An Historian’s Life
For Alex
An Historian’s Life Max Crawford and the Politics of Academic Freedom
Fay Anderson
MELBOURNE UNIVERSITY PRESS An imprint of Melbourne University Publishing Ltd (MUP Ltd) 187 Grattan Street, Carlton, Victoria 3053, Australia
[email protected] www.mup.com.au First published 2005 Text © Fay Anderson, 2005 Illustrations © Belong to the individual copyright holder as acknowledged in the text. Design and typography © Melbourne University Publishing Ltd 2005 This book is copyright. Apart from any use permitted under the Copyright Act 1968 and subsequent amendments, no part may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means or process whatsoever without the prior written permission of the publishers. Designed by Phil Campbell Typeset in Utopia by J&M Typesetting Printed by University of Melbourne Design & Print Centre National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry Anderson, Fay. An historian’s life : Max Crawford and the politics of academic freedom. Includes index. ISBN 0 522 85153 3. (paperback) ISBN 0 522 85154 1. (e-book) 1. Crawford, R. M. (Raymond Maxwell), 1906-1991. 2. University of Melbourne. Dept. of History - Employees Biography. 3. Historians - Australia - Biography. 4. Academic freedom - Australia. 5. History - Study and teaching (Higher) - Victoria - Melbourne. 6. Liberalism Australia. I. Title. 994.0072
Contents Introduction
1
1. Origins and Influences
15
2. ‘Forward the Professors’
53
3. War and Diplomacy
101
4. Brave New World
153
5. Academic Freedom and the Australian Story
217
6. ‘Things Will Never Be the Same’
278
7. ‘Into the Night’
321
Conclusion
366
Bibliography
375
Index
388
vii
List of abbreviations ABC ACCL AIF ADB ANU ASIO CPA FAUSA MI5 MUSA MUP NAA NLA SRC UMA VOKS WEA
viii
Australian Broadcasting Commission Australian Council of Civil Liberties Australian Imperial Force Australian Dictionary of Biography Australian National University Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Communist Party of Australia Federation of Australian University Staff Associations Military Intelligence Service, section 5 Melbourne University Staff Association Melbourne University Press National Archives of Australia National Library of Australia Students Representative Council University of Melbourne Archives All Union Association for Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries Workers Educational Association
Acknowledgements There are many people to thank for assisting and inspiring me in this endeavour. They include: Liz Agostino, Perrie Ballantyne, Tony Birch, Andy Brown-May, Robert Dare, Don Garden, June Factor, Barbara Falk, Patricia Grimshaw, Ken Inglis, Jamie Mackie, Janet McCalman, Peter McPhee, Carolyn Rasmussen, Ron Ridley, Richard Selleck, Ann Standish, Richard Trembath, Graham Willett, Sara Wills and Bart Ziino. Colleagues in the History Department and Australian Centre have generously commented on my work in progress and provided guidance. My particular thanks to Stuart Macintyre who was a great supervisor and continues to offer advice and encouragement. Thank you also to the Director of the Centre, Kate Darian-Smith for providing me with the support and time to see the work to completion and Roger Averill who emphasised the book’s contradictions and flaws, with humour. I am also indebted to the many people who granted me interviews: the late Clem Christesen, the late Nina Christesen, the late Dymphna Clark, the late Lloyd Churchward, Ken Crawford, the late Lloyd Evans, Sheila Fitzpatrick, Frank Ford, Betty Hayes, Donald Horne, Laurie O’Brien, June Phillip, John Poynter, the late Geoffrey Serle, Geoffrey Sharp, Nonie Sharp, Barry Smith, Valerie Tarrant, Arthur Turner and Cynthia Turner. My sincere gratitude goes to Ian Crawford and Margaret Cheshire who allowed me to intrude in their lives, generously offering important information and correcting the inconsistencies in my work. Over many years the staff at the National Library of Australia and the National Archives of Australia have been most helpful. I am particularly grateful to the University of Melbourne Archives for providing me with advice and access to their collections. Special thanks go to past and present staff members, most notably Cecily Close, Sue Fairbanks, Michael Piggott, Mark Richmond and Jason Benjamin. The staff at Melbourne University Publishing have been wonderful. Thank you to the publisher Louise Adler, Amanda Finnis, Nathan Katz and Monica Dux, who is always so encouraging. To Sue Lake, Deanne McLaren and the ‘Gin Club’ for their unerring patience and understanding when I have been distracted, exhausted and simply annoying. Final thanks I owe to my parents, and Alex who has lived with this research for much of his life. ix
x
Max Crawford at Oxford Hill and Saunders: Oxford
xi
Introduction
In 1952, at the height of the Cold War, Colonel Charles Spry, the Director of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (better known as ASIO), instructed his agents to vet all academics at Australian universities. ‘I am sure that you will readily appreciate’, Spry wrote to Robert Menzies, the Prime Minister at the time, ‘the inadvisability of employing, in any University, lecturers who are likely to infect students with subversive doctrines’.1 In Australia as in the United States, the intellectual as an ideologue had been an object of suspicion and resentment since the 1930s, and the Cold War confirmed and intensified this mistrust.2 Politicians, public agencies (most notably ASIO) and the press had hounded ‘suspect intellectuals’ and advanced the notion of manipulative academics for years. Raymond Maxwell Crawford (who was always known as Max), one of Australia’s pre-eminent historians, was considered highly suspect; his career was sometimes under siege and views often vilified. As both a participant in and observer of many decisive episodes of the era—Europe in the midst of the Depression, America and Russia at the height of World War II, post-war reconstruction and the Cold War in Australia—Crawford was regarded as a ‘radical’ and outspoken defender of intellectual autonomy. A study of his life provides insight into one man’s experience in the midst of political turmoil and change and the backlash against the intellectual community that these events
Introduction
1
inspired. The trajectory of Crawford’s political experiences suggests the changing nature of Australian progressive liberalism and the precarious state of intellectual freedom. This is the first lengthy biographical study of Max Crawford. His life and legacy have attracted considerable attention; he has been described as a ‘profound influence’ in Australia and a man who raised the quality of its intellectual life.3 But in other accounts of public life in the middle decades of the twentieth century, he is no more than a peripheral bit-player. These different estimates and the reasons for his faded acclaim raise intriguing questions. Despite Crawford’s diminished fame, his legacy casts an enduring shadow on subsequent generations of historians and public figures. His life intersected with some notable figures: English intellectuals such as Kenneth Bell, Christopher Hill, A.D. Lindsay, and Richard Tawney, and noted Americans Hans Baron and Merle Curti, as well as prominent Australians that included John Anderson, Kenneth Bailey, Macmahon Ball, Jim Cairns, Clem and Nina Christesen, H.V. Evatt, Brian Fitzpatrick, Kathleen Fitzpatrick, Keith Hancock, Donald Horne, Charles Lowe, Robert Menzies, Ian Milner, Keith Officer, Sydney Orr, Nettie Palmer, Stephen Roberts, Charles Spry and Russel Ward. Then there are students, such as Geoffrey Blainey, Manning Clark, Inga Clendinnen, John Mulvaney and Hugh Stretton, whom Crawford taught, mentored and encouraged during his thirty-four years as Professor of History at the University of Melbourne. This study considers Max Crawford as a historian and a public intellectual. It relates his experiences as a student at Sydney and Oxford, as a schoolteacher, commentator and struggling writer, a diplomat in wartime Russia, and a Cold War victim and accuser. Crawford is variously regarded as an inspiring or an aloof teacher, an advocate or detractor of Australian history, a great defender or betrayer of academic freedom. These contrasting evaluations are important. So too is Crawford’s role as a flawed ideologue: his compassion, hubris, imagination, self-obsession, sensitivity, courage and weakness. Political Denial and Self-invention There are three particular themes, which will be addressed in this biography. The first is the political denial and self-invention that dominated Crawford’s retrospective autobiographical writing. Born
2
An Historian’s Life
in a small country town in New South Wales in 1906, he was one of twelve children in a family guided by an informed and ambitious mother and a father who was a stationmaster and committed unionist. Two of Crawford’s uncles were parliamentarians who followed W.A. Holman out of the Labor Party in the wartime split over conscription. Although his political inheritance was substantial, Crawford insisted that his family was not political, and that he followed the family tradition in keeping his conscience free of political commitments. The ideology that he espoused, and afterwards was at pains to deny, was politically active and advocated the liberal values of freedom, tolerance and morality. The book will explore how he was drawn to progressive causes and lent his academic authority to them, only to retreat when he encountered fierce criticism. It is my contention that Crawford finally adopted a stance of independence from all engagement because of the cumulative effects of the Cold War and the firestorm surrounding his decision to write to the Bulletin in 1961, ostensibly to expose an alleged Communist plot. By this time he was aligned with a remarkable and influential group including: Vincent Buckley, Sidney Hook, Frank Knopfelmacher, Richard Krygier and James McAuley. In analysing Crawford’s political and academic experiences and charting the course of events that embroiled his life, the emphasis will be on the formation and development of his political beliefs, liberal perspective and intellectual role. I reconstruct the complex, evolving nature of Crawford’s political and historical ideology and his responses during the combative debates between radicals and conservatives. Crawford was a product of the Sydney cultural tradition and a member of the Melbourne intellectual elite, a celebrated dichotomy in Australian cultural history. His political and intellectual ideology is not easy to define. At various stages in his life, he adopted the guise of a self-confessed conservative, a civil libertarian, a public activist, a borderline radical, an advocate for the left and an accidental Cold War warrior. What apparently remained unchanged was his identification and acceptance of the obligations and expectations of the intellectual life. He maintained the liberal academic’s anxiety about intellectual independence, which was a prevailing characteristic of the Sydney intellectual tradition.4
Introduction
3
Crawford was an enthusiastic proponent of academic freedom when it was unfashionable and under threat. He understood it to embody free intellectual enquiry; the right and duty to offer new ideas and controversial or unpopular opinions; the freedom to follow a line of research where it led; and the freedom of the university to conduct its own affairs without external interference, particularly from the government.5 At the core of Crawford’s autobiographical construct was an insistence that he was ‘unpolitical’.6 This biography follows Crawford’s self-conscious re-invention, from an Australian working-class boy to Oxford scholar, and from confident public intellectual to unwitting or intentional victim. The Place of Academic Freedom The second theme is the place of academic freedom in Australian universities. I argue that it was often tenuous and never completely accepted by administrators, politicians or the press, which expected universities to avoid controversy. The limits of academic freedom on Australian campuses will be discussed, as well as the suspicion of liberal intellectuals in Australian public life, the repression of academic radicals and the attempts to stifle dissident voices. This surveillance culminated in deliberate and conscious political manipulation of the academy and the collusion and compliance of university authorities in such interference. At other times, the authorities displayed remarkable courage in defending civil liberties despite considerable criticism from politicians and the press. As the Cold War progressed, the public and political expectations demanded self-censorship and unwavering loyalty of Australian intellectuals. These themes will be analysed in the context of Crawford’s experiences and his transformation from a highly conspicuous, progressive and engaged liberal to a more traditional and reticent one. The lengths ASIO went to in its investigation of ‘subversive’ intellectuals will also be examined and the fate of those, like Brian Fitzpatrick and Russel Ward, who did not submit. Crawford’s Intellectual Style The third theme concerns Max Crawford’s intellectual style. His approach to the theory and method of history exercised a strong influence on the discipline, as it assumed a central position in
4
An Historian’s Life
Australia’s intellectual culture. The History School that Crawford shaped was celebrated for its scholarship, and its students achieved important positions in other universities and in public life. The book will consider the life of the Department, its influence, the approach to history and its legacy, which has been retrospectively celebrated and dismissed. The legacy attributed to the Melbourne School of History and its pedagogical innovations are closely related. I believe that Crawford’s historical approach gave his political activity resonance and relevance. His experiences reveal a political conscience linked closely to a particular understanding of history and the role of the historian. Crawford implied that this political awareness was an impediment. ‘The pleasing art of historical narration was at times’, he wrote, ‘elbowed out by the insistent demand that the past must somehow illuminate the present, that history must find answers to the problems which beset us ... How can you observe principles in political life?’7 The historians who were considered suspect were regarded as such not just because of their political activities, but also because of their writing which, by the 1950s, had moved away from a British attachment and emphasised the need for an independent Australian identity. The political interference of historians who pursued this divergent interpretation is an important and neglected aspect of Australia’s Cold War. This study is also concerned with the changing role of universities as they grew from small, intimate communities of scholars to large national institutions with new responsibilities. It considers the way that academics and their Staff Association responded to intellectual suppression, the role of female historians and their struggle to establish their careers, the changing conceptions of research, and the way that the historical profession took shape as a result of the growing interest in Australian history. While Crawford played an important role in the development of Australian history, he was by no means persuaded of its centrality. His own historical practice merits consideration for the way it shaped and expressed his activity as a public intellectual. * * *
Introduction
5
This is not a conventional biography, a full account of a life from birth to death. Rather, I am concerned with Crawford as a particular type of intellectual who became engaged in radical causes. I take from Richard Hofstadter the definition of the intellectual as ‘a person for whom thinking fulfils at once the function of work and play; more specifically, as a person, whose relationship to society is defined, both in his eyes and in the eyes of the society, principally by his presumed capacity to comment upon it with greater detachment’.8 The intellectual class is a relatively modern phenomenon, and the intellectuals’ relation to the rest of society is never entirely comfortable, because the attention and respect paid to their views seem to rest on a measure of detachment.9 The grievance against intellectuals as ideologues intensified when a large part of the intellectual community aligned themselves to communism and fellow-travelling in the 1930s and the 1940s.10 Radicalism and conservatism are important political concepts that constantly operate in this work, although both have various shades of meaning. Radicalism here largely applies to left-wing radicals: those who, in different degrees, embraced the doctrines of socialism and subscribed to progressive beliefs. The idea of political radicalism has long been bound up with this idea of change and progress. ‘To be radical was to have a certain view of the possibilities inherent in history—radicalism meant breaking away from the past.’11 Tim Rowse provides a useful definition of the form of radicalism that had the greatest currency among Australian intellectuals in the midtwentieth century—antagonism to both imperialism and inequality: Radicalism…endorsed the move away from Britain’s orbit and a patriotic rationale to the controversial plans of Reconstruction…A serious effort was made to exploit the socialist potential of this ‘national character’ to extend its political effects into a struggle against capitalism itself. Intellectuals from the Communist Party…inhabited a world that seemed to be turning inexorably leftwards after the war; and this brightening world included an Australia that had recently rediscovered the democratic strengths of its own traditions.12
6
An Historian’s Life
On the opposite side of the ideological divide are the conservatives, a label that also allows a number of different interpretations but, for the purpose of this book, has the characteristics discussed below. The main thrust of conservative thought has been a suspicion of left-wing radical change in all of its forms.13 In an Australian context, the conservatives were pessimistic about schemes for secular progress, convinced of the need for strong authority and attached to stability, tradition and hierarchy. After the Second World War, the Cold War and anti-communism brought a wider coalition of conservatives and more cautious liberals. The opponents of communism were concerned at the threat to Australia, but only as part of a worldwide struggle. They saw communism as ‘a danger to the whole European intellectual and cultural tradition, from which all that was valuable in Australia derived.’14 * * * This biography originally intended to avoid Crawford’s personal and domestic life. The private sphere seemed irrelevant to my purpose, which was to explore the life of a public intellectual. This intention had to be reassessed. Crawford’s youthful experiences inevitably and profoundly influenced aspects of his personality. His denial of the impact of his working-class roots and the family’s political engagement—indeed his place as the favoured son—had a lasting effect on his subsequent behaviour. Crawford’s tendency to alter and reinvent episodes of his early life is a strong theme of the biography. The complex friendship with his fellow historian, Kathleen Fitzpatrick, is also essential to understanding the development of his career, and her story provides a vivid account of the struggle experienced by women academics in the middle of the twentieth century. Crawford’s second marriage to Ruth Hoban is important. She was a leading protagonist in the controversy that erupted after Crawford accused staff of communist subversion, involving the Bulletin and ASIO. This was a devastating episode that provoked criticism of Crawford’s motives. Had he become a political reactionary, a puppet of the right? Or was he motivated by misguided considerations of personal loyalty? As the book was nearing completion, I was asked if I now ‘understood’ Crawford and if I had resolved the contradictions. As with all
Introduction
7
lives, there are secrets and inconsistencies that I cannot possibly comprehend or resolve. There is no conclusive evidence as to what drove Crawford to write to the Bulletin in 1961, thereby effectively destroying his reputation. Although the assumption that people are responsible for their actions might be overly simplistic, there is a moral continuity between the inner and outer person.15 Janet Malcolm claims that biography is a flawed genre.16 One of the most problematic aspects of writing it is the precarious balance of interpretation and historical evidence. The genre offers great scope for imaginative interpretation, although this is constrained by the innate difficulties of understanding another person and fathoming the complexities and frailties of human nature. I draw conclusions, but not, I hope, at the expense of concealing ambiguities, gaps, confusions and inconsistencies in the evidence. Bernard Crick observed that a biographer has an obligation to show how he or she reaches conclusions, not to pretend omniscience. The biography should also reveal to the reader things that are mute, problematic and uncertain.17 I never met Max Crawford, nor did I know about his reputation or legacy when I began this study. The contradictions of his life emerged from the tattered suitcases and shabby boxes that contained his correspondence, diaries and papers. Letters were scattered, papers randomly filed and tutorial notes piled in disorder. The only semblance of order existed in the folders documenting his political and public experiences and the abandoned research undertaken for the intended books on contemporary events. Copious notes, letters and drafts were painstakingly ordered in neat folders with succinct titles: Sydney University, Oxford, Bradfield College, the Spanish Civil War, the Australian Council for Civil Liberties, Brian Fitzpatrick, censorship, conscription, the press, the Australian Legation to the Soviet Union, Russia 1940s, Australia-Soviet Friendship League, the refusal of the American visa, the Bulletin and Communism. These titles offered a clue to Max Crawford’s priorities and preoccupations. The papers relating to the Social Studies/Bulletin Enquiry in 1961 were present, but so also was a stipulation that they would be closed to the hungry eyes of researchers for thirty years after Crawford’s death. Hence the collection was available to me with this one important exception. Although the restriction might reveal Crawford’s
8
An Historian’s Life
