View allAll Photos Tagged quickmatch
2167. Feb. 1961. A Jack-stay transfer from frigate HMAS QUICKMATCH to Daring Class destroyer HMAS VOYAGER [II]. The image brought back a memory for Contributor and author Graeme Andrews, who recalls making the crossing between the two ships on that day.
These photographs have been made available to the Unofficial RAN Centenary 1911-2011 photostream by the HMAS CERBERUS Museum, at the Flinders Naval Training Establishment, courtesy of the Curator, Warrant officer Martin Grogan RANR. With thanks to Toni Munday of CrestCerberus and Geoff Green for assistance.
3811. A pleasant afternoon on the quarterdecks, as the ships were opened to the local French and Islander populations. On March 27, during the voyage, HMAS Queenborough had achieved 31 knots during full power trials, which was presumably not done at the same time as she was conducting ocean water quality tests and dumping obsolete ammunition either. If fact, we suspect it would have been done to give the CSIRO boffins aboard a thrill.
We imagine them on the forward 40mm bofors gun deck, chins up, eyes closed, short pointy beards headed into the wind, and loving it ...
3984. This is not the same seaboat departure as the preceding image - the men here are dressed for shore. Scuttles are out, too, suggesting the setting is in South East Asia.
Photo: Graeme Andrews, RAN 1955-1968, RANR 1980. From a private disc, with permission.
2685. Four of the RAN's five 'Q' class destroyers were converted to Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigates, but three together in one place is as many as could ever be seen in service.
In 1957, just four years after her conversion, HMAS QUADRANT's hull and engines were found to be unserviceable and she was paid off on August 16 that year before the conversion of the fourth ship, HMAS QUIBERON, was completed.
QUIBERON, the subject of the preceding photo, was re-commissioned as a frigate on December 18, 1957. A total of 23 Royal Navy destroyers underwent Type 15 frigate conversions, emerging with a somewhat different, full-width bridge structure to the RAN ships. The bridge of the RN ships was also farther forward, with the forward AA weapons mounted on top of the bridge.
Photo: Photo RAN Historical, Navy Heritage Collection image ID NO. 04174, the image appears in the Topmill Pty Ltd book 'Australian Warships and Auxiliaries of the 1940s' compiled by Jonathan Nally [Topmill, Sydney] p72 ; also Topmill's publication 'Australian Seapower: FRIGATES - Profile No. 6] Topmill Sydney, undated] p34.
1435. GASCOYNE, as mentioned earlier, had spent 13 postwar years laid up in reserve - from April 1946 to June 1959 - when she was brought back into service as a survey frigate. Fitted with a laboratory, depth-sounding apparatus and a helicopter platform on her quarterdeck, she conducted surveys for seven years around the coasts of Australia.
GASCOYNE paid off at Williamstown Naval Dockyard in February 1966, and was used as an alongside accomodation vessel for the crews of ships under refit, very much as HMAS TOBRUK and HMAS QUICKMATCH had been.
The frigate was declared for disposal in 1971, and broken up by the Fujita Salvage Company in Osaka the following year.
Photo Lindsay Rex, it is an Unofficial RAN Centenary 1911-2011 photostream acquisition from Rex/Priest, Down Under Ships Photographs, Melbourne. This usage allowed.
875. This looks like Manly - and the ship is being dressed for some occasion. Our guess is that HMAS QUICKMATCH is on duty at the Australia Day Regatta, and event stretching continuously back into the early 19th Century, the oldest continuously held sailing regatta in the world.
POSTSCRIPT: On reflection, it may be the occasion when QUICKMATCH transported the visiting Queen Mother from Manly to Sydney.
Photo: RAN Official, it appeared in Ross Gillett's book 'Australian and New Zealand Warships Since 1946' [Child and Associates, Sydney 1988] opp. p17.
1383. We're very sorry about the heading. There's a story behind it.
In the United States in 1969 Kookaburra was on a reporting assignment competing against a very elegant British feature writer from the New York Daily News, Anthony Stewart.
We'd attended an inquest out in the Pennsylvania coal country into the death of Mary Jo Kopechne in Senator Edward Kennedy's car at Chappaquiddick. When it was over we [along Derryn Hinch, then working in the Sydney Morning Herald's New York bureau] went up to the cemetery at Larksville where she was buried, and purely by accident met Mary Jo's parents, Gwen and Joseph Kopechne. We were invited into the gatekeeper's cottage [the gatekeeper happened to be an uncle of the dead girl].
The Kopechne's had been terribly hurt about the imputations against their daughter's purity, and KookaburraI began his story with something very tremulous and somnehow quaint that Mrs Kopechne had said to him: 'The doctors told me that my daughter was a maiden lady..."
Tony Stewart began his story: "The wintering sun touched the Appalachins with gold ..."
I've always wanted to use it.
Here's HMAS QUICKMATCH, whose reconstruction at Williamstown Naval Dockyard took place in 1954-55. This photograph was taken in June 1961, and it is very possibly therefore taken during the RAN's ceremonial fleet entry into Sydney Harbour to mark its 50th Anniversary.
Photo: Alan Zammit. It appears in John Bastock's book 'Australia's Ships of War'
[Angus and Robertson, Sydney 1975] p319.
1378. In Royal Navy service during WWII HMS QUEENSBOROUGH served with distinction on Arctic convoys, in the Mediterranean, Indian and Pacific Oceans.
Of the five Q Class destroyers with RAN connections, only HMAS QUICKMATCH and HMAS QUIBERON were formally commissioned into the RAN and Australian-manned. They and the other ships, HMSs QUEENBOROUGH, QUADRANT and QUALITY often served in company, and operated as a squadron with the British Pacific Fleet in the latter stages of the war.
What's known is that all five ended up in Sydney in late 1945 after the surrender in Tokyo Bay, and there was some crew swapping from the four 'N' Class destroyers that were reverting to the Royal Navy for return to Britain. The five 'Q's remained with the RAN initially on loan until presented outright in the early 1950s. As is well known, and discussed earlier, four of the five were then converted to Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigates.
Photo: James Henry Cleet [1876-1959] FRPS, AT Imperial War Museum, this copy from the Terry Dickens Collection, it has appeared on the World Naval Ships Forums website, and appears here with permission of Terry [forum Moderator AstralTrader].
626. With deck crews busy, HMAS QUICKMATCH departs Sydney under lowering cloud. She's a ship the Kookaburra visited several times in Melbourne as a youngster, but seemed then to lack something in glamour due to her light topside armament.
Photo: Naval Historical Society of Australia, it appears on the NHSA's disc set 'Warships Of The Past and Present' compiled by Graeme Andrews an Honourary Life Member of the Society.
3581. Does anyone recall the photo we had of Graeme Andrews doing his laundry on HMAS Quickmatch back in 1961? It's here, pic NO. 3285.
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Goodness. How times had changed in the mess decks 35 years later.
Photo Graeme Andrews, RAN 1955-1968, RANR 1980. From a private disc, with permission.
625. Seen here in Port Phillip Bay, in her first years as a frigate, QUICKMATCH did repeated deployments with the Commonwealth Strategic Reserve in Asia. She spent three Christmases in a row in Hong Kong in the first years of the 1960s.
Photo: RAN Official, it appears in Ross Gillett's book 'Australian and New Zealand Warships Since 1946 [Child and Associates, Sydney 1988] p34.
3812. Another view of the same pleasant afternoon, but the ship astern has thrown too deep a shadow in the foreground for the photographer to capture his lovely subject. Never mind, it's an interesting dock scene, and a good view of the verdant headland with French colonial houses behind.
Photo: Collection of Graeme Andrews, RAN 1955-1968, RANR 1980. From a private disc, with permission.
624. The former WWII destroyer's conversion to a 'Q' Class or Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigate was completed at Williamstown Naval Dockyard on Sept 23, 1955.
With a broader enclosed super-structure, at 2,020 tons standard, 2,700 tons full load, she emerged from the dockyard somewhat heavier than the 1,705-2,500 ton ship that went in.
She was broken up in Japan in 1972.
Photo: RAN Official, it appears in Ross Gillett's book 'Warships of Australia' [Rigby Australia, 1977] p183.
2253. The 'Q' Class destroyer HMAS QUICKMATCH in the first years after World War II, prior to her conversion to a Type 15 anti-submarine frigate.
Photo: From the archives of the HMAS CERBERUS Museum, Flinders Naval Establishment, Victoria, NO. 1074, it has been made available to the Unofficial RAN Centenary 1911-2011 photostream, courtesy Warrant Officer Martin Grogan, RANR.
With thanks to Toni Munday of CrestCerberus for assistance.
1379. Author John Bastock states in his book 'Warships of Australia' that HMS QUEENBOROUGH formally transferred to the RAN in Sydney in Sept. 1945 - the month this photo was taken - replacing HMAS NORMAN, which reverted to the Royal Navy.
While HMASs QUICKMATCH and QUIBERON served with the occupation forces in Japan, and QUADRANT served as a troop ferry between the islands and Australia for a time, QUEENBOROUGH and QUALITY both paid off into reserve fairly soon after the end of the war, pending the Type 15 frigate conversion in HMAS QUEENBOROUGH's case. QUALITY remained in reserve alongside HMAS SHROPSHIRE, and was no doubt used as a source of parts for her sisters.
Photo: Lucien J. Baee Collection it appears in John Bastock's book 'Warships of Australia' [Angus and Robertson, Sydney 1975] p157.
6237. With water pumped from the new dock, we get a look at the 23,000-28,661 tons [full load] carrier's undersides.
Here's a partial listing of warships that entered the Capotain Cook Dock between March 1945 and March 1995, and the number of times:
Battleships: HMS ANSON [2] HMS DUKE OF YORK [2] HMS KING GEORGE V [I]
Carriers: HMAS MELBOURNE [27]; HMAS SYDNEY [24] HMAS VENGEANCE [5]
HMS FORMIDABLE [I]; HMS GLORY [2] HMS ILLUSTRIOUS [I] ; HMS IMPLACABLE [2] ; HMS INDEFATIGABLE [I]; HMS INDOMITABLE [I]; HMS VENERABLE [I]; HMS VENGEANCE [I]; HMS VICTORIOUS [I].
Cruisers: HMAS AUSTRALIA [17]; HMAS HOBART [14]; HMAS SHROPSHIRE [7].
