Brendan Whiting (31 January 1935 – 2 January 2009,

Sydney, Australia Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and List of cities in Oceania by population, Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metro ...

) was an Australian author and researcher, who wrote non-fiction books. Whiting was born in Australia, and lost his father during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

when he was 6 years old. His first book, ''Ship of Courage'', was about the Australian cruiser , on which his father died. The ship was sunk by the Japanese in 1942 during the

Battle of Sunda Strait The Battle of Sunda Strait was a naval battle which occurred during World War II in the Sunda Strait between the islands of Java, and Sumatra. On the night of 28 February 1 March 1942, the Australian light cruiser , American heavy cruiser , ...

. In that book, Whiting focused on the lives of the crew, rather than providing military details of the battle itself. His second book, ''Victims of Tyranny'', gave an account of the lives of the

Irish rebels Irish may refer to: Common meanings * Someone or something of, from, or related to: ** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe ***Éire, Irish language name for the isle ** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...

, the Fitzgerald convict brothers who were sent to help open up the north of

Van Diemen's Land Van Diemen's Land was the colonial name of the island of Tasmania used by the British during the European exploration of Australia in the 19th century. A British settlement was established in Van Diemen's Land in 1803 before it became a sepa ...

in 1805, under the leadership of the explorer Colonel William Paterson. It discussed the cruelty of the

transportation Transport (in British English), or transportation (in American English), is the intentional movement of humans, animals, and goods from one location to another. Modes of transport include air, land (rail and road), water, cable, pipeline, ...

system that the Irish rebels were subjected to and how the brothers eventually won their freedom. Much of the media publicity Whiting received was due to his last book, ''The Shroud Story'' in which he presented evidence disputing the validity of the 1988

carbon 14 dating Radiocarbon dating (also referred to as carbon dating or carbon-14 dating) is a method for determining the age of an object containing organic material by using the properties of radiocarbon, a radioactive isotope of carbon. The method was dev ...

tests on the

Shroud of Turin The Shroud of Turin ( it, Sindone di Torino), also known as the Holy Shroud ( it, Sacra Sindone, links=no or ), is a length of linen cloth bearing the negative image of a man. Some describe the image as depicting Jesus of Nazareth and bel ...

Views on the Shroud

Whiting believed the

to be genuine and in ''The Shroud Story'' he wrote: Whiting argued that areas of cloth directly next to the tested samples retained a gum coating not found on any of the fibres from the main part of the Shroud. The coating seemed to be

gum arabic Gum arabic, also known as gum sudani, acacia gum, Arabic gum, gum acacia, acacia, Senegal gum, Indian gum, and by other names, is a natural gum originally consisting of the hardened sap of two species of the '' Acacia'' tree, ''Senegalia sen ...

routinely used during re-weaving repairs. Whiting also pointed out that chemist

Raymond Rogers Raymond N. Rogers (July 21, 1927 – March 8, 2005) was an American chemist who was considered a leading expert in thermal analysis. To the general public, however, he was best known for his work on the Shroud of Turin. Biography Rogers was bor ...

(who died in 2005) uncovered cotton fibres in the tested sample but not from samples taken from the main part of the Shroud during the 1973 examination. Rogers also found that the sample used for radiocarbon dating contained alizarin dye (utilized by re-weavers), whereas no dye of any form was found on any part of the original Shroud cloth. Whiting therefore reasoned that the carbon dated samples were from repair fabric used in the reweaving at a later date. Given the atmosphere of controversy that has surrounded the many views on the Shroud of Turin, Whiting's book received a critical assessment by fellow researcher Ian Wilson, to which Whiting provided responses.Whiting's response to Ian Wilson
/ref> For instance, Wilson argued that Rogers' theory has been refuted by Mechthild Flury-Lemberg at the 2005 Shroud conference, but Whiting disputed that statement. Whiting was also a supporter of the writings of the Italian mystic Maria Valtorta, and referred to her book ''

Poem of the Man God ''The Poem of the Man-God'' (Italian title: ''Il Poema dell'Uomo-Dio'') is a multi-volume book of about five thousand pages on the life of Jesus Christ written by Maria Valtorta. The current editions of the book bear the title ''The Gospel as Reve ...

'' in his writings. Those references caused further debate between Whiting and Wilson.

Books

* ''Ship of Courage: The Epic Story of Hmas Perth and Her Crew'', Allen & Unwin, 1995, * ''Victims of Tyranny: The Story of the Fitzgerald Convict Brothers'', Harbour Publishing, 2004, * ''The Shroud Story'', Harbour Publishing, 2006,

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Whiting, Brendan 1936 births 2009 deaths 20th-century Australian non-fiction writers