Maritime History

HMAS Protector (1884)

HMCS (later HMAS) Protector was a large flat-iron gunboat commissioned and purchased by the South Australian government in 1884, for the purpose of defending the local coastline against possible attacks in the aftermath of the 'Russian scare', of the 1870s. She arrived in Adelaide in September 1884 and served in the Boxer Rebellion, World War I and World War II. During July 1943, Protector was requisitioned for war service by the U.S. Army. On the way to New Guinea and off Gladstone, she was damaged in a collision with a tug and abandoned. The hull was taken to Heron Island off the Queensland coast and later sunk for use as a breakwater. Her rusting remains are still visible to this day.

Also on this shelf

See also

• ▸CSS Shenandoah
• ▸Cultural references to Leonardo da Vinci
• ▸Cryptogram of Olivier Levasseur

Uncatalogued shelf

Text from Wikipedia; plate via Wikimedia Commons. Text CC BY-SA 4.0; plate freely licensed (see Commons). Source record. Images and catalogue data are reproduced from open-access collections.