On This Day
1939 > WW2
On This Day - 1939
- September 2, 1939
CDRE Wilfred Rupert Patterson, CBE, RN, was appointed to command His Majesty’s Australian Squadron, his flagship was HMAS CANBERRA, (cruiser). He replaced RADM Wilfred Custance who was in the grip of a fatal illness.
- August 27, 1939
The Australian Naval Board approved the mobilisation of 350 RANR for duty at Darwin, Navy Office, Melbourne and the Naval Control Service.
The passenger liners MORETON BAY, ARAWA, KANIMBLA, and CHANGTE, were requisitioned by the Admiralty in Sydney. The first three were converted to armed merchant cruisers, and the CHANGTE became a victualling stores- issuing ship.
- August 4, 1939
New York newspapers carried headlines; ‘Aussies Mutiny-British Officers Too British’. The story concerned an incident in HMAS PERTH, (cruiser), when ratings objected to the wearing of whites ashore. The matter was settled within the ship.
- June 29, 1939
The modified Leander class cruiser HMAS PERTH, (CAPT H. B. Farncomb, MVO, RAN), was commissioned. PERTH was laid down in Portsmouth Dockyard, England, as HMS AMPHION, on 26 June 1933, and launched on 27 July 1934. The Marchioness of Titchfield performed the launching ceremony on 15 June 1936. AMPHION was re-named PERTH at the ceremony by the Duchess of Kent.
- June 14, 1939
The Government acquired 357 acres of land at Brown’s Hole near Nowra, NSW. Operating as a Royal Naval Air Station during WWII, the site later commissioned as HMAS Albatross.
- June 10, 1939
HMAS PARRAMATTA, (sloop), was launched at Cockatoo Island, Sydney.
- April 3, 1939
HMAS VENDETTA, (destroyer), transported the body of the Australian Prime Minister, Joseph Lyons, to Devonport, TAS, for burial.
- March 30, 1939
The Australian Naval Board in a letter to the Government stated, “the control of sea communications in Australian waters must depend basically on the strength of the British Fleet”.