2 The Sinking Of HMAS Armidale
The HMAS Armidale was a corvette (although it was originally built to be a minesweeper) in service of the Australian navy during World War II. It was commissioned on June 11, 1942, only to be sunk in November that same year. While on a mission to evacuate soldiers and civilians from Betano Bay, Timor, the HMAS Armidale was spotted by Japanese airplanes, which proceeded to attack it along with its sister ship, HMAS Castlemaine. Armidalewas soon destroyed by the attacking Japanese airplanes, forcing its crewmen to abandon ship. Twenty-one crewmen, including the captain, climbed onto a small, damaged motorboat, where they awaited rescue. When the rescue never came, they began rowing toward Australian waters.
Two days later, another 29 survivors began a similar journey on a badly damaged whaler that wouldn’t stop taking water. The survivors clung to a floating raft (shown in the photograph above) while awaiting rescue. After several days out at sea, the men on the motorboat were rescued along with those on the whaler. But the men hanging on the raft were never found.
The photograph shown above was taken by the pilot of a Hudson reconnaissance airplane, who even dropped a message for them saying that their rescuers were on the way.
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