By Commodore DD Farthing DSC RAN (Rtd.)*
(This article was published in Headmark in 2012)
Judge Advocate: “It is competent for the Court, whether the accused be an officer or rating, to record a verdict of honourable acquittal, but only in exceptional cases and where the professional conduct or personal honour of the accused is in issue.” Subsequently: ‘’This is the Court’s finding: the first charge – Honourable Acquittal; the second charge – Honourable Acquittal. (Extracts from the Court Martial of Captain J.P. Stevenson, 25 August 1969)
John Philip Stevenson comes from a naval family. His father John B. Stevenson joined the Royal Navy as a Cadet in 1890. Stevenson Senior’s first connection with the RAN occurred when, having been lent by the Admiralty, he came to Australia as Commander of HMAS Encounter in 1911 and then had command of HMAS Cerberus, then the naval depot at Williamstown. He served in several RAN cruisers during WWI and was promoted to Captain in 1916. Having transferred to the RAN, he served in Navy Office, as Australian Naval Representative in London from 1924 to 1927, and as Second Naval Member of the Commonwealth Naval Board. He was briefly Acting Chief of Naval Staff. He retired as a consequence of the severe naval reductions of the depression.
RAN College J P Stevenson joined RANC in January 1935 and graduated in December 1938, with prizes in Mathematics, Chemistry and Physics. On Subs’ Courses he established an early reputation for excellence with “firsts” in Signals, Gunnery, Navigation and Pilotage, and Torpedo courses. His first ship was HMS Shropshire and he relates his first naval “adventure”. In 1940 the Admiralty issued an order that all Dutch merchant ships were to be arrested. JPS found himself “as a very nervous Midshipman” climbing up the side of a 5000-ton freighter, with a support party of fifteen sailors, to take the ship into Dakar. After two pleasant weeks in Dakar, he was retrieved by Shropshire’s Walrus and rejoined his ship in Freetown. Shropshire then took part in the hunt for the Graf Spee and subsequently in the operation against the Bismarck. He was posted as Navigator of HMAS Nestor not long before that ship was sunk (bombs and a torpedo) in the Med in 1942. He then joined the sister ship, HMAS Napier. In 1943 Lieutenant Stevenson was posted back to Shropshire, then fitting out in the UK for re-commissioning and transfer to the RAN as a replacement for HMAS Canberra. On arrival in Australia, Shropshire joined Task Force 74 – comprising three USN and three RAN cruisers and five USN and three RAN destroyers – for service in the Solomons and with a support base in Milne Bay. Shropshire had the best radar and thus had the air warning duties for the force. JPS clearly impressed as a radar officer as he was then selected with his good friend “Dusty” Millar (later Captain Robin A H Millar RAN) to undergo the Radar Officers’ course in the UK. He flew by B24 Liberator to San Francisco, travelled by train across the US, with a two week stopover in Washington and then a “very uncomfortable” passage across the Atlantic in Queen Elizabeth. Radar course The Admiralty “boffins” declared that the two RAN officers could not possibly complete the course because their academic qualifications were inadequate, but they stuck to their guns and passed the six month course at Eastbourne – undeterred by being directly under the flight path of V1s (many) and a few V2s. After the course, JPS was given high priority to return to Australia and ordered to fly home; initially in a Sunderland. Dusty Millar received lower priority, travelled by sea, and beat him home. War’s end Lieutenant Stevenson finished the war in HMAS Shropshire as Fleet Radar Officer and was at the surrender in Tokyo Bay. Shortly after the surrender, he was detached to a joint Allied force tasked with Prisoner of War recovery and restoration of Japanese essential services. A few days later he was flown to Nagasaki in a C47 aircraft. The Japanese had immobilised the airfield runways by digging trenches across them. After searching for some time, the aircraft captain announced that they would have to do a belly landing. JPS says that “this was probably my least enjoyable experience of the war.” The group then went to the coal mines where the POW’s had been most harshly treated and were in the greatest need of help. They organized air drops of food and medical supplies and had to deal with serious unrest between national groups, some of whom had been collaborating with their captors. JPS also reported that there was no opposition from the Japanese; they had completely accepted the Emperor’s order to surrender. Shore posting, and another course Post-war found Lieutenant Stevenson training radar operators at HMAS Watson. Infrastructure was basic and they went to the Watsons’ Bay pub for meals. After six months at Watson, he was informed that he was to be transferred to the Electrical Branch. A polite, but determined “no thank you” resulted in JPS, accompanied by J L W “Red” Merson, travelling in RMS Strathaird to UK for long N/D Courses.
