Download SUBMARINES` SWANSON G THE second half of 1944 saw the

CHAPTER
19
SUBMARINES' SWANSON G
second half of 1944 saw the collapse of the enemy submarine
T HE
campaign in the Indian Ocean though, for the first two months of th e
period, that ocean was the principal area of Allied shipping losses t o
submarine attack . Most of the sinkings were by German U-boats whic h
arrived in the Indian Ocean in June (U 181, U 196, U 198 and U859) ,
and July (U 861 and U 862) . The Japanese 18 opened the ball on 2nd
July, with the sinking of the American ship Jean Nicolet (7,176 tons )
bound from Fremantle to Colombo, about 190 miles S .S.E . of Addu Atoll .
But by then the Japanese effort had been spent . In September only three
boats remained based on Penang . The situation in the Pacific was such
that the main strength of the Japanese submarine force had to be concentrated there, in accordance with Japanese doctrine, to cooperate agains t
the American fleet . Of the five ships—the first being Jean Nicolet—sunk
in the Indian Ocean in July, four were the victims of U 181, U 196 and
U 198.
The U 198 scored the first U-boat successes in August, when th e
Germans sank eight British ships and one American . On the 5th an d
7th of the month U 198 sank two British ships, Empire City (7,295 tons )
and Empire Day (7,242 tons), off the East African coast in the latitude s
of Cape Delgado and Dar-es-Salaam . This led to an exhaustive searc h
by a hunting group of two escort carriers Begum and Shah, l four frigates ,
and two Royal Indian Navy sloops, and U 198 was tracked down and sunk
in the vicinity of the Seychelles on 12th August . Between the 13th and
19th of the month U 862 sank four ships off Madagascar . On the 20th
U 861 sank the Berwickshire (7,464 tons)—the only ship of the nin e
to be sunk in convoy—about 400 miles E .S .E . of Durban . The American
ship in the August sinkings, John Barry (7,176 tons), fell to a torped o
from U 859 on 28th August, as did the British Troilus on the 31st, som e
300 miles east of Socotra . The U-boat did not long survive her victims .
On 23rd September, just as she was entering Penang, she was torpedoe d
and sunk by the British submarine Trenchant . 2
Only three more ships were sunk by submarines in the Indian Ocea n
in 1944 . On 5th September the Greek loannis Fafalios (5,670 tons) was
sunk about 250 miles east of Mombasa by U 861 . It was the only Indian
Ocean loss during the month and no ships were sunk there in October .
The last two losses of the year were in November . On the 2nd the America n
tanker Fort Lee (10,198 tons), bound from Abadan for Brisbane, wa s
sunk by U 861 east of Mauritius . Fifty members of the crew, from thre e
1
HMS's Begum and Shah, escort carriers (1942-43), 11,420 tons, two 5-in guns, 20 aircraft ,
16 kts.
2 HMS Trenchant (1943), 1,090 tons, one 4-in gun, ten 21-in torpedo tubes, 154 kts .
548
SUBMARINES ' SWANSONG
Nov-Dec194 4
lifeboats, were picked up and landed at Albany and Fremantle . O n
5th November the British Marion Moller (3,827 tons) was torpedoed an d
sunk about 100 miles north of Trincomalee . Because of bad coal she ha d
straggled from a Colombo to Calcutta convoy . H .M .A .S . Norman (Lieut Commander Plunkett-Cole) took part in the rescue of her entire complement of 71 . In company with British destroyers Roebuck, Quadrant an d
Quality, Norman arrived at the scene of the sinking on the evening of
the 6th . The survivors were embarked in Roebuck, after which the ships
carried out an unsuccessful A/S search .
Meanwhile matters were made more difficult for the German submarine s
operating in the Indian Ocean, and the mining of the approaches t o
Penang by R .A .F . Liberator aircraft led the Commander-in-Chief U-boat s
at Wilhelmshaven, to transfer the Far Eastern Base to Batavia in October .
This move was a preliminary to the withdrawal of the boats from wha t
was now an unprofitable area . Ten of them remained in Eastern water s
in October—U 168, U 181, U 183, U 196, U510, U 532, U 537, U 843 ,
U 861 and U 862 . They were ordered to load up with raw material s
including tin, wolfram, opium and quinine, and sail for home by mid January at latest . None of them succeeded in reaching Germany .
