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Occasional Paper 65: Sailors, Soldiers and Two Wars. From HMCS protector to South Africa

October 30, 2019

October 2019

The following story was written by Dr Anthony Stimson BA Hons B Ed PhD, who has extensively researched the history of the Boer War including the South Australian men that volunteered. He is a frequent visitor to Australian battlefields in South Africa and President of the South Australian Boer War Association, an association for descendants of men who served and anyone interested in the war in South Africa.

Dr Stimson was a co-founder and principal of Eynesbury Senior College, Institutes of Business and Technology and international English language academies in Adelaide until stepping down in 2007. He then consulted to schools and chaired the academic boards of tertiary education providers, but is now preoccupied with two books on South Australia’s involvement in the Anglo-Boer War.

This paper was first published in “The SA Boer War Association” Journal – “Dispatches” Issue 14 in June 2018.

For a short time in 1900 South Australians were involved in wars on different sides of the globe. Remarkably, six men served in both wars and both services, navy and army. Five seamen enlisted in the 5th South Australian Imperial Bushmen (5SAIB) for service in South Africa two days after they returned from duty on the China Station on the gunboat HMCS Her Majesty’s Colonial Ship Protector. The sixth enlisted a few weeks later in 6SAIB.

When the anti-European protest known as the Boxer Rebellion erupted in Beijing the South Australian Government promptly offered the gunboat for service. A heavily armed vessel of 920 tons, she had been ordered after the Russian war scare of 1882 and had served uneventfully in South Australian waters since 1884. Her shallow draught persuaded the Admiralty that she might be useful for operations in coastal waters and the offer was gratefully accepted.

There were two sticking points. The Admiralty wanted the gunboat to be commanded and crewed by Royal Navy personnel as she was to be commissioned as a ship of the RN for the term of her deployment. The Holder Government conceded on command; Capt. James Clare stepped down and Capt. James Creswell RN took command. But Holder would not bend on crewing. When Protector sailed on 6 August 1900 she was crewed by South Australian Naval Reservists.

Her service was uneventful and she returned to Port Adelaide on 6 January 1901. Among the reservists on board were Harry Beare, Jacob Davis, Louis Deers, Charles De Longville, George Luckett and Thomas Malloney. We will never know why each man immediately put his hand up to serve in South Africa but it probably came down to adventure and the frustration of not having seen real action on the Protector’s deployment.

Harry Beare was the youngest of the six. A keen member of the Naval Reserve’s fife and drum band, and the son of a senior constable, he sailed as Boy 1st Class, presumably after badgering his parents for permission. He returned home an Able Bodied Seaman. While the others enlisted in 5SAIB two days after docking at Port Adelaide he did not. Most likely it took him a few weeks to persuade his parents to let him enlist. At any rate, he was proudly wearing his naval uniform when he enlisted in 6SAIB in March. He came from a family of crack shots.

If his parents had forebodings they were well placed. As far as we know, Harry Beare is the youngest South Australian to die in South Africa. He was 16 when he died of enteric fever in Kroonstad in April 1902, only weeks before the end of the war. He is buried somewhere in the sprawling ruins of the Kroonstad cemetery.

Jacob Davis, 24, a baker, had the unusual distinction of being profiled in The Jewish Herald, London, as the only Australian Jew serving in the Royal Navy. The shortest man in 5SAIB at 5’3”, he had two main claims to fame in South Africa: he had a lucky escape when accidentally shot in the thumb by one of his mates (the bullet went on to kill Tpr. Bruce May); and he stole Col. De Lisle’s horse, dying its coat overnight with coffee and Condy’s crystals, and docking its tail. To no avail – De Lisle’s servant recognized the horse. It was an open secret that Davis was responsible but there was no evidence to contradict his claim that the horse had strayed into the Australian lines. He was let off. ‘Give an Australian half an hour with a horse and tails are changed, manes are hogged and brands disappear as if by magic,’ a Tasmanian said wryly.

Baker, horsebreaker and amateur boxer, Davis lived life on the wild side. ‘He is the most reckless man God ever put breath into,’ a witness told a coronial inquest into the death of a mutual friend in 1899. The coroner was taken aback. After the war there were convictions for breaching the peace and – in 1927 – brandishing a revolver in Grote Street and threatening to kill one Frank White. Davis claimed the gun was simply a souvenir he had brought back from South Africa. He said he carried it for protection against rival West End pushes or gangs. It is not inconceivable. Born in Grote Street, he lived his life in the West End and when he died in 1939, bankrupt, was living on West Terrace. It was a tough area.

