The ROV needed to pass, or at least survive, one more series of tests when we reached 500 metres before proceeding to Sydney. However, when the pilot pushed his joystick forward to fly the Comanche ROV out of its protective garage, nothing happened. The vehicle was stuck, frozen in place, because the subsea winch on the garage wouldn’t release its floating tether. Part of me wanted to scream in frustration at the extent of our rotten luck. Without the freedom to fly around the wreck site, the ROV was nothing more than a video camera at the end of a very long cable. We’d have no ability to control its position relative to the wreck, other than moving the Geosounder around on the surface 2,500 metres away. To top it off, we couldn’t even point the camera because of the broken pan-and-tilt unit. In the offshore world, we had a dismissive name for ROVs with such limited functionality. We called them ‘dopes on a rope’.
A decision was needed, and because this one was so important, I called a meeting on the bridge with all the ROV supervisors and senior pilots, along with Captain Deland and John Perryman. In my mind it came down to a simple choice. We could either abort the dive and hope the ROV could be mended before the next wave of bad weather hit us, or we could just go for it. I knew the decision was mine to make, but I wanted to hear everyone’s opinions first. I could see that the ROV crew felt defeated and had lost confidence in their ability to fix the system. To be fair to them, the sheer number of equipment failures they had faced was unprecedented. It was a huge long-shot, but if we were able to drop the garage close enough to the wreck, we might get one or two pictures that would confirm it was Sydney. If the ROV was truly unrepairable and we were forced to terminate the whole project, at least we would have achieved HMA3S’s minimum requirement of identifying the wreck. ‘OK, let’s go for it,’ I said.
Once the decision to continue the dive was made, I wanted to make sure we avoided all risk of entanglement of the garage with the wreck. I explained to the navigator, Nigel Meikle, that I wanted to drop down on Sydney’s port quarter in order to stay clear of the fractured bow, where there would be a lot of jagged steel and fouling hazards. When the vehicle reached 2,300 metres, John and I joined the ROV pilots in their control van on the boat deck so I could speak to them directly. At this point everything depended on the quality of Nigel’s calculations. If he was wrong, we could search for hours without getting anywhere near the wreck. As the vehicle descended the last fifty metres very slowly, I expected to see the lights beginning to reflect off the featureless seabed. Instead, a faint shape appeared in front of us and I was the first to recognize what it was: ‘We’re on it, it’s a gun!’
In a remarkable display of his skills, Nigel had put us exactly where I had asked him to. The excitement level in the control van exploded with the realization that we were staring directly at the twin barrels of ‘X’ turret, pointed to port in the position they had last fired on Kormoran. John perfectly summed up the significance of this wonderful picture: ‘My God, there is no doubt about that at all!’ My gamble had paid off. We had the pictures Australia had waited decades to see, and the project could have ended right at that moment if it had had to. Fortunately, it didn’t. The ROV crew persevered in patching up the Comanche, and over the next four days we comprehensively documented the damage to both Sydney and Kormoran, resulting in a collection of stunning photographs that cleared up once and for all any historical questions about their fierce battle.
When we returned to film the wreck of Sydney, this time with an ROV set free from its garage, the evidence of the damage it had suffered at the hands of Kormoran was plain to see. The German account of the action, which was scarcely believable at the time, was that they had fired 500 15 cm shells of mainly the armour-piercing type, and of those, 150 or more had scored direct hits on the cruiser. We didn’t attempt to count the shell hits during our investigation – that analysis was performed afterwards by another organization, using the footage we shot — but the number of gaping holes and impressive indentations we could see suggested that the German accounts were not exaggerations. In fact, when taking into account the numerous hits from Kormoran’s smaller-calibre guns, it was fair to say that Sydney’s hull was riddled by gunfire. The evidence certainly backed up Derniers’ account that the fighting started at close range, and that Sydney’s bridge and forward guns were targeted early on in the action. In particular, one 15 cm shell hit on the port-side base of the director control tower, a strike that Detmers claimed took place at the outset of the battle, would have had a devastating effect on all bridge personnel, including Captain Burnett.
The large sonar target I had spotted on the northern edge of the debris field, some 480 metres away from the hull, was indeed the remains of Sydney’s bow. We found it upside down on the seabed at a slight angle that perfectly exposed its port side, where Kormoran’s G7a torpedo had hit. The break in the bow was very irregular, with large sections of hull plating bent and torn in a multitude of directions. The port-side plating also showed signs of being indented, which was consistent with Kormoran’s torpedo exploding on contact. Finding the bow such a large distance from the rest of the hull indicated to me that it had detached at the surface before plummeting to the seabed. As the hull and all the other wreckage forming the debris field had been found to the south-east of the bow in the direction that Sydney was last seen travelling, I took this as a clear sign that the bow snapped off first, and that this was the likely trigger causing Sydney to sink. The final orientation of the hull on the seabed, of 140° true, also supports the likelihood that the crew were trying to reach Geraldton, and that the ship was under way right up to the moment the bow was suddenly and catastrophically lost.