bitterness, grief or even shame about the episode, the chapter on the Social Studies Enquiry is dependent on alternative sources. George Paton, the Vice-Chancellor at the time, requested that the Council members destroy all papers of an incriminating or confidential nature. I utilised the oral testimony of the main, surviving players. Geoffrey Sharp, Cynthia and Arthur Turner and Laurie O’Brien were at the centre of the storm and have kept relevant documents, so their perspectives are fundamental to the account. The version of their adversaries is sadly lacking, with only Donald Horne still alive. The material in the remainder of Crawford’s private collection forms the most important source of my research. I quoted at length from the diaries and extensive correspondence. Biographers prize such sources because, as Janet Malcolm suggests, letters are the ‘conduit of unmediated experience’.18 Max Crawford’s personality and motives emerge from his vivid correspondence, notes and writing; the clarity of his careful and melodic voice is important. The letters from his contemporaries, colleagues and former students provide an added dimension, and I hope the vulnerabilities, humour, grace, loyalty, ambition, bitterness and indecision are apparent in their words. The close and sometimes brittle relationships with former students like Manning Clark emerge clearly in this correspondence. When conducting interviews, I avoided those who have already written at length about Crawford. Instead, I spoke to individuals who have not been involved in retrospectives on the History School and Crawford’s legacy.19 Some of his protégés have been almost hagiographical in their recollections. This is inevitable. Crawford was compassionate and generous towards the young historians he mentored. Some of the women I interviewed, however, were far more critical in their recollections. This book, then, will attempt to reconcile the ‘filial attachment’ felt by many of Crawford’s students with the harsh criticism from those who thought the Melbourne School was too pleased with itself.20 With the exception of Crawford’s last surviving sibling, Ken Crawford, and a brief conversation with his son Ian Crawford, I had not previously interviewed family members for the basis of this work, which was the foundation of my PhD. This is not because I adhere to Janet Malcolm’s belief that ‘relatives are the biographer’s natural enemies’ (although they pose unique challenges),21 but because as stated
Introduction
9
earlier, the purely domestic sphere is not a major aspect of my enquiry. This decision was reversed when I sought copyright permission from Max Crawford’s surviving children, Ian Crawford and Margaret Cheshire. The challenges came to the fore as they attempted to reconcile memories of their father and their contented childhoods with some of the more critical assessments presented in this book. What could be more confronting than reading a stranger’s interpretation of your father or of a marriage? What could be more challenging than considering the contemporary views offered in diaries and letters? Both Ian and Margaret’s perception and understanding enriched the book and gave me an insight that was previously lacking, though Ian Crawford quite rightly conceded that his perspective was as a child. Curiously Crawford’s colleagues and Crawford himself (possibly unwittingly) had presented an occasionally contrasting view of his domestic life. And others who knew Crawford (and there are a multitude of former colleagues and students) have sometimes taken exception to the interpretations that I make and the conclusions that I reach. Crawford’s work has been kept alive in recent publications. The most recent contained the proceedings of a symposium involving thirty of Crawford’s former students. They reflected on his contribution to history in Australia as a teacher, practitioner and the ‘creator’ of the Melbourne School.22 It was a celebration that provoked sharp criticism by some historians who were not present. The Discovery of Australian History 1890-1939 presents the lives of ten historians who pioneered the academic discipline of Australian history and includes essays on Crawford, Jessie Webb and Kathleen Fitzpatrick. On Crawford’s retirement, a special issue of Historical Studies was dedicated to his work and influence. It included the recollections of former students and colleagues, Crawford’s own graceful and reflective article on the ‘School of Prudence’ (which was reprinted) and a survey of the 575 Honours graduates of the Melbourne School of History from 1937 to 1966.23 Making History includes three eloquent essays by Max Crawford, Manning Clark and Geoffrey Blainey on the practice of history.24 While these works are extremely informative, they largely neglect the political dimensions of Crawford’s life. And it is the magnitude and ramifications of intellectual
10
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autonomy that is so important in Crawford’s story. There are many accounts of academic freedom, liberalism and intellectuals in America, but a dearth of research on academic freedom in Australia. Fiona Capp’s fascinating account of security surveillance of Australian authors and intellectuals was groundbreaking.25 Yet, while it emphasised the political allegiances and attachments, it tended to neglect the experience of academics, the intellectual concerns and the formative role of universities in Australian public life. There is a growing interest in the history of ASIO. Works include Frank Cain’s The Origins of Political Surveillance in Australia and The Australian Security Intelligence Organization: An Unofficial History;26 Brian Martin’s Intellectual Suppression: Australian Case Histories, Analysis and Responses;27 and in particular, David McKnight’s chapter entitled ‘Trenchcoats and mortarboards’ in his work on ASIO, Australia’s Spies and their Secrets, where he examined academic autonomy in universities.28 Certain controversial episodes have attracted attention. Stuart Macintyre and Anna Clark’s History Wars has explored some of the seminal battles.29 Phillip Deery’s recent exposé of Ian Milner as a Russian spy rather than a Cold War victim is insightful.30 Cassandra Pybus reconsidered the Orr case in Gross Moral Turpitude.31 Peter McPhee’s biography of R.D. ‘Pansy’ Wright,32 and Craig Munro’s profile of Inky Stephensen,33 considered the issue of intellectual autonomy. Humphrey McQueen’s book on the Courier Mail’s posthumous campaign against Manning Clark was astute in parts.34 Russel Ward’s vivid autobiography examined his own devastating experiences.35 However, a fuller analysis of university collusion and ambivalence towards intellectual freedom has yet to be written. Robert Dare has correctly observed that Max Crawford was ‘an unremitting autobiographer’.36 The narrative that he constructed so carefully was indeed meticulous and prophetic. Crawford’s story is characterised by the idea that he embarked on a pilgrimage from humble beginnings to the glories of Oxford, that he progressed from an unknown and unpublished historian to the visionary head of one of Australia’s finest university departments.37 Underpinning these recollections is the constant denial of a political mission and the representation of his political commitments as being secondary and incidental. As Dare observes, any experiences that might threaten the
Introduction
11
‘myth of origin were eased gently into line’ or dismissed completely.38 Most of Crawford’s autobiographical writing was completed after he retired, and it is touched by disillusionment and the desire to avoid political and ideological fervour. Crawford never mentioned the Bulletin debacle, the tragic postscript to his life. Humphrey McQueen maintained that Crawford’s biography of George Arnold Wood was a ‘scarifying’ autobiographical confession and Crawford’s ‘literary mask’.39 Crawford made only one fleeting and somewhat unconvincing reference in his autobiographical writing to the political activity that had absorbed so much of his time and energy. ‘I was commonly considered very radical myself, even rather more radical than I was, much of it being little more than a Balliol-fostered belief that diversity of opinion should be heard’, he wrote somewhat defensively. ‘I often found myself pushed by the circumstances of the late 1930s in particular into uncomfortable stands that were, in the terms of that time, radical.’40 Crawford was here implying that at times he was an unenthusiastic and accidental participant. Tim Rowse has observed that Australian liberal intellectuals derived much of their legitimacy and institutional security from the myth of political independence.41 Crawford perpetuated this myth, but I believe that his insistence on placing himself outside politics sits oddly with his background and early life. Indeed, he attempted to conceal or at least minimise his inheritance. Despite his later denials, his working-class origins and his family’s significant political connections did mould him. This provided a clue as to how to approach Max Crawford, and a place to begin. As Andre Malraux once observed, ‘a man’s first truth is what he hides’.42 Notes 1
David McKnight, Australia’s Spies and their Secrets (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1994), 145.
2
Richard Hofstadter, Anti-Intellectualism in American Life (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1974), 38.
3
Geoffrey Serle, ‘R.M. Crawford and his School’, Melbourne Historical Journal No. 9 (1970), 3.
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4
Tim Rowse, Australian Liberalism and National Character (Melbourne: Kibble Books, 1978), 29.
5
This definition has been taken from Christopher Lasch, The New Radicalism in America. 1889-1963: The Intellectual as a Social Type (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1966), 18, and S. G. Foster and Margaret Varghese, The Making of the Australian National University (Sydney: Allen & Unwin), 114.
6
Stuart Macintyre, ed., Making History: R. M. Crawford, Manning Clark, Geoffrey Blainey (Melbourne: McPhee Gribble/Penguin Books, 1985), 36.
7
Crawford to Vincent Crow, R.M. Crawford Papers, University of Melbourne Archives. Hereafter UMA.
8
Hofstadter, Anti-Intellectualism in American Life, ix.
9
Ibid.
10
Lasch, The New Radicalism in America. 1889-1963, 38-9.
11
Anthony Giddens, Beyond Left and Right: The Future of Radical Politics (London: Blackwell Publishers Ltd., 1998), 1.
12
Rowse, Australian Liberalism and National Character, 192.
13
Giddens, Beyond Left and Right, 2.
14
John Hirst, ‘Conservatism’, in Graeme Davison, John Hirst and Stuart Macintyre, eds., Oxford Companion to Australian History (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1999), 149.
15
Richard Holmes, Footsteps: Adventures of a Romantic Biographer (London: Flamingo, 1995), 175.
16
Janet Malcolm, The Silent Woman (London: Pann Macmillan, 1994), 10.
17
Bernard Crick, George Orwell: A Life (Middlesex: Penguin Books, 1980), 31.
18
Malcolm, The Silent Woman, 110.
19
Stuart Macintyre and Peter McPhee, eds., Max Crawford’s School of History (Melbourne: Melbourne University History Department Monograph, 2000).
20
Ibid., 4.
21
Malcolm, The Silent Woman, 10.
22
Macintyre and McPhee, eds. Max Crawford’s School of History. Crawford Special Issue Historical Studies,15, 57, (October 1971).
23 24
Macintyre, ed. Making History.
25
Fiona Capp, Writers Defiled (Melbourne: McPhee Gribble, 1993).
26
F. M. Cain, The Origins of Political Surveillance in Australia (Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1983) and The Australian Security Intelligence Organization: An Unofficial History (London: Frank Cass, 1994).
27
Brian Martin, Intellectual Suppression: Australian Case Histories, Analysis and Responses (Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1986).
28
McKnight, Australia’s Spies and their Secrets.
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29
Stuart Macintyre and Anna Clark, History Wars (Melbourne: Melbourne University Publishing, 2004).
30
Phillip Deery, ‘Cold War Victim or Rhodes Scholar Spy: Revisiting the Case of Ian Milner’, Overland 147 (1997), 9-12. See also Humphrey McQueen, Suspect History (South Australia: Wakefield Press, 1997), 57. McQueen contends that ‘left leaning experts remain divided about the issue’.
31
Cassandra Pybus, Gross Moral Turpitude (Melbourne: William Heinemann, 1993).
32
Peter McPhee, Pansy: A Life of Roy Douglas Wright (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1999).
33
Craig Munro, Inky Stephensen: The Wildman of Letters (St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1992).
34
Humphrey McQueen, Suspect History.
35
Russel Ward, A Radical Life: The Autobiography of Russel Ward (Melbourne: Macmillan, 1988).
36
Dare in Macintyre and McPhee, eds., Max Crawford’s School of History, 13.
37
Ibid.
38
Ibid. The obedient narrative includes Crawford’s ‘University Research: History’ in A. Grenfell Price, ed., The Humanities in Australia, A Survey with Special Reference to the Universities (Canberra: Australian Humanities Research Council, 1959); Crawford, Historical Studies, 1971, 27-42; Crawford, in Making History; interview with Max Crawford by Neville Meaney, 3 November 1986, Oral History Collection, National Library of Australia (hereafter NLA); R. M. Crawford ‘My Brother Jack: Background and Early Years’ in L. T. Evans and J. D. B. Miller, eds, Policy and Practice, Essays in Honour of Sir John Crawford (Canberra: ANU Press, 1987); Stuart Macintyre, ed.,, Old Bebb’s Store and Other Poems (Melbourne: The University of Melbourne, 1992).
39
Humphrey McQueen, Gallipoli to Petrov (Sydney: George Allen & Unwin, 1984), 80-1. McQueen is interested in what compelled Crawford to document the ‘unexceptional’ life of Wood.
40
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 35.
41
Rowse, Australian Liberalism and National Character, 23.
42
Andre Malraux, Antimemoirs (Paris: Gallimard, 1967), 1.
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An Historian’s Life
Chapter 1
Origins and Influences
‘One is all too aware of opportunities of original work missed, of work confidently planned that remains undone, of false leads followed.’1 After a career that spanned thirty-four years as Professor of History at Melbourne University, Max Crawford reflected on his chosen vocation with a mixture of satisfaction and regret. One of the original projects that remained undone was his historical study of contemporary Spain, devised whilst tutoring at Oxford in 1932. The emphasis was to be on the historical roots rather than the political implications of the conflict in that country. This project laid the foundations for his synoptic view of history. Crawford never lived in Spain; this was intended to be a purely intellectual inquiry. Yet he immersed himself in the language, examined the culture and historical events, and read modern Spanish literature to familiarise himself with the prevailing ‘attitudes and temper’.2 Although the project was terminated before it really began, Crawford would always remember its themes and inspiration with pride and sadness. The year 1932 foreshadowed the trajectory of his future scholarship and unpublished work. The excited anticipation of his careful planning would gradually diminish as he struggled to execute the plan. When Crawford was seventeen he imagined a very different
Origins and Influences
15
future. His keen perception of himself as a serious intellectual moved him to prophesise: One day I shall write. What it shall be — drama or poetry or novels I don’t know. But I do know I shall write...I feel it. I feel that I am being carried on the crest of a wave about to break, and when it does break I shall be freed. I shall write.3 Crawford described his inability to express his individuality, but was confident that maturity would liberate and strengthen him. He also hoped to inspire others. This boyish testimony, written during Crawford’s last year at High School, embodied all the determination and ambition of youth. Despite his confidence in his destiny, however, it would take nine years of struggle before he embarked on any writing project of substance. This was neither the great Australian novel, nor the poetry to which Crawford devoted a wavering commitment. Instead, it was the historical study of Spain. His roots and youthful experiences provide some indication of the intellectual he would become and the inconsistent direction his career would take. Crawford was the ninth of twelve children (the second child died in infancy). He was born in 1906 to Henry (who was always known as Harry) and Harriet Crawford and raised in the Sydney suburb of Bexley. He depicted his childhood retrospectively as one of genteel poverty. In reality, his young life was sometimes challenging, disrupted by the First World War, the enlistment of his older brother and uncle, the struggles of his father and the aspirations of his mother. The absence of the impact of the war in Crawford’s childhood recollections is startling. The war destroyed a generation of men and resulted in a break between the post-war survivors and the old men who had sent them to the battlefields of Europe.4 An uncle and elder brother served in Gallipoli and France, and a brother-in-law was one of those shattered ‘vets who took to the drink’.5 Yet Crawford did not mention the loss, the change in social attitudes and values that resulted from the wasteful carnage, nor political reaction against war. It is only in an historical account written for an American audience that he referred to the war in any length, and his style is detached, the meaning vague:
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I am conscious in my own retrospect of a hiatus: in those years after the war when I was a schoolboy and undergraduate, I can think of only one of my teachers of note who belonged to the generation of soldiers. We were taught by the middle-aged and the aged, and we too much lacked the bridge between of those nearer our own age who might have guided us safely past some of the pits into which we fell.6 The other notable and mystifying autobiographical disparity was Crawford’s recollection that his family was not politically minded. ‘It might seem that radical opinions were my family inheritance’, Crawford observed later in life, ‘in fact I knew little of this until recent years... We lived in a house of books and took study for granted; but I do not recall it as a political household.7 Yet his father, Harry a gentle, sociable man with the ‘soul of a poet’,8 was ‘deeply involved’ in the Railwaymen’s Union for much of his life. Max Crawford’s daughter, Margaret, was told that her grandfather contributed to the union magazine and visited union members all over New South Wales.9 As the eldest of his generation of the family, Harry had supported his younger siblings, much to his wife’s chagrin, and purchased the radical newspaper, Vedette, for his brother James, the family favourite who became a Queensland MP and was drowned in the Clermont floods. Yet the words, ‘that traitor Mannix’, uttered by Crawford’s father, were apparently the only political recollection of his youth.10 Although Crawford could not recall political debate, he would later speculate that the family’s political legacy most profoundly affected his brother Jack. That formative inheritance was a mistrust of politics. His uncles had followed W. A. Holman out of the Labor Party in the wartime split over conscription. One of them, Thomas Crawford, the former Presbyterian Minister in Newcastle and the southern Riverina, had been the Labor MP for Marrickville since 1910. He later stood as a National and lost his seat in the 1917 state elections. In the same year, he was appointed a Crown Prosecutor in New South Wales and, from 1940 until his retirement in 1947, he was Senior Crown Prosecutor. Hence, Crawford emphasised his uncles’ reluctance to bind their consciences to the dictates of one party, and suggested that such
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independence influenced his brother Jack. Later knighted, Jack would become known as one of the ‘seven dwarfs’, one of the top bureaucrats of diminutive size who etched his career in Canberra and became a distinguished public servant, working for both Labor and Liberal-Country Party ministers.11 The family influence was not confined to Jack: Max also refused to bind himself to any party loyalty—or so he maintained. Despite this, the youngest sibling, Ken, claimed that both Jack and Max were habitual Labor voters. Max would later write that he knew nothing of his uncles as MPs or the ‘Vedette venture’.12 If Crawford could not recollect political discussion among his family, he was not unaware of his family’s sentiments or his own views. Despite his protestations, he possessed a strong vision for Australia. He confidently pondered such issues as communism, class, and attitudes towards the British in Germany and France. These were hardly the thoughts of a man who was ‘quite unpolitical’.13 At the same time he insisted that politics ‘bored him’. It was his fascination with Machiavelli that aroused an interest in statecraft, and he took from Machiavelli the moral dilemma inherent in politics that ‘good may be bad and bad good’.14 Crawford also suggested in retrospect that the influences that shaped the careers of his political uncles might have operated ‘subliminally’ in his own parents’ house. He cited a readiness to sympathise with the underdog.15 Convinced that Bexley was the setting of Christina Stead’s classic book, The Man Who Loved Children, Crawford considered the ‘real poverty’ in the Bexley-Rockdale district—the widows and deserted wives with children. He recalled that if you moved further out to Sutherland, the poverty was even more confronting. One of Crawford’s elder sisters would ‘cry her eyes out for the little girls in her class who came to school in winter barefoot and wearing worn out flimsy cotton dresses’.16 Crawford later speculated that they were probably the children of casual and itinerant workers. The humanity that he observed in his siblings was also a trait that was constantly emphasised about Crawford himself. Education was pivotal to Crawford’s childhood. He fulfilled all expectations, excelled without apparent effort at Fort Street High School and distinguished himself at the University of Sydney. He graduated with first-class honours in English and History, one of an
