Cruiser (94 page)
Authors: Mike Carlton
14
Leading Stoker Percy Larmer, of Toowoomba, Queensland. Killed in 1942.
15
King.
16
Guille was decorated with the MBE for his efforts. Leading Stokers Percy Larmer and Peter Allom, and Perth's civilian canteen manager, Alfred âHappy' Hawkins, were awarded the British Empire Medal. Guille's citation said he had shown âthe greatest steadiness, judgment, common sense, determination and personal courage'. As a lieutenant-commander, later in the war he became the well-respected Captain of the corvette HMAS
Wagga
. He died in 2004. See
http://home.vicnet.net.au/~mildura/commandingofficers.htm
.
17
Norris, p. 26.
18
Lawrance.
19
Bracht.
20
Norris, p. 27.
Chapter 9: Disaster in Greece
1
Cunningham, p. 203.
2
A captain (D) was in charge of a squadron of destroyers. A captain (S) had submarines, etc.
3
A monitor was a large, slow ship of no use in a sea battle, but with heavy guns especially designed for bombarding targets onshore.
4
Cunningham, p. 308.
5
Norris, p. 37.
6
A good story that no doubt improved over time.
7
Between Britain, Australia and the Netherlands.
8
Menzies,
Dark and Hurrying Days
, p. 24.
9
Blamey was a controversial figure, to say the least. His escapades as commissioner of the Victoria Police in the 1930s, including an incident where his commissioner's badge was found in a brothel, brought him widespread notoriety. The men of the Army's 21st Infantry Brigade, who had fought like lions in Kokoda in 1942, never forgave him for accusing them of behaving like rabbits.
10
Menzies,
Afternoon Light
, p. 26.
11
Menzies,
Dark and Hurrying Days
, p. 53.
12
Menzies, quoted in Long,
Greece, Crete and Syria
, p. 17.
13
Cunningham, p. 315.
14
Roskill,
Churchill and the Admirals
, p. 181. Roskill had a distinguished career at sea in the Second World War and, on his retirement, as a prolific naval historian. He wrote the official three-volume naval history of the Second World War,
The War at Sea
.
15
King.
16
Norris, p. 38.
17
In one of the curious tides of history, hundreds of Kastellorizo's inhabitants migrated to Australia in the last century. Their descendants today include such prominent Australian names as the Paspaley pearling family of Darwin, the Kailis fishing dynasty from Western Australia, former South Australian Labor Senator Nick Bolkus, the Sydney lawyer Nick Pappas and the television newsreader John Mangos. They call themselves Kazzies. They have a thriving community association in Melbourne:
www.kastellorizo.com.au
.
18
Parkin,
Mediterranean Diary
.
19
Bracegirdle, Ahoy â Mac's Weblog,
http://ahoy.tk-jk.net
.
20
Reid family papers.
21
Norris, p. 114.
22
Jim Nelson.
23
Sheedy, p. 142.
24
York
and
Gloucester
were also cruisers. Both were later lost in the Med.
25
Norris, p. 47.
26
Ibid., p. 48.
Chapter 10: Fleet Action
1
Quoted in Pack, p. 15.
2
Sheedy, p. 146.
3
Quoted in Pack, p. 42.
4
Greene and Massignani, p. 151.
5
Sheedy, p. 149.
Perth
could never have reached 36 knots. Sheedy's claim is an exaggeration, pardonable under the circumstances. Her top speed was 32 knots, flat-out.
6
Ibid., p. 151.
7
Quoted in Pack, p. 67.
8
Cunningham, p. 332.
9
Appendix L,
Royal Navy Staff History 44
.
10
Lieutenant-Commander Rupert Robison DSO RAN, of Woollahra, Sydney.
11
Clifford, p. 164.
12
Sheedy, p. 162.
13
The Junkers JU88 was a workhorse of the Luftwaffe's bomber squadrons.
14
Bracegirdle, Ahoy â Mac's Weblog,
http://ahoy.tk-jk.net
.
15
Nelson family papers.
16
Jim Nelson.
17
There were rumours after the war that Murdoch's service file recorded that he had deserted in the face of the enemy. This is not correct. The file is available online from the National Archives. Understandably, I have been unable to trace his relatives.
Chapter 11: Prelude to Crete
1
Jodl was questioned on Führer Directive No. 25 during his war-crimes trial at Nuremberg on 5 June 1946. The transcript is online at
http://avalon.law.yale.edu/imt/06-05-46.asp
. Yale University Law School's Avalon project â
http://avalon.law.yale.edu/default.asp
â is the internet's outstanding collection of historical documents over the millennia, beginning, almost unbelievably, in the year 122
BC
. The entire Nuremberg transcripts, in English, are but a fragment of the collection.
2
Herrmann is still alive. In 1945, he was imprisoned by the Russians for ten years.