Missile destroyers: HMAS BRISBANE [14]; HMAS HOBART [14] HMAS PERTH [15]
Destroyers: HMAS ANZAC [11]; HMAS ARUNTA [18]; HMAS BATAAN [13]; HMAS DUCHESS [8];
HMAS QUADRANT [14]; HMAS QUALITY [9]; HMAS QUEENBOROUGH [23]; HMAS QUIBERON [25]; HMAS QUICKMATCH [7]; HMAS TOBRUK [21]; HMAS VAMPIRE [23]; HMAS VENDETTA [10]; HMAS VOYAGER [9]; HMAS WARRAMUNGA [21] HMS CARYSFORT [1].
Frigates: HMAS BARCOO [32] - record; HMAS GASCOYNE [20]; HMAS MURCHISON [15] ;
HMAS HAWKESBURY [11]; HMAS SHOALHAVEN [13]; HMAS CULGOA [12] HMAS CONDAMINE [13] ; HMAS MACQUARIE [5]; PNS SIND [1]; HMAS DIAMANTINA [3]; HMAS LACHLAN [1].
Destroyer escorts: HMAS PARRAMATTA [14]; HMAS STUART [8]; HMAS YARRA [12]; HMAS TORRENS [7] ; HMAS SWAN [6] HMAS DERWENT [5].
There are scores of dockings among submarines and ships of other types, as well as about 40 commercial vessels, including FAIRSTAR [2] and GOTHIC [1]. Overall, apart from the two years the BPF was based in Sydney, foreign usage of the Australian dockyard appears to have been very light. The ship names and figures here are from the CXook Dock's 50th anniversary booklet.
Photo: based on the book credit in the following entry, we think this photo can also probably be attributed to Steve Given, RAN.
5488. The kid with big ears, skinny legs and dangerous footwear has borrowed his Dad's old fashioned bike without mudguards to get here. His shock-haired blonde mate has got his sister's Malvern Star. Words fail - one can't express what a total, complete abandonment of all pride it would take from him to do that: for a boy in the 1950s to get on a girl's bike like that in public.
Well, at least it hasn't got a basket on the front. But notice how he's a little abashed, disadvantaged, and standing back fractionally, at the HMAS ANZAC [II] sentry's approach. The other boy is completely happy and at ease within himself, thinking about what it would be like to get a bayonet in the guts.
By the look of both of them, one would say they're Tigers barrackers from Richmond, or Swans followers from South Melbourne. Anyway, the circumstances show they really HAD to get here.
Boys and battleships in the 20th Century, one of the strongest attractions known to man. One that lingers on.
This is not actually a battleship - it's a Battle Class destroyer. But anything grey with guns. The fascination filters down.
It's just a guess, but we would say this is late February 1954, the Royal Visit, with ANZAC being one of the ships that escorted the Royal Yacht GOTHIC into Melbourne to pick up the Queen and Duke, who were arriving there by air. The destroyer had itself carried them on earlier stages of their visit, to the Great Barrier Reef. So, more notions of gallantry, loyalty and romance.
Now battleships, if not destroyers, are obsolete. Yet they were, and remain, the most complex pieces of machinery ever devised and built by Man. For a boy in the mid-20th Century it was as if their power, their pomp and their ceremony - along with the concepts of pursuit, rescue, escape , and duel at sea - were all conceived to grip, and trap a boy's imagination, whole generations of boys, somehow imbued with a Code.
Not the worst one, either. Like battleships, it may have been left behind. But it would never let them go.
BOYS AND BATTLESHIPS:
Pic 5400. The EMDEN blown to pieces all over again, in the Brisbane River, Ca. 1920
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Pic 5: NZ schoolboys pass judgment on RAN battle group, Aotea Quay Wellington, Feb. 25 1950.
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Pic 66. Greeting USS Mullany, Newcastle NSW, early 1950s.
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Pic. 154: Barefoot boy sees HMAS MURCHISON tied up, Nov. 1950, Kings Wharf Newcastle, NSW.
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Pic 2224. Boy, bike, and HMAS CULGOA, Newstead Point Park , Brisbane 1950s.
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Pic 4885: Boys, bike, and HMAS AUSTRALIA [II], Newstead Point Park, Brisbane, May 24, 1954.
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Pic 2585: Boys, young and old, view carrier HMAS VENGEANCE in the Brisbane River.
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Pic 244. Taken by Dads to see corvette COOTAMUNDRA, Newcastle NSW Ca. 1950.
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Pic 245. Boys and Dads survey COOTAMUNDRA tie up Kings Wharf Newcastle NSW.
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Pic 2586, Short pants wave to HMAS VENGEANCE, Fremantle, March 3, 1953.
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Pic 1604, the boy at the ferry rail, and HMAS AUSTRALIA [II] Ca. 1950.
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Pic 5410. Kookaburra in first long pants, with HMAS QUICKMATCH, 1958.
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Pic 1459: The Dead Boy views HMS ENCOUNTER. Brisbane, 1910
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Pic 4473. Boys consider grounded HMAS BARCOO’S situation, Glenelg SA 1948.
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Pic 139: Altar boys view VENDETTA, funeral voyage of PM Joseph Lyons, April 11, 1939.
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Pic 2096: Street kids salute VAMPIRE visitors in Saigon
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Pic 1117. The bike brigade gathers for LEANDER, Princes Pier Port Melbourne, 1938.
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Pic 6134. Boys, one on bike, admire Fairmile B ML825 at Williamstown. A.C. Green.
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Pic. 3212 HMAS STUART [I] and HMAS WATERHEN bring boys with their bikes to a dock at Williamstown.
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Pic 6489: Youngsters on Fremantle dock in May 1949, with HMAS AUSTRALIA [II] .
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The end.
5450. On a last visit to New Zealand, the RAN flagship looked as fine as ever, captured here in Wellington by Christopher Howell, a maritime photographer and ships supplier from Bluff, who made many such magnificent images available to the Centenary Photostream.
In fact the this Collection is filled with scores of marvelous images, including so many 'originals' by our regular contributors that it became impossible to choose the 'covers', and we tended therefore to look to the unusual. What we're trying to say is that there are many, many more like this, which simply should not be missed.
For all the controversy that dogged her long career, HMAS MELBOURNE [II]was one of the two or three most significant warships in the RAN's history, and gave unflagging service that deserved more to be honoured than questioned.
THE HMAS MELBOURNE II] COMPENDIUM OF 350 IMAGES - Part Seven [Conclusion].
Pic 4626 Second view from TV stills of August 18, 1980 departure, courtesy Terry Dickens U.K.
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Pic 4627. Third in TV film still sequence of August 18, 1980 departure for Operation SANDGROPER courtesy Terry Dickens.
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Pic 4628 At the Oil Wharf, Garden Island Sept 25 1979 with new LW02 radar antennae missing
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Pic 4629 At the Oil Wharf Garden Island being passed by HMAS SYDNEY [III] Circa 1971.
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Pic 4630. May 1, 1962 exercising with submarine USS Catfish and a Gannet overhead
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Pic 4637 At the Tamar Basin Hong Kong May 6-14 1966.
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Pic 4638, Another view at Tamar Basin 1966, Typhoon IRMA looming.
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Pic 4657. Families welcome the carrier returning to Brisbane from SEA DEMON, June 11 1959
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Pic 4658 Another Brisbane scene June 11, 1959 on return from SE Asia
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Pic 4659: Approaching Hamilton Wharf Brisbane April 21, 1967.
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Pic 4660: Lines party jump ashore as carrier approaches Hamilton Wharf Brisbane April 21, 1967
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Pic 4662. With USS SWENSON Exercise SEA DEVIL May 7 1962
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Pic 4833 Aft section of USS FRANK E. EVANS after collision with MELBOURNE, June 3 1959
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Pic 4834 Damaged bows from USS FRANK E.EVANS collision, June 3 1969.
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Pic 4835. USS EVERETT F. LASRSON stands by aft section of USS FRANK E. EVANS after collision
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Pic 4836. Another view of USS FRANK E. EVANS aft section secured to USS EVERETT F. LARSON
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Pic 4852: Ships band in bofors sponson as HMAS VAMPIRE [ii] approaches to refuel
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Pic 4855. In the mothball fleet VENDETTA alongside zoo background colour Nov. 4 1984
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Pic 4856. Second image of this paid in the mothball fleet Nov 4, 1984.
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Pic 4941. April 1959 in the South China Sea, by Trevor Weaver
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Pic 4949. 816 Squadron personnel sunning on MELBOURNE’s weather deck outside the hangar.
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Pic 4950 MELBOURNE crewmen relaxing ashore at a canteen in Rabaul. Ron Marsh photo.
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Pic 5133 MELBOURNE leads a Type 12 frigate and HMAS SUPPLY out of Sydney Harbour, circa 1962-63.
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Pic 5144: Sept. 1977, Looking immaculate, HMAS MELBOURNE returns from the Spithead Jubilee Review with HMAS BRISBANE and HMNZS CANTERBURY.
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Pic 5145: Looking down from the island on a 1950s flight deck crowded with Gannets and Sea Venoms.
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Pic 5209: MELBOURNE and QUICKMATCH in classic 1950s image used in recruiting ads
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Pic 5210: Nine gannets parked on MELBOURNE’s stern, one Gannet foreground, 1958 by Graeme Andrews.
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Pic 5266: At the Oil Wharf, Garden Island, Sept. 1979.
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Pic 5267: Another angle on the same day and location, Sept. 1979.
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Pic 5331: April 16, 1980 - Framed by the Harbour Bridge, MELBOURNE returns from RIMPAC 80.
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Pic 5332. Another angle on Melbourne’s return from RIMPAC 80, April 16, 1980.
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Pic 5333: Oct 1967: MELBOURNE arrives off Point Loma San Diego picking up new aircraft.
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Pic 5334. MELBOURNE in 1958, from John Lyall.
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Pic 5335; MELBOURNE in 1967 before receiving her new generation of aircraft.
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Pic 5337: Grumman Tracker S-2G on the catapult, 1979.
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Pic 5339,: Air brakes on, an A4 G Skyhawk lands on MELBOURNE 1980.
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Pic 5340, Everyone seeking the shade of MELBOURNE’s flight deck on a hot day in 1958.
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Pic 5341, a companion image to that above, on a hot day in 1958.
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Pic 5451 At the Cruiser Wharf at Garden island with HMAS PERTH [II] and HMAS BARCOO close by, 1966.
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Pic 5452: MELBOURNE is moved across to the Atholk Bight reserve fleet 1982.