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emergent class of intellectuals who were highly motivated, upwardly striving children of the lower-middle classes. University study was, among other things, a ladder to higher status and security.17 Academic achievement was to be his escape from the sprawling suburb of Bexley and the life of his close and devout Presbyterian family. Crawford’s success inspired others.18 At Sydney University, Crawford fell under the spell of George Arnold Wood, J. F. Bruce and John Le Gay Brereton. They were an intoxicating combination, and Brereton became the object of Crawford’s unabashed admiration, which he likened to ‘just out and out hero-worshipping’.19 Even with the encouragement of his three mentors to embrace new ideas, he could not break from accepted beliefs and the need for compliance. In a letter written in 1928, when Crawford was attending Oxford, he provided a ‘mental biography’ that reviewed his performance at Sydney. ‘You probably noticed while we were in Arts’, Crawford wrote in a fit of self-criticism, ‘that if the conversation urged towards the controversial in the matter of the living, I either dodged it or asserted the conventional ideas’.20 Crawford also observed that the result of his work at Sydney University was ‘extreme conventionalism in essays and a waste of much mental energy in weaving laborious cobwebs upon the basis of canons tightly held and sheltered from criticism’.21 The self-criticism might have been provoked by his exposure to new ideas and possibilities. His achievement at Sydney suggests he was judging his performance too harshly. Both Le Gay Brereton and Wood left an indelible impression. Brereton inspired Crawford’s interest in fiction, poetry, theatre and drama. A benevolent and perceptive teacher, he recognised his student’s impatience and his ability to understand humanity with sympathy. In an essay for his English lecturer, Crawford insisted that it was only possible to write great literature ‘after a broad and intense experience of mind and the art in the faith of life’.22 Wood, a nonconformist, taught British and European history and emphasised the importance of primary research. The University also exposed Crawford to liberalism, the creed espoused by George Wood and other Sydney intellectuals. Liberalism was a doctrine of freedom - freedom from the tyranny of superstition, tradition, hierarchy and privilege.23 Wood embraced the ‘English ideal’ of liberalism:
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a belief in liberty and a willingness to promote it for the benefit of others.24 Like Crawford, Wood’s philosophical liberalism did not prepare him for the political controversies of the day, and he suffered for opposition to the Australian government’s military action against the Boers.25 Under his tutor’s guidance, Crawford began to consider the importance of experience, liberalism, and ideas. ‘Tomorrow I Sail’ The baptism of experience began on board the S.S. Ormonde on 27 July 1927. After winning the Woolley Scholarship, Crawford accepted a place at Balliol College, Oxford, the alma mater of Wood, who had previously pointed two other protégés, George Henderson and Garnet Portus, in that direction.26 There was an assumption, indeed a conviction that education of real worth had to be undertaken in England. Ensuing ‘accidents of scholarships’ led Crawford to history and away from his favoured subject, literature. Wood predicted that he would do excellent work in Australian history if he found a year to devote to it.27 Sadly, it would be the last time the two men met, as Wood committed suicide the following year. The significance of the decision to leave Australia did not elude the reflective young Crawford, who wrote in his diary with trepidation, ‘Tomorrow I sail and in the future what?’28 The departure was marred by Crawford’s anxiety about his family. In 1925, during his undergraduate years, his father had retired from his beloved position as stationmaster of Grenfell. With an ‘incurable optimism’ and lack of business acumen, Harry Crawford accepted an offer of a partnership in a wood-and-coal business. Plagued by ill health, but still with a large family to support, he was forced to work in a series of menial jobs after the enterprise failed.29 Curiously, Crawford later remembered this selectively and described his father as having a ‘head for figures’.30 Despite familiarity with the struggle involved in raising eleven children, Harry’s difficulties came as a great shock for the family. Oxford was an enormous extravagance that they could ill afford. Crawford was sensitive to the burden he had imposed and hoped he would be able to relieve his father’s financial worry after two years of study.31 Although he did not think of delaying the trip, he did consider Leeds University rather than the more expensive Oxford. Wood
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persuaded him that Oxford was ‘far better’ and suggested that if the necessity arose, he could utilise the influence of an old college friend at Cambridge.32 Crawford’s feeling of guilt might have been exacerbated by his brother, Jack, who had sacrificed his education for the family’s financial benefit. Only a year before, when Harry Crawford’s ill-conceived venture into the entrepreneurial world began to look precarious, Jack had left high school in the fourth year. He had joined the State Bank and only returned to Sydney High to complete his secondary education when he had earned enough money to pay board to his mother. Later in life, it was Jack who felt great sadness at the memory of his father labouring in the quarry. Sibling rivalry was apparent between the two brothers, close in age and both possessing great potential. The youngest boy in the family, Ken, observed that Jack and Max were not close.33 Max’s son, Ian had a different impression. The brothers shared a bedroom throughout their early life and negotiated separate and acclaimed careers. The perception of competition might have been intensified by the two boys’ very different personalities. Crawford recalled a teacher who, upon watching him walk ahead of his brother Jack, described them as ‘dignity and impudence’. It was an observation that caused some mirth and reflection.34 Crawford clung to his dignity for the rest of his life, and many of his students would recall their professor’s distinctive patrician demeanour. The elitism and formality on board the S.S. Ormonde would prove a stage for Crawford’s private dramas. Shipboard society introduced him to a way of life that, until then, he had only imagined. He was mystified by the company, confused by the ceremony of dinner and distracted by menus and cutlery. Feelings of intimidation, inadequacy and alienation emerged. Having grown up in a family that did not tolerate pomposity or pretension, Crawford found the ‘hideous camouflages of social small talk’ abhorrent.35 His unwelcome exposure to polite society encouraged him to consider the differences between its shallowness and real values. He reported that ‘breeding was more than the ability to read a French menu’; it required ‘honesty and straightforwardness and consideration for others’. This distinction made him appreciate the ‘real kindness of home and Herbert Street and Glenbrook’. Anticipating the
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21
seduction of affluence, Crawford hoped that he would retain this pride in his origins during his time away. He considered it a test whether he would ‘improve or merely acquire polish to cover degeneracy’.36 As the ship sailed across the Indian Ocean, Crawford navigated his own thoughts about Australian identity, nationalism and Empire. The tensions of belonging and independence, acceptance and rebellion, compromise and contradiction were constantly tested on board. On the second day of the journey, a ‘disgruntled’ English Officer complimented Crawford with the remark that he was the first Australian he had met who did not speak like one. Crawford responded in his diary with characteristic ambivalence, ‘a praiseworthy thing I suppose’.37 Although he recognised the condescension, he listened in tactful silence as the Officer attacked the Australian education system. Crawford was himself capable of snobbery and in a letter to his mother he considered the Englishman’s opinion unacceptable because it was gained from the experiences of a ‘few shop girls’. While he spoke of the varieties and efficiencies of Australian schools, he thought, but did not say: ‘If he can’t realise the differences between an old and new country, let him stay in the comfort of the old’.38 Crawford continued to harbour an ambition to be a writer. The stories he was beginning to formulate reflected his difficulties in attempting to be both socially acceptable and a patriotic champion of Australia. One story was profoundly autobiographical and somewhat prophetic, as it dealt with the tug of loyalties many Australian intellectuals experienced. The outline was as follows: Travelling from a young and raw country like Australia to an old and highly developed country like England, imbued his interest in philosophical and liberal questions. Then he found great difficulty in settling down again in his own native land, where he would not find so much sympathy of interests.39 Crawford portrayed the protagonist faced with the choice between achievement in exile and the love of native ideals and interests, and frustration when he returned home. The Australian scenario
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was not as hopeless as the hero anticipated. He found ‘real worth behind the lack of European polish and education displayed by Australians’, and eventually found comfort in the ‘circle of liberal minded, educated men’.40 With an odd mix of confidence and defensiveness about Australia, Crawford argued diplomatically with passengers on its behalf, accepting that Australia had not had time to develop ‘the high cultural level and natural philosophies of older countries’. He also insisted that there were ‘men who are doing much to found worthy traditions, and the universities are not the least factor in our cultural progress’.41 The pilgrimage to England provided the impressionable young man with an insight into the imperial system in operation and countless opportunities to challenge and test his compassion with the less fortunate. These sympathies were shaped by Crawford’s fervent Christian ideals. The Church was the focal point of his early life. When he recorded in his diary a discussion on the ‘degeneracy’ of the Aborigines, he pondered issues of creation and evolution, rather than invasion and injustice.42 Despite this strong emphasis on Christian doctrine, compassion was not always evident in Crawford’s youthful responses to life and, at times, he lacked the assurance to speak out against intolerance. He described his encounter with a fellow passenger who had broken the leg of a ‘disobedient’ New Guinea boy. The passenger lectured Crawford on the necessity of ‘unbroken firmness in the management of natives’ and insisted that any ‘display of kindness was regarded as weakness’. Crawford at the callow age of only twenty-one, did not contradict this claim, but wondered if Christian practices and ‘civilised ideals’ might be more successful.43 In Colombo, Crawford showed very little understanding of the poor in the ‘wretched hotels of Singhalese masses’ and was repelled by the lack of comfort and cleanliness. For all the freethinking liberalism he imbibed as an undergraduate, he could not bridge the gulf between his own comfort and the conditions of the poor. ‘Perhaps it is as well for them not to aspire too much. Still, they could live in more clean conditions without extra cost.’44 Crawford was clearly conformist at this stage. News of P. R. Stephensen, a Queensland Rhodes Scholar who was apparently
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23
spreading Bolshevik doctrine at Oxford, appalled him. He thought it was outrageous that Stephensen had accepted a scholarship to oppose the ideals of Rhodes. ‘If he intends to carry on Bolshevist propaganda,’ he defiantly wrote, ‘he might at least, as a gentleman give up the Rhodes Scholarship’.45 The importance and complexity of academic freedom had not yet occurred to him. Crawford’s rectitude and conventional attitude to women also emerged on the voyage. This provides an insight into the mature liberal who was considered a champion of women. In a time of formality, his experiences were limited. They were confined to social interaction within the church, with his sisters, his fiancé Dorothy Cheetham, whom he described as a ‘little brick’ or ‘sensible’, and his mother. Harriet Crawford’s hold over her son, and the devotion and dependence she inspired, emerges from Crawford’s detailed diary entries, as well as constant correspondence between them. Crawford perceived that he was the ‘chosen one’ of his family. ‘Mum is wonderful—no detail is forgotten.’ He wrote in his diary on the day of his departure. ‘She shows no sign of the struggle I know she is going through. I have always been rather a favorite with her and I know she does not like the idea of my going away.46 The favouritism Crawford claimed was not apparent to the remainder of the family, who were oblivious to their brother’s belief.47 Harriet Crawford encouraged her son and she proclaimed that she would help him with ‘all in my power’.48 Crawford wrote at the time that she had worked ‘like a slave for him’. 49 The Crawford family, like many working and middle-class families, deemed education a social advantage and opportunity for advancement. Ken Crawford thought that a university education was restricted to the younger three boys, and the prospects for his five sisters were very different.50 Margaret Cheshire, however, contradicted this and believed that both her grandparent’s were dedicated to the idea of education and in fact all the daughters were given the opportunity to train in their chosen vocation. Lillian became a piano teacher, having studied as the Sydney Conservatorium where she was told that her hands were too small for her to become a concert pianist, Gladys became a dressmaker, Marjorie a bookmaker and both Rene and Grace were schoolteachers.51 In his youthful naivety, when categorising women, Crawford would veer between decent and good to loose and bad. His
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An Historian’s Life
description of a young woman he had met in Melbourne was a demonstration of moralism and inexperience. She was ‘a true hearted, enthusiastic little girl and a good companion’, he wrote in his diary. ‘After all she will gain more happiness of life than the jazziest, most cocktail-saturated, most stale-tobacco intoxicated ennued hangeron.’ He did attempt to temper this simplistic outburst when he admitted that this was an individual preference and there was room for all sorts—‘although I know which one I prefer’.52 His ideals of love were inevitably immature and simplistic. In a planned story, he defined real love as ‘unselfish and moral’, and false love as ‘selfish lust and a slander to the pure nature of love’.53 He did not hold to a rigid Calvinist morality, but to a New Testament theology of redemption and love. As an undergraduate, his liberalism was not inconsistent with his religious beliefs. Both proclaimed similar values: morality, equality, and justice. Crawford’s faith would diminish with experience and the new influences he was exposed to at Oxford. His spiritual life was eroded by a growing conviction that the secular creed of liberalism was better able to explain the changing world. ‘The theology of original sin that protected society’, he wrote with sadness, ‘gave us little forewarning of the faces of evil as it really existed in the world we lived in; nor did it show us the true hell manufactured by human beings for themselves’.54 Politics, Empire and Liberalism After his long journey, Crawford arrived in London in September 1927, intensely lonely, homesick and preoccupied with money. He regretted that he had left home so early, because of the enormous expense his Oxford studies required. In the first few weeks, he searched for comforting reminders of home to ease his feelings of isolation and disorientation. So he was delighted while visiting Kew Gardens to smell the scent of gums reminiscent of the Blue Mountains. On a mission to Bexley in Kent, he gave the Headmaster of the local school ‘the best wishes of the Bexley Public School’ in Australia.55 Crawford was slowly seduced by the history and tradition of England. His exploration of London confirmed the superiority of the Empire and heartened him as he could feel ‘the fascination taking hold’.56 He visited the Tower of London and pondered issues of
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punishment and the progress of humanity, yet concluded that ‘the empires are the stepping stones towards the protection of human government’.57 Within two weeks of arrival, he wrote to his mother: ‘I wouldn’t have missed this for the world’.58 By October, Crawford was happily installed at Balliol. After a disappointing first impression, he was captivated by the orderly gardens, imposing buildings and formal silver service meals consumed in the oak-panelled dining hall. He expected the prestigious College would provide intellectual debate and lively talk, ranging from Gandhi to the ‘latest English eccentrics’. Oxford did indeed attract literary and intellectual figures during the 1920s, its luminaries including Wystan Auden, Harold Acton, Claud Cockburn, and Evelyn Waugh. Crawford told his father that he looked forward to ‘getting in touch with what was happening in Spain, Germany, Manchuria and so on’.59 This indication of his intellectual and political interest and his expectations of Oxford is important. The University always symbolised status and security. He was convinced and reassured his father that after his degree he would effortlessly find a job.60 Oxford had been a magnet for young Australian scholars since the early twentieth century. Under the aegis of its Master, Dr Benjamin Jowett, Balliol established a reputation for providing leaders of church and state for Britain and the Empire.61 Australian students had acquired a reputation for irreverence and one of them recalled how they ‘blew into the antiquity of Oxford with the challenge of their own and country’s youth’.62 Indeed, Balliol attracted some of Australia’s more progressive historians, including George Henderson and later Keith Hancock, who paved the way for the new generation of Australian historians, such as Esmonde Higgins, P. R. Stephensen and Herbert Burton, all of whom were politically engaged at Oxford. With great ‘alertness’, Crawford started work with his college tutors, Humphrey Sumner, A. D. Lindsay, Kenneth Bell and C. G. Stone. He wrote home with unbounded admiration for Bell, ‘one of the best tutors in Oxford’, and with humour about Stone, whom he found disconcerting with his speech impediment, deafness and idiosyncratic mannerisms.63 The young student quickly discovered that he was benefiting more from Oxford than he ever had at Sydney, and doing two to three times as much work with half the effort.64 He worked with Bell on a modern history syllabus, read English
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constitutional and political history, political theory and the American Revolution. Such intense productivity led A. D. Lindsay to express concern that he would ‘break under the pressure’.65 Instrumental in Crawford’s unrelenting drive was his desire to remain at Balliol for an additional year. It was Kenneth Bell, ‘vague, kind and inviting’,66 who became the new figure for Crawford’s pedestal. A brilliant teacher, eccentric, father of eight children and author of no books, Bell was a tireless advocate for his students.67 He felt that Crawford could do more if he remained at Oxford for another year. Bell wrote to Harry Crawford expressing this strong opinion and arranged with the Rhodes Trust to award Crawford a half-scholarship for the third year, and cajoled him to borrow the remainder. Harry Crawford was in an unenviable position and might have felt there was no alternative but to comply. Crawford informed his mother that he wanted to stay at Balliol, but also wanted to return to Sydney and do his ‘bit’ for his struggling family.68 As the economy deteriorated, Harry Crawford’s fortunes improved only slightly. The railways had re-employed him as a temporary timekeeper, and he supplemented the small income with various jobs as a rate collector and timekeeper in a railway quarry. Through comradeship and personal pride, he joined in the hard labour with the quarry workers. In a curious letter, Crawford with newly found assurance, almost assumed the paternal role, expressing his gratitude for his father’s ‘brave game’. He noted that by Harry ‘hanging on’, he would be able to remain at Oxford instead of seeking employment straight away. Under the circumstances, it was an insensitive comment. Crawford was confident that within two years he should be earning ‘something considerable’.69 His laboured insistence that he wished to return home was not entirely convincing. Crawford would later acknowledge the influence of Oxford. He had gone to England ‘an immature and naive youngster and matured rapidly’.70 The metamorphosis did not take place with the ease that he later suggested. He succumbed to periodic fits of self-doubt and moments of intense guilt about his family. In a letter to a friend during the first year, Crawford articulated these difficulties, as well as his transformation. Now free of the home environment and the force of attitudes instilled in him as a young boy, Crawford believed he was no ‘longer afraid of the consequences of ruthless thinking’.71
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Politics, the Empire and liberalism became even more significant themes in Crawford’s intellectual and social activity at Oxford. The liberalism that had influenced him at Sydney was refined by the more patrician tradition at Balliol. The majority of students enjoyed great affluence, clung to tradition and Empire, and espoused egalitarian and liberal views. The 1920s was a turbulent decade at Oxford, as the limits of free speech and censorship were tested. In 1923, the Vice-Chancellor, Dr Lewis Farnell, a renowned political reactionary, banned a public lecture by Marie Stopes on the subject of birth control. According to J. C. Masterman, Farnell was firmly convinced that ‘the University was threatened by a subversive spirit among the young which it was his mission to suppress’.72 In reality, political activity did not attract large numbers of students. Wystan Auden provided a telling commentary on the ‘frivolous’ Oxford he remembered. ‘Looking back now, I find it incredible how secure life seemed.’ Auden wrote. ‘Revolution in Russia, inflation in Germany and Austria, Fascism in Italy, whatever fears or hopes they may have aroused in our elders, went unnoticed by us. Before 1930, I never opened a newspaper.73 Crawford’s liberalism was a cultural commitment rather than a call to overt political action. In 1928, he was elected to the Ralegh, ‘one of the University’s biggest political clubs composed of men from the colonies of the Empire’. With William Muir and other liberals, he formed a Synoptic Club.74 His political activity did not extend to the Labour Club, which was the most active and radical of the four political clubs at Oxford, or to participation in the demonstrations that had so offended Farnell. Oxford was also a cultural and social experience, a lifestyle in which to widen horizons, cultivate friendships and gain confidence. Initially England had disquieted and intimidated the young Australian, who was alone and unfamiliar with the social conventions and etiquette it demanded. Lady Francis Ryder, who welcomed ‘men and girls from the Dominions who came to her with a private introduction’, arranged for Crawford to be presented to society.75 He was rather bemused by this blatant form of elitism. He decided to accept the invitation. ‘I must admit I am a bit puzzled how to write to a real, live lady but I am going to chance. Crawford wrote to his family with humour and barely concealed pleasure, ‘“Dear Lady Ryder.” I can see I’ll have to go in for spats and an accent.’76