First to leave, and first to be lost, was U 168, which was sunk by th e
Dutch submarine Zwaardvisch 3 near the coast of Java on 5th October .
On 9th November U 537 was caught on the surface off Bali by th e
American submarine Flounder, and destroyed with two torpedoes . U 19 6
left Batavia on 11th November and sank in Sunda Strait, possibly afte r
striking a mine . U 510, U 532, U 843 and U 861 reached Europe . U 843
was sunk in April 1945 while on the last leg of her voyage from Berge n
to Kiel . U510 surrendered at St Nazaire on 24th April, and U 532 surrendered at Liverpool in May . U 861 reached Trondheim in Norway on 18th
April . U 183 was torpedoed by the American submarine Besugo 4 in the
Java Sea on 23rd April 1945 .
In December 1944 two large transport U-boats, U I95 and U 2I9 ,
reached Batavia from France . They, and U 181 and U 862, remained in
the Far East when Germany surrendered, and were taken over by th e
Japanese and given "I" numbers . But none saw service before the surrender of Japan . But to one of them, U 862, belongs the distinction of bein g
the last enemy submarine of the 1939-45 war to sink a ship on the Australian coast, and one in the Indian Ocean .
U 862's commanding officer, Korvetten Kapitan Heinrich Timm, wa s
a former merchant service officer who had sailed in Australian water s
before the war . He left Batavia on 17th November 1944 to operate off
the west coast of Australia, and then continued along the south coast t o
the south of Sydney. Here, on 24th December 1944, he claimed t o
3 Zwaardvisch, Dutch submarine (1943), 1,170 tons, one 4-in gun, eleven 21-in torpedo tubes,
15 kts .
4 Flounder and Besugo, US submarines (1943-44), 1,526 tons, one 3, 4 or 5-in gun, ten 21-in
torpedo tubes, 20 kts.
' This information, supplied by the Historical Section of The Admiralty, came from the capture d
German Naval Staff diary . (U-Bootskriegfuhring, Dezember 1944-April 1945 .) Ref. No. PG .31752.
193945
MINESWEEPING FLOTILLAS
54 9
have sunk an American Liberty ship and on 6th February 1945, while
returning to Batavia, a second Liberty ship, 700 miles west of Perth . He
also stated that an attack on a tanker off the South Australian coas t
was frustrated by aircraft .
It was by this last-mentioned attack that U 862 first made known her
presence in Australian waters . At 10 minutes past midday on 9th December, when off Cape Jaffa, about 130 miles S by E of Adelaide, the Gree k
s .s . Ilissos (4,724 tons) broadcast that she was being attacked by a n
unidentified submarine . An hour later she amplified this by saying tha t
the submarine had submerged when she had fired back . She was ordered
by Navy Office, Melbourne, to continue her voyage to that port, and i n
the meantime naval and air support and search operations were instituted .
At this stage of the war, with the front some distance from Australi a
and moving progressively farther away as the Japanese perimeter shran k
under mounting Allied pressure, the problem of the removal of minefield s
came to the forefront . There were not only those laid in Australian water s
as defence measures, but also those laid by the Japanese in waters occupie d
by them . It became necessary to form minesweeping flotillas, and the
virtual elimination of the submarine menace in Australian waters an d
in the Indian Ocean—allied to the provision in the Indian Ocean of more ,
and more suitable, escort vessels—made it possible to withdraw some o f
the corvettes from escort work and assign them to that for which they wer e
originally designed—minesweeping.
Early in the war, in December 1939, the 20th Minesweeping Flotilla ,
comprising H .M .A . Ships Swan, Yarra, Orara and Doomba, had been
formed . Other ships joined it from time to time, and its compositio n
changed as circumstances demanded . s Throughout 1940 and 1941 the
20th M .S . Flotilla carried out sweeping operations, removing the minefield s
laid by the German surface raiders of those years, and conducting searching sweeps . With the entry of Japan into the war, the ships then comprisin g
the flotilla were required for other duties, and its operations ceased unti l
it was re-formed in 1945 .
