1942 Bravery and Sacrifice Remembered

On this day, December 1, 1942, the Australian Bathurst class corvette, HMAS Armidale (I) was attacked and sunk by Japanese aircraft. 

In addition to her crew of 83, Armidale carried three AIF soldiers, two Dutch officers and 61 Indonesian troops of the Netherlands East Indies (NEI) Army. 

40 RAN personnel, the two Dutch officers and 58 NEI soldiers were lost.

Tasmanian Ordinary Seaman Teddy Sheean manned his 20 mm Oerlikon gun, and despite being mortally wounded, continued to fire at the attacking aircraft, even when his position had gone under water.

He was credited with shooting down one enemy aircraft, and driving other aircraft off.

Leading Seaman Leigh Bool who survived the ordeal later recalled:

Two or three [aircraft] went right across the ship and they apparently were using their torpedoes as bombs. These did no damage although several of the torpedoes hurtled low right across the ship. However, the others hit us within two or three minutes of the commencement of the attack. We were hit on the port side forward, causing the ship to heel over at an angle of 45 degrees.

The Armidale was going fast and the captain ordered us to abandon ship. Ratings were trying to get out lifesaving appliances as Japanese planes roared just above us, blazing away with cannon and machine guns. Seven or eight of us were on the quarterdeck when we saw another bomber coming from the starboard quarter. It hit us with another torpedo and we were thrown in a heap among the depth charges and racks.

We could feel the Armidale going beneath us, so we dived over the side and swam about 50 yards astern as fast as we could. Then we stopped swimming and looked back at our old ship. She was sliding under, the stern high in the air, the propellers still turning.

Before we lost her, we had brought down two enemy bombers for certain, and probably a third. The hero of the battle was a young Victorian ordinary seaman, Edward Sheean, not long at sea, who refused to leave the ship.

Sheean had no chance of escape. Strapped to his anti-aircraft gun, he blazed away till the last. One of the Japanese bombers, hit by his gun, staggered away trailing smoke, just skimming the surface until it crashed with a mighty splash about a quarter mile away.

Sheean was posthumously awarded a Mention in Despatches, and in 2001 a Collins class submarine was commissioned as HMAS Sheean in his honor.

Lest we forget.

More information is available here.