The Life and Death of HMAS Sydney (II): Part 1

[Enceladus828]

Hello all.

For the past five years I have been very interested in the story about HMAS Sydney (II), the ship that was the Pride and Darling of the Royal Australian Navy during World War 2, and particularly her final battle and loss on November 19th 1941; I even did an inquiry project about her in school almost five years ago.

 

Since the Leander class cruiser was added in Desert Wings-Tobruk, I have decided for the 80th anniversary of her sinking to do a series about her consisting of five parts from when she was first commissioned, her Mediterranean service, and her final battle and loss. I have done several in-game recreations and taken screenshots of events that Sydney was involved in as well as her final battle.

 

Hope you all enjoy (Please note if there is anything wrong or something that I missed please let me know) :

 

HMAS Sydney was a modified-Leander class (also known as a Perth or Amphion class) light cruiser that was built in 1934 and commissioned in 1935. She was 562 feet long and her primary armament consisted of eight, 6 inch guns that were mounted into 4 turrets. Her secondary armament consisted of four, 4 inch Mk. V Quick Firing guns, 12 0.5 inch machine guns, 14 Lewis machine guns, and eight 21 inch torpedoes in one 4 torpedo tube launcher on each side, her standard displacement was just over 7,000 tons while at max load was almost 9,000 tons, her armour consisted of 1 inch hull plating, a 3 inch belt over the machinery spaces, and a 2 inch belt over magazines and shell rooms, her top speed was almost 33 knots and she also carried a Supermarine Walrus seaplane that could be launched via catapult. The difference between the Leander class and the modified-Leander class was that the latter class had their machinery and propulsion equipment in two self-contained units, thus allowing the ship to continue operating if one set was damaged, there were two exhaust funnels unlike the Leander class which only had one funnel, and the side armour was extended from 84 to 141 feet. 

 

Picture of HMAS Sydney taken in 1941.

 

 

In October 1935, Sydney sailed from Portsmouth, England to join the Royal Navy’s Mediterranean fleet at Gibraltar to enforce the sanctions on Italy following the Abyssinian crisis. In July that year she sailed for Australia, reaching Fremantle, Western Australia later that month and the port of Sydney on August 11th. Until 1939, Sydney spent most of her time conducting training exercises in Australian waters. At the start of WW2, Sydney was assigned to conduct patrols and escort duties in home waters. On November 16th 1939 she was captained by Captain John Collins. On November 28th, Sydney joined the Kent-class Heavy cruisers HMAS Australia and HMAS Canberra in search of the German pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spree in the Indian Ocean which went unsuccessful.

 

Captain John Collins on the right.

 

 

In May 1940 Sydney was transferred to the Mediterranean and became part of the 7th Cruiser Squadron. She was in the port of Alexandria on June 10th 1940 when Italy joined the war with Germany. On June 21st, Sydney, accompanied by the Leander-class cruisers, HMS Orion and HMS Neptune, the French battleship, Lorraine, and four destroyers shelled the Libyan port of Bardia.

 

 

Southwest of Cape Matapan on the evening of June 28th, Sydney, along with two Leander class cruisers, HMS Orion, HMS Neptune and two Town class cruisers, HMS Liverpool and HMS Gloucester, commanded by Admiral John Tovey (the same Admiral who would lead the pursuit and sinking of Bismarck) from the HMS Orion, engaged three Italian destroyers, Espero, Ostro and Zeffiro, transporting anti-tank units from Taranto, Italy for Tobruk. The first shots were fired at 18:33 and just over an hour later, Sydney struck the destroyer Espero. Her Captain, Enrico Baroni, decided to sacrifice his ship by laying smoke to allow the other two destroyers to escape. By 20:00 the Espero was dead in the water and with night falling and low on ammunition, Tovey ordered Sydney to sink Espero and rescue survivors. At 20:40, Espero rolled 90* to starboard and went down with 145 out of her crew of 225 that night including Captain Baroni. Sydney rescued 44 of her crew and dropped one of her own cutters with provisions, oars, and signal projectors for the remaining 36 in life rafts, though only 6 would be picked up by an Italian submarine two weeks later, bringing the death toll to 175. This was the first surface engagement between Allied and Italian warships in WW2.

 

Espero going down. Please note that the Turbine class destroyer is not in the game so the Spica class torpedo boat was used as a placeholder

 

Italian destroyer Espero

 

On July 9th, off the coast of Calabria, southern Italy, a fleet of British and Australian warships, including Sydney, and the carrier HMS Eagle, led by Fleet Admiral Andrew Cunningham engaged a fleet of Italian warships led by Admiral Inigo Compioni. The outcome was indecisive but a few ships from both sides were damaged and Sydney was awarded a medal: “Calabria 1940”.