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An Historian’s Life
After meeting Lady Ryder, Crawford considered her ‘nice’ and not in the least condescending. The amenities of privileged society overcame his suspicion. His letters describe with pride a visit to the House of Commons arranged by Lady Ryder. Although Crawford perceived that these social events were ‘more trial than pleasure’, he happily examined his performance and the impression he gave: ‘I think I really shone this afternoon’.77 In contrast, Manning Clark, who retraced his teacher’s journey to Balliol, eschewed the charms of the indomitable Lady Ryder. He found her ‘course for colonials’ objectionable and declined the experience.78 Clark, never an obsequious anglophile, was offended that Australians were considered in need of polish.79 Such insight, however, was observed with the benefit of hindsight. Crawford was uneasy and less confident of his Australian identity, perhaps because it betrayed the working-class roots he appeared uncomfortable with, and perhaps also because he wished at all costs to avoid the charge of parochialism. Establishing friendships was difficult initially for the young and earnest Australian. It took several months before he felt accepted. Analysing the motives, he informed his mother: ‘I seem to be making friends on every side now. England is like that. People put you on probation for three to four months and then either accept you or reject you.’ Crawford in no way condemned this selective process, and echoed the benefits of aloofness: ‘It sorts one from many rather irksome acquaintances’.80 Whereas Crawford did not challenge or question the conventions and motivations, Keith Hancock remarked that the English cliquishness, accent and style were intended to make the colonials ill at ease.81 Liberal he may have been, but this in no way mitigated Crawford’s emerging prejudices. He described in apparent disbelief an Australian schoolteacher he met ‘who had the worst accent I have ever heard on an Australian’. Tempering this, he admitted on reflection and somewhat patronisingly that the man ‘turned out to be a very decent chap’.82 Crawford also began to accept the British class system. During a holiday to Somerset with a group of Oxford friends, Crawford wrote with acquired formality that they had ‘a man here—Jenkins by name’. Whilst describing his servile and demanding duties, he concluded with an offhanded pragmatism, ‘probably this job is a way out of unemployment’.83
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Crawford was widening his social circle, yet intimate friendships were select and included only the affable and good-natured William Muir, Christopher Hill and William Enthwistle. He was single-minded with his time and never ambitiously networked with the in-crowd or indulged in carousing. Travel on the continent was an important component of Crawford’s cultural education and he visited Brittany, Vienna and Italy and stayed with a family in Germany for a month. Many of the experiences in these foreign places were clumsily recreated in his attempts at writing fiction. He failed to capture the atmosphere and personalities. Except for a brief mention in his diary of Mussolini’s Blackshirts and an Italian’s admiration for Il Duce’s ‘firmness’, Crawford seemed unaffected by and apathetic about continental politics. There is no mention of Germany, the discontent with the Weimar Republic, mounting unemployment, left-wing activism or bans on public demonstrations. One recurring issue plagued Crawford’s last two years at Oxford: the continual wavering about the direction of his career. Kenneth Bell proved an enthusiastic and resourceful adviser, and suggested the British Colonial Service. This was an idea that apparently surprised Crawford, who still nursed feelings of social inadequacy and believed the Diplomatic Corps was confined to ‘chaps with the influence of family and wealth behind them’.84 Moreover, he was unenthusiastic about working in Africa or India and preferred to ‘keep to the academic line’.85 In reality, an academic career was an elusive ambition in the 1930s, as the Australian universities could only employ a limited number of practitioners.86 Crawford expressed concern about his weakness and susceptibility in dealing with Kenneth Bell, ‘a man of strong personality and also a strong politically minded Englishman’. He apparently feared that Bell would influence him against his ‘bent towards a political or rather administrative life’. There was actually no danger of this. Barely six months later, after Crawford declared he wanted to find an academic job, he informed his mother: ‘I do feel a strong inclination towards administrative work of some kind...Certainly more than towards academic work.’87 Despite his failure to resolve the problem and his evident confusion about it, the last term at Balliol was happy. He had become
30
An Historian’s Life
comfortable with its privileges and lifestyle. The awkward boy intimidated by the conventions during dinner on the ship had vanished and in his place was a confident young man who adopted ‘a real Oxford accent’.88 As Crawford negotiated an identity that reconciled both an Australian and a British persona, he became the quintessential Oxford man: urbane, polished and confident. As he anticipated in a letter to his family, this was a busy period of study, punting on the river, tutoring, problems to be settled, Gilbert and Sullivan, tennis, walks and club meetings. ‘There ain’t much time, but life’s not arf bad’, he quipped.89 Crawford’s Balliol education ended in 1930 with first-class honours and the Kingston Oliphant Prize, a Balliol prize for an essay on an historical subject. He had fulfilled his academic promise. His ambition to win prizes and scholarships, reiterated by Harriet Crawford, was now accomplished. Thoughts turned to home: the constant promises to his family and the commitment imparted to Dorothy needed to be fulfilled. Still clinging to the ambition of becoming a creative writer, a hope undiminished by his lack of productivity, Crawford devised a new story, with all the enthusiasm of those previously planned. ‘It had an Australian theme’, he wrote to his father, ‘based on the three generations of his parent’s family – ‘a sort of a Forsyth saga’.90 Exile The return to Sydney proved a bitter disappointment. After the stimulation and prestige of Oxford, Crawford could only describe the return as an ‘exile’.91 The belief that ‘a Balliol man could always get a job at Balliol’s recommendation’ proved false at this time of severe depression.92 Crawford’s promise and impressive academic results did not guarantee him an academic post or even well-paid employment in a position with influence. Instead, he found himself teaching at Petersham Girls’ High School and later Sydney Grammar School, starved of intellectual stimulation and teaching history that was ‘narrowly political, very dry and quite superficial’.93 The only glimmer of hope was a weekly broadcast for the Australian Broadcasting Commission. Formed in 1932, the ABC played a unique role in expounding Australian themes and culture. Its policy was stringent, and it was prevented from broadcasting controversial
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opinion.94 Crawford, who was appropriately neutral, enjoyed the work as it accorded him a public role. He began to consider a university career and applied for academic posts—a readership in History in Hong Kong and the chair of English at Canterbury College in New Zealand. The school-teaching provided a ‘negative spur’ to the intellectual style of history he would later develop. It also encouraged the disillusioned teacher to return to the country where he was happiest and most focused. In September 1932, Crawford travelled back to England to relieve Kenneth Bell during the Michaelmas term at Balliol College. It had been an irresistible offer and apparently represented a career move made ‘at great risk in these years of depression’.95 The risk was not as perilous as Crawford suggested, because his Australian position was no more secure. Almost immediately after he married Dorothy Cheetham, his weekly broadcasting came to an end, and two salary cuts followed in quick succession at Sydney Grammar. Crawford wrote to Bell in despair, inquiring about available positions at Oxford. He received an encouraging response: ‘So I sold my furniture, chucked my job and booked a passage in a boat full of syphilitic deportees.’96 ‘Spain Indeed’ Several months after Crawford’s return, William Muir wrote to his friend: ‘Spain indeed. My God, and at Christmas too!’97 It was a jovial letter, written to confirm details of their intended holiday together. Despite the frivolity, it is the first indication of Crawford’s interest in writing about modern Spain. He had evidently been uncertain about the project, because Muir appeared surprised and bewildered: ‘work on Spain? Spain?’ From these apparently vague plans, Crawford applied to the Rockefeller Fellowship Advisory Committee for financial support. At the time of the application in January 1933, he had developed his proposal with the approval of A. D. Lindsay and Humphrey Sumner. He had written enthusiastically to Oxford friends for guidance, including William Entwhistle, who was familiar with the procedure. Entwhistle suggested potential advisers and cited the Junta de Ampliacon de Estudios, a body responsible for research and assisting foreigners.98 Crawford’s timing was impeccable. Events in Spain were exciting public interest as the country embarked upon far-reaching changes.
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After years of military dictatorship, elections in April 1931 produced a majority for the progressive parties. For the first time, Spain granted its citizens democratic rights, including freedom of opinion, organisation and religion. The swing to the left under Azana lasted until his defeat in the elections of November 1933.99 Crawford’s proposed research plan, still in its infancy, was repetitive in structure. He considered ‘Spain first as a good subject matter’ in which to work out his ideas about ‘historical determinism’.100 The study he envisaged was not confined to conventional narrative, the standard method of establishing events exactly as they occurred, according to Von Ranke’s dictum. Instead, Crawford intended to approach the democratic and social changes in Spain by concentrating on themes of economy, geography, demography and urban migration. The intended project was a departure from Crawford’s previous academic work. It indicated his maturing ideas about the role of history and morality and the evolving conviction that the study of history should be relevant to contemporary events. The tutoring at Oxford came to an end in November. Crawford was disheartened. It appears he had hoped the position would be extended. Jack Crawford, the boldest and most outspoken of the siblings, considered that Kenneth Bell had misled his brother.101 Seemingly drifting, Crawford accepted a temporary position at Christ’s Hospital. School-teaching proved trying. In a letter to his mother, he wrote about the experience with philosophical resignation levelled by a grudging recognition of its worth. There was a positive outcome. ‘The changing about from school to school has given me a great deal of useful experience, despite the disadvantage that it was accompanied by some unpleasant uncertainty.’ Crawford wrote pragmatically. ‘I have had more chance to try out and pick up ideas in these two terms than I ever had at Sydney Grammar.’102 Crawford’s growing attention to the history of ideas was also a legacy of his teaching in Australian and English schools. ‘The demand that history should illuminate’, Crawford remarked, ‘was probably reinforced against the narrowness and aridity of the political and military narrative that I found to pass for history.’103 Crawford’s conceived ‘plan of attack’ for the project on Spain, set down in a notebook, indicated his evolving ideas. He began to develop
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the study beyond the brief structure devised in the application to the Rockefeller Committee. Influenced most profoundly by the intellectual Mandariago, Crawford considered themes of national character in Spanish society, writing and art from the past and present. Despite this innovative methodology, Crawford found the slow response from the Rockefeller Committee frustrating. William Muir inquired about the ‘Spanish enterprise’, but could only guess at the outcome: ‘no initiative’, ‘red tape’.104 In April 1933, with his wife still in Australia and with an infant son Michael, who he had not yet met, Crawford applied for the position of librarian at Adelaide University. Harriet Crawford expressed great concern about the welfare of his wife and Michael and imparted some well-intentioned advice on her son, writing constantly to him about his career. ‘It certainly would be hard to decide between that and the Spanish project, if both were decided in your favour,’ Harriet Crawford counselled in one letter, ‘but I certainly think Adelaide would be the wiser choice and especially as you have Dor and Michael to consider as well as yourself.’105 Even the normally restrained Harry Crawford expressed reservations about the Spanish project.106 Crawford could barely conceal his mounting frustration and fatigue; he was ‘doing the work of a man and a half and feeling rather fed up’.107 He was also concerned about his domestic situation. A proud and chivalrous man, he was ashamed that he could not provide for his young family. The exchanges between Dorothy and Crawford suggest affection, but also unease. Dorothy was preoccupied by their ‘not very bright future’.108 This was understandable. As their daughter, Margaret observed, Crawford had been overseas for three years during his prolonged engagement with Dorothy, briefly reunited after their marriage in January 1933, and then separated again when Crawford returned to Oxford. Dorothy was then expected to travel alone with an infant to England.109 Harriet Crawford exacerbated the existing strains. With characteristic humour, Jack observed that their mother, left with three unmarried daughters, of ‘whom none are too amiable as living companions’, was ‘depleted’ without her boys.110 Harriet was frantic about her sons’ prospects and was tireless in her attempts to guide them. She was particularly vigilant for her absent son. To curb his enthusiasm for study and travel, she offered sobering reminders of his
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duties as a husband and father. Harriet Crawford did not want to encourage ‘the adventurous streak’ that Kenneth Bell considered such a quality.111 ‘I hope you have something definite in view for the future before this reaches you’. Harriet wrote, ignoring or unaware of her son’s desire to avoid school-teaching. ‘Failing something decent over there, I wonder would the Grammar position (in Sydney) be available’.112 Her greatest priority was to see Crawford and Jack both together in Sydney: ‘That would be too great a joy’.113 The lack of confidence in their son’s research and academic prospects was logical. Crawford’s family continued to struggle in his absence. Harry Crawford, at 69, continued to work in the Grenfell quarry, which Jack Crawford described as a ‘bitter experience’.114 Crawford’s sister, Rene, an able and intelligent teacher at an Aboriginal mission, endured an ugly and public divorce, caused by the desertion of her husband. Harriet wrote in distress and anger about the proceedings, Rene’s indecision and how the ‘big man’ attended court with his ‘lady friend’. It was a painful and humiliating episode for Rene, left with the responsibilities of raising her children alone.115 The problems of the Crawford family and the difficulties Max Crawford endured while establishing his career in no way radicalised him. Nor was his situation unique. The Depression denied him and his peers the security and status that higher education had once guaranteed. This deprivation caused many intellectuals to be increasingly drawn to the left in politics. Although frustrated, Crawford never expressed anger about his plight, nor did he become antagonistic towards the capitalist system. Later in his career, he examined the legacy of the Depression in his most autobiographical lecture, ‘The Coming of Age’. He saw its significance in terms of ideological and social consequences: the backwardness of social legislation, the disappearance of the previous decade’s optimism and the new influence of economic and political doctrine. The most moving part of the narrative was his brief analysis of the people who suffered: those unaccustomed to such distress who wearily and unsuccessfully sought work and were thrown back on the dole, waiting for relief work. Perhaps in a cryptic tribute to his father, he wrote that ‘adversity calls out greatness’.116 Crawford was hardly a neutral observer in an ivory tower, yet the immediate effect of the Depression on his brother Jack was
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apparently far more profound. Curiously Max seemed more inclined to discuss the impact of the trauma on Jack’s life than on his own. According to Crawford, it left ‘an endurable mark’ on Jack who was devastated by their father’s hardship and his own twelve months of unemployment in 1932. Crawford also observed that his brother’s social conscience strengthened his interest in economics and would eventually lead to his distinguished career.117 The Depression provided intellectuals such as Jack and Brian Fitzpatrick with an impetus for humanitarian empathy. For Max Crawford it also apparently left a thwarted ambition and a fear of what could be lost. While Crawford lived his quiet life as a struggling schoolteacher in England, unemployment reached its highest point in mid-1932. Hunger marchers converged on London, and Oswald Mosley formed his infamous British Union of Fascists. Such distress and rancour found little recognition from Crawford. Nor did Hitler’s ascension as Chancellor of Germany, the nightmare of the Reichstag fire and the beginning of persecution of the Jews and Communists. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he remained surprisingly disengaged from the social and political turmoil of the times.118 In May 1933, after months of anxiety, Crawford was finally offered a permanent teaching job at Bradfield College in Berkshire. The school provided him with his first taste of professional security, but came at the expense of his study of Spain. As the obedient son, he might have felt he had no other option but to choose the safer alternative. He accepted Bradfield College’s offer. The decision delighted his mother: ‘How very pleased I was to hear you have a permanent position at Bradfield’.119 If Christ’s Hospital was an aggravation, Bradfield would be remembered with gratitude. Reunited with his wife and son, Crawford settled happily into the role of history master, and Dorothy into a comfortable anonymity. This time of domestic stability allowed him to explore issues of national character and other historical themes. Bradfield is a school of wealth, privilege and social advantages and afforded Crawford an insight into the nuances of England’s upper class. In contrast to Christ’s Hospital, with its egalitarian and democratic principles, Bradfield was a bastion of the Empire. Clearly fascinated, Crawford began to reconsider his anglophile views. He now regarded the English public school system, with its over-anxiety that
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the boys should not have any feelings of inferiority, as a social mistake. He insisted that the English were at a disadvantage because they became ‘exaggerated products of the system’, while the Australian boys more easily rejected narrow attitudes.120 Crawford’s exploration of the thematic and historical relevance of Spain continued. When the College performed Aeschylus’ tragedy, Agamemnon, he considered its central themes of vengeance and destiny as being paralleled in Spain. The earlier strain of overwork in temporary jobs, however, and the pressure from home had weakened his resolve, so he abandoned the research project before the Rockefeller Committee delivered its final decision. While declaring his exasperation at the Committee’s delay, he decided he ‘could hardly accept’ a scholarship now that he had arranged to go to Bradfield.121 In a letter applying for the position as tutor to Stephen Roberts at Sydney University in 1935, Crawford offered a slightly altered version of events. He suggested that despite its approval of the work, the Rockefeller Fellowship Committee did not offer support for the project, so he abandoned it.122 Later still, in a letter to the Registrar at the University of Melbourne, he continued to place great importance on the aborted study: While I was still in England I planned a monograph on Modern Spain and I began preparation for this. Owing to the difficulties of distance and material, I have had to modify the original scheme of work.123 Whatever the circumstances, Crawford’s response to the termination of the study remained ambiguous. In 1984 he recalled that although he never completed his ‘serious’ project in 1932, it ‘did set my feet on what I believe was the proper path for me if only I had known how to follow it’.124 He did not elaborate on this comment, and it could be interpreted that he regretted the road he took. He always insisted that his vocation as a teacher was followed at the expense of published historical work based on original research. The Return of the Native By 1935 after two years at Bradfield College, Crawford wanted to return home. He applied unsuccessfully for positions in the
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Max Crawford (front left) on his return home Photographer unknown University of Melbourne Archives, R.M. Crawford papers.
