Diaries and notebooks, 1900-c.1952

Component identifier:

Series 4

Content Summary:

Hughes' diaries cover the years 1916, 1917, 1920, 1922, 1924, 1927-1929 and 1934-1951. They are mainly pocket size and only a few contain any strict diary entries. The rest have reminders, addresses, phone numbers, notes, statistics, cuttings and lists of words. Three of the diaries (1942-1944) are engagement diaries kept by Hughes' secretary, and include such facts as the dates and times of Cabinet and party meetings. Other diaries are in Series 23 (1918), Series 13 (1918, 1921), Series 39 (1941) and Series 40 (1938).

The main group of notebooks although undated, clearly relate to the 1930s and 1940s. They contain handwritten and typed notes, statistics, quotations from books, newspapers and Hansards and appear to have been used in the preparation of articles or speeches. The subjects covered vary greatly but certainly cover the recurring Hughes topics like immigration, the British Empire, Japan, the Curtin and Chifley Governments and communism. Two other notebooks can be roughly dated. One (c.1911-1913) contains an incomplete unidentifiable narrative and the second (1925) contains notes on the seamen's strike, communism in Great Britain, the Australian Labor Party and Australia's population.

Two distinct groups of notebooks and two exercise books containing shorthand exercises which were compiled in the early 1950s complete the series. The former begins with a set of six leather notebooks containing material on such topics as war, defence, conscription, foreign policy, industrial arbitration, welfare and communism. They are followed by a set of notebooks compiled during 1924-1925 relating largely to the British Empire and international affairs, and may have formed the basis of newspaper articles Hughes had published at the time as well as to his book The splendid adventure (Angus Robertson, 1929). A note accompanying these notebooks indicates that notebooks 1 and 3 (in a sequence of 23) are missing from the series and 3 notebooks are not numbered. Other notebooks are located in Series 14 and Series 48.

Immediate source of acquisition:

The W. M. Hughes Papers were presented to the National Library of Australia by Dame Mary Hughes in 1953. The collection was received in two consignments. One consisted of papers taken from the Perpetual Trustee Company comprising material from Hughes' Lindfield home and from his office rooms at the Commonwealth Offices, Sydney; the other came directly from Lindfield. Lists of the contents of both consignments are held in the Library's Manuscript Branch. With the agreement of the executors and the Library, much of the collection, was for a time, held at the Australian National University by Fitzhardinge. He was permitted sole access to the collection while writing the biography Hughes commissioned in 1951. Fitzhardinge's own papers documenting the writing of the biography are also held by the Library (MS 5400). The papers transferred to the Library in 1953 are by no means the total collection of Hughes' personal papers, although it is impossible to say what proportion has survived. (see Fitzhardinge, p.936).

Names:

Hughes, W. M. (1862-1952)

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