To the end, Jacob Davis was proud of his naval and military service, and served briefly on the committee of the South African War Veterans Association. Two years before his death he could still fit comfortably into both wartime uniforms. He had thrown nothing out – bandolier, bayonet, medicine kit, brush were still there. There was even a pigtail from China. Asked how he came by it, Davis was unusually coy: ‘I usually get what I want.’

Louis Deers enlisted in 5SAIB with Davis and if anything his background was even tougher. He was six years old when in 1882 his widowed mother surrendered him to the care of the Destitute Board. He was admitted to the Industrial School at Magill and became a labourer. But his life took a turn for the better, perhaps because of his time in the Naval Reserve. When Capt. Clare, Naval Commandant, farewelled Deers, Luckett, Malloney and De Longville on the eve of their departure for South Africa, he said they had been ‘the flower of the crew of the Protector on her visit to China.’

Deers met a tragic end but not from a Boer bullet or fever. A certificated diver employed by the Fremantle Harbors Authority, he was diving to retrieve an anchor in March 1910 when he suffocated. An inquest found that his diving gear was operating perfectly and that no blame attached to anyone. The most likely explanation was that he had stumbled over a rock, his feet ending above his head. Deers left a wife and three children.

Charles De Longville was lucky to survive South Africa. The 22 year old carpenter from Port MacDonnell served as an Able Bodied Seaman on the Protector but on 11 October 1901, in close fighting outside Harrismith, took two bullets in the leg and one in the arm. Invalided home, he was hailed as a hero and presented with an inscribed medal by friends ‘as a token of their admiration of his pluck.’ The family still has the medal. He was granted a lifetime pension of 1/6 per day.

At 30, George Luckett was the oldest of the six men. Birmingham born and a mariner, he had been awarded the Bronze Medal of the Royal Humane Society for saving his captain’s life when the steamer You Yangs was wrecked off Cape Willoughby in 1890. Luckett served as an Able Bodied Seaman on the Protector and bizarrely found himself a sergeant in 5SAIB only days after the gunboat docked at the Port in January. He was promoted to sergeant-major in South Africa. In 1914, 43 years old, he went off to another war.

Thomas Malloney, 28, had served in the Naval Reserve for 12 years when he volunteered for the 3rd South Australian Bushmen in January 1900. He claimed to be a good horseman and a good shot but did not make the final cut. In August he sailed for China as a petty officer but did make it to South Africa with 5SAIB on return. His service there seems to have been uneventful.

Further Reading:

Australia and the Boer War, 1899–1902, AWM, available at https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/atwar/boer/

The Australian Boer War Memorial, Anzac Parade, Canberra, NHSA image

Occasional Paper 64: HMCS Protector – 1900 to the Present

October 30, 2019

October 2019

By Kingsley Perry, Committee member, Naval Historical Society of Australia

Occasional Paper Number 62 about the navy in South Australia from colonial days included reference to the acquisition of HMCS Protector in 1884 and her service in South Australia until 1900. She was then offered up to the imperial government as part of the expedition to China and the Boxer Rebellion.

She joined the ‘Eight Nation Alliance’ to protect their interest in China, temporarily commissioned as HMS Protector. It was thought that her shallow draft would be useful, but that turned out not to be a particularly useful attribute, but she carried out useful work in surveying and despatching. She returned to Australia in November 1900. In 1901 Protector was absorbed into the Commonwealth of Australia Naval Force.

She was then used as a training ship until becoming part of the new Royal Australian Navy in 1911. Now as HMAS Protector, she was modified as a patrol vessel and as a tender to the warship HMAS Cerberus. At the start of World War I she became parent/tender to the submarines AE1 and AE2, and in August 1914 accompanied them to German New Guinea waters. When the German colonies surrendered in September, Protector remained in Rabaul as a port guard ship, and then returned to Australia with HMAS Fantome in October 1914.

In October 1915 Protector sailed to the Cocos Islands for two months to investigate the salvage of SMS Emden. She then returned to Melbourne to resume tender duties for Cerberus, and also acted as a minesweeper in Victorian waters. In 1921 she was renamed HMAS Cerberus II and was used as a tender for the Flinders Naval Depot.

In 1924 the old Protector finished her career as a warship. Her armaments, turrets and engines were sold and she was converted to a lighter. She was sold in 1931 and renamed Sidney, as a wool lighter. Her service in war, however, was not yet over.