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Commonwealth public service and the librarianship and chair of history at Adelaide University. The Chair had recently been vacated by Keith Hancock who, feeling like a ‘deserter’, had left for an academic career at Birmingham University.125 Jack Crawford, who was a tutor at Sydney University, had informed his brother of Hancock’s departure and assumed that Fred Wood, the son of Crawford’s mentor, George Wood, might be a successful applicant—which would mean a vacancy at Sydney. Jack Crawford’s prediction proved inaccurate, but a temporary position for a lecturer at Sydney University did become available in May 1935, when Wood left for New Zealand. With Crawford’s Balliol connections and his irregular but varied employment record, as well as Jack as a persuasive intermediary, his application was successful. Once in the position, Crawford was fortunate to work with Stephen Roberts, the Professor of Modern History and one of the most influential academic historians of the period. Roberts created a ‘striking’ curriculum at Sydney, established the graduate program and began a new research-based honours degree.126 In contrast to his mood five years before, this second return home was happy. Crawford recalled in a poignant letter to his mother in 1940 that his homecoming was joyful. He had shed the shyness and awkwardness that marred his early career and was ‘a contented Australian’.127 Though he liked to think of himself as Australian, he had become a graceful, confident man who had adopted the refinement and style of Britain. His voice was distinct and melodic, and most recalled his patrician and even precious demeanour.128 Crawford formed a group of friends at Sydney that included economists and anthropologists, whom he found a constant source of stimulation. This was a time of renewed intellectual discovery reminiscent of Balliol. The unconventional and formidable philosopher and controversialist, John Anderson, became one of his regular Wednesday dinner companions. The balance of his intellectual friendships shifted, now that he was a colleague rather than a student. Although he respected Anderson, it was a more equal relationship, and Crawford was not susceptible to the charisma or intense discipleship that Anderson encouraged.129 He felt an affinity with him, as they shared similar views on Faculty matters and academic autonomy. But Crawford later admitted that a gulf lay between their
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personalities; Anderson was a man of absolutes, who opposed all forms of censorship, while Crawford apparently still retained his ‘instinct for compromise’.130 Although invigorated, Crawford was also confronted by the daily pressures of academic life: the burden of teaching and the pressure to produce original research work. His relationship with Roberts was uneasy, partly because of the latter’s superior manner and partly because Crawford felt that he was being exploited and treated as a subordinate. Personalities aside (and, by all accounts, Roberts was an exacting man), he was living the very life Crawford craved. In 1936 Roberts spent his sabbatical in Germany doing research for what would become The House that Hitler Built. It was an historical and contemporary account, written primarily ‘for the man-inthe-street who wishes to have some idea of the German experiment’.131 It was also the first major contemporary work to expose Nazism in the time of appeasement.132 The Bulletin began its political campaign against Roberts. The implications of the book’s enormous commercial success, and its ensuing vilification by the right-wing press, would not have been lost on Crawford. The Roberts family decamped from a modest bungalow in Gordon to a spacious harbour home in fashionable Point Piper. Lady Roberts would often quip to guests that it ‘really was the house that Hitler built!’133 In response to academic expectations and international events, Crawford wrote two articles, one on the crisis in Abyssinia and the other on Spain. Both were pivotal to his development as an active liberal engaged in public debate. Vital questions remain about his sudden productivity and the reasons for his compulsion to write about contemporary issues. He might have felt that, with his new appointment, he enjoyed a greater authority to comment. He might also have assumed a more visible public role because he could no longer ignore the political situation in Europe.134 On 18 July 1935, Crawford delivered an address on the Abyssinian situation at a meeting organised by the Joint Committee for Peace.135 The crisis in Abyssinia had enduring ramifications far beyond Italy’s invasion and eventual victory. ‘The dispute is of international importance’, Crawford observed, ‘not simply because of the important appeal to the League of Nations but because of the individual interests of various nationalities in Abyssinia’.136
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Crawford was not the only Australian writing about an approaching war. The literary critic, Nettie Palmer, who was living in Europe at the time, experienced the events at a perilously close range. Her writing was deeply personal as she described the peculiar ambience of hope, confusion, denial and speculation that characterised life in a country preparing for war. ‘The first blows in the Abyssinia War have been struck,’ Palmer claimed. I’m not sure... that most people grasp the fact, there has been so many months of what seemed like hesitation since we saw these shiploads of young Italians.’137 Crawford also presented his address when events were clouded in political and bureaucratic confusion. He wrote with detached authority and insight, and considered the wider issues: Italy’s intentions, the economic consequence of waging war, and the interest of other nations. What was lacking was the chaotic confusion and foreboding of fascism that dominated Palmer’s prose. Crawford may have briefly described the ‘irrational emotional enthusiasm, a nationalistic fervour reluctant to count the cost or take a realistic view of the situation’. But he underestimated the essence of fascism and the most basic implications of both Mussolini and Hitler. Civil War Within a year, Crawford’s attention was drawn back to events in Spain. Early in May 1936, the Popular Front of the left (made up of Republicans, Socialists, Anarchists and Communists) won a majority in the national elections. The Spanish electorate rejected dictatorship, the church and the monarchy. On 17 July, the Spanish generals rebelled, and the right decided to overthrow the elected Government. The country erupted in a prolonged and bitter civil war. Germany and Italy assisted Franco, while England and France adopted a non-interventionist policy, and Russia’s support for the republicans remained ambiguous. Crawford’s fascination with Spain was by no means unusual. Christopher Hollis, an Oxford contemporary, defined the common interest as a ‘streak of Hispanidad’ that one found in Englishmen like Walter Starkie, Gerald Brenan and Wyndham Lewis.138 The Spanish Civil War would be the great cause that captured the imagination and conscience of a literary and intellectual generation, both prominent
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and obscure, idealistic and cynical, of the right and the left. It provoked clichés of good and evil that fell easily into the two distinct ideological sides. As Cecil Day Lewis famously wrote, it appeared to be ‘the battle between light and darkness’. The historian Dante A. Puzzo attributed the impact of the war to its curious ‘purity’, despite the violence and corruption. ‘The enthusiasm it engendered was a springtime that briefly loosened the wintry grip of a world old, weary and cynical.’139 The Spanish war raised acutely the problem of political commitment for the intelligentsia. It offered a choice of alienation or involvement. Crawford remained a dispassionate observer, in contrast to the exuberant participation exhibited by those who joined the International Brigades to fight Franco. As a family man, such military service was hardly feasible but, even so, his level of engagement was never comparable to Nettie Palmer’s frenetic activities. When she returned from Europe, she embarked on a constant round of talks and addresses. Palmer was also instrumental in forming the Spanish Relief Committee. Crawford was never a member of the Committee and, although he collected its publications and social invitations, it is difficult to discern if this was for research purposes or if he was responding on a political and humanitarian level. In their correspondence, Crawford and Palmer remained on formal terms that suggest their relationship did not extend beyond the level of acquaintances. However, Crawford did correspond with both Nettie and Vance Palmer about intellectual issues and research. In 1939 the latter drew his attention to Aurousseau’s book, Highway into Spain. As late as 1942, Nettie Palmer was recommending Oriollo y Pollardo to Crawford because he was ‘always astonishingly clear’.140 Intense political activism was a risk for a man still establishing an academic career. By November 1935, the relatively inexperienced university lecturer found himself running the Department when Stephen Roberts departed for Germany. Despite this added burden, Crawford’s teaching allowed him to expand on the theme born in his early Spanish studies. In a general history tutorial paper presented in the following year and entitled, ‘The Decline of Spain’, his aim was to ‘see how far one can go in explaining Spain by examining the external conditioning’. The past, Crawford insisted, was fundamental to Spain’s
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position on 11 June 1936; the main moments of its history and nature were a legacy of its experience. He enlisted Mandariago’s argument that as a ‘further element into which the Spaniard is born we must take into account his history’. The University Extension Board allowed Crawford an opportunity to elaborate on these themes in a series of external lectures to secondary schools. Crawford sought ‘to readdress the writing of Spanish history’. He extended the original premise examined in the aborted project of 1932 and analysed Spain’s decline: its military, political decadence, economy and intellectual stagnation. Crawford argued that while Mandariago ‘treated the individual and universalism as something deep rooted in Spanish character’, he professed it was also possible to regard it as ‘a natural product of their history and environment’.141 In all Crawford’s writing, there is an awareness of the continuity of history. He was motivated by themes pursued in books and research rather than personal experience. After his retirement he would ponder the historian’s role and the legacy of his Spanish studies. ‘They underlined the historian’s fruitful role, if it needed underlying’, he wrote ‘as being the illumination, by means of accurate and percipient charting, both of situation and response, of the drama of necessity and freedom. So might chaos take on meaning and history be the School of Prudence.’142 Crawford also found time to write his second article, ‘Revolution in Spain?’143 Published on 10 July 1936, a week prior to the eruption of the Civil War, the article was, as Robin Gollan observed, ‘an informed picture of pre-war events despite the unavailability of information’.144 It is an analytical and dispassionate piece devoid of the partisan sympathies displayed by many writers who had lived in Spain. Crawford accepted the plausible comparisons between Spain in 1936 and Russia in 1917, but emphasised his interest was restricted to Spain. Referring to the country’s turbulent past, he wrote that, ‘we must realise that the political atmosphere in Spain now is one in which revolution or counter revolution does not seem remote’. Crawford did not fall into the usual simplistic stereotypes in his examination of the contradictions between the right and left, as well as the role the centre faction could play. The right, he declared, would ‘swing round to the side of a dictatorship’ if faced with a revolution.
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The right-wing would continue to wreak havoc, including the victimisation of intellectuals such as Ortega y Gasset. Crawford found the bombing of Ortega y Gasset’s house particularly abhorrent because of its implications for intellectual freedom. He warned that this type of ‘ineffective revolution followed by prolonged disorder might give new strength to such a movement’. Crawford was no more reticent in describing the ills of the left, plagued as it was by internal conflict; ‘the divisions of the left are on fundamentals.’ He emphasised that if this turmoil could not be controlled, the balance between revolution and counter-revolution would alter. The article described the chaos, confusion and inevitability of war. The scenario he offered was not remarkable. He cited Azana’s ominous prediction that: ‘This is Spain’s last chance to revive without Civil War’. Crawford also considered a number of likely fates, including ‘counter revolution with intervals of military dictatorship’. This did not eventuate, and Franco remained dictator until his death. ‘Prophesy is not easy’, concluded Crawford: Disorder is probable, and, in the end, it is a matter of how far Azana can browbeat the middle parties into reform, and at the same time, hold in the impatience of the extreme left groups. But passion rather than patience marks Spanish politics.145 Crawford recalled this conclusion with a degree of ambivalence in an unpublished paper written in the 1970s. ‘I had been specialising in Modern Spanish History for two or three years before the outbreak of war.’ He observed with retrospective pride. ‘I predicted its outcome a month before it happened and took no pleasure in the fulfillment of my prophecy.’146 Writing in 1936, Nettie Palmer had no doubts about the direction events were taking and was considerably less subtle in her prophecy: ‘I found myself thinking the feeling of liberation here was an illusion. The dark forces that struck back, there’ll be war all over the world.’147 It was the question of ‘Spain alone’ that interested Crawford in his 1936 article. In his analysis of the conservative agenda, the absence of German and Italian motives in Spain is glaring. For most
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intellectuals, the Spanish War involved much more than Spain. The involvement of Italy and Germany increased the possibility that the violence would spread. The threat of the next war and apocalyptic vision of imminent destruction became part of the intellectual consciousness.148 Crawford’s lack of interest in events in Germany and Italy is made all the more surprising when considering Stephen Roberts’s absence in Germany and the exchanges between the two colleagues. Roberts’s letters afforded Crawford an insight into world affairs at their most ominous. So Crawford was neither isolated, nor without intellectual awareness; yet he apparently ignored the international ramifications of Hitler and Mussolini. Roberts informed his colleague: By the way, I am entirely and totally converted to the belief that you are fortunate in living in Australia, and, though I shouldn’t like Mills to hear this heresy...I shall be jolly glad to be back. I’ve been thoroughly disillusioned this time with England and all the war talk just makes me ill.’149 His wife Thelma also proved an informative correspondent when she wrote a fascinating, if misdirected, letter to Dorothy Crawford: Stephen’s up in Berlin holding Premier Steven’s hand at the opening of the Olympic Games. Lucky Fellow! I have been listening to the excitement over the wireless. They sounded as if they had all gone completely insane. Politics and international crisis have been put in their proper place for once at least.’150 By 1936 the fascist purposes were not obscure. Despite this, Crawford failed to demonstrate a fear of fascism and the fanatical nationalism it inspired, until the signs were impossible to ignore. At the same time, Crawford responded to the Spanish Civil War with a new idea for a book. He planned to write a scholarly account of events with the same intense enthusiasm of previous attempts. His friend from Oxford days and a committed Communist, Christopher Hill, expressed great hope: ‘I look forward to seeing Crawford’s Spanish
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Revolution on every bookshelf next door to Carlyles’.151 The book was to be a continued exploration of the country that had absorbed his interests from 1934 to 1936. Crawford later explained that it was meant as both a contemporary and historical study: ‘For I was trying to understand the present by seeing how it developed out of its own past. My question might have been phrased’, he wrote, ‘could Spain move peacefully, if somewhat belatedly into the twentieth century?’152 Yet the writing ambitions were interrupted once again. In October 1936, Crawford applied for the Chair of History at Melbourne University, vacated by the formidable Ernest Scott. Notes 1
Crawford, Historical Studies (1971), 27.
2
Ibid., 29.
3
Essay, ‘Before the Dawn’, 1923, Box 1, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
4
Samuel Hynes, The Auden Generation: Literature and Politics in England in the 1930s (London: The Bodley Head, 1976), 20.
5
Interview with Ken Crawford, 2001.
6
R. M. Crawford, An Australian Perspective (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1960), 62.
7
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 36.
8
Crawford to Manning Clark, 1 January 1988, Box 64, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
9
Margaret Cheshire to author, 6 December 2004.
10
Crawford, in Making History, 36. (This comment was also recalled by Ken Crawford in the 2001 interview.)
11
Crawford, ‘My Brother Jack: Background and Early Years’, 2-6, in Making History, 37, and ‘Sir John does not shirk a whit of work’, The Age, 8 March 1979.
12
Max Crawford notes, Box 75, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
13
Ibid., 36.
14
Crawford, in Making History, 37.
15
Crawford, ‘My Brother Jack: Background and Early Years’, 6.
16
Crawford to Barry Hill, 24 July 1982, Box 64, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford taught with Stead’s half-brother, David, at Bexley Primary School. His sister was in the same class with Christina Stead at Bexley Primary and at the St George Girls High School, where she kept the class ‘spellbound with her stories’.
17
Ellen Schrecker, No Ivory Tower: McCarthyism and the Universities (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986), 36.
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18
Margaret Dymock to Crawford, 25 January 1924, Box 1, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The family had moved from Grenfell to Bexley when Crawford was in primary school.
19
Crawford to Harry Crawford, undated 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
20
Crawford to Mac, 19 August 1928, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
21
Ibid.
22
Essay, ‘What is the Truth?’, Box 1, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
23
Macintyre, ‘Liberalism’, The Oxford Companion to Australian History, 388-90.
24
Macintyre and Thomas, ed., The Discovery of Australian History, 30.
25
Ibid. Wood held the first Chair in history at an Australian University. Crawford’s hero worship of Wood was such that he wrote a lengthy biography.
26
Henderson occupied the Chair at the University of Adelaide, and Portus taught at the University of Adelaide and fostered the Workers Educational Association at the University of Sydney. See respective entries in Davison, Hirst and Macintyre, The Oxford Companion to Australian History.
27
G.A. Wood to Crawford, 15 March 1927, Box 1, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
28
Diary, 26 July 1928, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
29
R. M. Crawford, ‘My Brother Jack: Background and Early Years’, 10.
30
Crawford to Manning Clark, 1 January 1988, Box 64, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
31
Diary, 23 July 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
32
G.A. Wood to Crawford, 2 April 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
33
Interview with Ken Crawford, 2001.
34
R. M. Crawford, ‘My Brother Jack: Background and Early Years’, 10.
35
Diary, 29 July 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
36
Diary, 31 July 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
37
Diary, 23 July 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
38
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, exact date unknown, August 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
39
Diary, 16 August 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
40
Ibid.
41
Diary, 2 August 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
42
Diary, 29 July 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
43
Diary, 16 August 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
44
Diary, 10 August 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
45
Ibid. See Craig Munro’s fine biography, Inky Stephensen: Wildman of Letters (St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1992).
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46
Diary, 22 July 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
47
Interview with Ken Crawford, 2001.
48
Harriet Crawford to Crawford, 6 October 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
49
Diary, 22 July 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
50
Interview with Ken Crawford, 2001.
51
Margaret Cheshire to author, 6 December 2004.
52
Diary, 22 July 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
53
Diary, 31 July 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
54
Max Crawford, Old Bebb’s Store and Other Poems (Melbourne: University of Melbourne, 1992), 12.
55
Diary, 6 September 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
56
Diary, 3 September 1927, Box 3, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
57
Diary, 8 September 1927, R. M. Crawford Papers, Box 3, UMA.
