Gilmore was awarded a posthumous Medal of Honour in recognition of his self-sacrifice during Growler’s fourth wartime patrol, mounted from Brisbane on 1 January 1943. Several famous US submarines were based in Brisbane, including USS Wahoo (Lieutenant Commander DW ‘Mush’ Morton, USN) and USS Growler (Commander HW Gilmore, USN). Lieutenant Commander DW Morton, USN and Lieutenant Commander Howard Gilmore, USN both distinguished themselves in submarines based in Brisbane. Moore was subsequently awarded the Navy Cross for this action.
The S boats were soon involved in the Solomon Islands campaign, and one of them, S44 (Lieutenant Commander JR ‘Dinty’ Moore, USN), became the first US submarine to sink a major enemy warship when it torpedoed the Japanese cruiser Kako off Kavieng on 10 August 1942. By the end of the month four were on active war patrols. The first of eleven S Class submarines arrived at New Farm, on the Brisbane River, in company with the tender USS Griffin, on 15 April 1942 under the command of Captain RW Christie, USN. It was also out of range of Japanese aircraft based in New Guinea. The ports of Fremantle, Western Australia, and Brisbane, Queensland, were selected by the USN as suitable ports to support a major submarine offensive, and facilities were quickly established at both to provide the necessary infrastructure.īrisbane proved highly suitable, with well established port facilities and a dry dock capable of handling most US submarines then in service. Consequently, the American Asiatic Fleet submarines were forced to evacuate their base at Cavite in the Philippines, and were successively ordered to withdraw to Bataan, Java, Hawaii and Australia.
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