Daramalan College. Not strictly an Alumni story… but a Daramalan connection, nevertheless.

John Walker MSC writes: As most of you would have seen, yesterday WW2 seaman Teddy Sheean is set to be posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross.       And the Daramalan link? We currently have three boys at the College, Matthew, Ryan and Ben Rickard who are Teddy’s Great-Grandnephews and are pictured here with the painting of Teddy's heroic action at the Australian War Memorial. A really proud day for the family and Daramalan.

In late 1942, Teddy’s ship was attacked by Japanese planes near Timor and started to sink. To quote Wikipedia, “As the crew leapt into the sea, they were strafed by the attacking aircraft. Sheean—after assisting to free a life-raft — was hit by two bullets from one of the aircraft, wounding him in the chest and back. Scrambling across the deck, he strapped himself into the 20 mm cannon and began shooting at the fighters in an effort to protect some of the sailors already in the sea. Subject to the fire from Sheean's gun, the Japanese aircraft were kept at bay and were unable to effectively strafe those in the water”.

Teddy continued to fire and managed to shoot down one of the Japanese bombers. He damaged a further two aircraft before the boat’s stern was engulfed by the sea. Despite this, Sheean maintained his fire as the water rose above his feet, and remained firing as he "disappeared beneath the waves".

In 1999, the submarine HMAS Sheean was named in his honour – the first ever to be named for a naval rating - and yesterday Teddy was finally recognised for his Valour.