58
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 13 September 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
59
Crawford to Harry Crawford, 18 September 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
60
Crawford to Harry Crawford, 7 November 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
61
Elizabeth Kwan, ‘G. C. Henderson: Advocate of ‘Systematic and Scientific Research in Australian History’ in The Discovery of Australian History 18901939, 31.
62
Ibid., 32.
63
Crawford to Harry Crawford, 23 October 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
64
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 29 April 1928, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
65
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 18 March 1928, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
66
Crawford to Family, 9 November 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Keith Hancock had a similar affection for Bell’s ‘lust for life’; see W. K. Hancock, Country and Calling (London: Faber and Faber, 1955), 84.
67
Manning Clark, The Quest For Grace (Melbourne: Penguin Books, 1990), 82.
68
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 25 March 1928, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
69
Crawford to Harry Crawford, 27 January 1928, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
70
Macintyre, ed. Making History, 36.
71
19 August 1928, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
48
An Historian’s Life
72
Judy Mabro. I Ban Everything: Free Speech and Censorship in Oxford (Oxford: Ruskin College Library, 1985), 6.
73
Charles Osborne, W. H. Auden (London: Eyre Methuen, 1979), 54.
74
Crawford never defined what he meant by the Synoptic Club.
75
Lady Francis Ryder to Crawford, 27 October 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
76
Crawford to Family, 8 October 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
77
Crawford to Family, 16 October 1927, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
78
Clark, Quest for Grace, 67.
79
Stephen Holt, Manning Clark and Australian History 1915-1963 (St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1982), 51.
80
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 11 March 1928, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
81
Hancock, Country and Calling, 85.
82
Crawford to Harry Crawford, 10 July 1929, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
83
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 19 March 1930, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
84
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 18 March 1928, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
85
Ibid.
86
Stuart Macintyre, ‘Ernest Scott: My History is a Romance’, in The Discovery of Australian History, 83.
87
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 8 August 1928, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
88
Interview with Ken Crawford, 2001.
89
Crawford to Family, 21 April 1929, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
90
Crawford to Harry Crawford, 29 December 1929, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
91
Macintyre, ed. Making History, 40.
92
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 18 March 1928, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
93
Macintyre, ed. Making History, 38.
94
See K.S. Inglis, This is the A.B.C. (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1983).
95
Crawford to Ross, 16 August 1933, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The reduction in income was critical and amounted to 3 pounds a week.
96
Ibid.
97
William Muir to Crawford, 8 November 1932, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. After graduating, Muir was employed at Glasgow University.
Origins and Influences
49
98
Crawford to William Entwhistle, 27 January 1933, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
99
A.M. Vander, Prelude to War (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1951), 6.
100
Crawford to Rockefeller Advisory Committee, 28 January 1933, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
101
Jack Crawford to Crawford, 16 June 1933, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
102
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 26 July 1933, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
103
Crawford, Historical Studies, (1971), 38.
104
William Muir to Crawford, 20 March 1933, Box 2, R, M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford had evidently not informed his friend about the progress of the project.
105
Harriet Crawford to Crawford, 28 May 1933, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
106
Harry Crawford to Crawford, 31 May 1933, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
107
Crawford to Ross, 16 August 1933, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
108
Dorothy Crawford to Crawford, 11 April 1933, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
109
Margaret Cheshire to author, 6 December 2004.
110
Jack Crawford to Crawford, 6 October 1932, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
111
Testimonial by Kenneth Bell, 24 October 1933, R. M. Crawford Papers, Box 2, UMA.
112
Harriet Crawford to Crawford, 8 November 1932, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
113
Ibid.
114
Jack Crawford to Crawford, 18 September 1933, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
115
Harriet Crawford to Crawford, 27 May 1934, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
116
Crawford, An Australian Perspective, 63.
117
Crawford, ‘My Brother Jack: Background and Early Years’, 14.
118
Hynes, The Auden Generation, Literature and Politics in England in the 1930s, 99.
119
Harriet Crawford to Crawford, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
120
Bradfield Notebook, 1933, Box 5, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
121
Crawford to Ross, 16 August 1933, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
122
Crawford to Stephen Roberts, undated 1935, Box 6, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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123
Crawford’s application to the Registrar, University of Melbourne, 15 October 1936, Box 6, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
124
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 39.
125
Hancock, Country and Calling, 81.
126
Deryck Schreuder, ‘An Unconventional Founder: Stephen Roberts and the Professionalism of the Historical Discipline’, in The Discovery of Australian History 1890-1939, 126.
127
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 1940, R. M. Crawford Papers, Box 5, UMA.
128
Crawford’s style was constantly remarked on in interviews.
129
Brian Kennedy. ‘John Anderson’, The Oxford Companion to History, 23-4. See also Brian Kennedy, A Passion to Oppose (Carlton South: Melbourne University Press, 1995).
130
Crawford, Historical Studies, (1971), 42.
131
Stephen Roberts, The House That Hitler Built (London: Methuen Publishers, 1937).
132
Schreuder, ‘An Unconventional Founder’ in The Discovery of Australian History 1890-1939, 39.
133
Ibid., 133.
134
Christopher Hollis wrote, in reference to Evelyn Waugh’s political indifference, that the interwar years made it no longer possible for any sane man to escape from political attitudes. Christopher Hollis, Oxford in the Twenties, Recollections of Five Friends (London: Heinemann, 1976), 106.
135
R. M. Crawford, ‘The Abyssinian Situation’, Address presented at the Joint Committee for Peace, 18 July 1935. Later published in The Union Recorder, 25 July 1935. There is no indication whether Crawford chose the topic or was requested to discuss the crisis.
136
Ibid.
137
Nettie Palmer, Fourteen Years (St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1988), 181.
138
Hollis, Oxford in the Twenties, 28.
139
Ibid.
140
Nettie Palmer to Crawford, 13 August 1942, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
141
External Paper ‘The Decline of Spain’, 1936, Box 10, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
142
Crawford, Historical Studies, (1971), 42.
143
R. M. Crawford ‘Revolution in Spain?’, Australian Highway, July 1936. The article was published in a paper distributed by The Workers’ Educational Association. The aim of the Australian Highway was to publish articles of ‘general interest to students’ and ‘provide a place where all questions relating to adult education may be discussed openly and completely’. The objectives were listed in a University of Sydney memo to tutors, signed by
Origins and Influences
51
W. B. K. Duncan (director of tutorial classes) and Lloyd Ross (editor), June 1936. 144
Robin Gollan, Revolutionaries and Reformists (Canberra: A.N.U Press, 1975), 53.
145
Crawford, ‘Revolution in Spain?’, Australian Highway, July 1936.
146
R. M. Crawford ‘The Spanish Civil War’, drafted paper, incomplete. The occasion and date are unknown, possibly 1970s. Box 10, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
147
Palmer, Fourteen Years, 222-3. Diary entry recorded 4 July 1936.
148
Hynes, The Auden Generation, 42.
149
Stephen Roberts to Crawford, 24 August 1936, Box 6, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
150
Thelma Roberts to Dorothy Crawford, 1 August 1936, Box 6, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
151
Christopher Cook to Crawford, 4 November 1936, Box 6, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
152
Crawford, Historical Studies (1971), 29.
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Chapter 2
‘Forward the Professors’
In the late nineteenth century, the University of Melbourne was described as having the appearance of an ‘English village centred around its pond’. The landscaped grounds and imposing architecture imitated the Oxbridge model. The ornamental lake was devised in the 1860s to obscure swampy ground, though a lingering stench occasionally exposed its origins. Wilson Hall, considered the ‘architectural jewel’, dominated the campus and the Tudor building known as the Quadrangle remained the hub of academic life. The building housed the original professors’ apartments, the library and the lecture theatres. The theatres had a door at the back for the students and one at the front for the lecturers to maintain the academic hierarchy.1 At the time Crawford applied for the Chair of History, the University retained reminders of the ‘inward looking estate’, but changes were afoot. The lake, a place for socialising, courtship, pranks and protest, with its stories of dissident students being thrown into its murky waters, was about to be drained and filled. The buildings, badly dilapidated, were now a ‘barbarous jumble and a melancholy mess’.2 The Appointment Crawford wrote his letter of application with a shrewd combination of confidence, modesty and self-deprecation as he related his previous
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The University of Melbourne in the 1930s Photographer unknown University of Melbourne Archives, Image UMA/I/1091
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academic experience and lack of published research.3 He did not embellish his record and hoped his general Spanish studies would prove valuable. A once raw, ungainly and rather conceited young man had been tempered by the years of adversity teaching in the English public school system and his inconsistent success within the familiar walls of Sydney University. Balliol had not quite been the imagined path to success. Crawford’s previous difficulties in employment had not, however, quite defeated his fierce ambition or his innate selfbelief. He was an indulged son in whom his sacrificial mother had placed her hopes and in whom she recognised abilities that she had done her best to nurture. If the University had had its way, the vacancy would never have been advertised. The search for Scott’s replacement had been marred by an astonishing display of misdirected confidence, as the Committee courted a more established scholar. In an urgent and rather callous mood, Kenneth Bailey, the Acting Vice-Chancellor, declared that Scott, who had informed the Council of his resignation on 21 January 1936, had aged ‘very swiftly and rather pathetically in the last twelve months’.4 Concern for Scott was understandable: he had suffered poor health since 1935 and would live for only another three years after his retirement.5 Conscious of his disintegrating constitution, he had deferred his decision to retire and negotiated with his prized pupil, Keith Hancock, to take the Chair. Scott’s confidence in Hancock was well founded. The son of an Anglican priest, educated at Melbourne Grammar and Trinity College with the benefit of scholarships, Hancock served a brief apprenticeship with Edward Shann in Western Australia as an assistant lecturer and was known as the ‘Baby Bolsh’ for his radical liberalism.6 He went on to achieve a distinguished degree at Balliol, which culminated in election to a fellowship at All Souls. In 1926, Hancock returned to Australia and became the Professor at Adelaide, where he wrote the classic text, Australia. He was described as a ‘curious maverick’, for the combination of his experience and identity.7 With all these glittering credentials, the Chair of Melbourne’s committee deemed Hancock the only worthy and ‘suitable’ successor. Apparently undeterred by the fact that he had accepted the Chair at Birmingham University a year before, they agreed in April that an invitation would be extended to Hancock by airmail. He was asked to defer his
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decision until the new Vice-Chancellor, Raymond Priestley, was able to see him in London. Priestley arrived there in June 1936 and began the protracted wooing. After a ‘couple of long yarns’ with the Hancocks, he tried to make the prospect of Melbourne as appealing as possible. He empathised with Hancock’s concerns: that he should fulfill his obligations at Birmingham for five years, and that by leaving England, he would be ‘very much out of touch with his materials at the other end of the world’.8 ‘It is clear’, Priestley wrote, ‘that Hancock is persona grata at Birmingham, as I fancy that he would be in any academic circles’.9 The doubts expressed by Hancock only made him more attractive. Promises were imparted; he did not have to begin until May 1939 and would be given a long spell every five years to research and write.10 The temptations were not sufficient, and Hancock declined. He expressed his regret, but was concerned by the ‘time factor’ surrounding his multi-volume historical work on the British Commonwealth. He also did not wish to face two harried and anxious years, leaving behind ‘an obligation half performed’ and a piece of work ‘spoilt by superficiality and haste’.11 There is some discrepancy over the nature or extent of Hancock’s duties at Birmingham. They were not as exacting as he maintained, for Priestley observed he had the luxury of two complete days in a week for his research work. It is debatable whether Hancock ever seriously considered the Melbourne bid. He had left Australia in 1933 with the full knowledge of Scott’s imminent departure. Later in life, Hancock ruefully offered several reasons for rejecting Melbourne. The timing ‘did not fit’; he was in Birmingham too briefly for a resignation to be ‘decent’; and less convincingly, Melbourne might not have appointed him.12 The prestige of Birmingham, the attractions of Britain and the importance of Hancock’s writing clearly took precedence, despite his insistence that Scott’s History Department had maintained fine traditions.13 Hancock would later self-consciously confess that his record as a professor was not exemplary. The single-minded pursuit of writing took over other obligations: domestic, teaching, public demands and the monotony of administration.14 He found the tenuous balance between teaching and writing impossible to achieve. Perhaps Hancock’s voluminous body of work mitigated the neglect of other obligations.
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The demands on Australian professors were onerous, and the casualties of the history profession at that time striking. G. A. Wood and Edward Shann both committed suicide; Scott and A.C.V. Melbourne would die at a relatively young age, and G. C. Henderson suffered from acute depression and was forced to retire early. On 3 August the despondent Melbourne Committee decided to advertise the vacant position in Australia and England. Max Crawford was under no illusions about his chances and provided only two referees, Kenneth Bell and A. D. Lindsay, both from Balliol. By late October, he was one of twelve Australian and New Zealand applicants, with an additional six applications coming from England. Crawford was in good company, and the leading contenders all brandished a swag of publications. Each candidate’s qualifications, experience and references were thoroughly scrutinised. The field was narrowed to seven contenders: Crawford, J. C. Beaglehole and J. Rutherford from New Zealand, A. C. V. Melbourne from Queensland, J. Harrison and Herbert Butterfield (Hancock’s recommendation) from England and Fred Wood, Crawford’s close friend and rival. The Committee sought a candidate who had published work and was not embedded in Australian history. A more questionable concern was with the applicant’s physical appearance. Priestley evidently had a penchant for phrenology and observed that Beaglehole was ‘quite good looking’; Melbourne had a ‘fine strong head’, but looked like an administrator; Wood was ‘pleasant’; Owen had a ‘fine head and face’ (though he wasn’t shortlisted); Rutherford had the ‘best face of all’, and as Hall’s photograph suggested that he was not their ‘man’, he was eliminated straight away. As for Crawford, Priestley described him having ‘an attractive, alive and intelligent face but not particularly strong looking. A good head and forehead, falls away rather below, but a wide and humorous mouth.’15 It was Wood, with his impeccable academic pedigree, who had blocked Crawford’s path at Sydney in 1931. He too used Bell as a referee. Bell felt compelled to write informally to another Balliol man, G. S. Browne, the Professor of Education at Melbourne University, about his two former students. Both men, according to Bell, were ‘very good indeed’, had ‘energy and initiative’ and owed their success and continued improvement ‘to their own efforts, determination and patience’. Fred Wood had the better publication record and had done
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‘some excellent historical writing’ despite personal tragedies, notably his father’s suicide and the death of his first child. This, in Bell’s view, personified Wood’s ‘pluck, determination and outstanding power of work’, although the Wood family were not ‘everybody’s pigeon’ and ‘had a certain awkwardness of manner’.16 What did Crawford have to offer? By all accounts he was an instinctive, gifted and ‘first rate teacher’. ‘His pupils love him’, wrote Bell, ‘he’s got the teacher’s touch’. It was also suggested that, though fond of England, he was ‘a real Australian’. He had some devoted friends, but was not ‘a hankerer after fleshpots’, though Bell jested that a ‘marvellous superman smothered in PhD’s’ would apply and make Crawford look like an amateur.17 He urged the Committee to have courage and elect Crawford.18 Stephen Roberts was equally magnanimous in his praise to Ernest Scott. Crawford was: Energetic, loyal to a degree, has diverse interests, represented the combination of literature and history at its best, is a good mixer, takes part in all student activities, is an excellent lecturer and has many ideas.19 The Sydney School would regret his leaving. Curiously, Crawford had not called on Roberts to provide a testimonial. Equally unusual was the role Scott played in the selection of his successor. Fred Wood had seriously miscalculated when he included a vaguely positive letter from Roberts, for it had been common knowledge that their working relationship had not been happy. The Committee might well have been disconcerted when it read Roberts’ statement that ‘nobody turned out of Sydney in the last fifteen years who had come near’ to Crawford. In a further rebuff to Wood, Roberts contrasted Crawford’s ‘willingness’ with ‘his unfortunate experience with his two predecessors’.20 We can only speculate about Roberts’ motive. There is no evidence to suggest that Crawford’s relationship with Roberts was close. As a student of Scott and a post-graduate at London University, Roberts adopted the empirical school of scientific history, in sharp contrast with Crawford’s social and moral orientation.21 Although Crawford would later deny the importance of his
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family background, it distinguished him in the field. In particular, Stephen Roberts appeared contemptuous of those who assumed that a University education was a natural right regardless of ability.22 Known as ‘Swotty Roberts’, a none-too-flattering euphemism for his ambition and industry, Roberts had depended on scholarships to achieve the eminence he craved. In both Bell’s and Roberts’ opinion, Crawford’s very ‘humble beginnings’ had created a tenacious fighter, who also possessed the skills of a diplomatic negotiator. It was fortunate that Roberts intervened on Crawford’s behalf, since his other referee, A. D. Lindsay, had been more measured. ‘He has vigour and go’, Lindsay wrote, ‘and I think is a first class fellow. I can’t of course speak about his history.’23 There were a number of reservations about Crawford. According to Priestley’s cryptic notes, Crawford’s chief disability was his lack of research work and publication.24 This disadvantage was rationalised by Roberts, who claimed that Crawford had been ‘tied’ down by an early marriage and by the terrible grind of English schools.25 C. H. Currey also mentioned Crawford’s difficult circumstances, but provided a new dimension. ‘He is too steeped in the Oxford tradition’, Currey observed, ‘to have been able to publish anything that he would regard as worthy of publication’.26 Kenneth Bell’s qualm was of a more personal nature. He characterised Crawford as less steady and methodical than Wood, and thought he might be criticised as ‘overeager and too much inclined to dash off after all kinds of odd hares’.27 Raymond Priestley was pragmatic. He considered that Crawford was ‘rather on the modern side’ and projected an ‘excursion into Australian History’, though the Vice-Chancellor admitted it was difficult to escape at the time.28 Early opinion favoured a candidate from Queen’s College, J. Harrison. Priestley disagreed and saw Crawford’s potential, believing they could find no better candidate than the young historian.29 After ‘considerable discussion’ and by a narrow margin at the final meeting of the Selection Committee, it was agreed to see the unknown Sydney man. A delayed telegram reached Crawford on 21 December, and he was invited to an interview in Melbourne the following day. After a restless night on the interstate train, planning how to reshape the Melbourne School, Crawford was taken to the interview. Largely due to fatigue, the normally retiring Crawford did not
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Max Crawford in 1937 Photographer: Austin Marcott University of Melbourne Archives, Image UMA/I/1953