Like Sydney’s hull and bow, the parts of the ship found in the debris field tell their own story about the demise of the ship and the last moments of her men. By far the biggest surprise of our investigation was finding five of Sydney’s nine boats at various locations in the debris field. It never occurred to me that the wooden boats would have survived on the seabed for sixty-six years, or that they wouldn’t have been ripped off the ship as she sank and carried away to disintegrate in a different location. Each time another boat was found, it brought home the helplessness of Sydney’s men. For it was clear that these boats had never been launched or used.
On 31 March, a few days before we’d started documenting the wrecks, an announcement had been made in Canberra that caught us completely off guard. Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard, standing in for Kevin Rudd, announced that a commission of inquiry (COI) was going to be held into the loss of Sydney. It was to be headed by Terence Cole, one of Australia’s most eminent judges, who had been selected in part because of his expertise in maritime law. I had mixed feelings about the inquiry when it was announced. My main concern was that it would upset the relatives and open old wounds, just when we felt our expedition was close to providing the closure everyone desired. On the other hand, it might put an end to the debate and controversy surrounding the loss of Sydney once and for all. During the government’s announcement, the point was made that ‘no board of inquiry was conducted during World War II after the loss of Sydney’. Had the navy held an inquiry in 1941, as they should have done, it is likely that the controversy would never have started in the first place.
While on balance I agreed with the need for an inquiry, I couldn’t but help wonder what effect it would have on the ongoing operations. Would I get a call from Justice Cole instructing me about the type of evidence he wanted collected? Or would the navy send me a plan for forensic examinations in light of the fact that the COI was to be a legal inquiry in front of a sitting judge? Neither of these things happened. In fact, we received no instructions or advice about how we should conduct the photo/video documentation of the wrecks. I found it a bit odd that the collection of vital visual evidence upon which the outcome of the inquiry would likely be based was being left to me without input from those actually responsible for the inquiry.
Looking back today, in light of the extent of the sci
entific analysis of the photographic evidence we gathered, and the conclusions that the inquiry was able to derive from that evidence, I can only say that I am very proud of the work the expedition teams did in helping to solve the mystery surrounding the loss of Sydney. I was also pleased that the evidence we provided to the COI spoke for itself, and that there was no need for me to give any written or oral testimony. I did briefly meet with Justice Cole, at the commission’s offices in Sydney, before a longer meeting to help his legal and technical teams with some specific questions. He greeted me with the words: ‘I guess I owe my job to you.’ Although we both laughed at his attempt to break the ice, there was some truth in his throwaway line. His next words were in the form of a question I’d been asked many times before: ‘Tell me, how did you become a shipwreck hunter?’
Cole’s inquiry, as it became known, turned out to be an extraordinarily comprehensive and wide-ranging investigation that grew from the broad nature of its single term of reference: ‘To inquire and report upon circumstances associated with the loss of HMAS Sydney II in November 1941 and consequent loss of life and related events subsequent hereto.’ The raw statistics of the inquiry highlight what a complicated and monumental effort it was. Over the course of sixteen months, Cole’s team of solicitors reviewed nearly 31,000 archival documents and examined 77 witnesses, producing 2,563 pages of transcript. Including Cole himself, forty-two personnel worked on the inquiry. Cole separately appointed the Australian Defence Science and Technology Organization (DSTO) and the Australian division of the Royal Institution of Naval Architects (RINA) to give expert advice on the damage both ships suffered based on the video footage and photographs we provided. Their technical report alone was 392 pages long, while Cole’s three-volume report covering the evidence, conclusions and various conspiracies ran to over 1,350 pages. The cost of the COI to the Australian taxpayer was $6.66 million dollars.
As for the battle between Sydney and Kormoran, Cole’s conclusions pretty much agreed with what the underwater footage showed and what I wrote in my own book, The Search for the Sydney, which came out at virtually the same time as his report in August 2009. The empirical evidence produced by our expedition verified that the German accounts were truthful with respect to where the action took place; that the initial action was fought at close range of 1,000 to 1,500 metres; that Sydney suffered a torpedo strike on her port side; that she was heavily damaged on both her port and starboard side by Kormoran’s main armament of 15 cm guns with a minimum of eighty-seven hits being recorded; that Sydney’s bridge and director control tower suffered severe damage early in the battle, resulting in the deaths of many officers, probably including Captain Burnett; and that she suffered from extensive fires, making it unlikely that the ship’s boats would have been usable by survivors. Based on the DSTO analysis, Cole assessed that the casualties on board at the end of the battle were in the order of 70 per cent of the ship’s total company. Those still alive were unable to escape because of the damage to the boats and the Carley floats, and were killed when Sydney sank.
Cole was critical of Captain Burnett, and pretty much laid the blame for the loss of Sydney and his men at his feet, although he stopped short of saying his actions were negligent. He concluded that Burnett knew of the possibility that a raider was off the Western Australian coast at the time, and that the unknown vessel they sighted on 19 November might be German. Burnett’s fundamental error was that he assessed Kormoran to be an innocent ship, and in approaching her so close abeam he lost all tactical and armaments advantage, thus placing his ship in grave danger that was otherwise avoidable. In other words, he fell for the trap set by Detmers, and by the time he realized his error it was too late. Sydney was not at action stations when she drew up alongside Kormoran, and the first-strike advantage that Burnett handed to Detmers resulted in such critical damage that she was unable to recover. Cole’s final, damning conclusion was that ‘Capt. Burnett made a serious error that had terrible consequences.’