In 1943 she was requisitioned by the US Army and taken north. However, on the way she was damaged during a collision with a tug and was abandoned on a beach near Gladstone, Queensland. There she lay, her life seemingly well and truly over. But there was still some signs of life left in the old hulk yet.

The hulk was purchased for the princely sum of ten pounds by Captain Christian Poulson who owned the Heron Island tourist resort in the Great Barrier Reef. It was refloated and taken to Heron Island to be scuttled and used as a breakwater. It is still there today, lying on the reef crest at the entrance to the harbour.

Poulson established a tourist hotel on Heron Island in 1932. By 1943, at the time he acquired what remained of the old Protector, the island was declared a national park. At that time the resort comprised a large main building, some cabins, a tennis court, and water treatment facilities. When the war ended, Poulson opened up tours, and founded Barrier Reef Airways to provide a weekly Catalina flying boat service from Brisbane. In 1950 a marine research station was established, and marine research and education continues as a major aspect of the island’s activities. The resort was taken over by P&O Australian Resorts in 1980, has been renovated a number of times, and is a popular tourist destination.

The deteriorated and rusted hulk of the Protector clearly marks the entrance to the channel to the small harbour, and is one of the first sights for visitors as they arrive at the island. The management of the resort goes to good lengths to educate visitors about the history of this remarkable ship.

Other pieces of the Protector are preserved elsewhere. Her stern 6-inch breech-loading gun is outside TS Adelaide at the Birkenhead Naval Deport in Birkenhead, South Australia. A 4-inch quick firing gun is on display outside the Elizabeth and Salisbury Navy Club in Elizabeth, South Australia. The ship’s wheel is on display at the RAN Heritage Centre in Garden Island, Sydney.

Wreck of HMCS *Protector*, Image by Kobus & Lorraine Malan

Before her time – the tale of Navy’s first female sailor

September 25, 2019

Twenty-one years before the first Women’s Royal Australian Navy members (WRANs) entered service due to a shortage of telegraphists during the Second World War, a young Tasmanian girl was enlisted into the Royal Australian Navy.

In a remarkable twist of fate, six year old Nancy Bentley was playing in bushland at Port Arthur when she slipped and was bitten on the wrist by a snake. With the closest doctor at Sorrell, many miles away, her desperate father rowed the child to HMAS Sydney (I), then anchored in Carnarvon Bay after conducting exercises off Tasmania’s east coast, and pleaded for the ship’s medics to assist.

Commanding Officer, Captain Henry Cayley, weighed the situation and so as to avoid legal complications and not breach the King’s regulations and Admiralty instructions that women were not meant to board Royal Australian Navy warships, he devised a solution.

On 15 November 1920, Nancy was formally enlisted as an honorary member of the Navy. Her service number was 000001 and her official rating was mascot. She was enlisted “till fed up”.

Sydney transported the child to Hobart, where she received medical treatment and visited the cinema, before being returned to Port Arthur.

During her eight days of service, the crew doted on Nancy. She was issued with a Service Certificate, a Conduct Record Sheet and a uniform. They assessed her character as being “very good” and her naval rating ability as “exceptional”.

Having fully recovered Nancy was formally discharged from Naval service on 23 November 1920 – the reason given “being required by her parents”.

Nancy went on to live a full life and became Mrs Nancy Jones and lived until 1999 aged 85.

In an interview given to the Hobart Mercury in the 1970s, Nancy she remembered being treated well.

“I was the crew’s official mascot and everybody from the Captain down gave me VIP treatment,” Nancy said.

“While I was in sick bay at Port Arthur, mum and dad were given permission to visit the ship and bought me cow’s milk.”

In 1986, Nancy became a life member of the HMAS Sydney Association, an invitation that is only extended to those who have served on one of the four ships so named.

Occasional Paper 62: The Navy in South Australia from Colonial Days to the Present

September 16, 2019

September 2019

By Dennis J Weatherall JP TM AFAITT(L) LSM, Volunteer Researcher, Naval Historical Society of Australia

It’s reputed that the first sighting of the southern coast of our Great South Land was by a Dutch ship in 1627 the “Gulden Zeepaard” under the command of a Francois Thijssen. The next record accords Rear Admiral Bruny D’Entrecasteaux in the French war ship “La Recherche”. He was looking for La Perouse who was on a voyage of discovery in 1788, in company with Boussole and Astralabe, both the latter seemingly disappearing without trace.

