Australian Penthouse

What sort of blokes were the sailors?
A lot of them were depression-era kids—some grew up in the slums of Sydney, and they’d have been lucky to get a bit of bread and dripping for dinner at night. Others were country kids.

But to suddenly grow up and see the world like that, and to come out of the depression and plunge into WW2, it was a huge thing. They were an amazing generation—they dealt with it all. They grew up strong and they stayed that way.

And their first big stop was New York City!
Oh, New York was an absolute eye-opener for them. They were stunned and amazed—skyscrapers and Coca Cola and women. I like the story of the two sailors who were at Madison Square Garden, at the old ballpark.

The locals invited one to have a hit out on the field. Someone pitched a baseball at him and he missed it and fell over. But the second pitch he knocked out of the park!

And so they just rolled out the red carpet for them and took them to nightclubs where they met movie stars and all of that stuff.

The Aussie boys done good!
Yeah, but the story I really like was when they were on their way back across the Pacific and they called in at Tahiti. It was more or less a four-day orgy! Half of the ship’s company was dancing or swimming naked in the water with these Tahitian girls and it was just an amazing scene. Of course, it got a bit rougher after that.

You need some fond memories when you’re floating in oily and fiery waters…
…When you’ve just been torpedoed, yes. There was a terribly sad story of one former crewman who was dying on the Burma-Siam railway and he said to his mate, “I’m gonna die tonight. Just come and sit with me and talk with me about the old times and about Tahiti and everything.”

It was terribly poignant. They saw life in a way I don’t think any other Australians have: from those incredible highs to the atrocities of the railway. They went from the A to the Z of human experience.

The ship survived several battles before it was finally sunk. Did its first hostile contact in the Mediterranean, with a dozen casualties, come as a shock?
They knew it was coming, but nothing can really prepare you for the first time you’re under attack. Particularly from the dive bombers of the Luftwaffe, which must have been terrifying. They were under attack day after day until, finally, a bomb hit them.

HMAS Perth was one of just three cruisers to survive the almighty Battle of the Java Sea… only to then stumble into the main Japanese invasion force in the Sunda Strait.

That was an absolute tragedy. But in hindsight, the Japanese were everywhere. The Perth blundered into that and was outnumbered, outgunned, out-everythinged.

They fought as best they could with what they had and ended up firing practice ammunition and star shells, which were utterly useless. But I guess it gave them something to do and a sense they were fighting back. It was a tragic battle. There was no other end to it than that the ship was going to be sunk.

So they knew they were doomed?
Well, it’s hard to say. If you were on the bridge or you were working one of the guns, then you could see the battle. But if you’re below decks, you don’t have a clue—you just hear the noise and the feel vibration of the ship.

Until the torpedo hits, that is, and then you know you’re stuffed. And when the second torpedo hits, you know you’re gone for all money. Some of them could see it straightaway, that they were doomed.

Others didn’t know for a while. There were blokes who would have been killed outright when the first torpedo hit, and others who were trapped inside the ship with no way of escaping—which would have been an appalling way to go.

In your estimation, what was the Perth’s finest hour?
That final battle. It was magnificent and she fought to the very last. The captain, Hector Waller, should have won the Victoria Cross.

But for some reason—which puzzles a lot of people—no-one in the Australian Navy has ever been awarded the VC. Until fairly recently, they had to be okayed by the British Admiralty in London.And they never once okayed the Victoria Cross for an Australian sailor.

Was Waller’s contribution to that final battle known to his men?
Oh, yeah. He was an inspirational leader, and they knew he’d done his best to get them out of it, to try to save them and the ship. To this day, they still hold him in enormous regard. They knew how the battle was fought—and how it ended.