On passage he first met Joanne, his future wife, but she disembarked in India and they did not meet again for a further five years. After his N/D course he joined the frigate HMS Loch Quoich as Navigator and served in the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean. He was briefly CO of the minesweeper HMS Flying Fish, which was soon deployed elsewhere, and then joined HMS Vengeance as Direction Officer in the Med, before transferring to HMAS Sydney which had returned to the UK to collect RN sailors transferring to the RAN. Commands and promotions On return to Australia JPS assumed command of HMAS Barcoo, then the training ship, followed by a brief period in command of Hawkesbury. He commented that “the River class ships were good to handle”. Then followed HMAS Australia as Fleet D, Navy Office as Director of Plans, Manus Island (HMAS Tarangau) “to sort out some irregularities”, and a very enjoyable interlude in the Royal Yacht as ADC to the Duke of Edinburgh for the Melbourne Olympic Games. (He had been promoted Commander on 30 June 1954.) Next he was CO of Anzac and the ship was awarded the Gloucester Cup in 1957. Marriage followed and a very agreeable appointment to the US Naval War College. He did not finish this course as another “crash” posting intervened; this time as Naval Attaché in Bangkok. JPS reports that he achieved an “adequate” level of fluency in both spoken and written Thai. After Bangkok he was XO at Watson before becoming D10 (as Acting Captain; it would be confirmed 31 December 1960) in Vendetta. He was detached briefly from Vendetta to act as Naval Adviser to Counsel assisting the Royal Commission into the Melbourne/ Voyager collision. Unsurprisingly, Counsel Assisting, Jack Smyth QC, soon decided that he knew all there was to know about naval matters and Stevenson returned to his ship. Command of the Flagship Captain Stevenson then had command of HMAS Sydney, was Commodore Superintendent of Training at Cerberus (where the writer first met him and learned a great deal about leadership) and had a tour as Naval Attaché in Washington before assuming command of HMAS Melbourne. On the 3 June 1969, Captain J P Stevenson’s distinguished and remarkable career came to an abrupt and desperately unjust end.
SEATO Exercise Sea Spirit
A few days earlier, at the end of May 1969, HMAS Melbourne was at anchor in Manila Bay preparing for the SEATO Exercise Sea Spirit, an exercise involving convoy escort from Manila to Sattahip in Thailand. Ships in the Melbourne Task Group comprised HMAS Melbourne, USS Larson, USS Keyes, USS Frank E Evans, HMS Cleopatra and HMNZS Blackpool. FOCAF, Rear Admiral G J B Crabb CBE DSC RAN, was task Force Commander; Captain Stevenson was Task Unit Commander. In Manila, Captain Stevenson entertained the Commodore of the USN Destroyer Squadron and all the exercise Commanding Officers to dinner. In his own words: “The purpose or the dinner was to get to know the Captains, exchange information, tell them what I was going to do, and to build confidence. I said to them all; ‘I want you to be particularly vigilant as we are going into a wartime situation, so you have to be on the ball.’ ” He also said “Melbourne had a collision with Voyager in 1964 and we do not want to have another. Watch my signals very closely before going to your new position. I do not think that either the RAN or its Government can stand another collision at sea.” He also said words to the effect “If there is to be any close manoeuvring the Captain has to be on the bridge.” (For readers unfamiliar with aircraft carrier operations, it must be pointed out that a carrier is severely restricted in its ability to manoeuvre while it is operating aircraft, for reasons of flight safety. For this reason, all escorting vessels — which necessarily are much more manoeuverable than the much-larger carrier — are invariably required and obliged to keep out of the way of the carrier at such times.)
Departure from Manila
The Task Group sailed from Manila on 29 May. On the night of 30/31 May the feared collision was narrowly avoided. USS Larson was moving from the screen to planeguard astern of Melbourne on a clear, moonlight night with a calm sea. Visibility was excellent. Larson initially turned away from Melbourne, but then reversed her course and headed directly towards the carrier. Captain Stevenson broadcast in the clear “You are on a collision course”, Larson then used hard rudder and passed very close down Melbourne’s starboard side – one estimate gave the minimum clearance as 100 feet (30.5 metres). It later transpired that Larson’s CO was not on the bridge. Rear Admiral Crabb sent for the USN Commodore and pointed out that FOCAF Standing Orders stipulated that destroyers changing station were always to turn away from the carrier. Commander Rilling, CO of Larson, reported that he received a “serious chewing out from the Commodore.”