Able Tasman probably saw the same coast even earlier in 1644 from his sketch charts. Another voyager was Lt. John McCluer of the Bombay Marine Company in 1790, followed by Captain Matthew Flinders in 1802-1803. A Lt. James Grant in January 1800, in command of “HMS Lady Nelson” (a 60 ton Brig), discovered and named parts of the coast such as Cape Banks, Cape Northumberland, Mount Gambier, Mount Schanck. He was promoted to Commander after a battle with the Dutch in 1805 off today’s Netherlands and he was remembered with a memorial atop Mt Gambier in 1900 for his discoveries.

The Province of South Australia (as opposed to Colony)[1] was established in December 1833 when the British Parliament passed the South Australian Act. South Australia was in fact called a “Province” rather than a Colony to distinguish it from other Colonies that had transportation as their main source of population.

In the early 1850’s the then Governor Henry Young looked at ways of protecting the Province and in due course informed the “Home Authorities” that “it’d accord great satisfaction and increase confidence to his government if the English Pendant was more frequently seen in these waters” and, more importantly, subject to available funds available to the Provinces and Colonies, if a naval force were to be established on the Australian coast. It appears this submission was considered rather too radical by the “Lords of the Admiralty“.

Recommendations were forthcoming to build forts at The Semaphore, Glenelg, Torrens Island and inland towards Adelaide. The wish list also had a requirement for six gunboats, each with a 100 pounder gun, with additional guns ashore. Port Creek would be defended by torpedoes and a boom, along with telegraphic communications, with the lighthouse augmented with both a permanent and volunteer military force. This was a very ambitious programme on which to embark to defend the Province of South Australia, with a parliamentary grant of 20,000 pounds. Fort Glanville and Fort Largs, plus a military road, eventually materialised.

[1] While the ‘South Australian Act’ may have referred to the establishment as a “Province” the term was not generally used. SA was generally referred to as a ‘Colony’ e.g. Her Majesty’s Colonial Ship Protector.

In the mid 1800’s Britain made it quite clear that her contribution to the security of Australia would be the continued policy of the Royal Navy. It would assume full responsibility on the high seas and no more, therefore the question of adequate local defence measures became paramount during the American Civil War period.

Around the same time an MP, a Mr H.B.T. Strangways, suggested the purchase of a “quick turret ship” capable of carrying two 150 pound shot guns and able to steam at 18-20 knots, which was some speed at that time. Due to a change in Governor the idea was shelved for more than ten years.

In late 1859 the Province bought to the attention of “the powers” there’d been no HM ships in the waters of South Australia for nine years. This brought a flood of visits by RN ships “HMS Esk” (1,169 tons with 21 guns) along with “HMS Charybdis”, “Curacoa”, “Falcon” and “Galatea” soon after the matter had been raised.

HMS Falcon – a Cruiser class sloop of 17 guns, 1045 tons, commissioned 30th March 1855 and part of the Royal Navy Australian Station based ships

An English Act of Parliament in 1859 established a Reserve volunteer force of seamen to be available for general service in the RN in times of emergency to be known as the RNR. The Colonial Defence Act was passed into law in 1865 and this “made it lawful for any Colony to provide, maintain and use vessels of war and to raise and maintain seamen for such vessels, also to raise and maintain a volunteer force to serve in the RN in emergencies, appoint officers, obtain from the Admiralty the services of officers and men, enforce order and discipline, making all subject to the R&I’s of the RN”.

Volunteers raised in the Colonies were to form part of the RNR, the Queen may then accept an offer of use of such vessels and men, with such ships then being a ship of war of the RN. Local ships were granted authority to wear the Blue Ensign with the badge of the Colony in the fly and a Blue Pendant.

It was this Act which made possible the formation of the Naval Brigade, and the building of H.M. Colonial Ship, HMCS Protector in 1884 and her subsequent future service in the RN during the “Boxer Rebellion” in 1900. During this period as HMS Protector she flew the White Ensign and her officers given temporary commissions in the Royal Navy.

In 1862 Colonel F. Blyth of the Volunteer Military Force recommended additional protection for South Australia by stationing a gunboat “at the outer bar” of the Port River. In 1865 a Commander Parkin recommended six gunboats each capable of firing off a 100 pound shot. This recommendation was put forward for consideration after the success of Ironclad Monitors during the American Civil War.

In 1867 the government considered the introduction of a naval training ship for boys who had fallen foul to the courts. There were many against the idea, but eventually it was decided to go ahead with such a programme. A suitable vessel was acquired – the hulk “Fitzjames” – which was found in Victoria (where a similar scheme was already operating) and towed to South Australia, anchored off the coast, and used as a training ship for young boys between 1876 and 1891.

