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HMAS Swan (U74)
HMAS ''Swan'' (U74/F74/A427), named for the Swan River (Western Australia), Swan River, was a Sloop-of-war, sloop of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) that served during World War II. Design and construction The ''Grimsby'' class consisted of thirteen sloop-of-war, sloops, four of which were built in Australia for the RAN. ''Swan'', one of the first pair constructed, had a displacement of 1,060 tons at standard load and 1,500 tons at full load, was long, had a beam of , and a draught of between depending on load. Propulsion machinery consisted of two Admiralty 3-drum boilers connected to Parsons geared turbines, which delivered to the sloop's two propeller shafts. Maximum speed was . The ship's company in peacetime consisted of 135 officers and sailors; this increased to 160 during the war. ''Swan''s initial armament consisted of three QF 4 inch Mk V naval gun, QF Mark V anti-aircraft guns and a quadruple Vickers .50 machine gun, .50 in anti-aircraft machine gun mount for c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Swan River (Western Australia)
The Swan River () is a river in the south west of Western Australia. The river runs through the metropolitan area of Perth, Western Australia's capital and largest city. Course of river The Swan River estuary flows through the city of Perth. Its lower reaches are relatively wide and deep, with few constrictions, while the upper reaches are usually quite narrow and shallow. The Swan River drains the Avon and coastal plain catchments, which have a total area of about . It has three major tributaries, the Avon River, Canning River and Helena River. The latter two have dams (Canning Dam and Mundaring Weir) which provide a sizeable part of the potable water requirements for Perth and the regions surrounding. The Avon River contributes the majority of the freshwater flow. The climate of the catchment is Mediterranean, with mild wet winters, hot dry summers, and the associated highly seasonal rainfall and flow regime. The Avon rises near Yealering, southeast of Perth: it meand ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pensacola Convoy
The Pensacola Convoy is a colloquialism for a United States military shipping convoy that took place in late 1941 as the Pacific War began. The name was derived from that of its primary escort ship, the heavy cruiser . ''Pensacola'' was officially designated Task Group 15.5 and Army sources may use the term ''Republic'' convoy for the senior convoy vessel. The convoy, dispatched in peacetime, was intended to reinforce the United States Army Forces Far East (USAFFE), created to defend the U.S. Commonwealth of the Philippines and commanded by General Douglas MacArthur, with artillery, aircraft, munitions and fuel, as the threat of war with the Empire of Japan loomed. After war broke out, and Japanese forces attacked the Philippines, the convoy was diverted to Brisbane, Australia. Background The War Department on 16 August 1941 approved large-scale reinforcement of the Philippines. General MacArthur was notified that the first units would sail in September. When Chief of Staff Ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Royal Australian Navy Minesweeping After World War II
Following World War II the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) was required to clear naval mines from the waters around Australia and New Guinea. Minesweeping in these areas began in December 1945 and was completed in August 1948. One ship, the ''Bathurst'' class corvette HMAS ''Warrnambool'', was sunk during these operations. History During World War II both the Allies and Japanese laid mines in Australian and New Guinean waters. The RAN's minelayer, HMAS ''Bungaree'', laid almost 10,000 mines in Australian waters alone, and further mines were laid around Australian ports. Following the war Australia was legally responsible for clearing mines from its territorial waters as part of an international minesweeping effort coordinated by the Mine Clearance Board in London.Fogarty (1998), p. 123 The RAN's 20th Minesweeping Flotilla was assigned the task of sweeping Australian waters for mines. The flotilla was based at Cairns, Queensland and was commanded from the sloop HMAS ''Swan''. C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New Ireland (island)
New Ireland (Tok Pisin: ''Niu Ailan'') or Latangai, is a large island in Papua New Guinea, approximately in area with 120,000 people. It is named after the island of Ireland. It is the largest island of New Ireland Province, lying northeast of the island of New Britain. Both islands are part of the Bismarck Archipelago, named after Otto von Bismarck, and they are separated by Saint George's Channel. The administrative centre of the island and of New Ireland province is the town of Kavieng located at the northern end of the island. While the island was part of German New Guinea, it was named Neumecklenburg ("New Mecklenburg"). Geography The island is part of the Bismarck Archipelago and is often described as having the shape of a musket. New Ireland is surrounded by the Bismarck Sea in the southwest and by the Pacific Ocean in the northeast. For much of its in length, the island's width varies between less than to , yet the central mountainous spine is very steep an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Australian 11th Division
The 11th Division was an Australian Army unit formed during World War II by the renaming of Milne Force in December 1942. Predominately a Militia formation, the division's main role during the war was as a base command headquarters, although elements saw action in New Guinea against Japanese forces during the Finisterre Range campaign and in New Britain. It was disbanded in July 1946. History In July 1942, a headquarters was raised to command the units that had been sent to Milne Bay, to establish a series of airfields there after the Battle of the Coral Sea. The majority of the staff for this headquarters came from the 1st Division, and at the time of its establishment it was called "C Force" and became Milne Force in August 1942. Only a limited number of troops were assigned, with the first elements being two companies of Militia troops from the 55th Battalion, bolstered later by the arrival of the 7th Infantry Brigade and then the 18th Infantry Brigade, a veteran Second A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kenneth Eather
