Talk:HMAS Australia (1911)

Flag
Use of the Australian naval ensign is incorrect. MILHIST articles use historically correct flags & since the RAN ensign wasn't used until the 1960s, Australia (and all Commonwealth warships) would have used the White ensign. I'll change it soon. Folks at 137 (talk) 22:52, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Not the only capital ship?
I would think that HMAS Melbourne qualifies as a capital ship under any standard definition?198.253.49.6 (talk) 16:47, 19 November 2009 (UTC)
 * The definition used by the Royal Australian Navy's history website only includes this warship as a capital ship. Other sources use a broader definition (usually encompassing the three aircraft carriers, but one goes as far as including every ship larger than a destroyer). The discrepancy is addressed in a footnote in the article. -- saberwyn 20:27, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

CLEAR MISTAKE TO FIX
The present text states, "Australia did not participate in the Battle of Jutland: at the time of the engagement, she was undergoing repairs to her armour plating following two successive collisions with sister ship HMS New Zealand while zigzagging in heavy fog on 22 June 1916." Obviously this is an error because the Battle of Jutland occurred on May 31 - June 1, 1916, so a collision on 22 June 1916 could not have caused her to miss the battle. Somebody please get the facts correct and edit. Thanks! - N'Awlins Contrarian —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.237.230.2 (talk) 23:48, 19 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Should have read "22 April 1916". Now fixed. -- saberwyn 01:41, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Aircraft
We've got two different dates for the aircraft and there's nothing in Roberts to reconcile the two.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 20:22, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Proposed new lead photo
The State Library of Victoria now has two high-quality photos of Australia available on its website with their copyright status marked as "This work is out of copyright". Would there be any objections to using the photo in this thread as a replacement for the current lead photo in the infobox? - it's clearer and much higher resolution than the current photo. A high resolution TIFF version of the photo is also available on the SLV's website, but it's 30 MB +. Nick-D (talk) 10:41, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I have no problem using it.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 11:15, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
 * No probs here. -- saberwyn 21:16, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I've added it in, and moved the previous image back to its 'old' spot. The alt text will probably need some polishing. -- saberwyn
 * Thanks for that Nick-D (talk) 07:43, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
 * While having a read of this fine article, I noticed that this infobox picture is mis-captioned at the source (and here) as dating from 1914. It's clearly a post-war image, owing to several wartime additions being clearly visible; the large stablilised mounting above the foretop for the 15-foot and 9-foot rangefinder, and the director beneath the foretop.  She's also wearing a Commodore's Pendant (i.e. that of Commodore Dumaresq). --Simon Harley (Talk | Library). 19:58, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
 * One day, one day, we will come across an image that is what it says, not be the wrong ship, wrong date, wrong place, etc. In the meantime, I've stripped the date from the infobox. -- saberwyn 02:48, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Note II
Hey guys, where is note II supposed to link to in the article? — Ed   (talk  •  majestic titan)  20:49, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Right there. Oops. -- saberwyn 21:18, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks! — Ed   (talk  •  majestic titan)  04:27, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Potential TFA date
I know its a few years off, but I'm proposing that we try to save this article for "Today's Featured Article" on 4 October 2013. This will be the 100th anniversary of the arrival of the RAN's new fleet in Sydney, an event I believe that the RAN is planning to make some fuss about with an international fleet review and other festivities. If no other suitable articles present themselves, and if this is still at FA status, having the flagship of the RAN fleet on the main page would be pretty awesome. Some other suitable dates in the foreseeable furtue include 25 October 2011 (100 years since launching) and 21 June 2013 (100 years since commissioning), but I don't think those will attract as much off-Wiki attention. -- saberwyn 07:20, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
 * TFA'd on 25 October. So much for this plan. -- saberwyn 07:15, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
 * This is the problem when TFA's get scheduled ten hours before they go live... Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 07:51, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Promotions dispute
Shouldn't "in favour of" read "in preference to"? --Wikiain (talk) 02:07, 12 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure which is more correct, so I've rephrased the entire sentence. -- saberwyn 04:05, 14 September 2011 (UTC)
 * That looks better. It leaves open the possibility that the process was not designed or deliberately used to discriminate against Australians but simply designed for the RN generally, with criteria that - as it happened - Australians were less likely to satisfy, e.g. through lesser opportunity to gain particular kinds of experience or obtain particular kinds of training. Cock-up rather than conspiracy, maybe, though victims of the former would have been likely to suspect the latter. Perhaps there was indeed conspiracy, or at least collective prejudice, but one would need specific evidence. --Wikiain (talk) 05:59, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

