An Australia Day Tribute to HMAS AE2
- Shaun Lewis
- 48 minutes ago
- 4 min read
As Australia celebrates its National Day, I pay tribute to the brave Australian submariners of HMS AE2 in WW1. The submarine was one of two E-class boats built for the Royal Australian Navy. It’s ship’s company comprised a mix of Australian and British sailors, but the commanding officer was an Irishman, Lieutenant Commander Hew Stoker, an actor and cousin of Bram Stoker, the author of Dracula.
AE2 joined a squadron of British and French submarines at Tenedos, an island off the entrance to the Dardanelles Strait, in the spring of 1915. In late April, Stoker was ordered to penetrate the Strait into the Sea of Marmara and to ‘run amuck’. The Strait was considered impenetrable due to the sea defences of shore batteries, searchlights, anti-submarine nets, minefields and roving sea patrols. However, were AE2 to succeed, the submarine would be able to stop enemy shipping plying between the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles to resupply and reinforce with troops the Turkish forts defending the beaches of Gallipoli.
On the face of it, this was a suicide mission. Not only did the submarine have to overcome the Turkish defences, but also, the challenge of dived navigation. The Strait is forty miles long, four miles wide at its widest and narrows to just one mile across. It is only 120 feet deep at its shallowest. With currents of up to five knots against the submarine, its maximum dived speed was only three or four knots. The submarine’s batteries could not last a dived passage without surfacing for a charge (in the days before the snorkel mast). Moreover, even if AE2 did succeed in penetrating as far as the Sea of Marmara, the Turks would be on the alert for her return. In fact, as I describe in my novel, The Custom of the Trade, several allied submarines did succeed in the hazardous transit, but AE2 was the first.
At 02.30 on 25 April 1915, AE2 began her perilous transit. Stoker opted to remain on the surface as long as possible to preserve his battery. However, at 04.30, the boat was detected by a searchlight ashore and one of the forts opened fire. Stoker dived the submarine and conned her through a series of minefields. The crew could hear the mooring wires of the mines scraping along the hull. Were one of these wires to snag on any part of the submarine, the boat would drag the mine in contact with the hull and kill all onboard. Twice Stoker surfaced in the minefields to obtain a fix on his position. At 06.00, even though dived at periscope depth, the periscope was sighted by the Turks in forts on both sides of the channel and they opened fire. However, Stoker had sighted several Turkish ships in the vicinity and decided to attack a cruiser.
The torpedo was heard to hit, but a Torpedo Boat Destroyer counter-attacked and tried to ram AE2. In taking evasive action, the submarine ran aground in 10 feet of water, exposing its conning tower to the enemy, directly underneath one of the forts. Several shells straddled the submarine, but the crew managed to float her off the sandbank. From then on, the submarine was hunted by several Turkish vessels and in her flight she often ran aground. Every time Stoker raised his periscope to establish his position, the pursuing forces tried to ram her. However, Stoker reported that throughout, his men acted cooly and intelligently. As soon as he could, Stoker bottomed the submarine in relatively deep water of 80 feet and decided to sit matters out.
At 21.00, under cover of darkness, AE2, surfaced, 16 hours after her initial dive. The crew took the opportunity not just to recharge the battery, but to replenish the fetid air within the hull. AE2 signalled her success in passing through the worst parts of the Strait. Unbeknown to Stoker, the Allies had earlier decided to make preparations to withdraw from the beaches of Gallipoli, but news of AE2’s successful transit through the Strait persuaded the top brass to abandon such plans.
AE2 proceeded towards the Sea of Marmara on the surface until dawn, when she dived again. She arrived at 09.00 on the 26th. For the next few days, she carried out a patrol in both the Sea of Marmara and back in the Strait. Stoker tried to attack a few Turkish warships, but his torpedoes either missed or failed to explode. On several occasions, the Turks opened fire with rifles at the periscope or tried to ram the submarine. On the 29th, AE2 met up with HMS E14 in the Sea of Marmara. Lieutenant Commander Courtney Boyle was the first commanding officer to penetrate the Strait in a British submarine and was to earn the Victoria Cross for three successful patrols in the Sea of Marmara. The two Captains agreed to meet the following morning.
Unfortunately, whilst on passage to the rendezvous with E14, AE2 encountered a Turkish torpedo boat. Moreover, due to the fresh water flowing into the Sea of Marmara from inland, the density of the water was variable and the submarine lost her trim, broaching in the path of the torpedo boat. It opened fire and three shells penetrated the submarine’s engine room. No longer able to fight his submarine, Stoker gave the order to surface and for all hands to abandon ship. He then scuttled the submarine. Despite the Turkish torpedo boat and another continuing to fire on AE2, none of the 33 men were killed and all were made prisoner by the Turks for the next three and a half years. Four sailors died in captivity. AE2 was found in 1998, lying in 36 fathoms of water.
HMAS AE2 paved the way for several British submarines to wreak havoc in the Sea of Marmara. Indeed, so successful was the submarine campaign, the Turkish Army reinforcements for Gallipoli were forced to march on foot from Constantinople, transporting their ammunition on mules. If only the Allied intelligence branches had known, when the withdrawal from the beaches was later ordered, the Turks were down to their last seven days’ worth of shells. I describe the submarine campaign in more detail in my novel, The Custom of the Trade, a story that has proved very popular with my many Australian readers.
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