Tragedy
Tragically, on the night of 2-3 June an almost identical situation occurred which did not have such a happy ending. Again visibility was excellent; witnesses said “you could see for miles;” again the US destroyer Frank E Evans turned towards the carrier; again Melbourne broadcast in the clear “You are on a collision course”; again the destroyer CO was not on the bridge. The differences in this situation was that neither of the officers on Evans’s bridge was fully qualified and there was more time to recover the situation because, after the Larson incident, screen spacing had been increased from two thousand to three thousand yards. But even that extra time did not stop what happened. Shortly after 0300 on the 3 June Melbourne and Frank E Evans collided. Evans was cut in two; her forward end sank immediately and the stern section remained afloat. 74 American crew members lost their lives. (The details of the precise actions leading up the collision, and its aftermath, have been discussed at length in numerous other places, and will not be addressed here. The accident was unbelievably harrowing, and included many instances of personal heroism and individual tragedy. Of the latter, the worst was certainly the loss of three brothers from one family on board the Evans; their father, also on board, survived.)
Joint Board of Investigation
Following this disaster, a Joint USN/ RAN Board of Investigation was convened. The senior American officer and President of the Board was Rear Admiral Jerome H King Jr USN. Australian members were Rear Admiral H D Stevenson CBE RAN, Captain J Davidson RAN and Captain K W Shands OBE RAN. This article will not explore the details of this Investigation. Many readers will be familiar with at least the broad outline and Joanne Stevenson’s excellent book, In the wake, provides a good reference point.
Flaws in the conduct of the investigation
Almost any lay person and especially any mariner, on reading a transcript of the Investigation would recognise the unfairness and injustice of the process that was followed. For a legal practitioner the abandonment of the basic rules of procedural fairness is horrifying. The hectoring, overbearing approach of Admiral King is disturbing enough, but the passive acceptance by the Australian Board members of the irregularities in the conduct of the Investigation is sickening and incomprehensible.
The writer accepts that the RAN Board members must have received very firm riding instructions of a political nature, laying stress on the importance of the American alliance, but the absence of moral fibre in all the circumstances is hard to understand. The writer cannot accept the suggestion that the alliance was so fragile that the prospect of three Australian officers standing up for Australian rights would have placed the relationship in jeopardy. On the contrary, their unquestioning acquiescence could only have reduced respect for the RAN. Admiral King should never have been allowed to head the Investigation as the US destroyers were under his operational command.
The earlier, very similar incident with USS Larson, combined with the Evans disaster, may well have pointed to systemic failures within the Destroyer Squadron and, perhaps, in the wider US Navy. Admiral King quite deliberately and forcefully prevented all evidence of that earlier near-disaster from being discussed or reported. Even under the “dodgy” procedural rules adopted for this Investigation, Captain Stevenson should have been warned early in the proceedings that he was suspected of an offence. He would then have been entitled, as were American witnesses, to decline to give evidence and to be legally represented. The Investigation’s findings reported him for contributory negligence without his ever having been warned previously that he was suspected of doing something or failing to do something. Tony Vincent, a successful Sydney barrister and an officer in the RAN Legal Reserve Panel, was excluded from appearing at the investigation on the specious grounds that he may have represented more than one client. The USN legal staff in Subic Bay comprised dozens of lawyers; Vincent was the only Australian Counsel available. The Naval Board apparently thought that Commander H H Glass QC RANR could represent Australian interests, but he was Counsel assisting the Board and had very different responsibilities. Vincent, now deceased, commented that if he had been allowed to appear, his presence may have boosted the morale of Australian witnesses in the “massively Americanized” atmosphere; and may have given more backbone to the Australian members of the Court (who, despite their undoubted abilities allowed Admiral King to completely dominate the proceedings). He may also have been able to intervene when the findings of contributory negligence (without the requisite prior warning to Captain Stevenson) were announced. From Investigation to Court Martial Following this procedural travesty, tailored to suit Admiral King’s purpose, consideration was given by the RAN to the Court Martial of J.P. Stevenson. Despite the fact that he had given evidence that Captain Stevenson had done nothing wrong, Admiral Crabb, FOCAF, received orders from Canberra to convene a Court Martial. This placed Crabb in a most difficult situation as the legal advice he was receiving was adamant that there were no grounds for a Court Martial. Gordon Samuels, QC, J P Stevenson’s Accused’s Friend at the Court Martial (and much later Governor of NSW), wrote “I do not think that ever in my experience as an advocate I have appeared in a proceeding for