Book Launch: Salt In His Veins - Vice Admiral Peter Jones

Hear Peter Jones talk about his new naval biography, Salt in His Veins, the remarkable life of Vice Admiral Sir Albert Poland.
About this Event

Overview

Hear Peter Jones, a retired vice admiral, talk about his new naval biography, Salt in His Veins. It tells of the remarkable life of Vice Admiral Sir Albert Poland, the naval commander of the famous Tobruk Ferry Run of World War II that sustained the Australian army garrison known as the ‘Rats of Tobruk’.

Vice Admiral Poland (1895–1967) came from a long-standing naval family and had an action-filled career spanning two world wars. For most of World War I Poland served in the battle cruiser HMS New Zealand, taking part in the battles of Heligoland Bight, Dogger Bank and Jutland. He earned a Distinguished Service Cross commanding a torpedo boat in the heroic Ostend Raid. After the war Poland saw service in the Russian Civil War and then commanded gunboats in China and destroyers in the Mediterranean.

Poland’s service in World War II was even more eventful. He was described by historian Donald Macintyre as the most bombed officer in the Royal Navy. He commanded the sloop HMS Black Swan in the Norwegian campaign, which was bombed yet miraculously survived. As one of Admiral Andrew Cunningham’s trusted captains, Poland commanded the navy’s resupply effort to besieged Tobruk, and then commanded the famous 14th Destroyer Flotilla at the Second Battle of Sirte. At the end of the war, Poland took the Japanese surrender at Sabang. In tracing the course of such a career, Salt in His Veins describes in graphic detail some of the Royal Navy’s greatest deeds and gravest vicissitudes of the twentieth century.

This book graphically tells his story and shed on the work of the RAN ships that took part in the hazardous Tobruk Ferry Run.

About the Author

Vice Admiral Peter Jones AO DSC RAN retired served for 40 years. His sea service included three operations deployments to the Middle East, command of the frigate HMAS Melbourne and command of the Coalition Maritime Interception Force in the 2003 Iraq War. He earlier biographies were Australia’s Argonauts: The remarkable story of the first class to enter the Royal Australian Naval College and Guy Griffiths: The life and times of an Australian Admiral.

Copies of Salt in His Veins will be available for purchase and be signed by the author.

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