In addition to the 20th Minesweeping Flotilla there were, throughou t
the war, minesweeping groups based on Australian ports . They were made
up of auxiliary minesweepers and, as did the 20th Flotilla, changed thei r
composition from time to time as vessels were attached or withdrawn . '
When the corvettes, officially designated A .S-M.S vessels, were first bein g
built, they were allocated to the 21st and 22nd Minesweeping Flotillas ,
but actually their minesweeping operations were restricted to those o f
individual ships which served with the 20th Flotilla, as stated above, an d
with the 24th Flotilla . This flotilla, based on Darwin, comprised corvette s
that served there from time to time . But except for occasional routin e
e Ships which for various periods during 1940 and 1941 served in the 20th MS Flotilla were :
Ballarat, Bathurst, Burnie, Doornba, Goulburn, Lithgow, Maryborough, Mildura, Orara, Parramatta, Swan, Warrego, Warrnambool, Yarra .
7 The MS groups were : Sydney, MS Group 50 ; Melbourne, MS Group 54; Hobart, MS Group 60 ;
Adelaide, MS Group 63 ; Fremantle, MS Group 66 ; Darwin, MS Group 70 ; Brisbane, MS Group
74; Newcastle, MS Group 77.
550
SUBMARINES ' SWANSONG
Aug-Dec 1944
sweeping operations in the searched channel, these ships were employe d
in anti-submarine and convoy escort duties .8
In August 1944 a start was made on the clearing of the defensiv e
minefields laid by Bungaree from 1942 to 1943, in the various passage s
through the Great Barrier Reef . These clearing sweeps were designate d
" The Kills " . The first five, comprising "Kilnick", 1st to 5th August, " Kilbuck", 10th to 14th August, "Kilhop", 16th to 19th August, "Kilcoaster" ,
22nd to 27th August and 1st to 5th September, and "Kilnat", 20th t o
27th September, were carried out by H .M .A. Ships Kalgoorlie (Lieutenant
Peel) and Pirie (Lieutenant Thomson°) . In between sweeping operations—
as a result of which a total of 491 mines were swept—the two ship s
returned to Thursday Island for stores, water and fuel . A further and final
search was made in the "Kilcoaster" area by Kalgoorlie and Townsvill e
(Lieutenant Brackenbridge l ) between 20th and 27th November 1944 .
Meanwhile, on 26th October 1944 the Admiralty signalled to the Commander-in-Chief Eastern Fleet, and to the Naval Board, that two flotilla s
of minesweepers would be required for the defence of advanced bases
of the British Pacific Fleet . The signal continued :
It would be appreciated if ACNB would make available the five RN Bathurst s
fitted oropesa now on Australia Station to form 21st MSF . C-in-C Eastern Fleet i s
requested (a) to sail four RN oropesa Bathursts as soon as convenient to join
21st MSF, (b) to form 22nd MSF of nine RN Bathursts fitted L.L. Flotillas will
each be nine strong, allowing one vessel to be used for danlaying .
Prompt action was taken to meet these requests, and the nine ship s
to form the 21st Minesweeping Flotilla were soon concentrated in Australia .
They were Toowoomba, Burnie, Lismore and Maryborough of the Eastern
Fleet ; Ballarat, Goulburn, Kalgoorlie, Whyalla and Bendigo on the Australia Station. Early in December Ballarat (Commander Morris), Senio r
Officer of the Flotilla, Goulburn (Lieut-Commander Collins), Kalgoorlie
(Lieut-Commander McBryde, who had succeeded Peel in command on
26th November), and Whyalla (Commander Read) were in Sydney. Bendigo (Lieutenant Jackson 2 ) was in Brisbane, refitting. On 18th Novembe r
Toowoomba (Lieut-Commander Simpson), Burnie (Lieut-Commande r
Andrewartha), Lismore (Lieutenant Lever) and Maryborough (Lieutenant
Boyle) left Colombo for Fremantle, where they arrived on 2nd December .
Toowoomba remained in the Western Australian port to refit, and th e
other three sailed for eastern Australia .
On 9th December Burnie, Lismore and Maryborough were off Cap e
Nelson, Victoria, some 130 miles south-east of where Ilissos encountered
Corvettes which were from time to time units of the 24th MS Flotilla were : Armidale, Bowen,
Bunbury, Castlemaine, Cootamundra, Deloraine, Fremantle, Inverell, Kalgoorlie, Latrobe, Lithgow,
Parkes, Pirie, Townsville, Warrnambool, Wilcannia.
s Lt D . S . Thomson, RANR . HMAS' s Bungaree and Horsham ; comd HMAS 's Pirie 1943-44 an d
Lismore 1945. B . Sydney, 1 Jan 1906 .
