Originally commissioned as the Royal Navy modified Leander Class light cruiser HMS Amphion in June 1936, the vessel which was to become the first HMAS Perth was acquired by the Royal Australian Navy in 1939.

(Vital statistics: 6,830 tons, 555 feet, 8*6" guns, 8* 4" guns, 4* 3 pounder guns, 4 * 2 pounder guns, and 8 * 21" torpedo tubes as well as 1 Walrus amphibious aircraft, 32.5 knots.)

After doing escort and convoy work in the West Atlantic and Australia, and seeing some action in the Mediterranean, Perth returned to the Pacific. In February 1942 she was sent to the Java (Indonesia) theatre and participated in the Battle of the Java sea at which 5 allied ships were lost.

She was in company with the cruiser USS Houston in the Sunda Strait on 28 February 1942. Unfortunately they ran into a well protected Japanese convoy, and after being hit by four torpedoes the Perth was lost with some 350 of her 681 crew, including her captain, Hector Waller. (The third Collins class submarine (SSG 75) now bears his name.) The Houston was also lost in the battle.

106 of the survivors died in captivity. 218 made it home by the end of the war.

The wreck lies in some 35 metres of water, and in 1967 a number of her artefacts, including the bell seen here, were recovered and put on display at the Memorial.