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An Historian’s Life
display his usual inhibitions. Forty years later, he described the interview: Asked why I had not published very much, I replied that Professor Roberts had been away and that I had to run the Department by myself, and that in Sydney one had to prepare three lectures a week in each subject, whereas in Melbourne they gave two. Someone asked, ‘Why do they still do that?’ And I heard myself saying to these venerable gentlemen, ‘The reasons for that will have retired within the next ten years’—and I assumed that was the end of Melbourne for me. But they loved it: I was saying something about Sydney.30 Indeed, everyone was overjoyed. It was, according to Priestley, ‘quite an important day’ and the Committee was so favourably impressed with Crawford that his appointment was immediate and unanimous. He had won them with his measured confidence, personality, scholarship and attitude towards research, teaching, and University affairs.31 ‘He is all that we could wish’, Priestley wrote with prophetic foresight, ‘and will make a most stimulating head for our history school for the next thirty years with will.’32 The Melbourne School So, from a large and distinguished field of candidates, Max Crawford emerged as Professor at Melbourne at the age of thirty. It was not his youth that was unusual, but the conspicuous lack of published writing. The announcement of Crawford’s appointment further emphasised his failure to produce original work. ‘Teaching duties so far have been too heavy to allow him to publish any research work.’ A journalist who reported for the local press wrote. ‘But he is a wellknown authority on the American Revolution and has done research work on Spanish History.’33 Crawford himself was bemused and later described the selection as ‘Melbourne’s gamble into the future’.34 Surprisingly, the appointment of a seeming novice did not cause great controversy. The History Department was already considered unconventional, with the precedent of Scott, who had worked as a journalist and had no degree.35 The selection committee was intent
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on finding a general historian rather than a specialist, and a graduate from another university rather than a pupil of Scott. Crawford’s confidence in the reputation of Balliol had remained steadfast, and he was convinced that the weight Australia attached to that name had gained him the position. This was echoed by Gordon Greenwood, who congratulated Crawford on his success and wrote that Crawford was obviously correct about the Oxford clout.36 The Oxford old boys’ club was well represented at Melbourne, as Kenneth Bailey, G.V. Browne and Greenwood had Oxford credentials. Academics and prominent public figures alike were quick to express their approval and delight. They included Kenneth Bell, A. D. Lindsay, G. S. Henderson, Fred Alexander, Orwell de R. Foenander, Ian Hogbin, Fred Wood and Scott himself. Congratulating Crawford, Christopher Cook sensed the threat to his friend’s writing plans and wrote rather optimistically: ‘One thing, I hope that the projected book is not sabotaged by the new responsibilities’.37 With the news of his long-awaited success and in preparation for the new duties, Crawford took his family to Grenfell for a brief Christmas vacation. The ensuing months were fraught with the hurried completion of work in Sydney, preparation for Melbourne (he was to work in six fields and was familiar with only one) and the logistics of moving a young family for the third time in two years. During the interim, Crawford and Priestley began to develop their shared ideas about the History Department. Priestley disclosed for the first time to the new Professor his intention to make a survey of the entire University in order to convince the government and individual benefactors that they ‘must do better for their University’.38 On the advice of the Melbourne Chair Committee, which recognised his tendency to ‘overwork’, Crawford willingly took a holiday in Victoria, so he could assume his new responsibilities ‘more vigorously’.39 After years of drifting, Crawford and Dorothy now found permanence. In February they purchased a comfortable house in prosperous Kew, a solid bastion of the middle class. Crawford was now earning an impressive annual salary of 1200 pounds, a leap from the 400 pounds provided by Sydney. Although he was not a materialistic man, the salary and house reflected his image of himself and his new security. The home was very much Dorothy Crawford’s arena. The role of the academic wife was expected to be that of a silent and
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supportive partner whose activities were restricted to teas and childraising.40 By 1939 the Crawford family would have two new additions: Ian who was born in Sydney in 1935 and Margaret born in Melbourne in 1939. Melbourne also afforded Crawford a happy opportunity to become reacquainted with the eldest of his brothers, Stanley, who had left the parental home at the outbreak of war. After distinguished service in Egypt, Gallipoli and France, Stanley performed special duties for the Defence Department. It was not all domestic tranquillity. Crawford never deviated from the enormous task ahead of him and immediately set about transforming the History School. His selection signalled the University’s intent to break away from Scott and inaugurate ‘a new regime’.41 Crawford began with a review of resources and student numbers, and moved on to a detailed review of the Department. The results were encapsulated in two reports, the first submitted in May 1937 and the second in the following year. It was a remarkable feat for one so young to depart from the previous practices and reformulate the curriculum and pedagogy with such determination. Yet Crawford was not as much a novice as his age suggested. Unlike many academics, and despite his later protests, administration appealed to his sense of purpose and organisation. The signs were apparent as early as 1929, when he told his father that he felt quite a strong inclination towards administration of some kind.42 Crawford’s aptitude in this regard was amply demonstrated at Sydney when he wrote a letter to a senior colleague that provided a detailed inventory of necessary changes—all of which reflected his distinctive interpretation of history: An Honours School of History should have a nucleus of purely historical subjects, and for the rest, sufficient flexibility to allow the student to follow his individual bent towards an economic, social, philosophical or literary emphasis on his historical study.43 Sydney had been a valuable apprenticeship, and it was fortuitous that the mercurial, demanding Roberts had been mostly absent. Nevertheless, Crawford had oscillated between resentment that he
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had been exploited and frustration that he could not implement his plans. Melbourne gave Crawford the opportunity to realise the ambitious ideas he had for many years envisaged. It was also an exchange: Roberts, the Melbourne graduate, had gone to Sydney, and Crawford now went in the opposite direction. The divergent traditions of the cities in Australian cultural discourse would be defined in this period. The Melbourne tradition was embodied in a confidently middle-class intelligentsia, which saw knowledge as central to society and was inclined to be idealistic, earnest and progressive. In contrast, the Sydney intellectuals saw their role as one of aloof detachment and tended to be attracted to activities that personified that stance: anarchism, bohemianism and anti-authoritarianism.44 As he implemented his sweeping plans, the constant in Crawford’s chaotic life was his teaching. His didacticism had always been emphasised, and Bell remembered the deep impression Crawford had made on his students as a gangly twenty-five-year-old. His approachable ease, combined with his reverence for history, inspired similar enthusiasm in his Melbourne students. Manning Clark, the son of an Anglican clergyman, was in his second year as an undergraduate when he met Crawford in March 1937. It was the Professor’s first day and, in a period of extreme formality, he was a revelation to the young Clark. ‘He had a light in the eye: he wore on his face an expression of a man who knew much about melancholy.’ Clark recounted: He said that if ever I wanted to sort out any puzzles I should just knock on the door, and, if he was free, he would be delighted to talk things over. Being friendly and democratic at Melbourne University in those days was as rare as a display of generosity and understanding by either side in the sectarian dog-fight.45 It was the era of the ‘God professor’ and Crawford, according to one student, possessed the ‘sheer ability and charismatic quality’ to make ‘the system work at its best’.46 Others were not as complimentary. One young refugee student later accused Crawford of being a ‘vile, bourgeois mechanist’.47 Deeply sensitive, this comment greatly wounded Crawford, who repeated it years later. Less judgmental was
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Frank Ford’s assessment: he considered Crawford a talented teacher, but uninterested in students who were not destined for the Honours stream.48 Crawford was aware of the effect he had on students. As an undergraduate, he described to his father how he attracted other students with his placid disposition, which they found comforting and soothing. It was a quality that Bell described as ‘a quietness of sympathy’.49 Crawford emulated the examples offered by Wood and Bell, who had inspired such strong feelings of admiration. He attempted to provide an ‘intellectual lead to the department’.50 In Crawford’s long and hagiographic account of G. A. Wood’s life, A Bit of a Rebel, he observed that Wood believed a professor’s duty must be to the university, however strongly he might feel his obligations to the world beyond it. It was also his responsibility to maintain a balance between teaching, obligations to the academic community and the public.51 It might have been easier for Crawford to imitate Wood’s example if he had remained at Sydney, but Melbourne University was an unknown quantity. Crawford had only fleetingly visited the campus as a hopeful scholar on voyage to Oxford. Now, as Professor, he found himself among an academic fraternity that was considered more progressive and politically engaged than that at Sydney.52 In truth, the students and teachers who did gravitate into protest did so slowly, and although some joined the Communist Party of Australia, most remained intellectual sympathisers. The rise of fascism in the 1930s, Crawford would suggest later, provoked the beginning of ‘an alive and bitter ideological discussion’.53 Political and cultural groups fostered, informed and animated debate. By 1937 such organisations thrived: the Left Book Club, the Book Censorship Abolition League, the International Movement Against War and Fascism, the Labor Club, the Australian Council of Civil Liberties and the Spanish Relief Committee. They provided a potent mix of social, cultural and political activism. The issue that galvanised the campus was the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936, though Australian intellectuals were affected by Spain less than their European counterparts. Crawford’s two English friends, William Muir and Christopher Cook, kept him informed. Muir, the more jovial of the two, found events in Europe rather ‘thrilling’.54 Cook was decidingly more grim as he described
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‘lives of constant uncertainty’. He warned, ‘I think it most likely that some type of socialism will come in a few years, but whether it will bring war in its train, I don’t guess’.55 Protests over Spain gained momentum. Editors of the student newspaper, Farrago, likened a debate held on campus in early March 1937 to a ‘Spanish Bull Fight’.56 Such debates became increasingly vitriolic, firing passions comparable to those ignited by the conscription debate during the First World War. On 23 March 1937, Manning Clark witnessed another ‘talk’ on Spain at the University in the Public Lecture Theatre when the proposition ‘That the Church is the ruin of Spain’ was debated. Clark described the debate as ‘a refresher course in tribal loyalty’; the behaviour reminded him of the rabble watching a football match at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, rather than a formal intellectual debate. Howling mobs shouted down the speakers, students ran over the roof and the chairman, Professor C. A. Scutt, vainly called for order.57 Open letters exchanged in Farrago were even more poisonous, illustrated by the undergraduate B. A. Santamaria’s broadside against the economic historian Herbert ‘Joe’ Burton. In a response to Burton’s letter regarding the debate on Spain, Santamaria accused him of being ‘dangerous’, a ‘semi-communist’ and questioned his academic integrity as a senior lecturer in Economic History.58 Raymond Priestley had good reason to mock Melbourne’s reputation for radicalism and insisted that the University was far less threatening than Cambridge. The Vice-Chancellor described Melbourne’s left as small and inactive, its radical reputation as an invention of the fertile imagination of the conservative press. ‘I often think’, Priestley observed, ‘that if Cambridge University was put down in Melbourne, this place would go up in flames’.59 Although Crawford was concerned by the right-wing action in Spain, he remained uncomfortable with the form of protest it provoked. Manning Clark observed how his mentor was ill at ease with left-wing orthodoxy and some of the behaviour of his own disciples. Clark saw a man who continued to view the madness of Europe through the partial blinkers of a traditional and civilised liberalism, reminiscent of Sydney and Oxford. Clark suspected that Crawford believed ‘a man’s virtue did not depend on his material environment. A man was not born with virtue: he acquired virtue, by his intelligence and his soul.’
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Crawford’s critics considered his liberalism outdated, and some regarded him as chimerical. Clark was sympathetic and compared his teacher ‘like a man driving a team of horses who found to his dismay that one horse after another was breaking from a trot to a canter’.60 Crawford was not alone in his concern about the Spanish protests, and Raymond Priestley felt compelled at a Union dinner to call for some calm amid the alleged abuses of academic freedom. ‘I am a keen supporter of free speech and free discussion in a University’, he was reported as saying. ‘Nevertheless, I have viewed with dismay certain manifestations arising out of discussion of political and social questions here, particularly recently.’61 Scholastic Busybodies In April 1937, Crawford wrote a provocative letter to the Argus on behalf of five of his colleagues. It was a copy of a manifesto sent to the Australian delegates who had departed to an Imperial Conference. The letter challenged the British and Australian governments’ foreign policy.62 Crawford proposed that the Empire’s trade restrictions should be reduced and the League of Nations be given stricter control. This, in Crawford’s opinion, was ‘contingent upon the fascist countries coming back into the League and supporting collective security’.63 The success of the proposal was dependent on the resurrection of this ‘collective security’ and the assumption that both Hitler and Mussolini wanted peace. Max Crawford had at last made himself conspicuous. He had translated his beliefs into a more active stance. It was an inauspicious political debut. The Bulletin condemned the academics as ‘six scholastic busybodies’. In an editorial sarcastically titled, ‘Forward, the Professors!’ it maintained that the ‘conceited’ academics in their rarefied environment were not qualified to shape the foreign policy of the Empire. ‘In his accustomed sphere the Professor is rightly esteemed,’ the editor sneered: But it is hardly questionable that the specialised nature of his training, the secluded conditions of his calling and the character of his usual contacts disqualify him outright as a possible shaper of practical policies. Habitually associated with the University life, his idea of the world tends to be a mere enlargement of his school.64
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The Bulletin also alleged that the professors were in a position to subvert the Victorian youths they ‘instructed’ with realities taken out of Alice in Wonderland. The editor asked legitimate questions about the professors’ premise that economic relief by a revision of the mandate system and lowering of tariffs would undermine the Fascist dictators. In hindsight, the academic protagonists had grossly underestimated both Hitler and Mussolini. The Argus was also critical of Crawford and his colleagues. The Herald was somewhat kinder and saw merit in their peaceful political activism. In response to the mainstream press’s right-wing outbursts, Farrago commended the professors and maintained they could offer valuable contributions to discussion of the world situation.65 The Vice-Chancellor did not publicly support them. Priestley always insisted that the University as an institution was outside, even above, politics, and he subordinated his own public commentary to his duties as Vice-Chancellor.66 He did respond to a letter published in the Herald, which attacked the academics. ‘If they have sinned,’ Priestley wrote, ‘they are in good company since the Economist holds the same view’.67 This stormy debate was the start of what Crawford would recall ambivalently as ‘the noise of controversy’.68 A Memorandum of Change Politics withstanding, most of Crawford’s energy was consumed by his original reconstruction of the History School. In his first lengthy memorandum to Priestley written on 4 May 1937, he plotted three objectives: that more intensive honours work should be guided in smaller classes (hence the urgent need for more resources); that initiation into research be postponed to the graduate stage; and that the pass degree should include a new course on modern history and an aspect of Australian history.69 In Crawford’s mind, the Honours School took precedence over the remaining two objectives. It was his aim ‘to stimulate the individual student to mental activity, imaginative, sympathetic and critical, as far may be’.70 The student was expected in this process to consult a variety of sources, ‘geographical, economic and social, through political and constitutional to what one might describe as literary material’, so they might ‘analyse the relationship between men, their traditions, their environment, both human and physical’.71
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Crawford expanded on his objectives in an address delivered on a cold Friday afternoon in June 1937 to the Melbourne University Association. Although it was Crawford’s first public statement in Melbourne about history, the bulk of the paper had been written the previous year when he harboured hopes of transforming the History Department at Sydney University. The accompanying notes (and the surviving draft) were scribbled in one evening in May.72 They reveal a view of history that Crawford would later call the synoptic approach and that continued to inform his work. He viewed society through three prisms: the setting, the individuals and their social relationships. The method was not simply a legal, political, social or geographical one, but an attempt to synthesise these specialised perspectives. ‘History is the story of human societies agitated from within themselves and their setting to work out the nature’, Crawford declared. It was an argument that had its genesis at Oxford and Bradfield, and had been refined in Sydney.73 These themes were offered with more clarity and authority now that Crawford was Professor. His expectations of himself as a teaching historian responsible for the apprentices to his profession were at the core of the paper. History could not be built upon a ‘vague nostalgia for the past’, he maintained, but required the readiness to ‘face the role of understanding’. It is a discipline, he said, ‘training habits of thorough investigation and critical alertness’. He expected his students to understand the facts, but also to experience the process of understanding. Crawford’s exposition tended to grandiloquence as he expounded the duty of the teacher to develop critical awareness and sympathetic insight, a combination that constituted imagination. He likened the process to walking a tightrope, strung between certain fact and uncertainty. A believer in goodness, morality and integrity, he emphasised scholastic honesty as the most fundamental quality for a student.74 The roots of this approach were in Wood’s training; that the historian must guide the student to ‘live rightly’, to be men who matter in the world and matter for its good.75 Crawford’s address reveals as much about his approach to history as his plans for the History Department. He considered certain subjects particularly valuable: Greek and Roman civilisation, Europe in the Renaissance and the Reformation, the French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution. They were subjects already taught in the
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Department, and Crawford validated the inclusion because they raised issues of contemporary importance: liberalism and authority, dogmatism and tolerance. It was also an address of its time. ‘The professional historians’, he stated, ‘are all very conscious nowadays that we must criticise our authority and examine our documents’. With subtle skill, Crawford indicated the responsibilities he now assumed as a public figure in a decade of increased controversy. The synoptic way of seeing was not only a methodological and philosophical approach to history, but also a way of understanding the present desire for peace and the element of fear that inspired dictatorships. The ambitiousness of the synoptic approach, the breadth of its scope and its insistence on comprehensive standards made it difficult for Crawford to uphold those standards in his own work. His passion for history and his enthusiasm for teaching are unmistakable. He was a practised public speaker, with a clear, modulated delivery and commanding presence. Crawford’s Melbourne debut was a triumph.76 Several weeks after the address, he submitted to the ViceChancellor a new report defining the changes to the History School. In an extension of the earlier memorandum, it proposed to discard Australian history as a separate subject (and combine it with British history) because, in 1937, it attracted only fifteen students.77 Lewis Wilcher of Trinity College, who was appointed to teach British History, and was totally uninterested in the Australian story, concurred. ‘My own instinct’, Wilcher wrote, ‘is to say to hell with Australian history’.78 Crawford’s reasons were different. Defending the controversial decision, he maintained that it was the ‘comparative paucity of the first class writing on the subject’ that made it ‘of less educational value’.79 In an attempt to reassure those advocating Australian history, Crawford insisted that he had ‘clear plans for an Australasian course’.80 A revised course was intended as a departure from the ‘drab’ chronicle of events.81 However, the decision to abandon Australian history looked like a backwards step in deference to British history. Priestley assured the usually confident Crawford that the necessary committees would support the modifications.82 During this formative period, Crawford began to devise the course that would become his trademark. The Theory and Method subject, which was at the heart of the fourth year of honours studies,
