Advisory War Council papers, 1940-1945

Component identifier:

Subseries 46-1

Content Summary:

This subseries contains papers Hughes received as a Council member such as the Australian Military Forces weekly intelligence reviews, intelligence summaries by the AHQ and GHQ, Department of External Affairs fortnightly political intelligence summaries, reports by the Combined Operational Intelligence Centre, copies of War Cabinet agenda, minutes and summaries of decisions, weekly progress reports by the Chiefs of Staff, deciphered cables from the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs, and AWC agenda.

There is also a small amount of correspondence. It refers mainly to dates for AWC meetings, but includes letters on the decision to join the Council in October 1940 and to return in April 1944. The Letters Patent commissioning Hughes as a member and a group photo of the Council are also in this subseries. Papers are arranged in chronological order according to the month of the date of the document.

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)

Contents

Access and use