroyed by fire at Sydney on 2 July 1942. This small vessel carried a .303-inch Vickers machine-gun and depth charges on the stern. A number of these NAP vessels were destroyed by fire during World War II, including HMA Ships Siesta, Silver Cloud and Gladmore.

One of the survivors of HMAS Canberra enjoys a quiet reunion with his wife and two sons at the dockside in Sydney on 28 August 1942.

HMAS Canberra, together with HMA Ships Australia and Hobart, took part in the first Allied offensive action of the Pacific war, the amphibious assault on the Solomon Islands. On 7 August 1942, American forces successfully landed and defeated Japanese forces at Tulagi and Guadalcanal Islands. The Japanese reacted quickly and engaged the Allied force, inflicting heavy losses. HMAS Canberra and US Ships Astoria, Vincennes and Quincy were sunk during the action. In total, 83 of the crew, including the commanding officer, Captain Frank Getting, and one American on board the Canberra were lost during the action. The surviviors were returned to Sydney on board the American transport ship USS President Grant.

HMAS Voyager

Lieutenant Charles Bush, official war artist, sketching the wreck of the destroyer HMAS Voyager at Betano Bay, Portuguese Timor, December 1945.

The destroyer HMAS Voyager had been part of the ‘Scrap Iron Flotilla’ operating off Tobruk and elsewhere in the Mediterranean during 1940 and1941. In July 1941 she returned to Australia for a refit and joined the Pacific fleet in the middle of 1942. Voyager was on a supply run from Darwin to Timor with 250 officers and men of the 2/4th Independent Company, 15 tonnes of army stores and eight army barges aboard. During the disembarkation the ship swung on her anchor and ran aground on rock in Betano Bay. Efforts to refloat the damaged ship failed and late that afternoon Japanese bombers attacked, causing extensive damage. Two Australian corvettes, HMA Ships Warrnambool and Kalgoorlie, rescued the crew the next day and Voyager was abandoned and scuttled by naval gunfire.

HMAS Armidale

Survivors from the corvette HMAS Armidale, sunk on 1 December 1942 in action south of Timor. This group was sighted by an aircraft about 450 kilometres north-west of Darwin. A Catalina aircraft despatched from Cairns to pick them up reached the area on the afternoon of 8 December but was unable to help due to rough seas. Despite exhaustive searches and the recovery of other survivors, this group was never seen again.

SS Ceramic

This photograph of Able Seaman (AB) Alfred Jillard holding his young daughter Lois was taken during his final leave in Melbourne in 1942. In August 1942, AB Jillard, a member of the RAN Reserve, was assigned to the Shaw Savill liner SS Ceramic as a Defensively Equipped Merchant Ship (DEMS) gunner. On the evening of 6 December 1942 the Ceramic was west of the Azores in the North Atlantic. The ship was unescorted and bound for Australia carrying 280 seamen and 380 passengers, including 100 women and children, when she was torpedoed by the German submarine U-515. While lifeboats were still being lowered the old liner capsized and sank. Of the 660 on board, 559 of the passengers and crew were lost. The Ceramic’s three DEMS gunners, Leading Seaman Charles Henry Bruce, AB Alfred Jillard and AB Gus William Levitzke, were all lost. The sole survivor of the sinking, a British engineer, was picked up by the submarine and taken to Germany as a prisoner of war. More Australian merchant seamen were lost with the Ceramic than in any other ship lost in the Battle of the Atlantic.

HMAS Patricia Cam

On 9 February 1946, three years after her husband was captured by the Japanese, Mrs Violet Kentish wrote to the Editor of the ‘Leading Newspaper’ in Perth to try to find some news of him. The Reverend Leonard Kentish was taken prisoner in 1943 after the sinking of the stores carrier HMAS Patricia Cam.

HMAS Patricia Cam, a stores carrier, departed Millingimbi in the Northern Territory on 22 January 1943, heading for Elcho Island carrying stores and personnel for outlying missions and settlements. At 1.30 pm that day a Japanese float plan attacked the small vessel which sank almost immediately drowning one member of the crew. According to survivors, the Japanese floatplane returned and dropped a bomb amongst the survivors killing one more crew member and two of the Aboriginal passengers. Despite machine-gunning the survivors in the water they were not able to inflict any new injuries. The aircraft then flew away to the north but returned once more, landed and approached the Reverend Leonard Kentish, Chairman of the Methodist Northern Australian Mission District, a passenger on the ship who was sitting on a floating hatch cover. The Japanese pilot called Mr Kentish to swim over to him, had a brief discussion with him and then took him aboard and flew off.

