Cruiser: The Life And Loss Of HMAS Perth And Her Crew
Aug 2010 · Sold by Random House Australia
3.8star
4 reviews
Ebook
720
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About this ebook
The definitive biography of the Australian cruiser HMAS Perth, and the brave men who sailed with her.
Of all the Australians who fought in the Second World War, none saw more action nor endured so much of its hardship and horror as the crew of the cruiser HMAS Perth.
Most were young - many were still teenagers - from cities and towns, villages and farms across the nation. In three tumultuous years they did battle with the forces of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, the Vichy French and, finally, the Imperial Japanese Navy.
They were nearly lost in a hurricane in the Atlantic. In the Mediterranean in 1941 they were bombed by the Luftwaffe and the Italian Air Force for months on end until, ultimately, during the disastrous evacuation of the Australian army from Crete, their ship took a direct hit and thirteen men were killed.
After the fall of Singapore in 1942, HMAS Perth was hurled into the forlorn campaign to stem the Japanese advance towards Australia. Off the coast of Java in March that year she met an overwhelming enemy naval force. Firing until her ammunition literally ran out, she was sunk with the loss of 353 of her crew, including her much-loved captain and the Royal Australian Navy’s finest fighting sailor, ‘Hardover’ Hec Waller. Another 328 men were taken into Japanese captivity, most to become slave labourers in the infinite hell of the Burma-Thai railway. Many died there, victims of unspeakable atrocity. Only 218 men, less than a third of her crew, survived to return home at war’s end.
Cruiser, by journalist and broadcaster Mike Carlton, is their story. And the story of those who loved them and waited for them.
Of all the Australians who fought in the Second World War, none saw more action nor endured so much of its hardship and horror as the crew of the cruiser HMAS Perth.
Most were young - many were still teenagers - from cities and towns, villages and farms across the nation. In three tumultuous years they did battle with the forces of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, the Vichy French and, finally, the Imperial Japanese Navy.
They were nearly lost in a hurricane in the Atlantic. In the Mediterranean in 1941 they were bombed by the Luftwaffe and the Italian Air Force for months on end until, ultimately, during the disastrous evacuation of the Australian army from Crete, their ship took a direct hit and thirteen men were killed.
After the fall of Singapore in 1942, HMAS Perth was hurled into the forlorn campaign to stem the Japanese advance towards Australia. Off the coast of Java in March that year she met an overwhelming enemy naval force. Firing until her ammunition literally ran out, she was sunk with the loss of 353 of her crew, including her much-loved captain and the Royal Australian Navy’s finest fighting sailor, ‘Hardover’ Hec Waller. Another 328 men were taken into Japanese captivity, most to become slave labourers in the infinite hell of the Burma-Thai railway. Many died there, victims of unspeakable atrocity. Only 218 men, less than a third of her crew, survived to return home at war’s end.
Cruiser, by journalist and broadcaster Mike Carlton, is their story. And the story of those who loved them and waited for them.
Ratings and reviews
3.8
4 reviews
A Google user
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November 30, 2017
Good book.
Wayne Abell
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February 24, 2014
Well done
About the author
In a working life of more than fifty years, Mike Carlton was one of Australia's best-known media figures in radio, television and newspapers.
Beginning as a cadet journalist at the ABC, he became a war correspondent in Vietnam and for three years was the ABC's Bureau Chief in Jakarta. He also reported for the ABC from London, New York and major Asian capitals. In television, he worked on the ABC's groundbreaking This Day Tonight current affairs program in the 1970s and for Nine Network News and A Current Affair.
In 1980 Mike turned to talk radio, first at Sydney's 2UE and then 2GB, and later at London’s LBC Newstalk 97.3FM, where he won a coveted Sony Radio Academy award in 1993 for Britain's best talk breakfast show. His radio satire on current affairs, Friday News Review, was ‘must listening’ in Australia and the UK.
For many years he wrote a popular weekly column for the Sydney Morning Herald.
Mike has had a life-long passion for naval history and is the author of Cruiser, First Victory, Flagship and The Scrap Iron Flotilla.
Beginning as a cadet journalist at the ABC, he became a war correspondent in Vietnam and for three years was the ABC's Bureau Chief in Jakarta. He also reported for the ABC from London, New York and major Asian capitals. In television, he worked on the ABC's groundbreaking This Day Tonight current affairs program in the 1970s and for Nine Network News and A Current Affair.
In 1980 Mike turned to talk radio, first at Sydney's 2UE and then 2GB, and later at London’s LBC Newstalk 97.3FM, where he won a coveted Sony Radio Academy award in 1993 for Britain's best talk breakfast show. His radio satire on current affairs, Friday News Review, was ‘must listening’ in Australia and the UK.
For many years he wrote a popular weekly column for the Sydney Morning Herald.
Mike has had a life-long passion for naval history and is the author of Cruiser, First Victory, Flagship and The Scrap Iron Flotilla.
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