1 Lt A . B . Brackenbridge, RANR . HMAS Westralia ; comd HMAS Townsville 1944 . Of Mosman
Park, WA ; b . Sunderland, England, 21 Aug 1904 .
a Lt-Cdr W . Jackson, RANVR. HMAS ' s Kapunda and Vendetta ;
Of Hobart; b . Dover, Tas, 28 Oct 1907 .
comd HMAS Bendigo 1944-46 .
1-25Dec1944
FRUITLESS SEARCH
55 1
The weather was bad, and the three corvettes were making only
seven knots on passage to Melbourne . At 1 p .m . on the 9th Andrewarth a
in Burnie was ordered by signal from N .O .I .C . Port Melbourne to take
Lismore and Maryborough under his command and search for and attack
the submarine . Soon after receiving the signal Lismore suffered an engine
breakdown, and Andrewartha detached her to proceed to Melbourne ,
where she arrived on the evening of the 10th on one engine . Burnie and
Maryborough met Ilissos about 7 p .m . on the 9th . Neither the Greek shi p
nor an escorting aircraft had anything further to report . The two corvette s
searched for the submarine fruitlessly until noon on the 10th, when the y
were ordered to resume passage to Port Phillip . They arrived on the evening
of the 11th, about 24 hours after Ilissos, whose report to N .O .I .C . Port
Melbourne was graded Al .
The air and surface searches for U 862 had produced negative results ,
but as a safety measure all shipping, except local traffic between Newcastle ,
Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide, was routed south of Tasmania ; ship s
were ordered to darken ship at night when west of 150 degrees Eas t
except when in the immediate vicinity of Wilson's Promontory ; to zigza g
in southern Australian waters ; to stream paravanes when within the 200 fathom line between Newcastle and Fremantle ; and to maintain radio
silence . Burnie, Maryborough and Lismore, which were due to go to Sydney
to join the 21st Flotilla, were retained in the Melbourne area to swee p
the shipping routes in Bass Strait . They commenced sweeping operations—
with negative results—on the 12th . The four ships of the 21st Flotill a
in Sydney were ordered to proceed to Melbourne, where they arrive d
on 18th December . During the passage search sweeps were carried ou t
outside Sydney, and from Wilson 's Promontory to Port Phillip . Again n o
mines were discovered .
II
On 1st December 1944 H .M .A .S . Quiberon (Commander Harrington )
sailed from Colombo as a unit of the 4th Destroyer Flotilla in compan y
with H .M. Ships Quilliam (D4), Quality and Quadrant, screening th e
battleship H .M .S . Howe, Flagship of the British Pacific Fleet, on passag e
to Fremantle, which they reached on 11th December . In the early hour s
of the 24th the 4th Flotilla secured alongside at Williamstown . It was here,
at 5 a .m . on 25th December, that D4 was ordered by Commander SouthWest Pacific Sea Frontiers—Admiral Royle—to proceed with the flotill a
with all dispatch to position 36 degrees five minutes South, 150 degree s
43 minutes East (40 miles off the New South Wales coast, 85 miles sout h
of Jervis Bay) to hunt a possible submarine .
These orders resulted from an " S .O .S ." submarine alarm broadcast
which confirmed the report of the Ilissos. At 2 .52 a .m . on 25th Decembe r
Navy Office received an emergency S .O .S . from the American ship Robert
I. Walker (7,180 tons), Fremantle to Sydney, reporting that she ha d
been torpedoed in the above position, and asking for air cover and
U 862 .
552
SUBMARINES ' SWANSONG
25-26 Dec
immediate assistance . About an hour later Robert J . Walker, in an amplifying signal, said that the ship was afloat and apparently not taking muc h
water, the rudder had gone and a big hole was blown in the steering engin e
room . "Everybody aboard no casualties . Send air coverage and tug to
tow us in ." Two minutes after the foregoing, she sent another S .O .S .