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Pic 5634. 1977, returning from Jubilee Review with British ASR craft as deck cargo:
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Pic 5635: Same as previous, 1977 with deck cargo
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Pic 5636: With Queen Elizabeth Silver Jubilee deck sign, CANTERBURY and BRISABANE [II]
Pic 5901: MELBOURNE and SYDNEY [III] at GI, ca. 1958, from WARRAMUNGA
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Pic 5903: At Hong Kong, Oct 12, 1956.
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Pic 6009: In Manila Bay for Exercise Sea Imp, May 1966, Bob Westthorp:
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Pic 6022: Being re-painted, Tamar Basin, Hong Kong May 1966:
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Pic 6023: Being re-painted, superstructure, Tamar Basin Hong Kong, May 1966, Bob Westthorp:
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Pic 6024: at Exercise Sea Imp, May 1966:
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Pic 6036: At Penang, June 9 1966, Bob Westthorp:
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Pic 6273: At Hawaii, 1970s:
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Pic 6440> In Vancouver, Canada, Oct 11 1967.
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Pic 6441. Berthing in Vancouver, Oct 13, 1967.
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Pic. 6783. Flying trials in the English Channel, Jan 19, 1956.
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THE END. PHOTOSTREAM COMPENDIA COMPLETED THUS FAR:
HMAS WARRAMUNGA [I] Tribal Class destroyer: single entry under pic 5470, 50 images
HMAS ARUNTA [I] Tribal Class destroyer, two parts, under pic entries 5467-5468, 80 images
HMAS HOBART [I] Modified Leander Class light cruiser: Two parts, under pic entries 5464-5465, 100 images
HMAS MELBOURNE [II] Light fleet aircraft carrier: seven parts, under pic entries 5444-5450, 350 images
HMAS QUEENBOROUGH, 'Q' Class or Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigate; Two parts under pic entries 5435,5436, 60 images.
HMAS ANZAC [II] Battle Class destroyer, Two Parts under pic entries 5429-5430; 60 images.
HMAS SHROPSHIRE, heavy cruiser: Three Parts under pic entries 5415-5417, 75 images
BOYS AND BATTLESHIPS: COMPENDIUM ESSAY on a 20th Century Romance, under Pic NO. 5488, 20+ images
HMAS AUSTRALIA [II] heavy cruiser : Three parts under pic entries 5412-5415, 200 images
HMAS VAMPIRE [II] Daring Class destroyer, three parts Pic NO. 5501-3, 100+ images
BRITISH PACIFIC FLEET IN AUSTRALIA; single entry; under Pic 5365, 50 images
HMAS BARCOO, WWII River Class frigate, single entry, under Pic NO. 6186, 30+ images.
FOUL WEATHER IN PORT COMPENDIUM - single entry at Pic NO. 6191, 60+ images
5503. Although the last of the 20th Century Daring Class ships in existence, HMAS VAMPIRE [II] was not the longest serving. That honour goes to the 54 years service of the former HMS DECOY, completed in 1953, as as BAP DIEGO FERRE served on in the Peruvian Navy from 1969 until finally decommissioned on July 13, 2007.
On being sold to Peru,, DIEGO FERRE underwent a rebuild at Cammell Laird to 1973, and emerged carrying launchers for eight Exocet MM38 SSMs, making her and sister BAP PALACIOS [ex-HMS DIANA] the most powerful Daring Class destroyers in the end. They also acquired helicopter platforms on the quarterdeck. Thus the RAN is left clinging to the claim that ours remained the best-looking - and there is still one in existence.
One can see the missile destroyer appearance of DIEGO FERRE on her Wikipedia entry below. PALACIOS was decommissioned in 1993.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BAP_Ferr%C3%A9_(DM-74)
The photo above shows VAMPIRE after her 1970-71 modernisation, seen from HMAS MELBOURNE [II]. It is RAN Archive, Navy Heritage Collection image ID. NO. M01166.
Pic 3238: Seventeenth in modelmakers images, 40 mm twin bofors mount facing.
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Pic 3239: Eighteen in modelmakers imnages, aft deckhouse and funnel.
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/5163900966/in/photostream
Pic 3298: Refuelling at sea from MELBOURNE , 1960s.
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/5188767267/in/photostream
Pic 3513: Seen from a Sydney ferry, 1981. Eastwood Collection
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Pic 3670: Builders Trials, 1959, Graeme Andrews SHF Collection.
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Pic 3927. Berthed in the Saigon River with QUICKMATCH, Feb. 1962 – Graeme Andrews.
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Pic 3987: Oct 4, 1977, meeting MELBOURNE on her return from Jubilee Review, Spithead
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Pic 4078: Firing a broadside, 1970s.
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Pic 4148: With the Sydney cliff line, 1970s, dramatic image:
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Pic 4635: On her own in Sembawang Basin, Nov 4-26, 1975.
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/5880769601/in/photostream
Pic 4852: Approaching HMAS MELBOURNE as the band tunes up.
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6052158401/in/photostream
Pic 4853: Docking at Garden Island in the 1960s.
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6052769540/in/photostream
Pic 4854: VAMPIRE at sea, 1960s.
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6052257409/in/photostream
Pic 4952: VAMPIRE rolls in a heavy swell, deteriorated colour image.
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6304857197/in/photostream
4953. Alongside HMAS MELBOURNE [II] grainy colour image.
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6304869071/in/photostream
Pic 5230: Port quarter view, showing escape hatches.
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6473883427/in/photostream
Pic 5504: Postscript, in the 1960s.
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6866852801/in/photostream
Pic 5505: Postscript, at the ANMM, Jan 1, 2007. Wikipedia
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6866978307/in/photostream
Pic 5506. Lit up at Sembawang Basin, Singapore 1979. CPO Dennis Mills [ret].
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6867144685/in/photostream
Pic 5934: VAMPIRE at Port Melbourne, Dec. 12, 1982, by Neil Penny:
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Pic 5935: VAMPIRE at Port Melbourne, Dec. 12, 1982, by Neil Penny:
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Pic 5936: VAMPIRE at Port Melbourne, Dec. 12, 1982, by Neil Penny:
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Pic 5937: Deck scene, VAMPIRE at Port Melbourne, Dec. 12, 1982, by Neil Penny
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Pic 6256: 1969, in SE Asia with 'B' turret missing - RAN
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Pic 6257: Another image, low angle, at sea with B turret missing in 1969
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The three-part VAMPIRE 100 COMPENDIUM concludes. OTHER PHOTOSTREAM COMPENDIA completed thus far:
HMAS AUSTRALIA [I] Indefatigable Class battlecruiser; two parts, beginning under Entry 5476, 100+ images.
HMAS WARRAMUNGA [I] Tribal Class destroyer: single entry under Entry 5470, 50 images
HMAS ARUNTA [I] Tribal Class destroyer, two parts, under pic entries 5467-5468, 80 images
HMAS HOBART [I] Modified Leander Class light cruiser: Two parts, under pic entries 5464-5465, 100 images
HMAS MELBOURNE [II] Light fleet aircraft carrier: seven parts, under pic entries 5444-5450, 350 images
HMAS QUEENBOROUGH, 'Q' Class or Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigate; Two parts under pic entries 5435,5436, 60 images.
HMAS ANZAC [II] Battle Class destroyer, Two Parts under pic entries 5429-5430; 60 images.
HMAS SHROPSHIRE, heavy cruiser: Three Parts under pic entries 5415-5417, 75 images
HMAS AUSTRALIA [II] heavy cruiser : Three parts under pic entries 5412-5415, 200 images
BRITISH PACIFIC FLEET IN AUSTRALIA; single entry; under Pic 5365, 50 images
BOYS AND BATTLESHIPS: Under Entry No.5488, 17-image essay on the 20th Century romance between boys and battleships.
HMAS BARCOO, WWII River Class frigate, single entry under Pic NO. 6186, 30+ images.
FOUL WEATHER IN PORT COMPENDIUM - single entry at Pic NO. 6191, 60+ images
BOYS AND BATTLESHIPS: COMPENDIUM ESSAY on a 20th Century Romance, under Pic NO. 5488, 20+ images
[These compendia can be found by putting the Pic, or "Entry' number in the search field above right]
5489. The first completed of the RAN's Type 12 frigates, HMAS PARRAMATTA and the following three ships were essentially of the Rothesay class sub-group, but incorporating a number of modifications, while the last two ships were of the Leander sub-group.
Built at Cockatoo Island Dockyard PARRAMATTA was completed on July 14, 1961, in intially armed a twin 4.5 inch dual purpose gun mounts, a twin 40mm bofors after and two triple sets of Limbo anti-submarine mortars. The appearance of the first four ships was dominated by the towering Dutch LW-02 air-warning radar on the foremast, which, from the fore and aft aspect, looked top-heavy for the ship [see first images below].
While they initially carried no guided missiles, a Seacat quad mounting soon replaced the bofors aft, and the Australian Ikara anti-submarine missile system eventually replaced one of the triple limbo mounts on the quareter deck.
The ships displaced 2100 tons standard, 2700 tons full load. Like her sisters, PARRAMATTA [III] underwent a four years and two months long modernisation and refit at Williamstown Naval Dockyard, in her case from June 1977 to August 1981, and emerged with a lower profile, the LW-02 radar sitting lower on the mainmast aft. The frigates spent considerable time on deployment with the Commonwealth Far East Stragetic Reserve.
PARRAMATTA was paid off almost 10 years after modernisation, on January 11, 1991, and sold that year for breaking up in Pakistan.
The Photograph above shows her departing Fremantle on October 31, 1973. It is from the RAN Archives, Navy Heritage Collection image 01964.
THE COMPENDIUM: 40 Photostream images of HMAS PARRAMATTA [III].
Pic 89: Tall ship with Dutch LW-02 air warning radar
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Pic 90: Stern view showing Seacat and Ikara missile installations.
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Pic 91: SUPER IMAGE with YARRA [III] VOYAGER [II] and VENDETTA in Japan May 1962, from Ash Moore.
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Pic 144: At the EMS mooring, Garden Island with STALWART [II] GREAT IMAGE.
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Pic 779: Trials ship PARRAMATTA joins fleet for 50th Anniversary entry June 15, 1961
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Pic 1262. At Williamstown ND opposite accommodation frigates QUICKMATCH, GASCOYNE
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Pic 1300: SUPER IMAGE At Garden Island, TCV COLAC alongside, SUPPLY behind, 1965.
