A Silent Legend

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Seen by many moviegoers, but known by few … Joining the Royal Navy on his 18th birthday in 1938, the late Commander Philip White, R.N., was one of 370 survivors when, on the 14th October 1939, the Royal Navy battleship,… Read More ›

Recent Posts

  • Tech Diver 1934

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    In the America of the early 1930’s, popular radio broadcaster, Phillips Lord, created a character that he named, ‘Seth Parker’, an imaginary backwoods preacher whose simple, homespun philosophy resonated with a listening audience drawn from across the country. In 1933,… Read More ›

  • Search For the ‘Centaur’

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    On the 14th May 1943, while en-route to Port Moresby, in New Guinea, to evacuate wounded, the Australian Hospital Ship Centaur – although illuminated and clearly marked as being a Hospital Ship – was torpedoed and sunk off the coast… Read More ›

  • Dressed For Success

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    One of the early, recreational scuba diving pioneers, Commandant Yves Le Prieur – the French Navy Commander who designed the single lens mask for use in submarine escape – had, in 1934, devised and patented a self-contained underwater breathing apparatus… Read More ›

  • An Artificial Gill

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    By 1974 the U.S. Patent Office had already awarded patents on, “two artificial gills which enabled a free swimming diver to extract oxygen dissolved in sea water for his respiration. Carbon dioxide elimination is accomplished through the same device. “In… Read More ›

  • D-day ‘Frogmen’

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    The first men ashore at ‘Gold’, ‘Sword’ and ‘Juno’ beaches on D-day, were divers of the Landing Craft Obstruction Clearance Units; a hundred and twenty ‘frogmen’ forming ten units (four from the Royal Navy and six from the Royal Marines)… Read More ›