Major General Kenneth William Eather, (6 July 1901 – 9 May 1993) was a senior Australian Army officer who served during the Second World War. Eather led a battalion in the Battle of Bardia, a brigade on the Kokoda Track campaign and a division in the New Britain campaign. He was the last Australian officer to be promoted to the rank of major general during the Second World War, and when he died in 1993 he was Australia's last surviving general of that war. Education and early life Kenneth William Eather was born in Sydney, New South Wales on 6 July 1901, the eldest and only son and the first of three children of William Eather, a property manager, and his wife Isabella Theresa née Lees. William managed a plantation in Papua for a time and as a boy Ken lived in Port Moresby. Ken was educated at Abbotsholme College, a boarding school that was later attended by future prime ministers Harold Holt and William McMahon. While at school he served in the Australian Army Cadets, in wh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
HMAS Swan Guns (079323)
His Majesty's Australian Ship (HMAS) (or Her Majesty's Australian Ship when the monarch is female) is a ship prefix used for commissioned units of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). This prefix is derived from HMS (Her/His Majesty's Ship), the prefix used by the Royal Navy of the United Kingdom, and can be equally applied to warships and shore bases (as Australia follows the British tradition of referring to naval establishments as stone frigates). On 10 July 1911, King George V granted the title of Royal Australian Navy to the naval forces of Australia. At the same time, the prefix and acronym were approved for use in identifying units commissioned into the RAN. The prefix had been used prior to formal approval, with the torpedo-boat destroyer In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast, manoeuvrable, long-endurance warship intended to escort larger vessels in a fleet, convoy or battle group and defend them against powerful short range attackers. They were originally develo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clarence Strait (Northern Territory)
Clarence Strait in northern Australia separates Melville Island from the mainland of Australia. It also connects the Beagle Gulf in the west to the Van Diemen Gulf in the east. It is approximately 50 km (31 mi) north of the city of Darwin. Administrative status On 4 April 2007, most of the area occupied by the Clarence Strait was gazetted by the Northern Territory Government as a locality with the name, Vernon Islands Vernon Islands, also known as the Potinga Islands, is an island group in the Northern Territory of Australia located in the Clarence Strait about north-east of the territory capital of Darwin. The group consists of three islands which were .... The locality has not been added to any existing local government area and is considered to be part of the Northern Territory's unincorporated areas. References Coastline of the Northern Territory Straits of Australia {{NorthernTerritory-geo-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bombing Of Darwin
The Bombing of Darwin, also known as the Battle of Darwin, on 19 February 1942 was the largest single attack ever mounted by a foreign power on Australia. On that day, 242 Japanese aircraft, in two separate raids, attacked the town, ships in Darwin's harbour and the town's two airfields in an attempt to prevent the Allies from using them as bases to contest the invasion of Timor and Java during World War II. Darwin was lightly defended relative to the size of the attack, and the Japanese inflicted heavy losses upon Allied forces at little cost to themselves. The urban areas of Darwin also suffered some damage from the raids and there were a number of civilian casualties. More than half of Darwin's civilian population left the area permanently, before or immediately after the attack. The two Japanese air raids were the first, and largest, of more than 100 air raids against Australia during 1942–1943. The event happened just four days after the Fall of Singapore, when a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Timor
Timor is an island at the southern end of Maritime Southeast Asia, in the north of the Timor Sea. The island is East Timor–Indonesia border, divided between the sovereign states of East Timor on the eastern part and Indonesia on the western part. The Indonesian part, also known as West Timor, constitutes part of the Provinces of Indonesia, province of East Nusa Tenggara. Within West Timor lies an exclave of East Timor called Oecusse District. The island covers an area of . The name is a variant of ''timur'', Malay language, Malay for "east"; it is so called because it lies at the eastern end of the Lesser Sunda Islands. Mainland Australia is less than 500 km away, separated by the Timor Sea. Language, ethnic groups and religion Anthropologists identify eleven distinct Ethnolinguistic group, ethno-linguistic groups in Timor. The largest are the Atoni of western Timor and the Tetum of central and eastern Timor. Most indigenous Timorese languages belong to the Timorâ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sparrow Force
Sparrow Force was a detachment based on the 2/40th Australian Infantry Battalion and other Dutch, British, US and Australian 8th Division units during World War II. The force was formed to defend the island of Timor from invasion by the Empire of Japan. It formed the main part of the Allied units in the Battle of Timor. The force began deploying in late 1941, and following Japan's entry into the war, it was drawn into the fighting in response to the Japanese invasion of Portuguese and Dutch Timor in February 1942. After heavy fighting around Irekum, the main element of the force – the 2/40th – were forced to surrender on 23 February 1942; however, elements of the force, specifically commandos from the 2/2nd Independent Company, supported by the local population, continued a guerilla campaign and inflicted heavy casualties on the Japanese until August, when the Japanese launched a counter-offensive. Despite reinforcements from the 2/4th Independent Company arriving in Sept ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Koepang
Kupang ( id, Kota Kupang, ), formerly known as Koepang, is the capital of the Indonesian province of East Nusa Tenggara. At the 2020 C ensus, it had a population of 442,758; the official estimate as at mid 2021 was 455,850. It is the largest city and port on the island of Timor, and is a part of the Timor Leste-Indonesia-Australia Growth Triangle free trade zone. Geographically, Kupang is the southernmost city in Indonesia. History Early history and Portuguese domination Kupang was an important port and trading post during the Portuguese and Dutch colonial eras. There are still ruins and remnants of the colonial presence in the city. Representatives of the Dutch East India Company (VOC) first encountered Kupang in 1613 after having conquered the Portuguese fort on the island of Solor. At this time the area of the city was governed by a Raja of the Helong tribe, who claimed descent from the island of Ceram in the Maluku archipelago. Kupang occupied an ideal strategic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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