Each year, on the anniversary of the battle and the loss of Sydney, a sunset service is held at the beautiful Dome of Souls memorial situated at the summit of Mount Scott in Geraldton. Since its dedication on the sixtieth anniversary in 2001, the memorial has become so significant in commemorating the loss of Sydney and the sacrifice of her 645 men that after the wreck was located the site was declared a national memorial in 2009. Our discovery of the wreck site also allowed the fifth and final element of the memorial to be constructed: a pool of remembrance to symbolize the finding of Sydney. The granite floor of the circular pool forms a map that shows the exact location of the wreck, indicated by the wingtip of one of the 645 gulls representing each of the lost souls, along with the geographic coordinates that radiate out from the gull’s wing.
I had attended the commemoration service in November 2008, which was an amazingly emotional and well-attended event, with an estimated 2,000 people coming from all parts of Australia. Visiting Geraldton and attending the service is the one chance I get to meet the relatives, learn the stories of their families and hear what our discovery of the wreck means to them. So when Shane Van Styn, the mayor of Greater Geraldton, invited me to be present at the seventy-fifth anniversary service in November 2016, and to speak at a civic reception for the relatives afterwards, I wasted no time in accepting.
With it being a major anniversary, the service was again well attended, and I was able to reconnect with many of the relatives I had first met in 2008. Whereas the 2008 service was almost raw in its emotional intensity, eight years later I sensed a different, more accepting mood from the families. Many relatives told me that this service was easier for them and that knowing the wreck had been found helped with relieving the pain and sadness they still felt when remembering their loved ones. There were still tears, but these were tears of remembrance rather than mourning. The families of Sydney’s men suffered a terrible loss, and many lives were irrevocably changed as a result. However, it was plain to see how proud they were of the service their father, uncle, brother or son gave in defence of their country, as they filed one by one under the Dome of Souls to place a wreath in remembrance.
For all the professional fulfilment and recognition I got from leading the successful search for the wrecks, it doesn’t compare to the deep feelings that come from someone thanking you for finding their relative. As I stood looking at the huge array of colourful wreaths at the end of the service, a woman came alongside me and gently took my hand. As she looked at me, I could see that her eyes were moist with tears. But her voice was calm and steady as she said simply: ‘Thank you for finding my dad.’ It took me a second or two before I could reply, as my throat immediately choked with emotion. Her words had hit me in a way I hadn’t expected. I wanted to hear her story, so I asked about her father’s service and what the discovery of the wreck meant to her.
Helen Miller was a month away from her third birthday when her father, Chief Petty Officer Louis Nicholas Sampson, went down with the Sydney. At the age of thirty-four, CPO Sampson was one of the oldest and most experienced crew aboard Sydney, having served two long tours on the ship, which included taking delivery from England and her famous service in the Mediterranean. He had joined the Australian navy as a Boy Sailor 2nd Class at the tender age of fourteen, and as Helen describes was navy through and through’. His two brothers also joined up when they were young, and all three served with distinction and rose to become chief petty officers. With three young children at home (Helen’s brother John was six and her sister Fran was four), his death had a devastating effect on his wife Mary and the family. As you would expect, their lives changed forever.
In some ways, the loss of a family member at sea, where there is no known location and no body to be buried, can be a double tragedy. For many of the Sydney relatives, this was certainly true, as the mysterious circumstances of her loss compounded the void they were left trying to fill. As Helen explained, finding the Sydney had finally provided the answers they so desperately needed:
My mother married again and did not speak often of our dad. I think it was too painful for her. It was her sisters and brothers who told us little snippets of what he was like. His brother Fred also talked about him and was desperate for his resting place to be found. Unfortunately he died before she was found.
When we heard Kormoran was found first we thought no God could be so cruel and virtually did not breathe until Sydney was also found.
VI
AHS Centaur
SUNK ON A MISSION OF MERCY
AHS Centaur
SUNK 14
MAY 1943
268 died 64 survived
The incredible discovery of HMAS Sydney generated so much public interest in Australia’s naval history that for once I didn’t need to think about the next wreck I wanted to find when the inevitable question was asked. The first enquiries about the AHS Centaur had already started trickling in while I was still on board the Geosounder taking photos of Sydney and Kormoran. A few enterprising people had found my email address, and in writing to congratulate me about Sydney also asked if I would publicly support their calls for a government-funded search for the Centaur. The fact that Centaur, in an earlier and different wartime role, had played a part in the aftermath of the action between Sydney and Kormoran added an intriguing twist. The Centaur Association, a small group of families who had lost loved ones when the Centaur was callously and illegally attacked by a Japanese submarine in May of 1943, were hoping to use our discovery of Sydney to draw attention to what they considered was Australia’s second most famous wartime shipwreck.
The Shipwreck Hunter Page 30