Shown below are significant events for the month of June.
| Anniversary | Date | Year | Occurence |
|---|---|---|---|
| 111 | June | 1915 | Throughout the month the batteries at Helles continued to support a number of abortive attacks. For example, in support of an attack between 11 am and 9. 30 pm on 4 June the 2nd Battery fired 884 rounds. On 5 June it fired 127 rounds, on the 6th, 228 rounds and on 7th, before the attack was halted, 274 rounds. The 1st Battery also fired over 1,000 rounds per day. Additionally, individual 6-inch guns continued to arrive ashore, and the landing of a 4.7-inch gun in the latter part of June saw the formation of an Australian Heavy Battery with counter-battery duties. |
| 64 | June | 1962 | Australia’s military commitment in South Vietnam begins. First to deploy is the Australian Army Training Team Vietnam. From June 1964 onwards its members, who included individual Gunners, accompanied South Vietnamese army units into combat, and a former artillery officer, Major Peter Badcoe was awarded the Victoria Cross posthumously in 1967. |
| 74 | 2.June | 1952 | The last anti-tank regiment of the RAA is re-roled as a Light Regiment. The RAA Anti-tank branch is abolished, and the role is transferred to the Royal Australian Armoured Corps. |
| 84 | 7.June | 1942 | In the evening of 7 June 1942 the Illowra Battery (Port Kembla) radar detects a submarine on the surface, beyond searchlight range, but it could not be identified and therefore was not engaged. |
| 55 | 7.June | 1971 | In Vietnam in 1971 Lance Bombardier Peter ‘Blue’ Maher, 12th Field Regiment and his signaller Gunner Bayne ‘Gus’ Kelly, are attached to 5 Platoon, B Company, 3 RAR during a three-day battalion operation north of Phuoc Tuy Province. Towards last light on 6 June, 5 Platoon locate a large, occupied bunker complex. At first light on 7 June 1971, Blue adjusted covering fire onto the bunkers prior to 5 Platoon’s assault. The infantry came under heavy fire from a range of 15 metres and took casualties. Asked, years later, about his reaction at this point, he replied, ‘We just focussed on our job of bringing in fire support and had faith in the infantry.’ Blue engaged the bunkers again with fire ‘very close’ to 5 Platoon from A and 104th Field Batteries, as well as from US 155 mm guns. Later that morning, the remainder of B Company closed up to reinforce the platoon. When the Company’s forward observation officer was mortally wounded, Blue coordinated artillery as close as 100 metres, pausing to allow RAAF Bushranger and US Cobra gunship strikes. A RAAF Iroquois resupply helicopter was shot down. D Company 3 RAR and Centurion tanks from 1st Armoured Regiment joined the fray that afternoon. A total of 47 bunkers were uncovered. Lance Bombardier Maher was awarded the Military Medal for his steadfast coordination of sustained and accurate indirect fire and gunship support over almost 24 hours. |
| 85 | 8.June | 1941 | The 7th Australian Division commences its advance towards Beirut; an infantry brigade with a field regiment, an anti-tank battery, and a LAA section under command on the coastal road through Sidon and Damour, and a similar force on the inland road through Merdjayoun and Jezzine. The Gunners provide impromptu and harassing fire, and creeping barrages and programmed concentrations to fix Vichy defenders while the infantry manoeuvred. The guns on the coast road twice engage Vichy warships. Single guns and gun sections are often deployed forward in anti-tank or direct-fire roles. |
| 81 | 10.June | 1945 | In 1945 artillery amphibious assault joint and combined fire planning is at its zenith in sophistication and effect in the Pacific in WW2. Avoiding casualties through employing massive firepower in the late stage of WW2 while clearing Japanese from islands is paramount. For an amphibious assault by two brigades of Major-General Wootten’s 9th Division at Labuan and Brunei on 10 June, the CRA, Brigadier Eastick, had the 2/8th Field Regiment the 2/12th Field Regiment the 2/3rd Tank Attack Regiment the 2/3rd Composite AA. Regiment the 8th Survey Battery, and B Troop, 1st Australian Naval Bombardment Group (ANBG). LTCOL Watchorn was the Chief Bombardment Liaison Officer (CBLO) and acted as the adviser to the corps commander on naval bombardment, while his second-in-command became the Deputy CBLO and advised the commander of the bombarding task force or task group employing RAN and USN ships. There were two Senior Bombardment Liaison Officers (SBLOs) who could be attached to the commander of a naval attack group. Each troop was commanded by a major Naval Bombardment Liaison Officer (NBLO) who was attached to the assault division and usually located with the CRA’s staff. On each bombarding ship there was a Bombardment Liaison Officer (BLO) party of a captain and four other ranks. Each Shore Fire Control Party (SFCP) consisted of a captain, a sergeant and six or seven other ranks, mainly signallers, and these were deployed with the landing brigades and battalions. |
| 85 | 19.June | 1941 | 19 June to 6 July: The Victoria Cross is awarded to Lieutenant Arthur Roden Cutler, 2/5th Aust Field Regiment, ‘For most conspicuous and sustained gallantry during the Syrian Campaign and for outstanding bravery during the bitter fighting at Merdjayoun when this artillery officer became a byword amongst the forward troops with whom he worked.’ Cutler’s exploits over two weeks included repairing a vital field telephone communications line under heavy fire, repulsing enemy tank-attacks with an anti-tank rifle, setting up an outpost to bring artillery fire onto a road used by the enemy, and employing a 25-pounder field gun to demolish an anti-tank gun and post that threatened the Australian advance. Cutler was seriously wounded during the Battle of Damour, losing a leg as a result. |
| 96 | 19.June | 1930 | In 1936 the permanent and part-time elements of the Australian Artillery adopt a hat badge incorporating a field gun with a scroll bearing the battle honour UBIQUE (Everywhere) and a Tudor Crown above and scrolls below the gun bearing the motto CONSENSU STABILES (Strong in Agreement) and the word AUSTRALIA. |
| 141 | 23.June | 1885 | The 1885 NSW Sudan Contingent arrives back in Sydney with 9-pounder guns gifted to the battery as replacements for their old guns by the British in the Sudan. |
| 111 | 24.June | 1915 | On 24 June, probably for the first time, Australian artillery fire is directed from an aircraft in WW1 at Gallipoli in 1915. |
| 110 | 28.June | 1916 | Captain Selmes, the commander of the 101st Howitzer Battery, described an incident on 28 June 1916: it was caused by the bugbear of all Howitzer Battery Commanders – “A premature”. . . We were using a highly sensitive fuse “No 44” which had a centre pin to set off the mercury cap. I had fired some 40/50 rounds and then ordered a switch – the gun in question was close to a honeysuckle hedge and apparently a trailer must have caught the pin and caused the shell to burst about 50 yards from the muzzle. BANG, and when the smoke cleared, I found poor Small, a fine chap from North Shore C of E Grammar School, quite dead, and Gunner McCully rather badly wounded. Many shortcomings in artillery production remained in 1916. The shortage of shells was being rectified, but quality suffered. Premature explosions, either soon after leaving the muzzle, or more tragically in the muzzle, were common with all guns, but particularly so in 4.5-inch howitzer batteries which became known a ‘suicide clubs’. |
| 87 | 30.June | 1939 | A process known officially as pneumatization, begins in concerted fashion when the Military Board issues an instruction for mechanization of field artillery in 1939. Moving the guns was to become faster and easier. Earlier the Military Board announced mechanization of the Army but it was a slow process. Mechanization meant the issue of tractors and motor vehicles to each brigade and the replacement of the wooden steel rimmed wheels with rubber pneumatic tyres. |