Hulk “Fitzjames” Naval Training Ship for boys in South Australia

In 1876 the question of the purchase of a substantial naval vessel once again was raised. A Defence Commission was established and again it was recommended the Province purchase three gunboats. Treasurer Mr John Colton suggested a “turret ship” similar to the Victorian vessel “Cerberus” and a request was made to Victoria on how much it would cost. The SA Agent General in London, a Mr Dutton, at the time made contact with the Chief Constructor of the RN, a Mr E.J. Reed. He learned such a 1,000 ton ironclad ship carrying 25 ton guns would cost his government 29,500 pounds. The information was filed away for posterity in the SA government archives and didn’t proceed.

In 1877, following the “Russian Scare” of 1876-77, two British government men visited the Australian Colonies and SA Province to discuss their defence with their respective governments. One was a Mr W.F.D. Jervois, a future governor of South Australia. They recommended all Colonies/Provinces acquire gunboats or torpedo boats and man them with locally-recruited men for the protection of their local ports.

Another suggestion by Jervois was to purchase a vessel of 2,500 tons, ironclad with ten inch armour and heavy guns. Such an outlay – the amount of 150,000 pounds – wasn’t again all that palatable to the tax payers of SA, so the suggestion went nowhere for another five years.

Once Jervois became governor of SA (in October 1877) he suggested to the government they should hire British firm (Sir) William Armstrong & Co of Newcastle-on-Tyne to build its new naval vessel the “Protector”. The ship was constructed according to the “flat-iron” gunboat design, first introduced during the Crimean War.

Originally estimated that such a vessel would cost 40-50,000 pounds, it was to be the largest vessel ordered by any Colony or Province at 188 ft long, 30 ft beam and 12 ft 6 in draft. Propulsion was via two compound surface condensing engines generating 1,500 hp giving a top speed of 14 knots. For extra range Protector was fitted with a Schooner rig and flying topsails.

Protector was launched in early 1884 and commissioned the same year on the 19^th June – her first CO was a Commander John C.P Walcott RN. Her delivery passage to Port Adelaide via the Suez Canal arrived on station 30^th September 1884. Protector served SA for fifteen years up until 1900 when she was offered up to the Imperial government as part of the expedition to China and the Boxer Rebellion. Captain William Rooke Creswell CMG had previously served in the SA Colonial Navy but at the time of his appointment to be CO for the China Rebellion was Commander of the Queensland Maritime Defence Force.

On her return to Australia from China on the 1^st January 1901 she was just in time to be transferred to the new Commonwealth of Australia Naval Force and became HMAS Protector. There’s much more to tell about this gallant ship and we’ll leave its war time service and post service to another paper.

Rewinding back to 1870’s and Colonial times in South Australia. A site was selected for its strategic importance on the North Arm of the Port River and a Naval Store was established at Largs Bay. This depot was used for Naval Reserve training and the stowage of emergency items for sea rescue.

In the early 1880’s a temporary Torpedo Station was erected at this site which was later replaced by a more substantial building, some 110 ft in length, and built by the Naval Reservists. The new building consisted of a store room, lecture room and a residence for a torpedo officer – construction was in galvanised iron. A jetty was also built into deep water with a railway track system to handle stores and torpedoes. The “Station” was extended twice in 1890 and 1891 by the crew of HMCS Protector.

This torpedo station was intended to protect Port Adelaide in any hostilities, by a boom of heavy chains across the river and in turn by a gun battery. The Station could also mine the Port River as required – the government of the day acquired sufficient mines that were never used. On becoming obsolete and were in due course destroyed.

Eventually, post Federation, a Torpedo Boat was acquired in 1905. Better late than never as the saying goes! The Station was closed and equipment dismantled and transferred to the new Naval Depot at Birkenhead which was established in 1915 to replace the Largs Bay site. Birkenhead was located some 14 kms NW of Adelaide City central business centre on the Lefeure Peninsula, covering an area of 30 square miles. A Naval Drill Hall was built on the location in 1919 and is significant for its association with the early days of the Naval Reserve in South Australia and eventually with the RAN until its closure in 1990.

Between the wars, the base supported visiting fleet assets and the local Port Division of the RANR. In WWII it was commissioned as a Naval Shore Establishment as HMAS Cerberus IV on the 13^th September 1939 and a year later, 1^st August 1940, was recommissioned as HMAS Torrens after the river that flows through Adelaide and the River Class Torpedo Boat Destroyer of the same name. Torrens was disposed by sinking in 1930.

