HMS DIOMEDE in Neutral Bay
Photographer
Frederick Garner Wilkinson
(1901-1975)
Date1932
Object number00037692
NameGlass plate negative
MediumEmulsion on glass
DimensionsOverall: 82 x 103 mm, 2 mm, 0.04 kg
ClassificationsPhotographs
Credit LineANMM Collection Purchased with USA Bicentennial Gift funds
DescriptionHMS DIOMEDE is photographed in Neutral Bay on 20 March 1932. Frederick Wilkinson took this image from a ferry travelling between Mosman and Circular Quay via Cremorne for the Sydney Harbour Bridge celebrations.HistoryHMS DIOMEDE was a Danae class cruiser of the Royal Navy that was launched on 29 April 1919 after World War I, having been ordered under the Emergency War Programme in 1918. In the interwar period DIOMEDE was stationed in the Pacific and East Indies, from 1922-1925 it served on the China Station with the 5th Light Cruiser Squadron, 1925-1936 it sevred with the New Zealand Division of the Royal Navy and from 1936-1939 was in the Reserve Fleet in England.
During World War II it served in numerous operations; in 1939-1940 it was part of the 7th Cruiser Squadron at Scapa Flow patrolling against blockade runners and surface raiders. Then in 1940-42 it was stationed in the West Indies and was refitted, the South Atlantic (1942) and in the Home Fleet (1942-43). DIOMEDE spent its later career as a training ship (1943-1945) at Rosyth, Scotland before it was scrapped in 1946.SignificanceThis photograph is representative of HMS DIOMEDE in Sydney Harbour in 1932. The print is part of the F G Wilkinson Photograph Collection, comprising more than 700 glass plate negatives of ships in Sydney Harbour between 1919 and 1936. The collection provides an extensive and well-documented coverage of the changing styles of shipping in the port of Sydney before the decline of the coastal trade. The backgrounds also reveal the changing face of the city and harbour foreshores.