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Pic 1485: March 1988, at the finger wharf at Woolloomooloo, Geoff Eastwood
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Pic 1486: second in this sequence, Woolloomooloo March 1988
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Pic 1677: third in Woolloomooloo sequence by Geoff Eastwood, March 1988
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Pic 1711: At Bicentenary Salute, Oct. 1988 by Geoff Eastwood
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Pic 1712: Second view in the line at Bicentenary Salute, Oct 1988, Geoff Eastwood
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Pic 1262. At Williamstown Naval Dockyard berthed opposite accommodation vessels QUICKMATCH and GASCOYNE:
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Pic 2170: Cup Week at Port Melbourne, 1961.
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Pic2315: Aug 31, 1948: 4.5 inch turret replace during half-life refit, Williamstown.
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Pic 2350 In the Sembawang Basin, Singapore
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Pic 2494: Offshore with HOBART [II] 1980s.
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Pic 2560: PARRAMATTA refuelling at sea, 1968
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Pic 2655 At the Fitting Out Wharf, Cockatoo Island, 1961.
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Pic 2833: PARRAMATTA fires her Limbo anti-submarine mortar, Nov. 1965.
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Pic 2882. Taking on Fuel at Gabo Island, Nov. 1965. Close-up bridge view
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Pic 2983 PARRAMATTA [III] on trials 1961, Collection of Ashley Moore.
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Pic 2984: Overhauled at Bendigo Ordnance Factory PARRA’s 4.5 inch turret is returned Aug. 1978.
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Pic 3102 Washed colour from 1961 Jubilee booklet, wearing red trials flag
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Pic 3215: Oct 13-20 1986, Exercise CROWEATER
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Pic 3509 Fourth, or detail, from earlier series at Woolloomooloo, March 1988 Geoff Eastwood
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Pic 3510: At Garden Island, Queen’s Birthday August 1982. Geoff Eastwood
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Pic. 4096 In the 1970s with original tall foremast and Dutch LW-02 air warning radar
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Pic 4281 On Exercises with other Type 12s, 1960s.
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/5605124206/in/photostream
Pic 4831: With OFL lighter alongside at Garden Island, prob. May 1969.
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Pic4850. Alongside VAMPIRE from day boat, 1984 Stephen Hood.
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Pic 5114: Heeling trials at Cockatoo Island, 1960.
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Pic 5490: Leaving Fremantle for SE Asia, Oct. 31, 1973 [similar to cover pohoto above].
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Pic 5702. PARRAMATTA [III] in Melbourne's Yarra REiver, ca. 1961-63.
Pic 5703: PARRAMATTA [III] passes BHP's IRON BARON in the Yarra, Ca. 1961-63.
The End.
PHOTOSTREAM COMPENDIA COMPLETED THUS FAR:
HMAS AUSTRALIA [1] Indefatigable Class battlecruiser; two parts, beginning under Entry 5476, 100 images.
HMAS WARRAMUNGA [I] Tribal Class destroyer: single entry under Entry 5470, 50 images
HMAS ARUNTA [I] Tribal Class destroyer, two parts, under pic entries 5467-5468, 80 images
HMAS HOBART [I] Modified Leander Class light cruiser: Two parts, under pic entries 5464-5465, 100 images
HMAS MELBOURNE [II] Light fleet aircraft carrier: seven parts, under pic entries 5444-5450, 350 images
HMAS QUEENBOROUGH, 'Q' Class or Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigate; Two parts under pic entries 5435,5436, 60 images.
HMAS ANZAC [II] Battle Class destroyer, Two Parts under pic entries 5429-5430; 60 images.
HMAS SHROPSHIRE, heavy cruiser: Three Parts under pic entries 5415-5417, 75 images
HMAS AUSTRALIA [II] heavy cruiser : Three parts under pic entries 5412-5415, 200 images
BRITISH PACIFIC FLEET IN AUSTRALIA; single entry; under Pic 5365, 50 images
HMVS CERBERUS, single entry, under NO. 5848, 35+ images.
3368. Sabotage of warships on the Australian waterfront, as elsewhere during the Cold War, was not unknown when the newly-completed Daring Class destroyer HMAS VENDETTA [II], leaving for her first trials, suddenly surged forward and crashed into the caisson of the Alfred Graving Dock at Williamstown Dockyard on July 15, 1958.
The photograph above shows the scene some time after the accident, when the drydock ahead has been flooded to equalize the pressure on the damaged caisson and prevent a collapse. A major disaster has been narrowly averted, as HMAS QUICKMATCH had been below in the drydock when the danger threatened. As it is, the damaged destroyer is being gingerly [and manually] pulled back, with a long gash in her bows.
The report we have had, from a former employee in the dockyard's draughting office, was that the telegraph signals to the ships engine room had been reverse wired, causing the ship to move forward when the signal for astern astern was given.
The question that arises is whether this was deliberate - an act of sabotage. The amount of time VENDETTA had taken to build, almost 9-1/2 years, was itself indicative of the in industrial and ideological warfare constantly waged on the Australian waterfront in the 1950s, and for many decades afterwards. An example of sabotage of RAN ships occurred on June 21, 1951 when someone at Garden Island dockyard cut the radar cables on the aircraft carrier HMAS SYDNEY [III] in refit just before she was leaving for Korea [ Colin Jones, 'Wings and the Navy, 1947-1953,' p74].
The same sort of thing had happened to HMS THESEUS in Britain the year before [Jones, ibid].
With their connection to Korean war service, the assumption is that these were ideological acts by dockyard workers with communist sympathies. A more petty kind of sabotage could be seen as 'make work' acts that prolong a job, and as we have a;lready seen, the 2,800 tons standard VENDETTA was already a prime example.
VENDETTA took Williamstown 3 -1/2 years longer to build than it would later take Northrop Grumman to build the US Navy's 101,000 ton super carrier USS RONALD REAGAN at Newport News, Virginia. VENDETTA'S 9-1/2 years construction time was more than three times as long as it took Scotland's John Brown's shipyard to build Australia's first flagship, the 18,800 ton battlecruiser HMAS AUSTRALIA [I] [which was exactly three years and two days from keel laying to commissioning. VENDETTA took more than twice as long as it took Browns to build the 42,000 tons HMS HOOD; or than Germany's Blohm and Voss took to build the 41,700 ton BiISMARCK; and twice as long as Japan's Mitsubishi Kure and Mitsubishi Nagoya shipyards took build both the 65,027 ton super battleships IJNS YAMATO and IJNS MUSASHI.
No wonder the Williamstown dockyard workers would have found it hard to let her go. As it was, the accident earned them another four months work. HMAS VENDETTA, laid down on July 4, 1949, was finally commissioned and out of Williamstown on November 26, 1958 - hence our calculation of a construction period of nine years, four months and 22 days.
The same concerns could have applied to the faulty construction of the survey ship HMAS COOK, six years in building, and the modernisations of the destroyer escorts HMAS PARRAMATTA, HMAS STUART and HMAS DERWENT, relatively modest modifications that each took from 4 years and two months to 4-1/2 years to complete, longer than it took to build the BISMARCK in its entirety, or all but one of the other great ships mentioned earlier [the RONALD REAGAN took over five years].
There should have been a Royal Commission.
Then there WAS a Royal Commission. But it was not about HMAS VENDETTA [II], nor HMAS COOK, nor HMAS PARRAMATTA [III], nor HMAS STUART [II] nor HMAS DERWENT [II]. It was the late Frank Costigan QC's Royal Commission into the Ships Painters and Dockers Union, a totally criminalised and murderous organisation [now de-registered] whose rival union executives and their hired gunnies were running company tax evasion schemes, drugs and other scams from out of the dockyard, the home turf for many years of some of the Melbourne underworld's most dangerous.
Not a pretty picture - but at least HMAS VENDETTA [II] went though her service life without further serious mishap once she had left.
Photo RAN Historical Section, it appears in Vic Cassells's 'The Destroyers; Their Battles and Their Badges' [Kangaroo Press, Sydney 2000] p.165.
5435. The Photostream has been fortunate in accumulating an outstanding photo record of HMAS QUEENBOROUGH, RAN 1945-1972, spanning her original build as a Royal Navy 'Q' Class destroyer, and 1950s RAN conversion to a Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigate, later designatged as a destroyer escort.
The QUEENBOROUGH Collection was built initially on photos sent to us by Contributor Geoff Eastwood, whose late dad Roger Eastwood had a particular connection with the ship, and who took and gathered some outstanding images of her, both in the U.K. and in Australia.
From that base, we were lucky to get more original photos - some in authentic 1950s-early 1960s colour - from Contributors Graeme Andrews, Kimerbley Dunstan and Geoff Green, and in total they take the COMPENIUM well beyond the 'RAN Official' look, although we were also given access to some wonderful images from the HMAS CERBERUS Museum.
So here it is, Part One of Two:
THE QUEENBOROUGH COMPENDIUM.
Pic 5435 [above] is dated Aug. 2, 1955, the day QUEENBOROUGH became the first RAN ship to enter the Thames and visit London. If the date is correct, that must be the Thames Estuary - it's not familiar to us. The pic is from the Navy Heritage Collection, image ID NO. 04430.
Pic 198. Circa 1967, QUEENBOROUGH passes in the shadow of HMAS MELBOURNE [II]
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Pic 627, March 1972, QUEENBOROUGH pays off
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Pic 628. Dec 7, 1954, QUEENBOROUGH after conversion.
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Pic 629. QUEENBOROUGH with a line from HMAS SYDNEY III John Straczek
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Pic 848 July 4, 1962, bow on, at sea
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Pic 1222. In group of ships with HMS GLAMORGAN, Sydney 1968 Geoff Green
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Pic 1277: 1968 with HMS GLAMORGAN and others at GI, Geoff Green.
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Pic 1287: QUEENBOROUGH as the first RAN ship to visit London, Aug. 2, 1955
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Pic 1289. June 1971 and the voyage that fractured her hull
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Pic 1290, Oct 1968, QUEENBOROUGH as a partially dis-armed training frigate
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Pic 1291, decommissioning ceremony for QUEENBOROUGH, GI, April 7, 1972.
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Pic 1378. Destroyer HMS QUEENBOROUGH commissioned at Wallsend on Tyne, Dec. 1942
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Pic 1379. Destroyer HMS QUEENBOROUGH in Sydney Sept. 1945.
