19/05/2026
The Story of the H.M.A.S Armidale and the Heroics of Ordinary Seaman Edward "Teddy" Sheean.
Every Australian should know and memorise this story... Lest We Forget.
This Address was delivered on Anzac Day by my Good Friend, Angus Callander... Here it is
ANZAC DAY DAWN SERVICE – YEERAKINE ROCK MEMORIAL
Address by Angus Callander – President, HMAS Armidale Association (Inc.)
Thank you, Allen, for your kind introduction.
I would like to begin by thanking the Kondinin community for the great honour of delivering the Anzac Day Dawn Service address here at the magnificent memorial at Yeerakine Rock.
My good friend Gary Repacholi has often spoken to me about how special this place is. To stand here for
the first time, and to speak at this service of remembrance, is both a privilege and a profound honour.
Some months ago, I attended a memorial service commemorating the nurses of the Vyner Brooke and the
massacre on Bangka Island. Among those remembered was Sister Minnie Hodgson, whose final civilian role before the war had been as Matron of the Kondinin District Hospital. Like so many who served, she gave everything and has no known grave.
Today, I would like to share with you the story of another young Australian who rests beneath the sea without a grave to mark his sacrifice — Ordinary Seaman Edward “Teddy” Sheean VC of HMAS Armidale.
On the 1st of December 1942, Teddy Sheean gave his life to save his shipmates as HMAS Armidale was sunk during the Second World War. He was just eighteen years of age. For his extraordinary courage, Teddy Sheean was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross for Australia in 2020 — the nation’s highest award for gallantry. To this day, he remains the only sailor of the Royal Australian Navy to receive that honour.
Teddy was born in 1923 in the small farming community of Lower Barrington in north-west Tasmania. He was one of sixteen children, and six members of the Sheean family served in the armed forces during the war.
After leaving school at fourteen, Teddy worked as a farmhand before joining the Royal Australian Navy in late 1941. He trained at HMAS Derwent in Hobart and, in 1942, was posted to the newly commissioned Bathurst-class corvette HMAS Armidale. Armidale was one of sixty corvettes built in Australian shipyards during the war. These ships, named after regional towns and cities across the country, played a vital role escorting convoys, protecting supply lines, and carrying troops through dangerous waters.
Before joining Armidale, Teddy was accommodated aboard HMAS Kuttabul in Sydney Harbour — a requisitioned ferry used as a depot ship. While Teddy was on leave in Tasmania, Japanese midget submarines entered Sydney Harbour and sank Kuttabul, killing several of his mates.
HMAS Armidale was commissioned in June 1942 and spent much of its early service escorting convoys along Australia’s east coast and supporting operations in New Guinea during the Kokoda campaign. In November 1942, Armidale, together with HMAS Castlemaine and HMAS Kuru, was ordered to support operations in Portuguese Timor. Their mission was to assist in the evacuation of the 2/2nd Independent Company — Australian soldiers who had conducted a determined guerrilla campaign against overwhelming Japanese forces since early 1942.
At midday on the 29th of November, Armidale and Castlemaine departed Darwin. Soon after leaving port, a Japanese reconnaissance aircraft was sighted overhead. It almost certainly reported the ships’ movements.
On board Armidale were eighty-three crewmen, three Australian soldiers, and sixty-three Dutch East Indies troops — one hundred and forty-nine men in total. The following day, the ships came under repeated air attack. Through determined seamanship and evasive manoeuvres, the crews avoided destruction, but the attacks delayed their arrival at Timor. On the morning of the 1st of December, orders were received for HMAS Armidale to continue the mission alone while Castlemaine returned to Darwin.
It would prove a fatal decision. At approximately 3:00 in the afternoon, nine Japanese bombers and accompanying fighter aircraft attacked Armidale from multiple directions. Torpedoes struck the ship with devastating effect. Within minutes, the order was given to abandon ship. As wounded men entered the water, Japanese aircraft strafed the survivors.
It was at that moment that Teddy Sheean made the decision for which he would forever be remembered. Though already wounded, Teddy turned back. He climbed to the after deck, strapped himself into the Oerlikon anti-aircraft gun, and opened fire on the attacking aircraft.
Witnesses recalled seeing him continue to fire as the ship sank beneath him. Even as seawater rose around his waist, Teddy remained at his post, protecting the men in the water below. Survivors later spoke of tracer rounds still arcing skyward as HMAS Armidale disappeared beneath the sea.
His actions were not ordered. They were not expected.
The order to abandon ship had already been given. Teddy Sheean was free to try to save himself. Instead, he chose to defend his mates. It was an act of extraordinary courage, selflessness, and sacrifice — valour beyond the call of duty.
Yet Teddy Sheean was not the only hero that day.
For the one hundred men left alive in the water, another ordeal had only just begun.
The survivors clung to damaged rafts, floating wreckage, and an abandoned whaler. Many were wounded. Around them circled sharks and sea snakes. They were more than three hundred nautical miles from Darwin, and because Armidale had been operating under radio silence, no distress signal had been sent. In the days that followed, the survivors displayed extraordinary endurance and ingenuity. Lieutenant Commander David Richards, commanding officer of Armidale, departed in a damaged motorboat with wounded men and volunteers who attempted to reach Darwin in the hope of raising the alarm.
Those remaining worked tirelessly to salvage and repair a bullet-ridden whaler, bailing it with helmets and patching holes with torn clothing — an extraordinary feat under impossible conditions.
On the fifth day, a group of sailors and soldiers, including my father, John Callander, set out in the repaired whaler in an attempt to row to Bathurst Island. Meanwhile, the motorboat party was sighted by a Royal Australian Air Force Hudson aircraft and later rescued by HMAS Kalgoorlie. Their rescue led searchers back toward the area where Armidale had gone down.
The men remaining on the rafts were eventually sighted from the air. A photograph taken that day — showing exhausted survivors waving weakly toward the aircraft — remains one of the most haunting images of the war.
Tragically, worsening seas prevented rescue, and those men were never seen again. The men in the whaler were eventually rescued on the ninth day. In total, one hundred en lost their lives. Only forty-nine survived. For those who returned home, the memory of Teddy Sheean remained deeply personal.
Many survivors later spoke quietly of how his courage inspired them to endure, to keep fighting for life, and to look after one another through those terrible days at sea.
Today, the HMAS Armidale Association exists to ensure the memory of these men is never lost to history. For some survivors, remembrance became a private ritual. One survivor, Roy Cleland, would take leave each year on the 1st of December, travel into Melbourne, walk into Young and Jackson’s Hotel opposite Flinders Street Station, and buy two beers. Leaving one
untouched, he would tell the barmaid, “My mates will be along later to drink that.”
Another family kept a place set at the dinner table each night for their missing son and brother for three years after the sinking, refusing to abandon hope until the war finally ended.
These stories remind us that the cost of war does not end when the battle is over. Its grief echoes through families, communities, and generations.
As we continue this service today, let us remember that remembrance itself carries responsibility. By gathering here each year, we ensure that stories of courage, sacrifice, mateship, and service are not lost to time. May this memorial continue to stand as a place of reflection, gratitude, and remembrance.
And may we never forget those who gave their lives so that others can subsequently enjoy the freedoms
we too often take for granted.
LEST WE FORGET
