RANCA NSW
HMAS BUNDABERG J231
Builder Evans Deakin Ltd, Brisbane
Laid Down 7 June 1941
Launched 1 December 1941
Commissioned
12 September 1942
Decommissioned
26 March 1946
Battle Honours
PACIFIC 1942-45
NEW GUINEA 1943–44
Fate:
The ship was sold for scrap on 6 Jan 1961 to Kinoshita (Aust) Pty Ltd.
Displacement 650 tons
Length 186 feet
Beam 31 feet
Draught 8 feet 6 inches
Speed 15 knots
Crew 85
Propulsion Triple expansion,
2 shafts
Horsepower 2,000
Armament 1 x 4-inch gun
Machine guns
1 Bofors (later)
3 x Oerlikons (later 2)
Depth charges
and throwers
Extract from Corvette Magazine November 1989
R .L .(Bob) BURNS ex "Bundaberg" and "Ipswich" tells us about TOMMY:
"We had some interesting crew members on the "Bundaberg", but perhaps the most interesting was a near-black 'fuzzy wuzzy' Papuan known to the crew as "Tommy".
When the Japs entered the war, Tommy was a police boy at Samurai. Early in 1942 he took a 28 foot motor boat to Gasamata in New Britain and brought out 25 Aussie soldiers who had escaped from Rabaul. After they had received medical treatment at Samurai he took them 500 miles across the Coral Sea to Cooktown. For the next two years, Tommy worked at a naval depot where he was befriended by a naval officer who arranged to get him on "Bundaberg".
He made two trips with us and loved it. He never stopped working and could put his hand to anything. He was given the honorary title of “Able Seaman" and supplied with a uniform.
He was missionary trained and had high moral standards. He would never touch beer, but would drink soft drink all day. He hated swearing amongst the crew. His parents were both killed in an air raid on Port Moresby where he was born .
He made a trip with us to Adelaide and we took him to the "Cheer Up Hut”, where, to his disgust, they mistook him for American.
Tommy expressed a desire to own his own fishing boat after the war and I have often wondered whether he realised his dream.”
Drafted to a Corvette - HMAS Bundaberg At War 1942 – 1946 by John Orme
Having completed my 3 months new entry training at Flinders Naval Depot my class mess 114 H Block were drafted to various ships and depots. I went to Penguin where I was drafted to HMAS Patterson as a relief. Her duties were to mine sweep outside Sydney heads where we swept from 8 AM to 5 PM. I relieved on others but have forgotten their names.
One day on Garden Island a sailor came up to me and said: “Ordinary Seaman Orme you are on draft to HMAS Bundaberg, she is over there at number 7 Buoy, get back to Penguin and get your gear, she is sailing soon. Sailing where? I didn’t know. I couldn’t warn my family. I just wouldn’t arrive home at Maroubra that night. I missed her sailing time but with two others was bundled into a train to Newcastle where we boarded her at Kings Wharf late at night.
I went to No 1 Mess Starboard side. There was nowhere to sling a hammock, so it was laid anywhere there was a space, the first night was under the mess table. There was no place to stow my gear, so I lived out of my seabag until someone was drafted and I got a storage space under a seat.
The next day we sailed taking a convoy to Melbourne and I appeared before the Captain, Lieutenant Commander Pixley. He said in amazement, “How old are you?” “Nearly 18 Sir”, he turned to the Coxswain. “Give him his sea duties”.
I was taken away to his office which was about 3’ x 3’ off the Captain’s lobby. I had a range of duties and the only one that I remembered was my action station “after Oerlikon” which I shared with John Bartram (later to be an Olympian). I was to be part of the Starboard watch.
My first stint up the mast was terrifying. This little Corvette rolling like a cork. I thought my relief would never come. For the rest of the trip I was seasick and one evening I was sitting on the waist bollard and I heard the Quarter Master piping me. It was thought that I may have fallen overboard, as I hadn’t been seen since the change of watch. By the time we returned to Sydney I had recovered. I was sick the first 2 days of the next convoy but not again.
Lieutenant Commander Pixley wanted us all to be efficient sailors and had a leading Seaman teach us the ropes. L/S Nobby Clark had about 6 of us on the forecastle. Max Daniels who was in my class at Flinders, Bruce “Skinny” Maclean, Ron Manning, Noel Maddy, Len “Knocker” White, and myself. He was trying to show us a special knot but couldn’t. Much to everyone’s horror I showed him. I was glad when he was drafted.
Returning from Brisbane with seven ships in convoy we hit a cyclone. We were buffeted about and when the ship went into a trough you could only see the crest of the wave breaking down and on to the ship. On one occasion the helmsman lost steerage. I was lookout on the bridge and the huge wave crashed over the f’castle and gun throwing us sideways. We climbed over the waves and regained steerage. The next morning there was not another ship to be seen and we were still off Coffs Harbour. At that time, we did not have a radar and the seas were too severe to have the Asdic down. Sitting in the captain’s lobby with the rest of the watch rugged up in duffel coats the Asdic officer Sub Lieutenant Col Milliner said to me “You thought we were going to sink yesterday Orme, didn’t you? “Yes Sir” was the reply. “So did I“, he said.
We arrived in Sydney 24 hours late having hardly moved during the night off Coffs. On another occasion we recovered a lifeboat in six-foot seas having put our whaler out with some difficulty. When we rolled it over, I was amazed to see the number of fish beneath. It was towed to Sydney.
Our first convoy was crossing the Coral Sea to Milne Bay. I will never forget going through the China Straits and seeing the beautiful island of Samurai on our starboard side. I always wanted to return but never have. We had our first air raid alarm at Milne Bay. The first trip to Port Moresby was exciting and the natives arrived alongside in their lakitois and I bought gifts that I hoped to take home.
