Maritime battles months before Gallipoli landings
Australia's first fatalities in the carnage of World War I occurred in the tropical and volcanic waters off Rabaul, north-east of New Guinea, more than seven months before the Gallipoli landings.
In September, 1914, the Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force was despatched to the region. It consisted of about 1000 infantry aboard HMAT Berrima. The ANMEF was to occupy German New Guinea and capture important maritime radio stations there and elsewhere in the colony.
Berrima was accompanied by HMAS Sydney, Parramatta, Australia and Yarra, with submarines AE1 and AE2. Initially, the submarines were deployed off Cape Gazelle to watch for any German warships from Germany's Asiatic Squadron. Then, about 3.30pm on September 14, while AE1 was patrolling off Duke of York Island, under Lt-Cdr T. F. Besant, it disappeared with all hands.
Arthur W. Jose, an official historian of the RAN, wrote: "No trace of the AE1 - not even the tell-tale shimmer of escaping oil on water - was found, or has been since that time."
Three officers and 32 crew went to their deaths in baffling circumstances. On Rabaul, the ANMEF suffered six killed and four wounded, in the fighting to take the Bita Paka radio station.
AE1's sister boat survived the New Guinea campaign and accompanied the second Anzac fleet that sailed from Albany in late 1914.
It was towed to its rendezvous with fate at Gallipoli by HMAT Berrima. At 4.30am on April 25, 1915, under the command of Lt-Cdr Henry Stoker, AE2 successfully navigated the mined and heavily fortified Straits of Marmara off Turkey at the moment the first Anzacs stormed ashore on Gallipoli.
After torpedoing a Turkish warship, it was grounded twice and became too damaged to fight on. For five days the boat was hunted by the Turks. Then on April 30, due to a malfunction, AE2 uncontrollably rose to the surface. It was a point blank target for the Turkish warships.
Lt.-Cdr Stoker ordered the boat scuttled. The crew were taken POW and suffered what he described in a memoir as "three and a half years of the living death".
Later in 1914 Australia was to experience the maritime war much closer to home. Over four months, starting in August, the German light cruiser SMS Emden, captained by Karl Friedrich von Muller, captured, plundered and destroyed 24 ships.
It had raided Penang and laid waste to fuel tanks at Madras. By eluding the Allied warships hunting it, the light cruiser attained mythic status in the press.
Commanders of the Anzac fleet crossing the Indian Ocean were aware Emden was lurking. In fact, it was just 90km away. On November 9, von Muller had anchored at Direction Island in the Cocos archipelago. He sent ashore a landing party to destroy the radio station and disable three major transoceanic communications cables. But a staff member sent an SOS.
HMAS Sydney, commanded by Capt. John C. T. Glossop, was despatched from the Anzac flotilla. In the resulting battle, Sydney completely outclassed Emden. With his ship a shambles of twisted steel and dead crew, von Muller beached it on North Keeling Island. Of Emden's complement of 315 sailors, 134 officers and men were killed.
Yet, even with Emden destroyed, the oceans around Australia were not safe. From 1916, for two years, the German commerce raider SMS Wolf, commanded by Capt. Karl Nerger, sank or damaged 30 merchant vessels and two warships off the coasts of Australia, New Zealand and New Guinea. Although an enemy, Capt. Nerger's feat of seamanship was admirable. He was on the high seas for 444 days, covering 100,000km without sending a single radio message, and without putting into any port.
The RAN also undertook extensive patrols in South and South-East Asia, off East Africa, in the North Atlantic and European waters.