"Enemy attacking . "
Meanwhile, in addition to the 4th Destroyer Flotilla in Melbourne, th e
ships of the 21st M .S . Flotilla, also in that port, were ordered to rais e
steam immediately . At 4 .15 a .m . aircraft at Rathmines were instructe d
to conduct a search . And in Sydney U .S .S . PC5973 and H .M .A . Ship s
Quickmatch, Kiama and Yandra were directed to proceed as soon a s
possible, Quickmatch and Yandra to operate against the submarine an d
Kiama to take Robert J . Walker in tow . In addition, M .L's 822 and 82 3
and HDML1341 at Jervis Bay were dispatched to the position of th e
attack .
First contact with the stricken ship was at 6 .15 a .m . on the 25th, by
one of the searching aircraft, which reported sighting her with two empty
lifeboats one mile north . Visibility was only one to one-and-a-half miles .
A second aircraft report about 6 .55 a .m . said that nine boats or rafts ha d
been sighted . PC597, first to get away from Sydney at 7 .35 a .m ., was the
first surface vessel on the scene of the attack at 6 .34 p .m . on the 25th . She
found Robert J . Walker abandoned, with approximately 60 feet draft aft
and minus 10 feet draft forward, her stern awash to the bridge . After
cruising close aboard on both sides searching for survivors in the ship ,
PC597 started a search for the submarine and the ship's missing crew .
H .M .A .S . Quickmatch (Commander Becher 4 ) and Kiama (LieutCommander Benson) reached the scene between 11 .30 p .m . and midnight
on the 25th, and patrolled in the vicinity, seeking the submarine an d
the ship's company . Sixty-seven men were located in life-boats and o n
rafts at 5 .45 a .m . on the 26th, and were taken on board Quickmatch .
Two of the ship's company were lost . In the meantime Robert J . Walker
had sunk at 3 a .m . on 26th December . For some hours Kiama and Yandra
and the ships of the 4th Destroyer Flotilla and the 21st Minesweeping
Flotilla swept the area and its vicinity, searching for the submarine an d
mines . But the search was fruitless .
From subsequent reports by Captain M . D . MacRae, master of the
torpedoed ship, and members of the crew and the armed guard on board ,
Robert J . Walker, just after 2 a .m . on 25th December, was in position
36 degrees 35 minutes South, 154 degrees 43 minutes East, steering N
by E at 10 .8 knots . She was outside the 100 fathom line, was no t
zigzagging, and showed no lights . The night was hazy and moonless, win d
NE of moderate force, sea choppy . Visibility was medium to poor, due t o
haze and dust storm .
4
PC597, US patrol craft (1942-44), 280 tons, one or two 3-in guns, 18 kts .
Rear-Adm 0. H . Becher, CBE, DSO, DSC ; RAN. HMS Devonshire 1939-40 ; HMAS Napier
1940-42 ; comd HMAS Quickmatch 1944-45. B . Harvey, WA, 13 Sept 1908 .
Dec 1944-Feb 1945
SLOW RESPONSE
55 3
At 2 .18 a .m . a torpedo hit the ship on the starboard quarter, and
the explosion tore off the rudder, badly damaged the after steering gear ,
and flooded the shaft tunnel . The ship's crew and armed guard went t o
action stations. The ship took little water, but was unmanoeuvrable . A n
S .O .S . message was broadcast at 2 .30 a .m . At about 4 .20 a .m . a secon d
torpedo was seen at a distance of about half-a-mile approaching the star board quarter . It was exploded about 100 yards from the ship by 20-m m
gunfire . Just before 6 a .m . a third torpedo was sighted at about 3,00 0
yards . All starboard guns opened fire but could not stop the torpedo ,
which struck the ship's starboard side at No . 4 hold and blew out bot h
sides of the ship . The captain said that "two army trucks could have bee n
driven in one side of the ship and out the other" . Abandon ship wa s
ordered at 6 .1 a .m ., and the crew—with the exception of two men lost —
got away in three lifeboats and four rafts . The boats were rowed abou t
two miles from the ship, which drifted southwards and was lost to sigh t
about three hours after being abandoned . The boats and rafts kept togethe r
within a radius of about three miles until, 24 hours after abandoning ship ,
the survivors were picked up by Quickmatch at 5 .45 a .m . on the 26th .
Captain MacRae was critical of the fact that the first aircraft contac t
with the ship was not until 6 .15 a .m . on 25th December, nearly fou r
hours after the distress message in which air cover had been requested .
