This action, which had disturbed the sleepers of Terrigal, has been called 'the Battle of Terrigal' (Gill, 1957:69-70).īut false alarms ceased to be amusing a year or two later, because the Central Coast of New South Wales was the site of several merchant ship sinkings, and more than one lifeboat was to come ashore with shocked and damaged survivors not so far from Terrigal. They found that the object was a group of rocks with sheer faces four metres high, causing tidal eddies which had given the effect of movement on Stuart's detection gear. The next morning a submerged object was seen, and navy divers went down to inspect it. During the night HMAS Stuart sent down a series of depth charges. Naval authorities closed the ports of Newcastle, Sydney and Kembla to outbound traffic. The brand-new destroyer HMAS Stuart, which was on anti-submarine patrol off Sydney, sped to the scene and detected what seemed to be a moving submarine. On the morning of 9 September 1939, six days after World War II had been declared, two young boys reported seeing a submarine surfaced off Terrigal, a small holiday town on the New South Wales Central Coast. For teachers, schools and community educatorsĪfter the Battle of Terrigal: merchant navy losses off the New South Wales coast in World War IIĬurator, Australian National Maritime Museum Introduction.

Life in the navy during world war 2