Returning eventually to West Germany, he took a law degree and became notorious for his courtroom defence of former Nazis, including concentration-camp doctors and, eventually, the British author and Holocaust denier David Irving.
3
Norris, p. 62.
4
Parkin,
Mediterranean Diary
.
5
Jim Nelson.
6
Bracegirdle, Ahoy â Mac's Weblog,
http://ahoy.tk-jk.net
.
7
Norris, p. 63.
8
Quoted in Long,
Greece, Crete and Syria
, p. 71.
9
Rommel letter quoted in FitzSimons, p. 255.
10
Letter, Neame to the Australian Lieutenant-General Leslie Morshead, 31 March 1941. Morshead took great offence at it. Neame had won a Victoria Cross in the First World War and an Olympic gold medal in athletics, but as a general he made a very good lieutenant.
11
Quoted in FitzSimons, p. 251.
12
A small memory lapse. They were JU88s.
13
Bowden, âHMAS
Perth
Loses her Walrus',
www.navyhistory.org.au
.
14
Ibid.
15
Brian and Bowden survived the war. Beaumont was killed as a squadron leader in New Guinea in 1942.
16
Bracht.
17
Private Frank de Silva, of Newcastle, New South Wales, quoted in Australians at War:
www.australiansatwar.gov.au
.
18
Jim Nelson.
19
Whiting, p. 11.
20
Long,
Greece, Crete and Syria
, p. 172.
21
Quoted in Gill,
1939â1942
, p. 330.
22
Sheedy, p. 181.
Chapter 12: Aegean Tragedy
1
Many of Hitler's speeches are available, in English, at
www.hitler.org/speeches
.
2
Cunningham, p. 348.
3
Whiting, p. 13.
4
Able Seaman William Ranger, of Applecross, Perth, Western Australia. He survived the war.
5
Jim Nelson.
6
An acoustic mine detonates at the sound of a nearby ship's engine or propellors.
7
Norris, p. 76.
8
Freyberg was a man of great courage and energy, who treated his troops well and was admired by them. He is regarded as New Zealand's finest soldier, but, as a strategist and tactician, he would have struggled to make the Third XV. The
New Zealand Dictionary of Biography
(
www.dnzb.govt.nz/dnzb
) says that âhe could be stubborn and obtuse'.
9
Freyberg to Wavell, 1 May 1941,
www.nzetc.org
.
10
Churchill to New Zealand Prime Minister Peter Fraser, 3 May 1941,
www.nzetc.org
.
11
Churchill to Freyberg, 18 May 1941. The last line was a typically Churchillian exaggeration.
12
Freyberg, quoted in Long,
Greece, Crete and Syria
, p. 221.
13
Sheedy, p. 189.
14
Jim Nelson.
15
Sheedy, p. 190.
16
Bracht.
17
One of
Valiant
's officers was Midshipman Prince Philip of Greece RN, the future husband of Queen Elizabeth II.
18
Parkin,
Mediterranean Diary
.
19
The sinking of
Kelly
would inspire one of the great British propaganda films: Noel Coward's
In Which We Serve
.
20
Parkin, unpublished notes.
21
Cited in Churchill,
Vol. III: The Grand Alliance
, p. 259.
22
Cunningham to Admiralty, 26 May 1941. Roskill writes that Cunningham was ânotoriously harassed by extraordinary interference from London' (
Churchill and the Admirals
, p. 185).
23
Quoted in Long,
Greece, Crete and Syria
, p. 304.
24
Cited in Churchill,
Vol. III: The Grand Alliance
, p. 265.
25
The exact number was 1188 â almost twice the size of
Perth
's complement.
26
Norris, p. 86.
Chapter 13: The Starboard Slaughterhouse
1
Leading Cook William Fraser, of Lithgow, New South Wales.
2
Norris, p. 87.
3
Ibid., p. 87.
4
Sheedy, p. 198.
5
Ibid., p. 199.
6
Jim Nelson.
7
Norris, p. 87.
8
Whiting, p. 18.
9
Cunningham to the Admiralty, 14 September 1941.
10
ABC script, and a re-dubbed tape, held in the Australian National Archives, barcode 1018557.
11
Cited in Pfennigwerth, p. 153.
12
Cited in Clark, p. 44.
13
Churchill,
Vol III: The Grand Alliance
, p. 290.
14
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade,
www.info.dfat.gov.au/historical
.
15
Ibid.
16
This may have been a personnel and personal necessity. Lavarack and Blamey detested each other. Lavarack did not suffer fools gladly and said so. Blamey saw him as a rival and did his best to thwart his career at every turn, at one stage claiming Lavarack had âpersonality defects'. Coming from Blamey, that was the height of hypocrisy.
17
Sheedy, p. 207.