HMAS Swan was a of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). One of six built for the RAN, Swan was built at Cockatoo Island Dockyard, and entered service in 1916. The early part of the ship's career was spent on blockade duty in the Far East, before she was transferred to the Mediterranean for anti-submarine duty. Apart from performing shore bombardment during the Second Battle of Durazzo, Swans wartime career was uneventful.
The destroyer was placed in reserve in 1920, but was reactivated between 1925 and 1927 and assigned to Tasmania. Swan was decommissioned in 1928, stripped of parts, and sold for use as prisoner accommodation on the Hawkesbury River. After changing hands several times, the hull sank during gale conditions in 1934.
Design and construction
Swan was one of six s built for the RAN. The destroyer had a displacement of 750 tons, was long overall and long between perpendiculars, had a beam of , and a maximum draught of .
Although designed to reach , Swan was capable of reaching a maximum speed half a knot greater. She was launched on 11 December 1915 by the wife of Sir William Rooke Creswell, the First Naval Member of the Australian Commonwealth Naval Board.
After the end of World War I, Swan was assigned to an Allied fleet responsible for taking over Russian anti-Bolshevik naval units as Sebastapol. She then sailed in December with the French destroyer to report on conditions in the eastern Ukraine, although they reached their destination, an advance by Bolshevik forces caused the cancellation of the mission. Rhodes' plan did not gain government approval, and the ships were sold on to a pair of fishermen, who used them to transport blue metal to Milson and Peat Islands.
The wreck is located in .