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Pic 1385 QUEENBOROUGH in colour, off Sydney, mid-1960s, by Peter Freeman
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1706. COLOUR BY Roger Eastwood – in line of ships leaving Sydney Harbour 1959.
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Pic 2160 QUEENBOROUGH in the Thames Aug 2, 1955 Cerberus Museum
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Pic 2161 QUEENBOROUGH under London Bridge, Aug 2 1955 Cerberus Museum
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Pic 2166. QUEENBOROUGH and MELBOURNE [II] family Day on Port Phillip Bay, Feb. 10 1961.
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Pic 2190. Nov 29, 1957, approaching Boundary Street Wharf in Brisbane.
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Pic 2206. Among barges on the Thames, August 1955
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Pic 2207. Among sightseeing boats on the Thames, August 1955.
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Pic 2208 QUEENBOROUGH at sea – exceptional portrait !
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Pic 2214. Leading ANZAC and TOBRUK, Oct 1954.
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Pic 2252: RARE mid-ships close-up of destroyer HMAS QUEENBOROUGH 1948.
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Pic 2290, Stormy seas, June 1971, when she was damaged [REPEAT = yes but better print]
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Pic 2291, with line from HMAS SYDNEY [III] Oct 1954, prob. J. Straczek.
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Pic 2539. Partially disarmed as a training frigate, Circa 1969.
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Pic 2540. Overhead aerial in colour by Ross Gillett, Circa 1969.
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Pic 2606. In Sydney Harbour 1967
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Pic 2607. Also in Sydney Harbour, 1967.
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Pic 2796 SIXTIES COLOUR FAVOURITE – QUEENBOROUGH in Bombay [Mumbai] March 18-20 1961 by Kimberley Dunstran.
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Pic 2885. QUEENBOROUGH approaches HMS HERMES Exercise JET 61, Bay of Bengal 1961.
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Pic 3037: Departing Sydney Circa 1962-63.
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Pic 3038: Approaching a refuelling at sea position in heavy seas, 1960s
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Pic 3039. Close quarterdeck view with Sentry and Ship Name ring, Hobart Circa 1960.
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Pic 3191: DESTROYER QUEENBOROUGH in reserve Sydney Circa 1947.
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Pic 3387. DESTROYER QUEENBOROUGH in Sydney Circa Oct. 1945.
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Pic 3810 FIFTIES COLOUR QUEENBOROUGH and QUICKMATCH Noumea dock 1958
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Pic 3811. FIFTIES COLOUR QUEENBOROUGH and QUICKMATCH in Noumea 1958 GKAC.
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Pic 3812: FIFTIES COLOUR, at Noumea 1958.
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Pic 5538. Mid-ship detail, by Eric Hogben
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4366. Seen here over the wake of a passing sister destroyer, HMAS QUIBERON has joined the 7th destroyer Flotilla of the Royal Navy;'s Eastern Fleet in June 1943, along with her sister ship HMAS QUICKMATCH. The ships are based in Kilindini, Kenya.
They were the two of the eight 'Q' Class destoyers commissioned on loan into the RAN during WWII, although three of the others, QUALITY, QUADRANT and QUEENBOROUGH would be transferred to the RAN in Sydney in October 1945, a month after the war's end.
Built by Samuel J. White at Cowes and commissioned on July 6, 1942, QUIBERON first saw Australia on March 29, 1943, when she arrived at Fremantle en route to a re-fit in Melbourne.
We have previously given some sketchy accounts of QUIBERON's
very active service life up to that point, particularly in relation to her participation in the 'OPERATION TORCH' landings in North Aftrica and the sinking of the Italian submarine DESSIE.
Her third major action at that time was with a group comprising three cruisers and two destroyers [Force Q'] that attacked an Italian convoy escorted by destroyers on the night of Dec. 1/2, 1942, while the latter were bound for Tunisia.
Under the command of Rear Admiral C.H.J. Harcourt RN, the Allied ships were the cruisers, HMA AURORA, HMS SIRIUS, and HMS ARGONAUT, with escorting destroyers HMAS QUIBERON and HMS QUENTIN. In the course of the action, four enemy convoy transports and two enemy destroyers woud be sunk, with the QUIBERON detaching to engage one of the destroyers in a one-on-one duel. The Allied force would undergo severe air attacks the next day, with HMS QUENTION sunk and QUIBERON taking off most of her crew.
There is a graphic account of the episode in the action report of QUIBERON's CO of the time, CMDR Hugh Browning RN. There is a wrenchingly sad moment, even now, towards the end of his report [item 10] when CMDR Browning refers to four or five men who had to be left behind on the doomed QUENTIN through their own foolish actions - going below at a criticial point to retrieve possessions.
This slightly abridged report is re-produced from former CMDR Mackenzie J. Gregory RAN's well-known 'Mac's' Ahoy' website:
December 1942.
'....HMAS QUIBERON followed the cruiser into the attack. At 0055 ( 12.55 AM ) I sighted a destroyer of the Sirio Class emerging from a smoke screen on my port beam and turning to fire torpedoes; I left the line and closed at 26 knots.
Fire was opened at about 5,000 yards and the second salvo was observed to hit forward of the after superstructure. Successive salvoes also hit under the funnel and just abaft it.
Enemy salvoes fell just astern and on the starboard quarter. At 0059 ( 12.59 AM ) the enemy, badly damaged, turned to starboard and was hidden by the smoke screen.
At 0101 ( 1. 01 AM ) two "E" boats appeared out of the smoke, then about 2,500 yards away, and attacked with torpedoes. I turned hard astarboard and torpedoes were observed to pass down my port side , uncomfortably close.
2. I realised that unless I rejoined the line I might be taken for an enemy destroyer and subjected to the intensely accurate fire of HMS AURORA. I endeavoured to rejoin without fouling the range and switched on my Type 252. At 0107 ( 1. 07 AM ) I passed a Troopship badly afire and fired at her, probably unnecessarily, as she was obviously sinking. This ship was observed to sink. About 1000/1500 troops were in the water shouting for help. I judged them to be Italians.
I succeeded in rejoining astern of HMS QUENTIN at 0110 ( 1.10AM )
At 0112 ( 1. 12 AM ) sighted another Troopship on fire, but not badly; HMS QUENTIN and HMAS QUIBERON finished her off, and she was observed to sink, Semi Armour Piercing shell were used and some went right through the ship without bursting.
At 0133 ( 1. 33 AM ) another destroyer was sighted lying on her side; fire was opened at 2,000 yards approximately and two hits were observed. It is not known whether this ship sank. HMS SIRIUS finished off yet another destroyer with one salvo which set her afire from end to end.
3. The total bag observed by HMAS QUIBERON was three destroyers [ in fact only 2 sank: Mac Gregory ) and four Merchant Ships, of which two are known to have been Troopships. It is not known whether any "E" Boats were sunk or damaged, but I do know that HMAS QUIBERON did not hit any.
4. At 0636 ( 6. 36 AM ) one torpedo bomber attacked from the port side of the line and torpedoed HMS QUENTIN.*
HMAS QUIBERON circled HMS QUENTIN once, then signalled for information as to whether the ship could steam. Reply was ship could not steam but would remain afloat for a little time.
5. As more enemy aircraft were heard and seen I decided to carry out Rear Admiral Commanding 12th. Cruiser Squadron's verbal instructions and endeavour to " Cut our losses." I proceeded alongside HMS QUENTIN and ordered her to " Abandon Ship."
I was alongside for about 8/10 minutes, it seemed longer, and was subjected to cannon fire and bombs. I decided that I could stay no longer, and went full astern as another pair of aircraft attacked.
The bombs fell where my forecastle had been and exploded under my bow.
6. I had hoped to make sure of sinking HMS QUENTIN, but finally decided that I must try and get my ship into harbour; especially as I had over 400 men in my ship at the time.
I was aided in this decision by the thought that the enemy aircraft, which had become bolder as they realised my guns were not High Angle, would undoubtedly sink HMS QUENTIN; this is what I believe to have happened, as aircraft were observed bombing her for at least 10 minutes after I had left. This was of great assistance to me as it halved the weight of attack on this ship. Had HMS QUENTIN been sunk, it is unlikely that HMS QUIBERON woud have got away unscathed except for some minor damage.
7. There were seven determined attacks on HMAS QUIBERON after she left HMS QUENTIN and I was pleased to see that our fire was very accurate and time and again the Dive Bombers were turned away at the last minute, and either jettisoned their bombs or made no other attempt.
The method of attack was the usual type, one bomber would endeavour to draw the fire when almost out of range, and the other would come in diving, hoping that the Oerlikons would be caught with empty pans. Luckily this ruse had been encountered before, and the gun's crews were not caught out by it. Two aircraft were seen to be hit but I regret none were observed to crash. In all, there were ten attacks made by two or three aircraft together.
8. HMAS QUIBERON evaded most of the bombs by a quick turn at the last minute after bombs had been released and only a few fell close.
This was due to the magnificent work by my Engineering Officer who gave me 320 revolutions ( 33 knots ) in a ship already overdue for boiler cleaning and decoking, at about three minutes notice.
9. HMAS QUIBERON arrived at Bone at 0915 ( 9. 15 AM ) and secured alongside HMS SIRIUS, who took care of the survivors. Eight Officers ( including the Commanding Officer ) and one hundred and seventy Ratings were taken off HMS QUENTIN.
10. It is a matter of deep regret that I was unable to remain alongside a few minutes more and bring off the four or five who were left, but I must point out that these Officers and Ratings had in all cases gone below to pack, in spite of my frenzied efforts to get them onboard my ship. ( I cannot imagine how anyone might be so foolish as to give up the chance of survival to go and gather a few personal possessions. )
11. As a result of the night action and the action against enemy aircraft, I wish to recommend the following Officers and Ratings for decorations. The names are not shown in order of merit, but the attached forms are numbered in order of merit.
Hugh Browning
Commander. Royal Navy...'
* A response to CMDR Browning's resport appears on the 'Mac's Ahoy' website citing Luftwaffe reports to show that HMS QUETIN was sunk by a 250Lb bomb mistaken for a torpedo. Mac Gregory reports that CMDR Browning died in England in February, 1997.
Photo: Derek Simon [1919-2004], courtesy Graeme K. Andrews [RAN 1955-1968, RANR 1980].
4368. Built by Broken Hill Pty Co. at Whyalla, SA, and commissioned on April 7, 1942, HMAS KALGOORLIE's first role was as an anti-submarine escort on Australia's east coast. And a busy role it was.