The survivors landed on a small rocky islet near the Wessel Islands, a couple of them dying of their injuries shortly afterwards. Some of the Aboriginal passengers managed to light a fire to attract attention and the group was discovered three days later by other Aborigines who took the commanding officer, Lieutenant Alexander Meldrum, RANR, to Marchinbar Island by canoe to seek further assistance. From there he walked nearly 60 kilometres to Cape Wessel to the nearest Coastwatcher station in order to radio for help.

At the same time, a RAAF pilot from 7 Squadron spotted the others on the beach and organised to drop food and first aid kits to them. HMAS Kuru rescued the group seven days after their sinking on 29 January 1943.

In 1947, Mrs Violet Kentish discovered her husband’s fate. His captors had beheaded him on 4 May 1943. The perpetrators were arrested and tried as war criminals. Former Sub-Lieutenant Safejima Maugan, who had ordered the execution, was hanged in Stanley Gaol, Hong Kong, on 23 August 1948. Hoyama Kenzo and Kohama Shozuke both received sentences of life imprisonment for their part in Kentish’s execution.

HMAS Hobart

On 20 July 1943, HMAS Hobart was operating with HMA Ships Australia, Arunta and Warramunga as part of Allied Task Force 74 in the Coral Sea when she was hit by a torpedo from a Japanese submarine. Thirteen crew members were either killed in action or 'presumed dead' when the torpedo entered the port quarter and exploded. Hobart managed to limp into Espiritu Santo in the New Hebrides where she was de-munitioned. HMA Ships Warramunga and Arunta then escorted her back to Sydney for repairs.

The three ’N’ class destroyers HMA Ships Nizam, Nepal and Napier in July 1945.

During the night of 11 February 1945, HMAS Nizam was hit by a heavy squall as she rounded Cape Leeuwin in Western Australia. A huge sea from the starboard quarter caused the ship to keel over an estimated 60 to 70 degrees, burying the whole of her port side in the water. The ship was travelling at 21 knots and the water swept down the ship sweeping boats, davits and sailors overboard.

According to Able Seaman Jack Boyle:
I was fast asleep when a tremendous crashing noise woke me up about 2215. The ship seemed to be upside down. All the lockers and tables from the starboard side had broken away and crashed onto the port side of the mess deck. We found out later that we had lost all the guns crew from B mounting, no survivors. [A personal communication from Able Seaman Jack Boyle to Ken Cunningham, quoted in ‘Man overboard, N Class Destroyers’, Naval Officers Club Newsletter No 58, 1 September 2004, pp. 19-22]

Despite their efforts it was impossible to find the lost sailors in the darkness.

The ‘N’ class destroyers lost a total of 15 sailors overboard during World War II. HMAS Nizam was the first to report a man overboard in March 1941. Later that year on 21 October a huge sea swept over the starboard quarter of the ship taking one crew member and 20 Australian soldiers from the 2/24th Infantry Battalion who were being evacuated from Tobruk. Leading Cook Robert Burchell and 14 of the soldiers were recovered but Burchell, who had suffered severe head injuries, died the next day.

There are two memorials in Australia commemorating the men lost overboard from ‘N’ class ships. The two sailors swept overboard from HMAS Napier are commemorated on a plaque at Queenscliff, Victoria. At Augusta, Western Australia, the nearest town to Cape Leeuwin, is a memorial cairn and wall commemorating the ten Nizam sailors lost in February 1945.

Engine Room Artificer Ford from HMAS Warrnambool supports an unidentified seaman who was injured when their Bathurst class corvette struck a mine on 13 September 1947.

HMAS Warrnambool struck the mine during minesweeping operations near Cockburn Reef in Queensland. The defensive minefields, laid by HMAS Bungaree during World War II, were being cleared by the 20th Minesweeping Flotilla when Warrnambool struck the mine. Four members of the Warrnambool’s crew were lost in the explosion. Despite her sinking two years after the end of World War II, HMAS Warrnambool was classified as a war loss although the four men killed in the explosion, dying after the cut-off date for the Roll of Honour, were not classed as war dead.