By the end of 1914 all the German warships overseas
had been accounted for and Australia’s fleet could be
released for areas of greater need. Australia went to
British waters, Melbourne and Sydney following her
there after a period patrolling off the West Indies and
North America.
Heavy guns had been the foundation of naval power
for hundreds of years and the arms race preceding
the war concentrated on building more and bigger
battleships with heavier and more powerful guns.
By 1914 Great Britain and Germany possessed
enormous fleets of dreadnought battleships and
battle-cruisers which faced each other across the
North Sea.
HMAS Australia joined the vast concourse of the
Royal Navy’s Grand Fleet in February 1915. For the
next four years her war became a long and tedious
series of patrols and exercises in bleak northern
waters, always prepared and ready for action.
But for Australia’s flagship that battle never came. It
was her fate to be under repair in dockyard hands
on the one occasion in all those years when the two
opposing fleets finally met at the Battle of Jutland
in June 1916. Results of the battle have long been
debated, but out of the British battle-cruiser force to
which Australia belonged, three of her nine sisters
engaged were sunk with the loss of 3,300 lives.
HMAS Australia’s moment finally came 10 days
after the Armistice when a defeated Germany
surrendered its battle fleet for internment, sailing
to Great Britain between two long columns of the
Grand Fleet’s dreadnoughts. Australia was given the
honour of leading the port column of the battle fleet in
recognition of this nation’s outstanding contribution to
all aspects of the war, not least in the war at sea.
The enemy battleships remained a dangerous threat
for the rest of the war, but largely inactive. Instead,
Germany gave increasing priority to submarine
warfare. Submarines were an untested weapon
prior to the Great War but they quickly showed
their ability to sink large, armoured warships and
disrupt merchant shipping traffic. German U-boat
numbers rapidly increased and the introduction of
an unrestricted warfare policy early in 1917 was so
successful that Great Britain was almost isolated from
outside resources.
Destroyers were badly needed to defend convoys
and combat the U-boat menace, and Australia’s six
destroyers were transferred
to the Mediterranean
particularly for anti-
submarine duties. They
worked hard, engaging
enemy U-boats on several
occasions with depth
charges and gunfire, and
aiding damaged ships. To
assist in this role they were
equipped with underwater
listening devices and an
observation balloon to
widen their vision and add
the possibility of sighting
submerged U-boats.
Australia entered the
war with two submarines
of our own. HMAS AE1
and HMAS AE2 were the
latest of their type and
in their delivery passage
during 1914 completed the
longest overseas voyage by
submarine up to that time.
Sadly, both were destined
for very short lives. AE1
tragically disappeared off
Rabaul on September 14,
1914 with the loss of all
hands during the Australian
capture of German New
Guinea.toP: australian submarine HMAS AE2 with crew on deck before leaving the UK for australia, 1914.
Image Australian National Maritime Museum collection
above: Destroyer HMAS Warrego in Brisbane while patrolling the australian coast in 1915.
Image RAN Heritage Centre collection