There seem to be some problems with the mutiny section. This, "After the battlecruiser's arrival in Fremantle, the sailors were expecting shore leave after four years' service in foreign waters. However, the stay only amounted to three full days, with Australia scheduled to depart early on 1 June for Melbourne," suggested to me on first reading that no leave was granted, when in fact it was. There's no mention that some of those sailors arrested were drunk, nor that when Australia left Fremantle Captain Cumberlege cleared lower deck and read out the articles of war (which are very explicit about the penalties for mutiny). See Stevens, The HMAS Australia Mutiny, 1919 in Naval Mutinies of the Twentieth Century, a surprising omission from the bibliography. As to "Two senior officers resigned from the Board in protest", I know that Grant tendered his resignation. Did anyone else on the Board? Dumaresq, who tendered his resignation five days after Grant, was not a member. --Simon Harley (Talk | Library). 09:21, 14 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll need to track down a copy of Frame and Baker's Mutiny before I can fully respond to this (the other sources cited, I either own, or can easily access). As for not using Mutinies of the Twentieth Century, Worldcat and Trove indicate that there are only six library copies available in Australia (none of which are easy for me to access), and the Google Books version did not have the relevant chapter available when the article was expanded; now that (most of) the pages are visible, I'll try to integrate relevant material when possible. -- saberwyn 03:22, 15 September 2011 (UTC)

Sorry for the delay. Most of your concerns can be fixed by copyediting, and I am drafting such at the moment. The second officer was Grant, but the way it was phrased in the source implied that both were Board members. At the moment is I am finding some major discrepancies between Frame's and Stevens' account of these events: a problem when they are the two main names in RAN historiography. The first is the sequence of events once the ship was underway: Frame claims the stokers returned freely before Cumberledge's lecture, while Stevens says that they only did so after the speech and after being ordered. The second is the number of involved. Steven says 5 + 7, but Frame gives 5 + 27. The RAN backs up Stevens' numbers (albeit, ship history pages are the domain of the Sea Power Centre, which Stevens heads, and he may have written or contributed to that webpage), while the Australian War Memorial agrees with Frame. I'll try the best I can, but its probably going to need a sledgehammer copyedit. -- saberwyn 03:18, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Perhaps it might be better to summarize the disputed numbers in a note rather than jump through hoops to cover it in the article?--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 14:47, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I noticed the various differences when I read Stevens's chapter (they're not insignificant), but refrained from mentioning it precisely because of the dilemma you now appear to be facing. It's all very well Wikipedia stipulating that all "significant views" be represented but clearly someone here isn't right.  You may want to get in touch with the SPC and try and see if they have any comment.  Given the number of disagreements between Stevens and Frame, your paragraph highlighting the differences is probably the best solution. --Simon Harley (Talk | Library). 20:18, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Image
Hi all, there's an image of Australia at the US Library of Congress that I don't think anyone has uploaded (unless I missed it). Best, Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 16:59, 29 July 2014 (UTC)
 * A version with the text cropped off exists at File:HMAS Australia LOC 16921u.jpg. Its not in use in the article, because the ship has been misidentified: she is flying the Union Jack at the jackstaff, not the Australian national flag, so is not Oz but either sister ship Indefatiguable or New Zealand. See down the bottom of WikiProject Military history/Assessment/HMAS Australia (1911) for where it was picked up the first time (the series of indents starting from "Question for the masses:") -- saberwyn 09:52, 30 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Ah, that explains why I didn't see it in the Australia category at Commons. Thanks for the info! :-) Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 12:48, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

Propellor
The propellor mentioned in the text is located a short walk away and the plaque identifies it as the outer port propellor. This article identifies it as the outer starboard screw. Has the Australian War Memorial stuffed up? Or have we? --Pete (talk) 19:01, 29 July 2014 (UTC)
 * That's a Saberwyn OopsTM. Fixing.
 * As an aside, there was no need to bracket (A) in the file name, the ship was Australian for the full duration of her existence. -- saberwyn 09:52, 30 July 2014 (UTC)


 * Well, you'd think so. But look at the inscription on the propellor. --Pete (talk) 14:01, 30 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Sheer speculation but perhaps the propeller was made and marked before "HMAS" was settled. The Australian Navy becomes "Royal" in mid 1911 and building of Australia started in 1910. GraemeLeggett (talk) 18:47, 30 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Or the propeller makers simply didn't get the memo., so to speak, (if there even was one) about the use of "H.M.A.S." Colony-specific prefixes weren't new at this time, I don't think, but I'd have to check that (I'm thinking pre-Commonwealth Naval Defence Forces). &mdash;Simon Harley (Talk | Library). 19:07, 30 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Agree with both of the above as being likely explanations. See also HMS New Zealand --Pete (talk) 22:54, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

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