He commented that daylight came at 4 a .m . The distance off shore—S E
by E of Narooma—was about 35 to 40 miles, and the distance of th e
ship from Sydney was 160 miles . "If an aircraft had arrived even as lat e
as 5 a .m . it would in all probability have prevented the second torpedo hit ,
and the ship could easily have been towed to safety . "
III
On 28th January 1945 information was received by Intelligence Section ,
Western Area, of a possible enemy submarine in the general area to th e
south-west of Fremantle, and proceeding north-west . At the request of
the N .O .I .C . Fremantle (Commodore Pope) a search by Liberator air craft of the R .A .A .F . was carried out over an area of 160 miles radius t o
the south-west and west of Cape Leeuwin, on successive days betwee n
29th and 31st January . No sightings were made . The day the enemy submarine Intelligence was received in Western Australia the American Libert y
ship Peter Sylvester (7,176 tons) sailed from Melbourne for Colombo .
It was fortunate for those on board that at about the same date anothe r
American vessel sailed from Colombo for Melbourne .
On 10th February 1945 H .M.A .S . Leeuwin, Fremantle naval base ,
received via the Naval Board a signal from the American ship Cap e
Edmont, Colombo to Melbourne, that she had rescued 15 survivors fro m
the Peter Sylvester, which had been torpedoed in position 34 degrees 1 9
minutes South, 99 degrees 37 minutes East (820 miles W by S of Fremantle) at a few minutes before midnight on 6th February . The signa l
also stated that three boats and possibly four rafts were still afloat, and
554
SUBMARINES ' SWANSONG
11-13 Feb 194 5
that the after part of the ship was still floating, forming a menace to
navigation .
Commodore Pope sailed U .S .S . Corpus Christi5 (in charge of th e
operation) and H .M.A .S . Dubbo (Lieutenant Roberts) to the vicinity o f
the attack to search for survivors and to tow back or destroy, at discretion ,
the derelict if found . Arrangements were made for two R.A .A .F . Liberato r
aircraft and an R.A .F . Catalina to help with the search from dawn o n
11th February . Information from Cape Edmont that she had picked u p
the survivors in position 33 degrees 34 minutes South, 99 degrees eigh t
minutes East, 45 miles north-west of the position of the torpedoing, gav e
an indication of the drift, and was passed to searching ships and othe r
authorities .
At 8 a .m . on the 11th the searching Liberator aircraft sighted two raft s
containing some 20 men about 30 miles north-westward of where Cape
Edmont had picked up her survivors . The aircraft dropped supplies, an d
the Ammunition Supply Issuing Ship Darvel (1,929 tons), approaching the
area from the north bound for Fremantle, was given the position of the
rafts and asked to keep a lookout for them . C-in-C Eastern Fleet, ViceAdmiral Power, on the 11th directed the aircraft carriers Slinger an d
Speaker,' on passage from Colombo to Sydney to join the British Pacifi c
Fleet Train, to help in the search .
About midnight on the 11th Cape Edmont arrived at Fremantle, carrying survivors of the Peter Sylvester from whom some details of the attack
were obtained . The ship, with a crew of 42, an armed guard of 26, an d
107 officers and men of the American Army, was carrying 317 mule s
and 2,700 tons of cargo, mostly hay . She was attacked without warnin g
on a dark night with obscured moon, with visibility of about two-and-a-hal f
miles . She was not zigzagging . The first indication of attack was the arrival
of the initial salvo of two torpedoes, which struck on the starboard sid e
abreast No. 3 hold. All lights went out . The ship stopped . All electri c
circuits were grounded by the explosion, so that the wireless could no t
be used, and no "submarine attack" message was broadcast . About 3 0
minutes after the first salvo a second, also of two torpedoes, hit betwee n
Nos . 2 and 3 holds on the starboard side, and another 30 minutes ha d
passed when a third two-torpedo salvo hit the ship in about the same
position . The forward section of the ship broke away and sank . The ship' s
master, Captain Dennis, then ordered abandon ship . Of those on board ,
32 were believed to have been killed or drowned before ship was abandoned . The remainder, 143, got away in four lifeboats and on six life rafts .
Air searches on the 12th were negative, except for the sight of wreckage .
Corpus Christi arrived in the area and commenced searching about 8 p .m .
