A dusty diary from 1913 has turned up surprise links between a Sussex village and an Australian battleship.

Alisa Rogers came across the tome after a friend, Joan Hill, from Billingshurst, stumbled across it in an attic.

It had been given to Mrs Hill's husband in a pub but left forgotten in a loft for 15 years.

Written by a Mr J Etheridge, it is a chronicle of his time on the HMAS Sydney battle cruiser from 1913 to 1915.

There appeared to be no Sussex link but curators at Horsham Museum, where Mrs Rogers volunteers, discovered a letter behind the hessian cover from the author to his mother, a Mrs Convill, of Home Cottage, South Street, Billingshurst.

The log book is full of anecdotes as well as day-to-day accounts of life on the ship.

Mrs Roberts said: "I brought it to the museum for advice. I didn't think for a second they would find a local connection."

Curator Jeremy Knight said: "It's a particularly graphic reminder of how the sons and daughters of Sussex villagers moved across the globe to find new beginnings and how they could end up in the most unlikely places."