Rear-Admiral John Bryan Stevenson CMG
Royal Navy
Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force
by Robert Simpson
John Bryan Stevenson was born in Toxteth Park, Liverpool, England on 7th August 1876, a son to John Stevenson and Eleanor Alicia Bryan. He was baptised on 27th August of the same year and they were living at 9 Jolliffe St. John was an insurance broker, born in Ireland in 1943, and they and married in Ireland in 1875. Eleanor had been born in 1853 in West Derby. Lancashire. Unfortunately in late 1877 she passed away. By the 1881 Census John had remarried to Jessie, and they were living at 24 Mannering Rd Toxteth Park.
In the 1891 Census he was a lodger at a boarding house in Stoke Fleming, Devon and he was a Cadet in the Royal Navy. He was promoted to Lieutenant on 14th March 1898. The 1901 census showed him to be in Portsmouth Harbour as part of the crew on the Royal Navy ship Vernon or Tenders of the First Class Torpedo School, and he was a Lieutenant. He was appointed to HMS Albemarle from August 1908 until January 1911. On 31st December 1910 he was promoted to Commander. During the 1911 census he was visiting his father and the family in Little Sutton Cheshire before he went to Australia and was listed on the census as a Commander. He was then appointed to the HMAS Encounter in March 1911. The Encounter was a cruiser of the Challenger Class. He was noted as especially contributed to good results of Encounter in Battle Practice in 1911. In May 1911 he left London on the Macedonia and arrived in Sydney on 27th May. The Encounter was originally used by the RN, but was transferred to the RAN. A remark in his service records talk about a very satisfactory inspection of the Encounter in 1912. He was lent to the Australian Government on 1st July 1912 for 1 year on Encounter which was lent to the Australian Government as a training ship. He was noted as most hardworking and efficient, capable in every way and was recommended for advance in June 1912. His appointment on Encounter was extended for 2 years from 1st July 1913.
John married Frances Olive Brooke Bailey on 4th June 1914 in St. David’s Anglican Cathedral in Hobart, Tasmania. Frances had been born in Tasmania in 1884, one of two daughters to Francis Gerald Bailey and Annie Chaffey Langdon who had married in 1882. Annie’s parents were William Langdon and Anne Chaffey. William was a Captain in the Royal Navy and was a prominent influence in Tasmania. They had three children, James Walter Bryan born in March 1916 in England, Alathea Noel born in February 1920 in Victoria and John Philip born 24th August 1921 in Melbourne.
The Encounter was part of the 1st Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force which was used to occupy German New Guinea. She was the first RAN ship to fire in anger when she bombarded Toma Ridge in support of the troops on 14th September 1914, and also covered the landing at Madang on 24th September. The steamer Zambezi had been captured by her on the 12th.
At the beginning of World War 1, the British Government requested Australia to seize German possessions and wireless stations in the south-west Pacific region. The Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force was raised immediately with Colonel J G Legge producing the concept of operations, organisation and order within 72 hours. Within a week the contingent embarked from Sydney on 18th August 1914. They rendezvoused with the HMAS Australia and HMAS Melbourne near the south-eastern tip of New Guinea. There a conference was held (probably Australia’s first high level joint command conference) which included Rear Admiral Sir George E. Patey RN, Captain J.C.T. Glossop RAN, Captain J.B. Stevenson RAN, and Colonel W. Holmes, the land force commander. They discussed final plans. An operational order was issued to capture Rabaul. The British flag was raised at Rabaul on 13th September 1914, the mission was complete in just five weeks. On the 15th, Stevenson, Holmes and his staff went from Rabaul to Herbertshohe and had a meeting at the District Office headquarters with Dr E Haber (the acting Governor of New Guinea) to discuss the terms of surrender. At a second conference conditions were agreed to and the terms of capitulation were duly signed, Dr Haber’s signature being attested by Captain von Klewitz and that of Colonel Homes by Commander Stevenson.
He was Commander at Cerebus from 18th January 1915 to 1st November 1916. In December 1915 and June 1916, John was recommended for promotion. Then he was posted back to Encounter as Acting Captain from 1st November 1916.
In May 1920 John, Olive and the two eldest children left Australia on the Anchises, bound for England where they arrived in London on 24th June. John was listed as being in the Royal Australian Navy. They left on 2nd July 1921 on the Themistocles to return to Australia, with John listed as a Captain in the RAN.