On June 5 that year - five days after the midget submarine raid on Sydney Harbour - KALGOORLIE [LCDR H.A. Litchfield RANR] was rushed to the assistance of S.S. Echunga, which was being chased on the surface off Wollongong by the big Japanese motherboat submarine 1-24, one of five Japanese submarines gathered 30 nautical miles [56km] off Sydney waiting in vain for the return of the three 46-ton midget craft involved in the Harbour raid.
After the chase, HMAS KALGOORLIE escorted the alarmed merchantman into the steel port, Port Kembla, south of Sydney.
With all the sensation caused by the Sydney Harbour raid on May 31-June 1, it is now somewhat forgotten how dramatically activity was increased off Sydney as the three motherboats and two fleet submarines with floatplanes - respectively motgherboats I-22, I-24 AND 1-27, and I-21 and I-29 - turned to commerce raiding, and seeking to instil a sense of public panic in Eastern Australia by shelling areas of both Sydney and Newcastle.
They seem to have gone about their raiding with a complete contempt for Australian defences - or perhaps that was the psychologically message they were seeking to convey. In the early hours of May 30, before the raid, 1-21 had sent her float plane over Sydney with her navigation lights burning, and circling the Harbour twice as she attempted to identify targets [and reported USS CHICAGO as a battleship]. Another floatplane flight is believed to have been made over Newcastle that night [and there had been earlier float plane reconnaissance flights from Japanese submarines over Sydney, Melbourne and Hobart in March - and Wellington and Auckland in NZ soon after, and yet another over Sydney on May 23].
On 4 June, just south of Gabo Island, a Japanese submarine - believed to have been 1-24 - attacked and damaged the steamer BARWON with torpedo and gunfire, but she managed to make port. In the late afternoon on the same day, the coke and ore carrier IRON CROWN was torpedoed in the same area and sank immediately, losing 37 men from a crew of 42. Again 1-24 was thought to be responsible.
Following these incidents, in the early hours of June 8, the 1-24 randomly fired ten 5.5-inch shells into the southern suburbs of Sydney over a five minute period, but with totally neglible results. Only one shell exploded, in Bellevue Hill, and a grocery was superficially damaged.
Around the same, about 2 a.m., the submarine 1-21 [Captain Kanji Matsumura] surfaced about nine miles off Newcastle and fired thirty four 5.5 inch shells ashore over 20 minutes attempting to damage the industrial city's shipyards. Again only one shell exploded, and while some buildings and houses were modestly damaged the result were also neglible. The submarine submerged when Fort Scratchley fired four rounds in reply.
Two nights later a submarine surfaced and fired on the coastal freighter AGE heading into Newcastle without results and an hour and a half later the bulk carrier IRON CHIEFTAIN was torpedoed and sunk in the same area, 43 kilometres north easty of Sydney, with the loss of 12 lives,, uincluding the ship's Master.
In the two months after the midget submarine attack on Sydney, 14 Allied merchant ships were attacked off the coast, with six being sunk, with 60 seamen's lives and 29,000 tons of shipping lost. While the attacks closed ports and disrupted the efficiency of Australian shipping - forcing the introduction of a cumbersome convoy system, and the diversion of forces to protect them, the immediate results were poor for the weight of forces deployed, and the Harbour raid itself - sinking only the barracks ferry KUTTABUL - was a failure.
The Japanese submarine campaign off Australia's East coast would continue, however, until July 1943, with the last penetrations being a reconnaissance patrol off north western Australia in late 1944. A total of 54 Japanese and German submarines entered Australian waters during WWII, sinking 30 ships for a total of 151,000 tons. Among the last attacks was the sinking of the 7180 ton U.S. Liberty ship Robert J. Walker off NSW about 165 miles south east of Sydney, off Montague island, on Christmas Eve 1944, by U- 862 . It was the only sinking by a German submarine attack in the Pacific theatre.
The well-armed liberty ship had attempted to defend itseldf with gunfire and smoke floats, exploding one of the five torpedoes fired at it in the water by 20mm gunfire. The ROBERT J. WALKER lost two crew, with 69 survivors picked up from two lifeboats and rafts by the destroyer HMAS QUICKMATCH.
All of which has taken us rather far from HMAS KALGOORLIE, the ship in the photo, which was involved in the east coast anti-submarine campaign, and had also been involved in operations out of Darwin to occupied Timor, supporting Australian and Dutch forces. We're not sure where or when Derek Simon has taken the photo above, but probably in those northern waters.
Photo: Derek Simon [1919-2004], courtesy Graeme K. Andrews [RAN 1955-1968, RANR 1980].
5403. The approximate dating of this image is first based on the presence of the two old paid-off frigates ex-HMAS QUICKMATCH and ex-HMAS GASCOYNE being used as accomodation vessels at Nelson Pier, the largest of the two piers, seen on our right. They were there from 1966 until both were sold for scrapping and towed away in 1971 and 1972. Opposite them are three Attack Class patrol boats, with a Motor Stores Lighter and [looks like] an Oil Fuel Lighter farther down the pier in the bottom foreground.
At Dock Pier to the left, and in the Alfred Graving Dock are three Type 12 destroyer escorts with HMAS SWAN [III] probably being the ship fitting out and yet to receive her masts in the centre. SWAN, as we discussed recently, was commissioned at Williamstown on January 20, 1970 and is still some way short of completion here.
There are two smaller vessel under construction, one beneath an awning, at the building berths on land beside the two cranes - but for the moment we can't think what vessels they would have been in 1969, or thereabouts.
We also notice that the house that once stood at the head of the Alfred Graving Dock - the dock superintendent's house we think - is now gone.
On the Photostream we have been consistently and severely critical of the timetables for work at Williamstown - the years taken to get work done, and we're still trying to get a better overall grasp of the issues and reasons for that. Nonetheless, Williamstown was also the subject of one of our favourite postwar [1947] dockyard images - with HMAS SHOALHAVEN in the drydock - back at Pic NO. 2008 , an acquisition. It can be seen here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/4658471389/
This photo: RAN Historical, Navy Heritage Collection, image ID NO. 03069.
5156. With her foredecks still partly covered by tree branches - an attempot to disguise the ship from aerial attack, the wreck of the 9000 ton INJS AOBA would have been a familiar sight to the men of RAN ships posted to British Commonwealth Occupation Forces [BCOF] duties in Japan - along with many other major warship wrecks in the harbour at that time.
There is a list of RAN ships that served with the BCOF in the Dr James Wilson [AWM] paper on the subject [sdee previous entry], but going on what we know from other ship histories it appears not to be complete. BCOF. Therefore we'll add several and say that the ships included cruisers HMAS AUSTRALIA [II], HMAS SHROPSHIRE, and HMAS HOBART [I], destroyers HMAS WARRAMUNGA, BATAAN, ARUNTA, QUICKMATCH, QUIBERON and QUADRANT, along with frigates CULGOA, SHOALHAVEN and MURCHISON, and the Landing Ships Infantry [LSIs] WESTRALIA, MANOORA and KANIMBLA.
Photo: Collection of Rear Admiral Samuel Eliot Morison, USN, Naval History and Heritage Command [US] image NBO. NH97738.
6223. After her conversion at Wiliamstown Naval Dockyard from WWII destroyer to a Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigate, HMAS QUICKMATCH was recommissioned on Sept. 23, 1955 by LCDR Duncan Stevens, captain of HMAS VOYAGER on the night of her tragic loss.
LCDR Stevens had charge of QUICKMATCH for a year. This is a fine view of the 2020-2,700 ton [fl] frigate is taken off Sydney, we think possibly by Alan Zammit as ships were assembling for the RAN Fleet entry marking the Navy's 50th Anniversary.
Photo: as cited above, it appears in the Navy Heritage Collection, imnage ID NO. 01131.
6216. It's the start of the historic 1954 Royal Tour of Australia, a moment of almost unprecedented excitement in the country, and HMAS AUSTRALIA [II], along with the aircraft carrier HMAS VENGEANCE, destroyer HMAS ANZAC [II] and frigate QUICKMATCH has met and escorted the Royal Yacht GOTHIC down the East Coast of Australia. The heavy cruiser is seen here with an Admiral's flag on her foremast. The cliunker-built seaboat in the foreground has ';Liverpool' written on it aft. Perhaps it is from GOTHIC?
We are also reminded, looking at John Bastock's 1975 limited edition book 'Australia's Ships of War,' that AUSTRALIA's funnels were shortened again by 5ft at the end of WWII - so the funnels were raised 15ft in 1928 after her trials, due to smoke interference to the aft control position, and shortened again to a lesser extent after WWII.
By the way, we strive to get our captions right on the Photostream, and follow through with many corrections as they are pointed out to us. We have ourselves now realized that we had misinterpreted a couple of earlier images, one being pIc NO. 4570, which shows VENGEANCE similarly dressed ship and looking her best for the Queen's arrival in Sydney - a sort of companion to this image.
That photo with the corrected caption is here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/5729136157/
Similarly, we had seriously misinterpreted a photo of HMAS AUSTRALIA [II]'s final departure from Sydney Harbour on Saturday, March 26, 1955. We had earlier misinterpreted this 1955 farewell as a 1946 welcome back from Britain. It was at pic NO. 2782, here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/4925778399/
This photo: RAN, Navy Heritage Collection image NO 04620, it again comes to us via Ronnie Bell of Livingston, Scotland.
A three-part COMPENDIUM of links to more than 200 HMAS AUSTRALIA [II] images on this Photostream begins at Pic Entry NO 5412, here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6627997309/in/photostream
4408. We would like to share here a moment of a late discovery on our part, something we had long been idly curious about and finally happened across - the name of the photographer who produced this ipoarticular mage and a whole catalogue of dramatically sharp warship portraits for the British Ministry of Defence in northern England around the 1940s.
The man we are speaking about was James Henry Cleet [1876-1959], a Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society [and not to be confused with his father, a well known artist of the same name working in the Tyneside area].
The photoshere of HMS QUEENBOROUGH and HMS QUALITY [preceding entry] we stress are NOT particularly good examples of what we are speaking about in that they are scans of copies - not taken from the original plate glass negatives: but we think many warship history followers will instantly recognize the body of work we are speaking about from the composition and style.
Most of Mr Cleet's images are held in the Imperial War Museum, where these is some scant attribution - none that we could find on copies held in the Australian War Museum,
where a name search does not turn him up either.
