Recruiting and the second conscription referendum, 1915-1918

 
Component identifier:
Series 20
Content Summary:

In October 1916 and again in December 1917 Hughes sought through referenda the approval of the electorate for conscription for overseas service. This series comprises papers on the need for reinforcements and the second referendum. Most of the letters, copies of replies, telegrams and copies of cables are addressed to Hughes. They relate mainly to his concern for the depletion of the AIF, his concern to get messages urging a 'Yes' vote to troops overseas, his endeavours to obtain pro-conscription statements by overseas labour leaders, the selection of scrutineers for polling booths overseas, the censoring of T. J. Ryan's anti-conscription speech published in the Queensland State Parliamentary Hansard, and the reaction of Hughes' cabinet colleagues to the decision to close hotels on the day of the second referendum.

The main correspondents are Sir Ronald Anderson, Thomas Griffith, W. F. Massey, Andrew Fisher, Keith Murdoch, General Birdwood, Walter Long, George Knibbs, George Pearce, Sir John Forrest, Malcolm Shepherd, Percy Deane, and Octavius Beale. The series also has copies of correspondence between Pearce and General Birdwood, between Sir John Forrest and Sir Robert Collins, Forrest and Major-General E. Sinclair, and between Walter Long and Sir Ronald Munro-Ferguson. Copies of some speeches and cuttings complete the series.

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).

Contents

Access and use

Parent Restrictions:
Available for research.
Parent Terms of Access:
Copying and publishing of unpublished manuscript material is subject to copyright restrictions. For such material, written permission to publish must be obtained from the copyright holder(s). Copying of unpublished material for research purposes is permissible 50 years after the death of the creator of the material.
Location of this collection:
Parkes Place
Canberra ACT 2600, Australia
Contact: