The Daily Narratives were intelligence summaries of the previous day’s naval activities on the Australia Station. Each narrative was based on intelligence received up to 9am on the day it was compiled and was submitted to the Director of Naval Intelligence. The information in the narratives is almost identical to that recorded in the Navy Office War Diary for the previous day (the War Diary is described in Chapter 3 – see series B6230). The Daily Narratives and the Navy Office War Diary provide a continuous (but brief) chronology of the events.

The narratives are typewritten carbon copies. The whereabouts of the originals is not known. Although once filed, the Naval Historical Section has had them bound in volumes to slow their deterioration. Those dated 10 Nov to 1 Dec 1941 and 1 to 26 February 1942 were examined.

Narrative of Monday 10 November 1941: Sydney escorting HT Zealandia arrived Fremantle 0830 yesterday.

Narrative of Tuesday 11 November 1941: Sydney after escorting Zealandia from Fremantle to R.V. [rendezvous] intends returning to Fremantle PM 19 November or AM 20 November.

Narrative of Wednesday 12 November 1941: Sydney sailed Fremantle 1340H/11th November, escorting Zealandia to Sunda Strait.

Narrative of Friday 14 November 1941: HMS Durban sails PM today from Singapore to relieve HMAS Sydney as escort in vicinity of Sunda Strait, escorting Zealandia thence to Singapore.

Narrative of Saturday 22 November 1941: Aquitania departed Singapore 19 November for Sydney. ETA 1300/28. Zealandia arrived Singapore 20 November where she proceeds Darwin to embark troops proceeding on Xmas leave.

The Navy Office War Diary, described in Chapter 3, picks up the events from 24 November.

This series records the movements of RAN ships. The information is presented in typewritten lists which are filed alphabetically, by the ship’s name. Each sheet has information in chronological order under four headings: Port, Arrived, Left, and Remarks. The information appears to have been obtained from other records and typed onto these movement lists at some later time. The lists are stored loosely in Bantex foolscap box files.

Daily movement forms recorded the daily location and movements of each vessel on the Australia Station as well as HMA Ships abroad. The forms were completed in typescript and were headed Daily Movements HMA Ships and Auxiliaries Australia Station. The movement forms are arranged in chronological order, in bound in volumes.

From 27 November there are no further entries for Sydney. After 30 November the Sydney’s name on each pro forma is struck through, with nothing further entered against her name.

This file records the details of investigations by the Director of Naval Accounts to help him reconstruct the Sydney’s ledger in order to determine the amounts owing to the members of the ship’s company, and the calculation of the amount of money in bank notes that was held on board at the time the ship sailed on 11 November. The correspondence on the file includes; inquiries to the District Naval Officer in Fremantle to ascertain whether certain documents were left in Fremantle by the Sydney prior to sailing; and approval by the Treasury in March 1942 of a recommendation by the Department of the Navy that: each member be credited with full pay and allowances up to and including 20 November; to debit any allotments or other debits for which there was definite proof for this period; and to pay any remaining balance to the next of kin. The Treasury agreed ‘that the Commonwealth would not be justified in making any debits against the personnel for the pay day occurring at sea on 13 November.’

The file also contains approximately 80 Kit Lists for members of the crew of the HMAS Wallaroo, which was sunk in a collision with a merchant vessel off the coast of Western Australia on 11 June 1943. The Kit Lists were used to calculate the amount of reimbursement owed to the members of the ship’s crew for their items of kit lost in the accident. Why the Kit Lists appear on this file is unknown, since there is no apparent connection between these and the other papers on the file. They are of interest in that they appear to show that white canvas shoes were an authorised kit item for RAN ratings. The significance of this is discussed in Chapter 9 – The Relics.

The file contains two pages of handwritten notes seemingly unrelated to the search operations. These notes, images of which are reproduced in this chapter, would appear to give substance to claims that a message alleged to be from Sydney was heard over short wave at Geraldton, although the apparent date of the notes would appear to make this impossible. Extracts of these notes also appear in the log book of the South West Area Combined Headquarters – see series K809, described below.

The records in this series cover a wide range of topics, although most relate to World War II. The series was originally compiled to provide source material for G. Hermon Gill, the author of the naval volumes in the Australian official history of World War II. Most of the material had been assembled by 1950, and reflecting Gill’s own background, many of the records in the series are held in Naval Intelligence Division file covers. In many cases the records appear to have been removed from their original departmental files without regard for preserving the provenance or original order of the material. In later years new material was added and the series grew over time as records were added by the Navy Historical Section for its own reference purposes. The records include many from different sections of the Department of the Navy, and from outside sources as well, bundled together according to subject.

Reflecting their provenance, many of the papers in series B6121 carry the file numbers of the original departmental files from which they were taken. Sometimes whole files appear to have been removed from the departmental registry system and incorporated into the series. As a consequence of the way in which the series was compiled, the content of individual files is often erratic, with little or no structure or evidence of original order.

This series was previously identified as MP1587/1. In 1996 the Archives carried out a ‘serialisation’ (re-cataloguing) of the series, which involved giving it the new series number B6121.

The log book records a number of messages sent and received relating to the search and rescue operation, but of particular interest are the details of messages alleged by some to have been received from HMAS Sydney prior to its sinking. The description of these messages contained in the log suggests that they could have been transmitted by the Sydney, but this would seem to be impossible judging by the dates on which the log entries are recorded. Two handwritten notes which may have formed the basis of these log entries appear above in this chapter, and are discussed in more detail in Chapter 1, under Some unanswered questions. The microfiche copy of the log book is difficult to read. Relevant extracts are therefore given below. The times given in the log appear to be Z time (ie Greenwich Mean Time, or 8 hours behind local Fremantle time).

Thursday Dec 4 (page 148)
1520 – W/A [?Western Area – one word appears to be crossed out] phoned message received from Geraldton – Geraldton heard a call on 24.50 metres possibly from HMAS Sydney and requested Pearce to call Darwin for bearing.

1543 – Rd [received] following by telephone from W/A – S/L Cooper at Geraldton reports one of his operators listening on 24.5 metres heard R/T telephone signal calling Darwin or technical telegraph operator. Signals weak and operator thought it may be from HMAS Sydney. Later Geraldton report strength of signal increasing.

1545 – On instruction from Lt/C Moir [possibly Morn] Naval Duty Staff Officer signalled Darwin. Immediate – Establish watch on 24.5 metres immediately Geraldton heard R/T signal calling Darwin or technical telegraph operator and thinks call possibly from Sydney 1500Z/4

1555 – W/A phoned following received from S/L Cooper at Geraldton – Geraldton Aeradio opinion call coming from Sydney Aeradio on 25 metres. Following heard “Calling Darwin or technical telegraph operator from sea. Sydney calling send carrier men on board calling Frazer D/F Darwin cannot detect you Singapore call Darwin. This MSS Sydney calling message received frequency satisfactory will put through one [once?] more. Heard at 1510Z

Sat Dec 6 (page 149)
0054 – Signalled CWR [Central War Room] – Information received from Darwin that short wave broadcast overheard on 4th of December was from PMG Sydney to PMG Darwin. In view of confusion caused request information whether this a regular and authorised channel. 0054Z/6

The message of 6 December also appears in AWM64, O/2 (RAAF Central War Room operations diary) described earlier in this chapter.