These are the few facts that we have thus far gleaned about this great ships photographer :
'Jimmy' Cleet was born at 24 Bath Street Westoe in 1876, as we've mentioned the son of James Henry Cleet [1840-1913] a one-time shipwright and water-colour artist. He had an older sister Elizabeth Constance. On December 6 1908 Cleet married Eva Aspery. With some of his images, he is listed [anonymously] as an Official Royal Navy Photographer, but we don't have the details of how that came about, or when he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society.
Being the son of an artist, he apparently also painted watercolours. We find some of his father's 19th Century watercolours of their home area here:
www.imagine.org.uk/details/index.php?id=TWCMS:G4522&q...
There's another of Jimmy Cleet's 'Q' Class destroyer images at pic NO. 3348, HMAS QUICKMATCH, here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/5225777183/?reuploaded=1
And that's it for the moment. We'd be glad to hear more. These few details have been gleaned from the Imperial War Museum website, and the South Shields Sanddancers Forum website, a local Intrernet discussion group - who seem to have a lot of fun. Kooka's not sure if these are people called 'Geordies.' Hmmmm. Just checked, and we guess so. They sound great.
Photo; James Henry Cleet, FRPS [1876-1959], it is held in the Imperial War Museum, and the RAN Heritage Collection, image ID NO. 04432.
A two-part COMPENDIUM of the Photostream's 60+ images of HMAS QUEENBOROUGH begins at Entry NO. 5435, here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6684005275/in/photostream
6004. One of four RAN corvettes gifted to the Royal New Zealand Navy in June 1952, HMNZS KIAMA seems to have made at least two goodwill visits to her NSW South Coast name town. Local records show she presented her battle flag to the Sea Scouts there in 1962, and she is seen here again on an other visit in 1969.
As we have previously mentioned the crew of KIAMA, along with that of the destroyer HMAS QUICKMATCH and other ships, was recalled from leave on Christmas Day 1944 to go to the assistance of the U.S. Liberty Ship ROBERT J. WALKER, torpedoed by the German submarine U862 and sinking 165 miles south east of Sydney. The American ship, which lost two men killed, as it happens put up a remarkably good fight against its stalking enemy.
Armed with one 5-inch, one 3-inch and eight 20mm guns, after the first hit one of its 20mm gun crews managed to explode another torpedo in the water [it must have been running close to the surface] before the ship's guards threw smoke pots into the water to screen their vessel. Unfortunately there was a second hit from one of the five torpedos fired, and the 7,180 ton Liberty Ship's fate was sealed.
ROBERT J. WALKER sank at about 5pm on Christrmas Day, the only ship sunk by a German submarine in the Pacific during WWII. Her 56 survivors were picked up from boats by HMAS QUICKMATCH which reached the scene first.
Commanded by Korvettenkapitan Heinrich Timm U862, after successful patrols elsewhere, was based in Batavia from Dec. 1944, and was in fact the only U-boat to operate in the Pacific at any time during the war. After the ROBERT J. WALKER sinking she proceeded to New Zealand and in fact entered the port of Napier, giving rise to an urban myth that members of the crew had landed there to obtain milk from a farm.
Photo: RAN Archives, Navy Heritage Collection, image ID NO. 00142.
3366. We have had some photographs of this bizarre accident earlier. Nine years four months and 22 days in the building, on Friday July 18, 1958, the newly- completed daring Class destroyer HMAS VENDETTA [II] was about to leave the fitting out dock at WND for trials when she suddenly surged forward rather than going astern, and crashed into the caisson of the Alfred drydock.
With the caisson wall threatening to collapse, 'Abandon Ship' was sounded on the frigate HMAS QUICKMATCH inside the dock, which was in danger not only of being flooded, but of having HMAS VENDETTA [II] washed down on top of her. Engineers quickly flooded the drydock, to equalize the forces bearing on the caisson, averting any further disaster.
Photo: Crerdited RAN Historical Section, it appears in Vic Cassells's book 'The Destroyers; Their Battles and Their Badges' [Kangaroo Press, Sydney 2000] p.165.
5202. Two of Britain's greatest battleships, HMS DUKE OF YORK and HMS KING GEORGE V, werepresent at the Japanese surrender in Tokyo Bay on September 2, 1945. In European waters KGV had helped sink the BISMARCK and DUKE OF YORK had sunk the SCHARNHORST.
A limited number of British Pacific Fleet vessels were present at the surrender ceremony due to a shortage of re-fuelling vessels. We have also mis-stated the number of RAN vessels somewhere on the Photostream. A complete list of vessels present in Tokyo Bay is here:
www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq69-2.htm
The list appears to exclude the fleet aircraft carriers which remained outside the Bay to guard against the poossibility of a trap being laid. For the record we'd like to clear up the RAN ships present. There were eleven on the list above:
Cruisers HMAS SHROPSHIRE abd HMAS HOBART; destroyers HMAS BATAAN; HMAS WARRAMUNGA, HMAS NAPIER, HMAS NIZAM; frigate HMAS GASCOYNE; corvettes HMAS BALLARAT; HMAS CESSNOCK; HMAS IPSWICH, and HMAS PIRIE.
Somewhere we had assumed that QUICKMATCH and QUIBERON were there, and more of the 18 RAN corvettes attached to the BPF.
From John Pacini's '"With the RAN to Tokio,' State Library of Victroria [La Trobe Library] online. The link to the start of the full 49-page magazine-style book online at the SLV is here:
4025. Taken from the cabin of the 250 ton hammerhead crane at Garden island , we date this photo as 1951, or early 1952. Reason: repairs are being made to the bow of HMAS AUSTRALIA [II] after a Dec. 4, 1951 mishap; and it is just before the cruiser HMAS HOBART [I] is towed by the little tug ex-HMAS ST GILES up to the Newcastle State Dockyard for her [subsequently aborted] three year modernisation.
Anyway, these are the ships we can see here in this wonderful photograph, hitherto inexplicably overlooked by naval publishers.
LOWER RIGHT: Bay Class frigates HMAS CULGOA [F408] and HMAS CONDAMINE [F698].
MID PICTURE: Tribal Class destroyer HMAS WARRAMUNGA [D123] alongside HMAS AUSTRALIA [II], which has had her bow removed. Note the man at the top of the floating scaffold [visible enlarged]. AUSTRALIA has had an accident. On December 4, 1951, she was swept around by a sudden strong burst of wind while berthing at Woolloomooloo and collided heavily with the British freighter SOMERSET. See a photo of the damage at pic NO. 4949, here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6308646965/
THIRD TIER: destroyer HMAS QUICKMATCH, not yet converted to an anti-submarine frigate, lies outside HMAS HOBART.
IN RESERVE, ATHOL BIGHT, UPPER RIGHT: Q Class destroyer HMAS QUALITY lies on the heavy cruiser HMAS SHROPSHIRE.
Unidentified BATH CLASS corvettes and RIVER CLASS frigates, far right.
It is also an interesting view of the waterfront at Garden Island.
Photo: RAN Historical, it is held in the RAN's Heritage Collection, ID NO. 02480.
A three-part COMPENDIUM of links to more than 200 HMAS AUSTRALIA [II] images on this Photostream begins at Pic Entry NO 5412, here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6627997309/in/photostream
6172. Another image almost identical to one taken on nthe same day and shown earlier, this immediate post-WWII image of the destroyer HMAS QUICKMATCH is added for its comparative rarity. The ensign, and sailors making signals on the gun shield above the quarter deck, are the mostr obvious points of difference to entry 791, shown here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/3992993323/
Thge angle here is also somewhat wider - and the 1705-2500 ton [full load] QUICKMATCH appears to be going astern on this blustery day in late 1946.
Photo: Allan Charles Green [1878-1954], Green Collection, State Library of Victoria [La Trobe Library] accession NO.H91.108/1088, publicly released.
6164. An image dated the day following the preceding image, they are so similar we find it hard to believe they are not taken at the same time, and that there is some mistake in the record. Men are passing through a B deck hatch here, the ensign on the stern has picked up a breeze, and the photographer's boat has moved marginally. Otherwise the images are close to identical. However, we value all images of these past ships, particularly clear images of the 'Q' Class in their destroyer configuration, as these are not plentiful.
As we have mentioned a number of times, QUIBERON - one of the two 'Q' Class with QUICKMATCH actually commissioned on loan into the RAN during WWII - distinguished herself during the Allied landings in Algiers in Nov. 1942, when she participated in the sinking of the Italian submarine DESSIE and the attack on an Italian convoy escorted by three destroyers, in addition to rescuing the rescuing of the crew of a downed Fulmar aircraft, and picking up 182 survivors of sister ship HMS QUENTIN when she was sunk during a torpedo bombing attack on Nov. 28.
Photo: Allan C. Green [1878-1954], Green Collection, State Library of Victoria [La Trobe Library], accession NO. H91.108/1095, publicly released.
5296. On March 16, 1959, HMAS TOBRUK [I] and sister ship HMAS ANZAC [I] sailed from Sydney to relieve HMAS QUICKMATCH and HMAS QUEENBOROUGH in the Commonwealth Strategic Reserve at Singapore for the last time. The two destroyers returned in December. This photo could be taken around the time of their departure or return, but TOBRUK does not have the crew dressing ship with the ceremony generally seen on such occasions. In any event she was away for most of that year.
Photo: RAN Historical, Navy Heritage Collection image ID NO. 04335.
This is the new look to the quick launch area of multiplayer, with more or less the same items displayed, but just more polish once again.
5737. Another individual entry in the Eric Hogben Collection as sent to us, HMAS KIAMA was built by Evans Deakin and Co. Ltd in Brisbane and completed in Oct. 1943. Initially based at Milne Bay she engaged in convoy escorts around New Guinea, but was in Sydney on Christmas Day 1944 when crew were recalled from leave as she, HMAS QUICKMATCH and other units went to the assistance of the U.S. ship ROBERT J. WALKER, torpedoed and sinking 160 miles south of the city.
Returning to New Guinea she participated in bombardments of Buka Island in May and June 1945, and was present at Rabaul on Sept. 6 that year when the surrender of Japanese forces there was signed on HMS GLORY.
Paid off on April 3, 1946, in May 1952 KIAMA was one of four RAN corvettes gifted to the Royal New Zealand Navy. She finally paid off for disposal there on Aug. 19, 1976.
Photo: collection of the late Eric Hogben, courtesy of Geoff Eastwood, Sydney.
