General correspondence, 1929-1969

Containers:

Box 1-10 (MS 2505)

Component identifier:

Series 1

Content Summary:

The letters dating from 1929 until 1969 are arranged chronologically, and include congratulatory messages on the occasion of Barry's appointment as a King's Counsel in 1942, as a Judge of the Supreme Court of Victoria in 1947, his marriage in 1951 to Nancy Hudson, the award of a Carnegie Foundation grant in 1955, his creation as a Knight Bachelor in January 1961 and the award of a degree of Doctor of Laws of the University of Melbourne in 1969.

The bulk of correspondence dates from the early 1950s and consists of Barry's letters, together with the letters he received from Australian and overseas academics, criminologists and members of the legal profession. They deal with developments in the fields of politics, literature, drama and history, academic appointments, juvenile delinquency, capital punishment, penal establishments and methods of correction, probation, judicial decisions, and legal precedents and procedures. The correspondence reveals Barry's deep concern with the science of criminology and penology and the need that he felt for an Australian institute for research in criminology. Further letters appear throughout the collection in their relevant series.

Barry's principal correspondents were Mark Perlman, Norval Morris, Colin Howard, Zelman Cowen, John Robson, Paul Tappan, Harold Weir, David Derham, Sheldon Glueck, Leon Radzinowicz, Louis Blom-Cooper, Albert Morris, Negley Teeters, V.N. Pillai, Manuel Lopez-Rey, Elmer Barnes, Wilfred Dovey, Bernard Sugarman, John McClemens, Eugene Gorman, Martin Kriewaldt, Geoffrey Sawer, Vance and Nettie Palmer and Barbara Wootton.

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