On 16th July 1927 the whole family boarded the Nestor at Liverpool to return to Australia. Their address in the UK was given as Australia House, Strand, London and John was listed in error as a Captain in the RAF and Frances as Olive Broke.
By the 1930 electoral roll they were living at 97 Elizabeth Bay Rd, Darlinghurst, Sydney. John’s occupation was listed as RAN. In 1933 they were living at 79 Braeside St, Wahroonga and he had retired. In the 1936 and 1937 rolls they had moved to 1 Neringah Ave Wahroonga. On 5th January 1946 they left Liverpool on the Sarpedon, bund for Sydney. It is not known how long they were in England and what for, but their address there was given as C/o Bank of New South Wales in London. He was listed as Rear Admiral CMG. In 1949 they were still living at 1 Neringah Ave and he had no occupation listed.
John passed away on 13th July 1957 in Wahroonga, New South Wales. Records of his deceased estate file have him as a retired Naval Officer.
Frances passed away in 1978.
With their children –
James Walter Bryan Stevenson left Australia in December 1938 from Brisbane and arrived in London on 6th January 1939. At some time he joined the RAF and at the beginning of the war was Pilot Officer 42158 with 266 Squadron. They trained in Fairey Battles and then received Spitfires in January 1940. The squadron had its first action over Dunkirk on 2nd June 1940, where Sergeant Ronald Kidman was shot down while on patrol and James went missing. He is remembered on Panel 10 at Runnymede Memorial.
Alathea Noel Stevenson joined the WRAF in England in 1939. She served as a cipher officer and then an intelligence officer until 1945. Noel served in both England and France and was Mentioned in Despatches. She married Elliot Ogilvie Beresford Grant in Westminster London in 1942. He joined the RAAF in 1940 and rose to the rank of Squadron Leader with 262 Squadron. He was awarded a Distinguished Flying Cross for destroying a German U-Boat as Flight Lieutenant 402345. After the war they returned to Victoria to live and were associated with the Glenferrie Hill Recreational Club.
John Philip Stevenson joined the Permanent Naval Force on 1st January 1935 with the rank of Cadet Midshipman. In WW2 he was gunnery officer on HMAS Nestor, which was hit by bombs and torpedoes which killed a lot of crew below decks. After coming under attack while trying to get the ship under tow, they were taken off and he joined another ship. He was also at the Japanese surrender in Tokyo Bay. On 26th August 1969 he was honourably acquitted of two charges arising out of a collision of the HMAS Melbourne and USS Evans in the China Sea on 3rd June. He had plead not guilty to two charges; that as officer in tactical command he failed to transmit to the USS Frank E Evans a positive direction – after he had determined that the destroyer was on a collision course with HMAS Melbourne – to correct the collision course, and as commanding officer of HMAS Melbourne, he failed to put the aircraft-carrier’s engines astern when he determined that a collision could not be avoided by the action of the destroyer alone. On both charges he received honourable acquittal. Even though he received this, his reputation was destroyed. John was still demoted from Commodore to Captain afterwards. He was made a scapegoat for the accident, and he soon resigned and was discharged on 9th April 1970. His wife was actress Joanne Duff. They married in 1958. She was a star of stage and screen in the USA and Australia and also a best-selling author. Continuity Man was one of the shows she was starring in on the ABC in the 1960’s. One of the books she wrote was called No Case to Answer, which was about the collision and her attempt to clear his name. After resigning he worked in an executive position for the Australian Gas Light Company. In 1999 a special memorial service of the collision was held is Sydney. In 2012 the government apologised for his treatment by the government of that day, and the navy. They had two children, Bryan and Kerry Ann. Kerry, who is a managing director of a company called Symposium made a comment on its’ site that she was marching this year (2014) with her father in the Anzac Day march in Sydney as part of the HMAS Melbourne association, and he would be leading that section.
The museum does not hold anything for him, the story was done for a trip to Rabaul on the centenary of AN&MEF Force.
ANZAC Biographies
On our website you will find the biographical details of ANZAC (as well as British) servicemen & women
whose medals or other memorabilia form part of the collection belonging to the
Maryborough Military & Colonial Museum,
Maryborough, Queensland, Australia.