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QUIET WATERS

An account of HMAS Canberra and one of her sailors, and three USS cruisers and their men, who rest in the deep quiet waters of Iron Bottom Sound

by Brennan Keats

HMAS Canberra now rests upright 2500 feet down on the bottom of Iron Bottom Sound, her guns trained out to port with visible signs of the fire and shell damage she sustained in her last action scattered on her decks. Her forward superstructure has collapsed to her starboard side. Now she is a war grave for 74 sailors one of which is my brother, Russell.

After studying flute and organ at the then NSW Conservatorium of Music, Russell was prevailed upon by his parents not to pursue a musical career, so after what appears to have been a short period of time (I think it could be counted in weeks if not days) in the workforce he joined the Militia. He served in 17th Battalion, Signal Section, stationed at Brookvale. In a letter dated September 1939, he began what was to prove to be an ongoing plea to join the regular army. “I am writing mainly to ask you to lift your ban upon me in listing for the twenty thousand forces [meaning of this is unknown to me]. Will not commit myself finally until I hear from you, which I would like to do as soon as possible as I should give a decision tomorrow but have put it off for two or three days.”

He would have joined any of the services, as would so many young men of his generation, keen to be of service to their country. They saw war as something a man had to do.

Russell came from a strict home life yet despite this he persevered and eventually his father signed the papers. Having won his point, on 1 December 1939 he arrived at Flinders Naval Depot in Victoria.

It was not long before training commenced in the form of drill and physical training, rowing and water work, followed by rifle shooting -some chaps have very uncomfortable shoulders - and then another period of combining all three. Initially they slept in very uncomfortable beds, later they moved up to hammocks which were utter bliss in comparison.

He gave a vivid description of gas-drill a most necessary but unpleasant experience, which we don’t have nearly enough of for my liking. It does not entail any of the horror that people attach to gas-drill however. We were issued with modern respirators to last us for twenty years unless any drastic changes are made in the meantime. We did ordinary drill by putting on and taking off also went into the chamber with and without gadget. Tear gas not shocking and have never seen any thing as funny as forty men all howling their eyes out at once. It is a ghastly feeling, breathing continually through an apparatus that makes it an effort every time you fill your lungs.

All this adds up to toughness in Russell, who was prepared to speak out if circumstances required. On one occasion he was beaten up by a number of sailors for standing up for a young midshipman. There was compassion too, he wrote of a night in Cerberus when a young sailor came back so drunk he could barely walk. Rather than leaving him outside the mess it was at the instigation of Russell that he was dragged in, “shoved” under a shower and then, they “poured” him into his hammock.

I indicate the sheer monotony of a sailor’s life in Canberra showing the flag in her pre-war existence then during the war, constant convoy duty, and raider hunting. Because of the lack of radar in any form the hunting was a very “hit and miss’ affair. Please bear with this first section of the book, because it will give you some insight as to how unprepared she was to defend herself from the ghastly fate that awaited her.

I have portrayed the sheer horror of being in a ship subjected to concentrated fire by enemy warships. Given the sensitivity of my brother, in a respectful way, I’m grateful that if he had to die it happened as quickly as it did. He was spared many ghastly memories.

Finally, I have commemorated my brother not only in word but in song. Included is an audio disc of five songs written by his father, the composer, Horace Keats, during World War II, three distinctly nautical in flavour. Two of these impressed Russell to the point where he considered arranging them for Canberra’s choir, the other two he was not to hear on this earth at least.

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