On 13th February air searches were conducted by one Catalina aircraf t
5 Corpus Christi, US escort vessel (1943), 1,100 tons, three 3-in guns, 18 kts .
° Lt-Cdr F. W. Roberts, RD ; RANR . Comd HMAS's Cairns 1943-44 and Dubbo 1944-46 . Ship' s
officer; of Sydney ; b . Liverpool, England, 17 Dec 1912 .
'r HMS's Slinger and Speaker, aircraft carriers (1942-43), 11,420 tons, two 5-in guns, 20 aircraft ,
16 kts.
13-28 Feb
SEARCH FOR SURVIVORS
55 5
and one Liberator ; the Liberator sighted two rafts and one lifeboat an d
succeeded in guiding Corpus Christi to them . About 9 a .m . the ship picked
up 62 survivors from four rafts which were lashed together in 33 degree s
14 minutes South, 98 degrees 30 minutes East . This position, to the
north-west of that where Cape Edmont made her initial discovery, con firmed the north-westerly drift which had been indicated . In a further signal
during the day, Corpus Christi reported that she had picked up anothe r
31 survivors, including the captain, from two rafts and one lifeboat .
Slinger and Speaker entered the area and commenced searching, and
Darvel searched as she passed through the area, but sighted nothing an d
continued on to Fremantle . The Blue Funnel Idomeneus (7,792 tons )
also passed through the area from the north on her way to Fremantle .
She sighted an abandoned lifeboat, which was that originally seen by
Cape Edmont . In the afternoon of the 13th, H .M .A .S . Dubbo began he r
search ; and Pope sailed U .S .S . Hutchinson 8 and H .M .A .S . Warrnambool
(Lieut-Commander Wight) from Fremantle . At the end of the day ther e
were two lifeboats still unaccounted for, and these were understood to b e
making for Australia .
There was an unfortunate happening on the 14th when one of th e
two Liberator aircraft assigned to the search, heavily loaded with fuel fo r
the task, crashed on taking off, and five of the crew were killed . As a
result, further participation by Liberators after the 14th was cancelled .
Slinger's aircraft saw only searching ships, the empty lifeboat, the six rafts ,
wreckage and a number of mules . It appeared that the derelict after-portio n
of Peter Sylvester had sunk . On the assumption that the two missing boat s
were making for Australia, Pope suggested that when the searches planne d
for the 15th were completed, the areas searched could be considered clear
and that on the 16th searches should commence at position 31 degree s
30 minutes South and 103 degrees 25 minutes East . This took into account
the indicated drift and the South East Trades which were blowing, steadil y
for direction but at strengths varying from light airs to fresh wind . Th e
sea was generally choppy, with a heavy swell.
Search areas were detailed for the individual ships, but searches o n
the 16th and 17th were negative . On that day H .M .A .S . Castlemain e
(Lieut-Commander Collins), on passage Darwin to Fremantle, was directe d
to look out for the missing boats, and all coastal authorities as far nort h
as Derby were similarly instructed . Searches on the 18th, 19th, and 20th
were negative . Slinger and Speaker had to resume their voyages to Sydney ,
and on the 19th air searches by R .A .A .F. Beaufort aircraft were instituted . These were continued, with negative results, for five days afte r
the 20th . N .O .I .C . Fremantle then abandoned the surface search an d
recalled the ships to Fremantle .
On 28th February the escort carrier Activity9 reported picking up, a t
8
8
Hutchinson, US escort vessel (1943), 1,100 tons, three 3-in DP guns, 18 kts .
HMS Activity, escort carrier (1942), 11,800 tons, two 4-in AA and twenty 20-mm AA guns,
15 aircraft, 18 kts .
556
SUBMARINES ' SWANSONG
Feb-Mar1945
midday that day, one of the two missing lifeboats, with 20 survivors . The
boat, bound for Australia, was in 26 degrees 48 minutes South, 10 1
degrees 58 minutes East, about 600 miles west of Shark Bay . It had
failed to make the easting expected of it by those planning the searches .
On the 28th, C-in-C Eastern Fleet ordered H .M . Ships Formidable and
Uganda,' bound for Australia, to pass through the area of Activity's sighting and to search for the other boat . Activity's survivors—whom sh e
landed at Fremantle on 2nd March—said that the missing boat was als o
bound for Australia .
