Jan 42 min read

HMCS Protector, South Australia's only colonial warship

Further to Student Survey of the Torpedo Station Site, Hindmarsh Reach, Port River, 2000, although most details are covered in Stephen Jeisman's book titled "Colonoal Gunboat - The story of HMCS Protector and the South Australian Naval Brigade", here are a few details about the (Her/His Majesty's Colonial Ship) HMCS Protector.

**Painting of HMCS Protector steaming off the South Australian coast, 1901**

(Source: South Australian Maritime Museum Collection, HT87.57)

According to Bing AI, "HMCS Protector was indeed South Australia's only colonial warship. Built in response to the "Russian Scares" of the 1860s and 1870s, Protector was a flat-iron gunboat commissioned by the South Australian colonial government in 1884. Its primary role was to defend the colony's coastline and ports from potential seaborne threats1.

Protector served in several conflicts, including the Boxer Rebellion, World War I, and briefly in World War II under civilian ownership. It was a significant part of South Australia's maritime defense until it was decommissioned and eventually scuttled as a breakwater at Heron Island in 1943."

Built between 1882 and 1884, South Australia's only colonial warship was a veteran of three major conflicts and still exists today as a breakwater at Heron Island on the Great Barrier Reef.