page_title: History of the Royal Australian Navy
section_title: Sicily 1943
hierarchical_section_title: History of the Royal Australian Navy / World War II / Operations against Italy, Vichy France and Germany / Sicily 1943
caption_attribution_description: English: AWM Caption: NEW BRITAIN, 1945-09. A GROUP OF AUSTRALIAN SAILORS IN THE RABAUL AREA. BATHURST CLASS MINESWEEPER/CORVETTE HMAS DUBBO IS IN THE BACKGROUND.
context_page_description: The history of the Royal Australian Navy traces the development of the Royal Australian Navy from the colonisation of Australia by the British in 1788. Until 1859, vessels of the Royal Navy made frequent trips to the new colonies. In 1859, the Australia Squadron was formed as a separate squadron and remained in Australia until 1913. Until Federation, five of the six Australian colonies operated their own colonial naval force, which formed on 1 March 1901 the Australian Navy's Commonwealth Naval Force which received Royal patronage in July 1911 and was from that time referred to as Royal Australian Navy. On 4 October 1913 the new replacement fleet for the foundation fleet of 1901 steamed through Sydney Heads for the first time.
  The Royal Australian Navy has seen action in every ocean of the world. It first saw action in World War I, in the Pacific, Indian and Atlantic oceans. Between the wars the RAN's fortunes shifted with the financial situation of Australia: it experienced great growth during the 1920s, but was forced to reduce its fleet and operations during the 1930s. Consequently, when it entered World War II, the RAN was smaller than it had been at the start of World War I.
context_section_description: During early 1943, eight Australian-designed and built Bathurst-class corvettes were transferred to Egypt from the Indian Ocean, in preparation for Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of Sicily. They were part of a 3,000-ship Allied force. The corvettes arrived in the Mediterranean in May and were formed into the 21st and 22nd Minesweeping Flotillas. All eight ships survived the campaign without damage or casualties sustained in action, although HMAS Maryborough experienced a near-miss from a German bomber. When the captain of HMAS Gawler enquired what damage had been sustained, the response from Maryborough read: "no damage except to my underpants".
caption: Australian sailors with a Bathurst-class corvette in the background. The RAN commissioned 56 of this class of corvettes during World War II.
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "GIMP 2.6.11", "Image DateTime": "2012:09:13 11:15:46", "Image ExifOffset": "146", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "450", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "341"}