History of the MV Krait
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The Krait, which took the sea raiders of Z Force to Singapore and back in World War II, is today Australia's only Floating War Memorial.
The following notes on the history of this vessel are from the souvenir pamphlet which was sold to raise funds for the Krait Memorial Fund and the May 1976 edition of Beam Ends, the official RVCP journal.
Before the war this famous little vessel was a Japanese fishing boat operating from Singapore. Her name was Kofuku Maru. On the evening of 11 December, 1941, HMAS Goulburn had cleared the Changi Boom Gates and proceeded for patrol duties in the Rhio Channel, Singapore. At approximately 1845 hours, the 'Kofuku Maru' became the first enemy vessel apprehended in these waters, by an R.A.N ship, when it was arrested by HMAS Goulburn.
After Pearl Harbour and the Japanese invasion of Malaya, the vessel was taken over by the Royal Navy in Singapore and, at the surrender on February15, 1942, she was used by an Australian, Bill Reynolds, to rescue escapees from Singapore. She eventually reached Ceylon, after being machine-gunned by Japanese Zeros in Malacca Strait, and later went to Bombay where she was renamed 'Krait' after a small but venomous Indian snake.
In India, Major Ivan Lyon of the Gordon Highlanders, who had escaped from Singapore and who new the vessel during her rescue work, conceived the idea of using her, because she was Japanese built, for a long-range attack on Singapore from Australia. Attempts were made to sail her to Fremantle but these were abandoned because her engine was worn out, and she was later shipped as deck cargo and unloaded in Sydney Harbour in November, 1942.
She was first taken to Broken Bay, where some of Major Lyon's secret raiders were training, and later to Cairns, where she was fitted with a new Gardiner engine, prepared for the Singapore raid, and then sailed across North Australia to Exmouth Gulf, Western Australia.
Fourteen soldiers and sailors took part in Operation "Jaywick", the code name for the Krait raid which began from Exmouth Gulf on September 2, 1943. The Krait sailed from Exmouth Gulf through Lombok Strait, across the Java and South China Seas, and through the Rhio Islands to within 20 miles of Singapore. There she dropped three canoe teams who penetrated Singapore Harbour at night and with magnetic explosive limpets destroyed or damaged nearly 40,000 tons of Japanese shipping. She returned safely to Exmouth Gulf on October 19, 1943.
The full story of Operation "Jaywick" and Operation "Rimau" which followed in 1944, is told in " The Heroes " by Ronald McKie ( Angus and Robertson ).
At the end of the Pacific War she was taken over by the occupying authorities at Labuan, British North Borneo, and sold to a trading company which used her for the next 20 years as a timber carrier on Borneo rivers.
In 1963 the Krait Committee was formed to bring the Krait back and dedicate her as a War Memorial, and in March 1964, Mr Harold Nobbs, of the Volunteer Coastal Patrol, went to Sandakan and brought her back as deck cargo on the P&O Company's Nellore. She was unloaded at Brisbane and sailed south to Broken Bay arriving on April 24.
On Anzac Day, 1964, the Krait was sailed to Sydney and at Farm Cove she was handed over to the Governor, dedicated as a Floating War Memorial and then presented to the Volunteer Coastal Patrol for use in trust for training and rescue work.
The Krait is now in the care of the Australian Maritime Museum at Darling Harbour in Sydney.
