General correspondence, 1891-1941

Component identifier:

Series 3

Content Summary:

This series contains virtually all the surviving letters received by Bavin apart from those written by Sir Edmund Barton and Alfred Deakin. They form a very small proportion of the letters that he would have received and it can be assumed that in most cases they were retained on account of the importance of the correspondents. A significant proportion of them were written by barristers and judges, while others were written by politicians, public servants, academics and church dignitaries. They mostly date from the years 1900-1920 and surprisingly few letters from the last twenty years of Bavin's life have survived.

Among the subjects discussed in the letters are Bavin's marriage, Andrew Inglis Clark's writings on constitutional law, developments in the legal profession, the work of the Supreme Court of South Australia, High Court cases including the River Murray Case and the Vend Case, the possibility of Bavin entering politics, federalism, the River Murray Agreement, Australian naval policy, the 1909 Defence Act, Bavin's writings on Australian politics, the 'fusion' of 1909, the 1910 Land Tax Act, the possible establishment of an Imperial Court of Appeal, the 1911-1912 Royal Commission on the Sugar Industry, the outbreak of World War I and the course of the War, Muirhead Collins' visit to France in 1917, conscription, the League of Nations, the Round Table, banks and the Depression, Bavin's defeat in the 1930 elections, Sir John Latham's impressions of Japan in 1941, holidays and Bavin's illnesses. There are references to Sir Josiah Symon, Sir Samuel Way, Alfred Deakin, Sir Samuel Griffith, B.R. Wise, Sir Isaac Isaacs, Sir George Reid, Winston Churchill and H.H. Asquith.

The letters have been arranged chronologically. Unless indicated otherwise, Bavin was the recipient.

Immediate source of acquisition:

The Bavin Papers were received from four sources over a period of thirty years. In 1959 Bavin's son, Mr J.W. Bavin, transferred the long series of letters written to his father by Sir Edmund Barton and Alfred Deakin. In 1965 he donated further items, including the drafts of speeches and letters of Tom Roberts. In the following year a larger group of speeches, together with photographs, cuttings and Bavin's diary of his 1929 overseas tour, were presented by Miss Margaret Dalrymple Hay, who had been for many years Secretary of the University of Sydney Law School. In 1988 Mrs Valerie Tod, a grand-daughter of Bavin, donated the unpublished biography which had been written by J.W. Bavin under the name of 'Amicus'. Finally, another grand-daughter, Mrs Prue Wyndham, in 1990 presented the letters which now form Series 3 of the collection.

Names:

Bavin, Thomas, Sir, 1874-1941

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