Product details
- ISBN 9780733654732
- Weight: 300g
- Dimensions: 153 x 234mm
- Publication Date: 21 Jul 2026
- Publisher: Hachette Australia
- Publication City/Country: AU
- Product Form: Paperback
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For military history buffs and aeroplane enthusiasts alike, this fascinating story of the World War II Beaufighter Squadron is a must. Whispering Death is the story of the Australian-built Beaufighters, their pilots and their remarkable feats in World War II, and others who contributed to the story of the 'Green Ghosts' - the legendary 93 Squadron.
Several years ago former World War II Beaufighter pilot Warrant Officer Lerryn Mutton OAM arrived on the doorstep of history writer Patricia Skehan armed with twenty boxes of official documents and photographs and asked her to write his wartime story.
She was intrigued. The Beaufighter aircraft was unique, its silent motors earning it the nickname Whispering Death. She turned on her tape recorder.
After that point she recorded dramatic memories of Mutton, his navigators and ground crew, and of other 93 Attack Squadron members, with their unique association in Sandakan and Borneo war operations. Copies of the unofficial squadron diaries, plus diaries from two other squadron flyers, tell a remarkable story of the Green Ghosts, as 93 Squadron is known.
Whispering Death follows the squadron's formation in Narromine, NSW and training in Kingaroy, Queensland. Each of the main crew has a unique story to tell of how and why they volunteered to enlist, and each has their own chapter of diverse memories, their goal to stay alive.
Meanwhile the Beaufighters were being built in Australia, an early part of our major aviation history.
We also follow a group of women who are formed as the WAAAF and worked as codebreakers, helping Allied forces to victory in the Coral Sea and Bismarck Sea battles.
Patricia Skehan is a founding executive member of Concord Heritage, now City of Canada Bay Heritage Society. She guest-speaks for organisations including Rotary, Probus and VIEW clubs and historical societies, and lectures for U3A. She has presented heritage talks on FM radio and has been published nationally. Patricia conducts tours at Yaralla and Rivendell estates in Concord West. Since 1999, Patricia has travelled across NSW to give over 1000 heritage talks on 16 different subjects. She travelled to Britain in 2001 and 2005, researching the Thomas Walker family's royal connections at the University of Cambridge.
In 2013, Ethel Turner's granddaughter asked Patricia to transcribe letters from Jean Curlewis to her famous mother, written while a volunteer nursing aide during the 1919 Spanish Flu epidemic. Sourcing rare archives from Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, the Red Cross, Sydney University, Trove newspaper collections and museum sources, she found clues about Anzac secrets when given the seemingly unrelated diary of a young WW1 soldier.
Patricia was guest speaker at the Cenotaph in Sydney on Armistice Day 2020; her talk on the impact of the Spanish flu epidemic was televised nationally.
Born on Armistice Day, 1946, Patricia is married to a retired police sergeant. They live on the Central Coast.
