Sydney

Department of External Affairs

deserter

A4311, 102/1

938373

Digitised

Copyright National Archives of Australia

1937 to 1939

Notification of ships deserters. [Copy of record seized from German Consulate Sydney at outbreak of World War 2]

Series Title
‘Cumpston Collection’ of documents relating to the history of Australian foreign policy

Function and purpose
In late 1959 Dr John Stanley Cumpston, a long-standing External Affairs employee, was appointed department historian to the then Department of External Affairs. Dr Cumptson held this position until his retirement in 1969. During this time, Dr Cumpston collected a large amount of material concerned with the Department and all aspects of the history of Australian foreign policy. The records that Dr Cumpston collected for his research were gathered from the Department’s registered series, ‘private’ collections of Departmental staff and his own material. These records were stored together in boxes by Dr Cumpston with no overall control system.

There are copies of files of German origin covering the period 1929 to 1939, the originals of which were included in the collection but which have since been returned to the German Foreign Office. These items are registered on RecordSearch as items 102/1 – 102/7.

Correspondence

Siobhan Campbell