
Ä Parting Shot
Shelling of Australia by Japanese Submarines 1942
Bluewater Press
2nd Edition
Published on 10. April 2026
Book
Paperback/Softback
320 pages
978-1-7642202-8-6 (ISBN)
Description
A PARTING SHOT
Shelling of Australia by Japanese Submarines, 1942
In the early hours of 8 June 1942, Japanese submarines surfaced off Sydney and Newcastle and opened fire on Australia's east coast. It was the only time enemy warships directly bombarded the Australian mainland during the Second World War.
The attack came just days after the dramatic midget submarine raid inside Sydney Harbour, when the Japanese submarine M24 torpedoed the accommodation ship HMAS Kuttabul, killing twenty-one sailors. As the supporting fleet submarines withdrew from Australian waters, two commanders made a final gesture of defiance-surfacing offshore and firing their deck guns at Australia's largest coastal cities.
Although the bombardments caused little physical damage, the psychological impact was profound. Shells fell in suburban streets, unexploded ordnance was recovered, and rumours of invasion spread rapidly through the population. Yet within weeks the attacks were largely forgotten, their details obscured by confusion, incomplete records and decades of speculation.
Drawing on wartime documents, naval reports, civil defence files and bomb-disposal evidence, Steven Carruthers and Commander Terry Jones reconstruct the bombardments in forensic detail. Their investigation traces where the shells landed, why many failed to explode, and how authorities responded to an attack few had anticipated.
Focused, authoritative and deeply researched, A Parting Shot restores these little-known Japanese submarine bombardments to their rightful place in Australia's wartime history.
More details
Edition
Revised edition
Language
English
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
Thickness: 21 mm
Weight
689 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-7642202-8-6 (9781764220286)
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Steven Carruthers is an Australian maritime historian and former Royal Australian Navy serviceman whose research focuses on the Second World War submarine campaign off Australia's east coast.Drawing on decades of archival research and diving experience, his work combines naval history with maritime archaeology and the first-hand accounts of wartime participants and witnesses. His research has helped illuminate the little-known Japanese submarine attacks against Australia in 1942, including the shelling of Sydney and Newcastle.Carruthers writes from Warilla, New South Wales, and publishes under the Bluewater Press imprint.