Formidable and Uganda arrived at Fremantle on 3rd and 4th March
respectively, and both reported no sightings . But on the morning of 10th
March the American submarine Rock, 2 of Seventh Fleet Submarines, picke d
up the missing boat, with 15 survivors, 20 miles west of Vlaming Head ,
North West Cape . The boat, in 32 days, had sailed nearly 1,100 mile s
in a north-east direction . When rescued, the survivors—who were lande d
at Exmouth Gulf—had been out of food for some days but still had
sufficient water . They were in fair condition except for one man wh o
needed hospital treatment . With the finding of this boat, all six rafts and
four lifeboats known to have got away from Peter Sylvester were recovered ,
and with them all the 143 survivors who had successfully abandoned ship .
The torpedoing of Peter Sylvester and the search for her survivors
was notable for the fact that, owing to her inability to broadcast a sub marine alarm message, there was a delay of three days in the institutio n
of the search . And, as Commodore Pope commented in his report to th e
Naval Board : "No search would ever have been made but for the fortuitou s
chance of another merchant ship picking up the boat and signalling th e
information that Peter Sylvester had been sunk . "
Once that information was received, the search was instituted and carrie d
out in a manner which, for its careful planning, intelligent use of information, and close and informed cooperation resulting from the promp t
dissemination of advice by N .O .I .C . Fremantle, reflected credit on all
concerned . Though 50 of those rescued were picked up fortuitously by
ships not taking part in the organised search—namely the boats foun d
by Cape Edmont, Activity and Rock—the organised search was undoubtedly
responsible for the safe recovery of the largest number of survivors b y
Corpus Christi .
Again to quote Commodore Pope's report :
It will be seen that a most extensive search over a very wide area was mad e
by units of the Royal Navy (including naval aircraft), the Royal Australian Navy ,
the United States Navy, and the Royal Australian Air Force . In addition merchant
ships, civil and service aircraft, and large numbers of coastwatchers, police, an d
citizens in remote areas on the coast were requested to look out for the arriva l
of boats on the coast . The final result was most gratifying, observing that al l
personnel are believed to have been saved with the exception of a number killed o r
drowned at the time of the attack .
1 HMS
2
Uganda, cruiser (1942), 8,000 tons, twelve 6-in guns, eight 4-in AA guns, 3 aircraft, 33 kts .
Rock, US submarine (1943), 1,526 tons, one 3, 4 or 5 in. gun, ten 21-in torpedo tubes, 20 kts.
1943-45
MERCHANT SHIPPING LOSSES
55 7
As was stated earlier in this volume, the sinking of the American ship
Portmar and damaging of LST469 in convoy "GP55 " off Smoky Cape on
16th June 1943, marked the last attack of the war by a Japanese submarin e
in eastern Australian waters . The sinking of Robert J . Walker on 25th
December 1944, south of Jervis Bay, was the result of the final attac k
in the war by a submarine in Australian coastal waters ; and that of Pete r
Sylvester on 6th February 1945, 820 miles west of Fremantle, was th e
final submarine attack of the war on the Australia Station and in the India n
Ocean .
With the sinking of Portmar in 1943, 18 ships of an aggregate o f
79,608 gross tons were sunk by submarine attack on the Australia n
east coast, . with fatal casualties of 465 . The loss of Robert J . Walke r
brought these figures to 19 ships, 86,788 tons and 467 fatal casualties .
The addition of eleven ships totalling 64,196 tons sunk by submarin e
attack during the war elsewhere on the Australia Station, brought th e
total of ships so sunk on the Australia Station (as defined in 1939 )
during the 1939-45 war to 30, 3 of a total tonnage of 150,984 gross tons .
The fatal casualties in these 30 ships were 654, of whom some 200 wer e
Australian merchant seamen .
3 The ships sunk on the Australia Station by submarine attack during the 1939-45 war
were : i n
Eastern Australian coastal waters : Iron Chieftain, Iron Crown, Guatemala, George S . Livanos,
Coast Farmer, William Dawes, Dureenbee, Kalingo, Iron Knight, Starr King, Recina, Kowarra ,
Lydia M . Childs, Limerick, Wollongbar, Fingal, Centaur, Portmar, Robert J. Walker. Elsewhere
on the Australia Station : John Adams, Chloe, TJinegara, Samuel Gompers, Aludra, Deimos,
Mamutu, Peter Sylvester, Stanvac Manila, Nam Yong, Siantar .