a defendant in which the prosecution’s case was so totally bereft of any possible proof of guilt.” The Court Martial was convened at HMAS Watson on 20 August 1969. Captain Stevenson faced two charges: (1) That he failed to give a positive direction to USS Frank E Evans to correct the collision course; and (2) That he failed to back his engines when it was determined that action by Evans alone could not have avoided collision. Honourable acq uittal on both charges Throughout the brief proceeding Admiral Crabb reaffirmed his complete support for Captain Stevenson’s actions. On completion of the prosecution’s case the Judge Advocate, Commander P L Sharp QC RANR, directed the Court that, as a matter of law, there was no case to answer. He then explained that the Court could return a verdict of “no case to answer” or the alternative of “Honourable Acquittal”. After a brief retirement the Board returned with the verdicts of “Honourable Acquittal” on both charges. A newposting So ended two processes, the Investigation and the Court Martial, which were both in some respects farcical. Soon after the Court Martial, Captain Stevenson was informed that he would be sent to a new posting, as Chief Staff Officer to FOICEA: a position that was at the time filled by a junior captain. His new posting would clearly be a substantial reduction in status and responsibility, and could not be regarded as anything other than a demotion. In the circumstances, Stevenson felt that, having been cleared by Court Martial of any wrong-doing, he had no honourable alternative other than to resign. An editorial published at about that time in The Canberra Times said “… in his (Captain Stevenson’s) new appointment he may well have leisure for reflection, for he has been made Chief Staff Officer to the Flag Officer In Charge of the Eastern Australia Area. It is a shore job, one which until now has been the preserve of officers at least nine years his junior. He will not be able to take, for some time at least, the courses at the Imperial Defence College. … If an officer who was one of the RAN’s most senior and respected captains, and who was found to have no case to answer at his court martial, must be put ashore and punished, then that in itself is a naval disaster.”
Other opinions
Perhaps the thoughts of Gordon Samuels QC, as he drove back to the city after the verdicts, constitute the best summary: “I said goodbye to her (Joanne) and to Steve and drove alone back to town. I clearly remember this curiously empty feeling, quite contrary to the elation which counsel would feel after a good win. I think that the reason was that it was quite impossible to regard this court martial as a ‘contest’. As Jo Stevenson has made clear, it was more in the nature of a ritual sacrifice. The sacrifice was to be exacted whatever the result of the legal proceedings. And it was.” Even more trenchant were the comments of HRH The Duke of Edinburgh, in a letter written to Captain Stevenson many years after the collision, after he had read Jo Stevenson’s book. (JPS had been HRH’s ADC in the Royal Yacht during the Melbourne Olympics in 1956.) The Duke’s letter has been seen by the writer, and the following two sentences from it are quoted as a sample: “Miscarriages of justice occur from time to time, but not since the middle-ages – except under a military dictatorship – has there been such a blatant and deliberate distortion of justice. I read the account with mounting despair and disbelief.” Epilogue After an initial refusal, J P Stevenson was eventually allowed to retire and his pension was restored; although only in the rank of Captain, despite six years service as a Commodore. He had to appeal over the Permanent Head of the Defence Department to have his name included in the Emergency List. The “argy-bargy” surrounding this period reflects no credit on the Naval Board or the Government.
As anyone who knows him would expect, J P Stevenson made a great success of his subsequent career with AGL and then became General Manager of ELGAS. The loser in this whole sorry story was the RAN. The man’s experience, leadership and, above all, ability to inspire confidence and loyalty would have been of incalculable value in the higher ranks of the Service. If the injustice that he suffered was the price of the American alliance (and the writer does not accept for one moment that it was) then one can only say that the price was too high.
*Commodore D D Farthing DSC RAN (Rtd.) joined RANC in 1955. He became a pilot, receiving his wings in1963. He initially flew Gannets, then converted to helicopters. He commanded RAN Helicopter Flight Vietnam, for which service he received the DSC, as well as American and Vietnamese decorations. He commanded HMA ships Snipe, Swan and Hobart, and retired in 1989. Having earlier qualified in Law, he was called to the Bar, from which he retired in 2010.
Author’s Note: I became involved in the detail of this matter when, as a member of the Sydney Bar, I was briefed by the Australian Government Solicitor to join Captain Stevenson’s defence team. An action in negligence had been brought by a Senior Sailor who had been serving in HMAS Melbourne at the time of the Evans collision. The plaintiff asserted that he had not received proper care for traumatic stress following the collision 36 years previously. I considered the claim absurd and still do, and was delighted to play a part in convincing the plaintiff’s legal team to abandon the proceedings. Inevitably, the action brought renewed stress on J.P.Stevenson and his family, which he dealt with calmly and impressively.