HMAS Torrens D67 commissioned 1916, decommissioned 1920, RAN Image

Post WWII, HMAS Torrens returned to its peacetime routine of providing a naval presence in South Australia, assisting visiting fleet ships and the base for the RANR training once more.

On the 1^st March 1965, Torrens had another name change and recommissioned as HMAS Encounter which perpetuated the name of the former Light Cruiser HMS Encounter built between 1901 and 1905.

Encounter was assigned to the Australian Station and when the RAN was formed it was renamed HMAS Encounter. The name also commemorates the meeting of two great naval explorers, Captain Matthew Flinders RN and French Captain Nicolas Baudin, off the South Australian coast in 1802.

The establishment, HMAS Encounter was decommissioned on the 21^st March 1994 so ending more than one hundred years of permanent naval presence in the Port Adelaide area. The last Commanding Officer was Commander Brian Gorringe ADC RAN.

Crest of the Shore Establishment HMAS Encounter – Adelaide SA

Naval HQ SA – Keswick Barracks South Australia

A Naval Support Office was subsequently established at Keswick Barracks in June 1994. It is located on the southern outskirts of the Adelaide parklands and shares its presence with the Army Headquarters for SA. In 1998 the establishment was renamed “Navy Headquarters South Australia”, its main function being to provide administration support to Naval personnel serving with various Defence projects in South Australia. These include; RAAF Edinburgh, DSTO Salisbury, ASC Osborne, along with Reserve personnel living in SA and detachments of both the RAN and RANR Bands.

References:

Commonwealth of Australia Archives, Canberra

Department of Defence web site

Records and Register Commonwealth Militia – Reserves

South Australian Heritage data base

South Australian Government Register 10 Jul 1886 + 28 Feb 1891

South Australian State Library data news article Robert Thomas 1891

South Australian Defence of the Colony-Province 26 Mar 1859

Successful Torpedo Practice Register 27 Jul 1885

Naval Defence Act of SA 15 Nov 1887

Information article HMCS Protector 23 Sep 1884

SA History Hub – Protector Warship of SA

Sea Power Centre Australia

Colonial Navies of Australia

National Archives – Coastal Fortifications South Australia 1800’s.

Occasional Paper 63: Malta Revisited: Wartime Memories of HMAS Vendetta’s Malta Sojourn in World War II

September 16, 2019

September 2019

We are indebted to ex Supply Assistant Gordon Hill for this wonderfully illuminating description of his wartime service in the destroyer HMAS Vendetta when based at Malta. His story was first published in the June 2010 edition of the Naval Historical Review, available on the Society website.

The George Cross Island Association Reunion in 2004 gave me the opportunity to revisit Malta. I knew that if I put off visiting the Island again after 64 years it was doubtful I would ever do so. Visiting Grand Harbour, the Docks, the infamous ‘Gut’, Valetta, Sliema, the country towns and villages evoked memories of both happy and sad days of Malta at war.

HMAS Vendetta and the four other destroyers of the V and W squadron from Australia were assigned to the 10th destroyer squadron of Admiral Cunningham’s Mediterranean fleet at Malta. We arrived in December 1939 and were soon exercising at sea. The war had not reached the Med’ and with the French fleet as allies we sailed supreme in Mare Nostrum, as the Romans called it. Two battle fleets were a magnificent sight and we five little Australian destroyers were proud to be a part of it; destroyer escort to this mighty armada.

We escorted convoys taking troops to Marseilles, exercised in the Atlantic and visited Gibraltar.

On 5 March 1940 I had my 21^stbirthday in Marseilles, visiting the cabarets and dancing the night away. The French and British armies in the north would defeat the Germans, Poland would be liberated and the war would be over in no time. How quickly things changed. We evacuated troops from Marseilles to Palestine, the French fleet became our enemies and we returned to Malta.

Vendetta was feeling her age after months at sea and it was decided to put her in dock at Malta for a refit. Grand Harbour was full of ships, plenty of sailors went ashore enjoying themselves. One favourite place in Valetta was ‘The Gut’ a street full of bars. I had a memorable evening with two shipmates and two English squaddies (soldiers) in a room over ‘Dirty Harry’s’ Bar. We sang and danced and one girl did the ‘Dance of the Seven Veils’. One soldier who had a magnificent voice and sang ‘My Prayer’ and ‘Indian Summer’, two songs I will never forget.