 

 

On the morning of July 19th, Sydney, along with 4 H-class and one I-class destroyers, engaged two Italian Giussano class light cruisers (a subclass of the Condottieri class light cruiser): Giovanni delle Bande Nere and Bartolomeo Colleoni, armed with eight 6 inch guns, northwest of Crete -- in a place known as Cape Spada. The Italian cruisers were bound for the Greek island of Leros, near Turkey. Sydney sighted the two cruisers heading east and opened fire at a distance of 20,000 yards in which the Italian cruisers returned fire. Within three minutes, Sydney struck the Bande Nere’s forward funnel, killing four of her crew. Following this, the cruisers made heavy smoke and turned clockwise to the southeast and then the southwest to escape. Captain Collins then turned to starboard to bring his rear turrets to bear and focused his fire on the Colleoni.  Within minutes the Colleoni’s bow was blown off just in front of the forwardmost turret and another strike from Sydney knocked out the engines, leaving her dead in the water. Captain Collins ordered three destroyers to break off and sink her with torpedoes and pick up survivors; Colleoni would go down with 121 sailors while 555 were rescued by three of the destroyers.

 

Colleoni with her bow blown off.

 

During the battle, Bande Nere had struck Sydney in the forward funnel without any casualties. Collins and the H-class destroyer Havoc pursued the Italian cruiser but disengaged as he was low on armament and Bande Nere retreated southwest back to Benghazi at 38 knots. At the end of the two hour battle, over 181 salvoes had been fired. The destroyers would then be attacked by Italian bombers, damaging the Havoc. The ships returned to Alexandria the following day and were given a hero's welcome. Sydney would be awarded a medal: “Spada 1940”.

 

Sydney pursuing the Bande Nere. Please note that the modified-Leander class cruiser is not in the game and the Leander class cruiser, which only has one funnel, not two, and does not carry a Walrus seaplane was used.

 

Damage to Sydney's funnel.

 

Picture taken of HMAS Sydney's crew following the Battle of Cape Spada. 

This image has become a landmark image of HMAS Sydney.

 

From June to December 1941 Sydney escorted allied ships across the Mediterranean, shelled Axis held ports, and shot down Italian and German aircraft. She had been attacked over 60 times...

 

 

... without even a single fatality of her crew (there was a fatality on Sydney but this was attributed to an illness).

 

 

Sydney would be awarded her third medal for her service in the Mediterranean, “Mediterranean 1940”. On January 8th after departing Malta, Sydney was transferred back to home waters and reached the city that bore her name at sunset on February 9th. Two days later her ship’s company performed a freedom of entry march in which thousands of people including school children, for that day was decided to be a holiday for this event, attended. A clip from a 1993 documentary about HMAS Sydney shows this event.

On February 27th she departed for Fremantle, Western Australia to start her new duties of escorting ships up to the Middle East and Europe, the Dutch East Indies and Oceania. On May 15th she was assigned a new Captain, Joseph Burnett. Burnett served aboard HMAS Australia in WW1, reaching the rank of sub-lieutenant in October 1918 and then remained in England as part of an attachment of the Royal Navy. He would marry in 1924 and have three children. In December 1932 he was promoted to Commander and returned to Australia. On New Year’s Eve 1938 he would be promoted to Captain. HMAS Sydney was the first ship that Burnett had been assigned to Captain.

 

Captain Joseph Burnett (lesser known image).

 

On September 4th, HMAS Sydney left Sydney, Australia for Melbourne, that would be the last time that she was ever in the city that bore her name and ever passed through the Sydney Heads: the entrance to Port Jackson. On September 25th she returned to Fremantle.

 

Part 2 available here: The Life and Death of HMAS Sydney (II): Part 2 - Screenshots - IL-2 Sturmovik Forum (il2sturmovik.com)

 

Enceladus.

Edited November 19, 2021 by Enceladus

[FurphyForum]

@EnceladusWell done.

If you enjoyed that then follow up your studies on HMAS Perth also a modified-Leander class CL. With a history as rich and unique in the MTO. 

[BladeMeister]

Nice work Enceladus. It is apparent you have labored hard to bring this project to life. Keep up the good work and I look forward to parts 2-5.

 

S!Blade<><

[[CPT]Pike*HarryM]

On 11/4/2021 at 5:43 AM, FurphyForum said:

@EnceladusWell done.

If you enjoyed that then follow up your studies on HMAS Perth also a modified-Leander class CL. With a history as rich and unique in the MTO. 

Ship of Ghosts covers her ending very well, her and Houston, sisters-in-arms. ????

[FurphyForum]

@[CPT]HarryM Yep, good book. The author 'Mike Carlton' covers HMAS Perth in a book called 'Cruiser' - well worth the read also.

 

Spoiler

 

 

[JG1hkaddatz35]

On 1/21/2022 at 9:00 AM, Enceladus said:

Glad to see that Drop Tanks are back in Beta ?

I can understand why you’re doing it with only a few Bf-109s so that if any bugs are present that doesn’t affect every plane. But one question I have is were the fuel systems on the Fw-190s, P-51s, P-47s, etc. so radically different that each type plane will have Drop Tanks added to them in stages or will Drop Tanks be added to the rest of the planes already in the game quite quickly?

 

Thank you ?