5050. Also 1945, but an image possibly taken in Japan in the days or weeks after the surrender. HMAS QUIBERON wears her BPF "hull shortening" paint scheme for the last time, as with her D20 BPF pennant number.
Soon to become a member of the RAN's 10th Destroyer Flotilla, QUIBERON and her sister ship HMAS QUICKMATCH would return to Japan on Commonwealth Occupation Forces duties throughout the late 1940s.
Photo: RAN Historical, Navy Heritage Collection image NO. 03342.
5890. These mounts were among the last hand-loaded main armament weapons in the RAN, with perhaps only the 4-inch guns on the Q Class Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigates - QUICKMATCH and Co - lasting longer.
A total of 24 Tribal Class destroyers were built for the Royal Navy, with an exceptionally high attrition rate of 12 lost. A Further eight were built by Canada, for one lost, and the three RAN ships, which all survived their conflicts.
Photo: late Shaughn Lowry, with permission of owner Allen Pew, via Geoff Eastwood, Sydney.
4870. Owned by the second Melbourne Steamship Company Ltd [1884-1961] the 100 tons gross tugboat KEERA is seen here on naval duties in Melbourne in 1945, with a couple of naval ratings aboard.
The photo caught our attention as we had a recent image of HMAS QUICKMATCH being tended by the same venerable tug in the Yarra River in the mid-1950s, built in 1926, at pic NO. 4267, here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/5591252794/
KERRA became the property of Howard Smith Industries with its takeover the Melbourne Steamship Company in 1961, and - the Flotilla Australia website tells us - was sold to Antonios Miltonis of Williamstown in 1967, and converted to a trawler. That's our last trace of this vessel. A second much larger tug named KEERA came into service in Melbourne, in 1985, we think, and as far as we know is still in service., She was involved in the rescue of the grounded coal carrier PASHA BULKER off Newcastle's Nobby's Beach in 2007.
Photo: Herald and Weekly Times Ltd Collection, State Library of Victoria [LaTrobe Library], accession number hp004761.
4737. A foggy old image, but an interesting period piece. In the foreground to the left here is the Port Phillip Pilots Association vessel AKUNA, the former WWII corvette HMAS GLADSTONE. Out on Dock Pier still from the left is the decommissioned [in 1963] frigate ex-HMAS QUICKMATCH, used as a hostel vessel for the crews of other ships in the dockyard when necessary. Beside her is the Battle Class fleet training ship HMAS ANZAC [II], undergoing the final stage of her conversion, with the removal of B turret and bofor gun from B deck and construction of a forward classroom and chartroom there. Across the dock from this pair are the Type 12 frigates HMAS STUART [II] and HMAS YARRA [III], the latter built at WND and commissioned on July 27, 1961. STUART, built at Cockatoo Island Dockyard, followed her into service two years later, on June 28, 1963. They carry their original hull numbers - but on the bow, a recent measure following American practice. HMAS YARRA has steam raised.
Photo: Williamstown Naval Dockyard, it appeared in the WND's booklet marking the 75th Anniversary of the RAN, in 1986.
5728. Paid off into reserve at Williamstown Naval Dockyard on April 30, 1963, the former WWII destroyer and subsequent Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigate HMAS QUICKMATCH came into use there as accomodation for the crews of ships in refit or under construction - particularly the later Type 12 frigate HMAS SWAN [III] - laid down on Aug. 18, 1965 and commissioned on Jan. 20, 1970.
From one of two comments we have had, she doesn't seem to have been regarded as Five Star accomodation to put it mildly, and one can see that here.
We another another good pic of QUICKMATCH as an accomodation vessel, along with HMAS GASCOYNE at Williamstown - with PARRAMATTA [III] across the wharf - at Pic NO. 1262, here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/4700056243/
QUICKMATCH was sold for scrapping by the Fujita Salvage Company at Moji Japan in 1972.
Photo: collection of the late Eric Hogben, courtesy Geoff Eastwood, Sydney.
Aerial view of the former Australian destroyer HMAS Quiberon (G81) after her conversion to an anti submarine frigate (new pennant "F03"), photo dated 1958 in pencil on the back of this RAN publicity photo.
In early 1950, the decision was made to convert all five Q class destroyers in RAN service (three more had been acquired after World War II) to anti-submarine warfare frigates, similar to the Type 15 frigate conversions performed on several War Emergency Programme destroyers of the RN.
A proposal was made by the Australian government to pay for the upgrade to the five on-loan vessels, at the predicted cost of AU₤400,000 each. Instead, the British Admiralty presented the ships to the RAN on 1 June as gifts. The conversions were part of an overall plan to improve the anti-submarine warfare capability of the RAN, although Quiberon and the other ships were only a 'stopgap' measure until purpose-built ASW frigates could be constructed.[8]
Quiberon paid off on 15 May 1950 for conversion .
In November 1950 the task of converting Quiberon to a modern fast anti-submarine frigate was commenced at Cockatoo Island Dockyard in Sydney. Later the ship was transferred to the Naval Dockyard at Garden Island, Sydney, where the conversion was completed in December 1957.
Quiberon recommissioned on 18 December 1957 as a unit of the 1st Frigate Squadron. When completed by the conversion of three sister ships from destroyers to frigates, the Squadron comprised HMA Ships Quadrant, Queenborough, Quiberon and Quickmatch.
During the following six and a half years, Quiberon spent several periods of duty on Far East service as a unit of the Commonwealth Strategic Reserve and from time to time operated as a unit of the South East Asia Treaty Organisation forces on periodical exercises in Far East waters. Otherwise she operated as a unit of the Australian Fleet on the Australia Station. Her service career ended when she paid off to Reserve on 26 June 1964.
Quiberon was sold on 15 February 1972 for breaking up to Fujita Salvage Company Limited of Osaka, Japan, for $68,260.00. On 10 April 1972 the Japanese tug SUMI MARU No 38 left Sydney for Japan with Quiberon and another former RAN vessel, Tobruk , in tow
Footnote on her history published by the Naval Historical Society of Australia
No Australian destroyer had a more distinguished wartime career and only two other destroyers sank enemy submarines. Like her sister ship Quickmatch, she was a lucky ship and suffered no casualties in action.
5209. Such an old favourite, because many of us of a certain age and Navy interest grew up with it - another of those official photos used over and again in RAN recruiting advertisements in the late 1950s. Also, of course, there are two iconic ships of the 1950s in it.
We are in the process of obtaining - mainly through acquisitions - better and higher resolution copies of some of our earlier images, and these will be appearing shortly, along with a number of great new high-res pics, in the holiday season.
This is a higher-res. version however, from the RAN Archives of an image we had previously at pic NO. 3105 here:
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Again, we've done a little repair, and this image is more like that which people will remember from the old newspaper ads than the scan back at 3105. We will leave that there however, as the 'Old Photo' scan technique gives it a different kind of look and clarity.
Photo: RAN Historical, Navy Heritage Collection image ID NO. 01180, it appeared in the RAN'sGolden Jubilee booklet of 1961, in Ross Gillett's 'Warships of Australia' [Rigby Australia, 1977] p95; and in many other places since.
A COMPENDIUM of links to some 350 images of HMAS MELBOURNE [II] on this Photostream begins at Pic 5444 and extends over seven entries. It starts here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6707592179/in/photostream
4407. This is one of a series of official ship portraits taken of HMS QUALITY for the British Ministry of Defence in August 1942, and shortly before her commmissioning on Sept. 7 that year.
The 1705-2500 ton destroyer, built by Swan, Hunter and Wigham Richardson at Wallsend on Tyne, was one of the five 'Q' class ships to eventually come to the RAN. Two ship, HMAS QUICKMATCH and HMAS QUIBERON, were Australian manned and had been directly commissioned into the RAN on completion during WWII. Three of their six sister ships, QUEENBOROUGH, QUADRANT and QUALITY were passed to the RAN, initially on loan, in Sydney in late October 1945, after the end of WWII.
As we have now discussed many times, finally presentesd to the RAN on a permanent basis, four of the ships were converted to Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigates in the 1950s, but QUALITY was not converted. Laid up in 1950 she spent the remainder of her time tied up alongside HMAS SHROPSHIRE in Athol Bight.
The penny has finally dropped for us on why QUALITY was not also converted, and in fact got little usage in the RAN. We hink she was probably used largely as a source of spare parts to keep the other ships in service - but that is speculation on our part. EDIT: And wrong. See 'Additional In formation' from comments.
QUALITY was sold to the Mitsubishi Co. of Tokyo on April 10, 1958 for scrapping.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION IN COM,MENTS BELOW. From Les Roberts:
The RAN Volume of the Australian Centenary History of Defence states that capping of the Defence Budget and the cost overruns of the other four Q Class conversions meant that QUALITY's conversion was cancelled in 1954.
We had some really excellent companion images to this photo at pic NOs 761, 762, starting here:
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This photo: James Henry Cleet, FRPS [1876-1959] . Mr Cleet , from South Shields , UK, it was frequently used as an official photographer by the British Ministry of Defence . Many of his official warship portraits are held in the Imperial War Museum. This photo is also held in the RAN's Heritage Collection, where it is image NO. 02831.
4026. Sitting at the Cruiser Wharf towards the outer end of Garden Island, we have the sad sight of WWII cruiser HMAS HOBART [I], with the Q Class destroyer HMAS QUICKMATCH alongside.
HOBART has been brought across from the reserve fleet dolphins at Athol Bight, where she has lain since 1947, to be partially stripped before being taken to the State Dockyard, Newcastle in August 1952, for modernisation as a training cruiser.
This was abandoned in December 1955 after three and a half years 'work.' As far as we are aware, and this could be wrong, the public were never affordedan explanation of why this project was called off. A parliamentary debate was needed at least, an Auditor-General Report, but we've not found those things as yet.
The obvious suspicion would be Cold War industrial tensions on the Newcastle waterfront, but ex-Navy blokes have also mentioned that HOBART, 18-1/2 years old in 1952, was in no condition for the work to be started.
The cruiser was towed back to the reserve fleet dolphins, unfinished, at the end of 1955 and never raised steam again. As we have now shown a number of times, she was towed to Japan for scrapping in 1962.
Photo: RAN Historical section, it is held in the RAN Heritage Collection, ID. NO. 02482, and public through the RAN and sharing arrangements elsewhere. The image is out of copyright.
A two-part COMPENDIUM of the Photostream's 100 HMAS HOBART [I] images begins at Entry NO. 5464, here:
www.flickr.com/photos/41311545@N05/6734070483/in/photostream