The ship’s company was divided in two. One half went to live and work with the British army RA 4^thCoast Regiment and the other half, which I was unfortunate enough to be in, left to work on the ship during the day and to live in the NAAFI canteen. The canteen had facilities for showers and meals but we had to sleep on mess tables or benches, which at the time we thought nothing could be worse.

In dock Vendetta had one set of torpedo tubes removed and a high angle AA gun fitted, a 0.5 multiple machine gun replaced the small gun between the funnels, the mainmast lowered and sundry other work done by the dockyard workers. We carried out general maintenance and cleaned up the mess the dockyard workers invariably left behind each day. The upper deck soon had a new look. The boilers had been cleaned and the work on the engine refit commenced.

HMAS Vendetta wearing camouflage and new pennant no D69 which was changed in May 1940

On the 10 June I left the ship and was walking to the canteen to shower and spend the evening ashore when two army officers excitedly told me ‘the balloon has gone up’ That expression took a while to sink in but I soon realised that Italy had come into the war. The immediate fear was an Italian invasion by sea and air.

Italy had a menacing naval potential. Her fleet boasted 5 battleships, 25 cruisers, 90 destroyers and nearly 100 submarines. Admiral Cunningham decided to move the units of his fleet in Malta to Alexandria leaving just a few destroyers and other small ships. Vendetta’s refit crew now became dockyard defence and we carried a 0.303 rifle or if lucky a 0.45 revolver with us at all times to guard against a parachute invasion.

Living in the NAAFI canteen was bad enough but we were now to be quartered in a tunnel alongside the ship in the graving dock. Fifty men took their hammocks and laid them on the damp tunnel floor and turned in. Next morning we were covered by bites from fleas that infested the walls of the tunnel. The only relief was to dive into the harbour. That tunnel was our home for four weeks while we worked on the ship.

The bombing started early on 11 June. Valetta, the harbour and surrounding towns were bombed eighty times, sometimes up to eight air raids a day up to the time when we left on 8 July with the engine refit not completed. The siege of Malta had begun. Many people left their homes to live in the catacombs, ancient tunnels and caves and to cut air raid shelters in the soft limestone cliffs.

The only air defence was four Gloster Gladiators left behind by the navy. The Maltese people watched these planes gallantly take off each day to fight the Italian bombers. One of the navy planes was shot down and the people named the remaining three Faith, Hope and Charity. They gave a good account of themselves and shot down or disabled a number of bombers before they too met their fate. The plane christened ‘Faith’ was not badly damaged and after the war was restored and is now in the museum in Valetta.

Frantic efforts to supply the Island with troops, supplies and equipment for the army and air force through Gibraltar in the west and Alexandria in the east meant Malta Grand Harbour was once again full of ships and a target for the bombers. On one occasion one ammunition ship was on fire and another was sunk by navy divers attaching limpet mines to avoid it blowing up. Even though some supply ships were sunk, navy divers recovered stores from some sunken vessels. The harbour became a graveyard for a number of sailors, soldiers and dockyard workers unloading ships.

Italian bombing of Grand Harbour Malta, June 1941

On one occasion I was assigned to a working party to load depth charges on to a truck and take them to Ranella wireless station. This was the main WT station on the Island. We set up the depth charges as demolition charges in a number of the tunnels that made up this vast underground complex. I don’t think I was much help in handling 350 pound depth charges I only weighed 8 ½ stone and was sacked from a 6 inch guns crew at the training depot in Victoria because I could not lift a 112 pound shell off the loading tray

Soon after Italy came into the war an Italian passenger ship the El Nil was close to Sicily and trying to get to its home port when one of our aircraft spotted it and made it heave to. Vendetta was duty boat for the day and even in dry dock had to provide a boat crew if required. We were given the job of providing a boarding party to take over the passenger ship and I with others were roused from our tunnel quarters, armed and dispatched by a fast patrol boat to sea. We boarded El Nil which was two days sailing out of Malta. My job was to guard the engine room crew. Others took over the wheel house, bridge and other positions. The crew and passengers did not appear to resent our presence or resist. In fact, that night when relieved of my watch I slept comfortably in a cabin and next day ate my meals in the dining room with the passengers. A real contrast from our flea infested tunnel and NAFFI meals.

The Italian air force decided to have an air raid just as we were entering harbour. Pandemonium broke out among the passengers and crew. They tried to lower the life boats, and really panicked. Fortunately we had only a short distance to go to secure the ship alongside a wharf. When the air raid was over we managed to get everyone ashore and the army took them away as POW’s

After several attempts to leave Malta with a convoy, including our captured ship El Nil we finally dodged the lurking submarines and newly laid mines and proceeded to Alexandria which we reached on 13 July 1940. Upon our departure from Malta our C.O. LCDR Rhoades received a message from the Vice Admiral Malta praising the work he and his crew had done in improving the Island’s defences. The message spoke of the astonishing results produced by Vendetta’s crew who, in true Australian fashion, turned their hands to everything. The El Nil was turned into a hospital ship some time later. We spent the next two months escorting convoys of troop ships to Malta and screening ships of the covering cruisers and battleships.

We once again entered Grand Harbour Malta on 11 October 1940 and proceeded to our old place in the graving dock and our tunnel accommodation to complete our engine refit. Some German dive bombers had joined the Italians and inflicted heavy damage on ships in the harbour. The AA defence had been strengthened and now 4.5 AA guns, Bofors and multiple pom poms managed to shoot down a number of bombers. The RAF had some Spitfires and other aircraft and it looked less likely that Italy could take the Island.

One of our sailors had a portable gramophone and a few records which he played in our tunnel to entertain us. One record was Gracie Fields singing Gounod’s ‘Ave Maria’. The memory of the constant playing of that record later evoked such strong emotions in me that for many years I would become profoundly upset when I heard it played.

On the 13 September the long expected Italian invasion of Egypt from Libya began and their forces occupied Sidi Barini . On 28 October the Italian army invaded Greece. Vendetta, still in dock in Malta was like a greyhound straining at the leash to get the refit completed . We had missed a naval battle before by being in dock.

With the arrival of the Luftwaffe in Sicily only 60 miles from Malta bombing intensified. Life in the underground shelters, with food and fuel running short people were getting desperate. No pets were allowed to be kept. Babies were born and people died in their air raid shelters. We finally sailed from Grand Harbour on 10 November escorting the monitor HMS Terror to Suda Bay, Crete which was being set up as naval support base for the military reinforcement of Greece.

Our last visit to Malta was when we escorted a convoy from Alexandria arriving on 26 November 1940. This was a particularly hazardous trip. Several troop and supply ships were sunk by submarines and bombers. There was to be no further attempt to get supplies to Malta from both the east and west Mediterranean for some time. The navy even resorted to delivering aviation fuel to the RAF in Malta by submarine, carried in 4 gallon tins. In harbour, our ‘gashman’ was accused of selling our food scraps to people at the dockyard gate for a penny a plate, instead of feeding them to his goats. Goats were the only supply of milk as the Island land was too poor to support grazing cattle. The milkman came to your door or air raid shelter and milked the goats into any container you had.

In April 1942 HM King George Vl awarded the George Cross to the Islanders of Malta and Gozo as a tribute to their gallantry. The siege went on and the people were at the point of giving up the struggle when in August the ‘Pedestal’ convoy, after the loss of many ships (including the aircraft carrier Eagle) got through from Gibraltar. The tanker Ohio made history by delivering vital fuel, though badly damaged and finally sinking at the wharf. While this was considered the end of the siege, it was some time before other convoys got through to supply food to the starving people.

HMAS Vendetta went on in 1942 to make a name for herself in other parts of the Mediterranean, North Africa, Tobruk, Greece and Crete. Malta was in the past. The feather bed in the Emirates Airways hotel in Dubai on my return to Brisbane was a vast contrast to a hammock on the dirt floor of our tunnel dockside in Malta. All just a part of history.

A little about the author:

Gordon Hill is a current member of NHS. He joined the RAN as a Supply Assistant in 1938.. After initial training at Flinders Naval Base he was posted to HMAS Vendetta. In December 1939 the RAN destroyer squadron was sent overseas to join the Royal Navy East Mediterranean Fleet in Malta. He served in the Mediterranean in Vendetta until the middle of 1941 when transferred to HMAS Perth. After suffering bomb damage in the evacuation from Crete, Perth returned to Australia for repairs.

Gordon next joined HMAS Colac in 1942 and after a few trips to Milne Bay was posted to HMAS Magnetic at Townsville, to start up and run a supply base. His next posting was to the Combined Operations training base HMAS Assault at Port Stephens. He then returned to Milne Bay becoming Australian Liaison Officer with the American Supply Base. After the end of the war in 1945 he was involved with the disposal of surplus naval assets in North Queensland until discharged from the RAN in 1950.

Gordon later joined the Commonwealth Immigration Department as a Supply Officer and helped run migrant camps for displaced persons from Europe at Brisbane and Townsville, and set up another in Cairns. He became an accountant in Cairns and later Brisbane where he retired in 1980.

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