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was intended to stimulate historical inquiry and encourage an imaginative approach to tackle it.83 ‘Its inspiration’, Crawford reiterated, was not a particular conclusion, certainly not an ideology, though a belief in the importance and hopefulness of the study was implicit in it. It inspired, not acceptance, but a debate, and if there developed a Melbourne school of history, there was not a Melbourne ideology. Admittedly there was what had been called a Crawford flavour. I refer to Donald Horne’s distinction in The Lucky Country between Anderson’s influence in Sydney and mine here.84 Equally telling is Crawford’s retrospective comment that his early childhood influences—the conviction that ‘greater social justice was both needed and possible’—was not irrelevant to the ideology espoused in the Theory and Method course.85 Raymond Priestley resigned from Melbourne University late in 1937 and did not see the full impact of the new history curriculum. His successor was John Medley, a seemingly cautious and unobtrusive headmaster from Moss Vale. His appointment was controversial. Medley would prove an equally supportive and far-sighted ally of Crawford. The University had been fortunate, according to Crawford in later life, that both Vice-Chancellors ‘were able to add to the intellectual liveliness of the school by the appointment of staff of important intellectual stature’.86 Not all Crawford’s plans went as smoothly. Much to his chagrin, he failed to incorporate his Spanish studies. ‘Melbourne’s very different demands on my time ended them’, Crawford recounted. ‘A lecture course on Modern Spain would have brought them to some sort of fruition. I assumed that I would be able to return to them; in those days I was so full of energy nothing was impossible.’87 The exuberance that characterised Crawford’s administration was not apparent in his own research. Crawford implored Priestley to provide staff and redistribute the teaching and administration burden, because he found it impossible to combine these duties with research. ‘I am not willing’, he wrote defensively, ‘to publish original work based on insufficient reading and particularly insufficient thought’.88 This reluctance is consistent with Currey’s observation that the Balliol
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tradition and high scholarly standards inhibited Crawford from producing work.89 In Crawford’s defence, the burden placed on staff by the growing number of students was heavy and unremitting. From 1937 to 1938, he had a staff of only two full-time officers—himself and Jessie Webb—and three part-time assistants. A change in family relations might also have sapped his confidence. His brother Jack had won a Commonwealth Fund Fellowship to Washington. During his absence at Oxford, Max Crawford had assumed a protective attitude towards his brother. This was manifested in correspondence with his mother, as they discussed Jack’s education, future and the hope that he would retrace Crawford’s pilgrimage to England. In reality, Jack Crawford was quite capable of making his own decisions, and he might have resented his brother’s paternalistic attitude.90 Close in age and ambitious by nature, the brothers had achieved an intimacy when Crawford taught at Sydney, and Jack was working as economic adviser to the Rural Bank of New South Wales. Although Crawford was delighted with his brother’s research success, it must have also been a reminder of his own failed Rockefeller Fellowship application and the demanding professorial duties that crushed his hopes for original research and travel. Later in life, Crawford wrote with a sense of regret that the early years at Melbourne had ended the luxury of time afforded him in Sydney, and the move to Melbourne was not necessarily good for him as an historian.91 He was apparently defeated by overwork and his own expectations. He might, though, have been self-mythologising. Even in the period of relative calm in Sydney, the articulated intention to embark on original research and the freedom to continue his omnivorous reading were precarious and not sustained. Despite Crawford’s writing difficulties, he maintained an avid interest in Spain. In the absence of his book on that troubled country, the surviving addresses delivered in Melbourne in 1937 and his copious notes tell us much about his frustrated ambitions to write and his increased activism. By 1937, as the Civil War became a grim and bloody contest, the character of Crawford’s narrative changed. In a half-hour talk entitled, ‘The Spanish Background’, he considered issues of fear, suspicion and the role of communism. This was a significant departure from previously dry and detached papers. With a semblance of anger he wrote:
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The Spanish Revolution has been caused by fear. This fear is a compound of several fears, fear of anything with danger to life and property, fear of anti-clerical violence, fear of communist and anarchist revolution, fears which are summed up for the conservative Spaniard in the bogey of Bolshevism.92 The events in Spain provided Crawford’s fascination with the country with contemporary relevance, an interested public and a stimulating context for the application of his historical ideas. The premise of his original project of 1932 remained the same, but his emphasis altered as the international ramifications increased. He pursued his synoptic vision more readily. In his talk, he analysed ‘the background of fear and suspicion and the events that bred the atmosphere’. The theme that gave a fresh perspective to Crawford’s rather stale notes was the new emphasis on the intellectual. It was the generation of 1898 who were now accorded the central role in the present events in Spain. Crawford insisted that the intellectual and aesthetic revival was not something remote: it spread from the intellectual’s writing, from the universities to professors and the middle class and then to the officers.93 This redefined and sharpened perspective indicated his own growing interest in the intellectual’s role in society. Another paper written later in the year, ‘The Troubles in Spain’, began less dramatically, but examined similar themes. This lecture was not, Crawford admitted, ‘an authoritative exposition’; instead, it approached the topic with some ‘hesitation and due humility’.94 He insisted that inadequate material hampered confident analysis. He returned to the flight of Alfonso XIII in 1931 to illustrate the importance of the background to present events, the intellectual renaissance and the hopelessness of the political system. The powerful emotion of fear and the dread of communism were ‘the main emotional stimulus to the present counter-revolution’.95 The notes suggest that, by late 1937, Crawford hoped to return to his interrupted project. In a draft plan called, ‘Spain or more’, he began to consider the origins of the Civil War. He set down his intention to ‘see how this became almost instantly a general European War fought on Spanish soil and to paint a sense of the more important international implications of the conflict’.96 The self-defeating
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paranoia of Bolshevism was now a theme in Crawford’s notes. He was by no means aligning himself with the communist cause, but was attempting to introduce a rational and analytical response to a debate that had always incited hysteria. A New Approach The immediate burden on his staff was lightened when, at Crawford’s insistence and with Priestley’s blessing, the University made a vacancy available for another lecturer in November 1937. The new appointment would not be without its problems. Ernest Scott anticipated his successor’s request for new staff and wrote a glowing letter of introduction for a talented former student, Kathleen Fitzpatrick. She was a tutor in the School of English at the time, but had made it known that she wanted to be transferred, if Crawford had no objections. Scott assumed that Crawford would approve of Fitzpatrick, given their shared Oxford qualifications. ‘Unless’, Scott wrote, ‘you belong to that band of diehards (of whom I know some choice specimens) who think that Oxford is no place for women students, however blest with qualities’.97 Crawford did not harbour such prejudices and worked at a University that was considered advanced in terms of its employment of women, with fifteen per cent of its staff being female.98 He had worked successfully with the other full-time member of staff, Jessie Webb, and recommended her promotion from Senior Lecturer to Associate Professor.99 However, he might have had doubts about Fitzpatrick and enquired if she intended to devote herself seriously to work. In a lengthy and sensitive response, Kathleen Fitzpatrick catalogued her experience, character and ill-fated marriage to Brian Fitzpatrick: My situation is now that I have no children, have been separated from my husband for more than a year and have my full time and undivided attention to give to my work. I think this is the information you were seeking.100 Kathleen Fitzpatrick, nee Pitt, had at this juncture experienced a series of profound disappointments. She had graduated with first class honours, but did not obtain a scholarship to further her
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education. Instead her parents paid for her to enter Somerville College, Oxford, where she completed with second class honours and under some financial pressure. More tellingly, Fitzpatrick had not enjoyed Oxford where women were treated as inferior.101 Fitzpatrick had married Brian Fitzpatrick in 1932, and the marriage broke up three years later. It was such a harrowing experience that she could barely mention the marriage in her evocative autobiography. Divorce, although highly unusual for the period, was not unfamiliar territory to Crawford, whose sister had suffered the humiliation of a court divorce. Fitzpatrick was by no means the leading contender for the position, and other historians were seriously considered. Esmonde Higgins was one of the more impressive and controversial candidates. Higgins, the brother of Nettie Palmer, had distinguished himself at Scotch College and Melbourne University. After the War, he attended Balliol College without taking a degree. Higgins later insisted he could not afford the costs, but had actually been sent down for his political activities. In 1920 he joined the Communist Party of Great Britain and worked in the Labour Research Department before he returned to Australia in 1924. He was a fine teacher and had other academic qualifications suggesting a successful career, but employment was denied him because of his politics. In March 1936, Higgins was appointed tutor for the Workers’ Educational Association in Launceston, under the aegis of the University of Tasmania.102 Higgins’ politics were sufficiently controversial for Raymond Priestley to ask G. V. Portus about his WEA associate. Portus, who had supported Higgins’s application, described the younger man’s political indoctrination, qualifications and disillusionment with communism in Australia. Portus expected questions about Esmonde Higgins’ integrity and remarked that his ‘communist interlude would be regarded with deep suspicion’. ‘I don’t mean’, Portus wrote, ‘that he wants to teach communism. He is studiously careful not to do this.’103 The unspoken concern that dominated the exchange, and was constantly raised at the time, was the issue of subversion and the undue influence exerted by a teacher on young charges. This form of scrutiny was not confined to card-carrying communists. Herbert Burton’s chief disability when he applied for the History Chair was ‘his political opinions’, which would ‘count against
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him with some people’.104 In reality Burton appeared to have much in common with Crawford. Like Crawford, he was an established academic with an Oxford degree. His liberalism was of the Tawney variety, and he was often portrayed as more radical than he actually was. Unlike Crawford, Burton was friendly with the infamous P. R. Stephensen, who was sent down for being a member of the Communist Party and later gravitated to the right. By 1935 the Investigation Branch had become interested in Burton’s extracurricular activities and compiled a voluminous dossier on him. In practice, most academics refused to use the lecture podium to indoctrinate or recruit. Professionalism and prudence separated their politics from their teaching. They were, after all, highly trained scholars who shared with their colleagues the norms of their calling, including objectivity and fairness.105 Even so, Portus’s efforts were in vain, and Higgins’ bid was unsuccessful. Fitzpatrick was transferred from the English Department, and Crawford was quickly convinced that Scott had ‘sent me a winner’.106 A generous man by nature, Crawford remained supportive of Higgins’ scholarship and continued to correspond with him during his candidature for a Masters degree. The Higgins case showed the limits of liberalism in University circles. Politics now played a more critical role in selection. Those, like Higgins, who had ‘strayed’ found an academic career near impossible. Radical activists such as Brian Fitzpatrick and Stephensen operated outside the universities.107 Antagonism towards communism was not new, it had been a seething feature of Australian political life since the 1920s and was dramatised in the infamous ‘Kisch affair’.108 But as intellectuals became more engaged in the public sphere in the 1930s, a re-examination of their role occurred. Official surveillance of ‘suspect’ intellectuals was intensified. Since the 1920s Higgins had been of avid interest to the Investigation Branch, Australia’s equivalent to Britain’s MI5, with which it liaised and from which it drew inspiration and operational practices. MI5 provided information about various ‘suspect’ Australians, including postgraduate students at Oxford or Cambridge who joined the British Communist Party. Higgins was reported to be a ‘drug addict and to drink very heavily’ and had ‘a mischievous and objectionable character’.109 Richard Hofstadter observed of America that the appeal of communism was stronger among intellectuals than in the larger society.110
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This was equally true of Australia. In the 1930s the popular front attracted intellectuals to communism for the first time. The Depression and the dangers of fascism persuaded many of the younger generation to consider alternatives and, for many, communism was the only realistic option. Those who were resistant to actual membership were often attracted to the Communist Party’s ‘ambience of cultural engagement’.111 Crawford maintained a distinction between his own progressive liberalism and his capacity for radicalism. He could never overcome his ‘instinctive liberal inhibitions’.112 Although sympathetic to radical causes, he failed to engage fully with its principal form: popular-front communism. He was neither combative nor demonstrated at this point in his life that he was a ‘joiner’, which may have precluded him from Party membership. But Crawford also never criticised communism’s totalitarian excesses. Once the press began to report on the political sympathies of the young academics, the pressure intensified. Herbert Burton had written an article for Farrago entitled ‘No Imperialism’, on behalf of the Australian Council of Civil Liberties in early 1938.113 Sane Democracy, a conservative journal devoted to the ‘maintenance of British Democracy’, responded with a scathing editorial written by the architect Kingsley Henderson, entitled, ‘Subversionists at the University’.114 Henderson maintained that decent-minded students were disgusted with the spread of communism and anti-British propaganda at Melbourne University. He went on to distinguish between idealists, ‘waned and narrowed by academic education’, and the subversives, ‘the communists, cowards, pacifists and conscientious objectors’.115 Sir James Barrett, the Chancellor, dispatched an enraged letter to the Vice-Chancellor condemning academics (and Burton in particular) for bringing the University into disrepute. Priestley before his departure, responded calmly and advocated that the University should ‘enable controversial questions’ to be asked; he suggested the propaganda outside was ‘equally bad’.116 The article provided no credible evidence, but the potential damage to the University’s reputation alarmed the Professor of Law and President of the Professorial Board, Kenneth Bailey, who assumed the role of watchdog. Bailey, with his characteristic inability to take sides (Manning Clark observed that he was renowned for never offering an opinion, just ‘yes and no’), promptly sent a memo to the
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offending professors.117 Bailey claimed, that although he was impartial, the article contained ‘an indictment of some aspects of University policy’.118 As caretaker before Medley’s arrival, Bailey received a tirade of letters from Barrett. Bailey vacillated between concurring with Barrett, who advocated imposing restraint on communications to the press by staff, and defence of academic independence.119 As the Henderson campaign against Burton intensified, Bailey claimed the attacks ‘verged on the hysterical’ and was critical that there was ‘little strength in the liberal-democratic traditions’ in Australia.120 Henderson prepared a list of fifty-six seditious societies that had University staff on their executives.121 Barrett saw some merit in the list and wrote a series of letters to the new Vice-Chancellor, who did not prove compliant. ‘If fair comment inspires disgust in a Sane Democrat, I prefer to live under some other regime.’ Medley responded with tactical wit. ‘And if Sane Democracy involves unquestioned allegiance to a tribal god, let us do it properly and have a little human sacrifice to propitiate it. I could suggest a number of victims and so, I expect could you.’122 Universities were not expected to challenge orthodoxies, though the University staff was fortunate that the new Vice-Chancellor was prepared to defend their academic independence.123 A similar issue erupted whenever the Bulletin condemned the academic fraternity’s inclination to become involved in politics as partisan reporters or ‘authorities’ on international events. The editor alleged that the ‘Professors’ were destroying their credibility by ‘policy pushing’ and bringing the Universities into disrepute.124 Many believed, and Crawford was one of them, that it was the intellectual’s role to offer public leadership. Stephen Roberts was the most visible and most frequently attacked intellectual who wrote on foreign affairs. He regarded his engagement as an intellectual obligation. During his absence from Sydney, he had been delighted that Crawford kept up this aspect of ‘his work’.125 If the condemnation of Roberts was any indication, the Bulletin did not object to the cult of the expert but the academic who contradicted its own assessment. In this case, Roberts had forecast war with Hitler and discussed the persecution of the Jewish community. The Bulletin saw merit in Hitler’s treatment of communists and blamed the Kristallnacht on a deluded ‘jewboy’ who had shot an official.126
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Sympathy for Nazism was not restricted to the press. One of Crawford’s colleagues, David Rivett, in a letter to James Barrett, had expressed his ‘admiration for this new Germany’ and said that the conception of the Hitler regime was ‘grotesquely wrong’.127 The Australian Council of Civil Liberties The Australian Council for Civil Liberties (ACCL) was formed in Melbourne in 1935. The seminal figure in its formation was the Left Book Club leader, Roy Rawson. Other leading figures were Brian Fitzpatrick, Theo Lucas, J. M. Atkinson, Eugene Gorman, J. V. Barry, Max Meldrum, Geoffrey Leeper, Dorothy Davis (later Fitzpatrick), Mollie Baynes and Mary Lazarus.128 The Council championed the major causes of the time, including the removal of censorship, the refugee crisis, the Crimes Act, retention of civil juries and the immigration dictation test. Its position on the Spanish Civil War was not so decisive. Most of the members were sympathetic to the anti-fascist cause in Spain but the ACCL, at Burton and Boyce Gibson’s prompting, disassociated itself publicly from the issue to ensure the ACCL would not become ‘associated in people’s minds with political movements and policies’. 129 Brian Fitzpatrick exerted the most significant impact on Crawford during his involvement with the Council. Crawford had first met the dynamic and charming, if unpredictable, radical when he became Fitzpatrick’s research supervisor. A co-founder of Farrago and the Melbourne University Labor Club, Fitzpatrick had worked as a journalist in Sydney and London for almost ten years until he returned to Melbourne. They were an incongruous couple; Crawford was circumspect, mannered and careful, Fitzpatrick was uncompromising, gregarious and outspoken in his defence of freedom and Australian nationalism.130 It was never an intense friendship, rather a relationship based on mutual respect, shared liberal interests and an aversion to joining political parties. Fitzpatrick was one of a long line of strong and unconventional men who appealed to Crawford— Wood, Bell, Lindsay, Anderson and later George Paul and Tawney— although no one quite matched his reverence for G. A. Wood. The other major player in the ACCL was Joe Burton. By the time Max Crawford was invited to become its VicePresident in early 1938, the Council was a well-established and
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effective pressure group. His election might have at first appeared curious, for he was hardly a keen member of committees, but in many ways he was an ideal candidate for the Council. The numerous vicepresidents supposedly represented a cross-section of the community. As individuals of social stature in various professions, they were testament that the ACCL was ‘non-party and undenominational’.131 The arrangement allayed claims that the Council was a communist tool. Crawford’s refusal in the past to commit to a political organisation was part of his instinctive scepticism and caution. His historical training encouraged the pose of an impartial observer. What then persuaded him to attach himself to this organisation? Partly flattery and partly the conviction that the ACCL was non-sectarian, but there were also other incentives. Since his rewarding days at Oxford, Crawford had harboured a conviction that public engagement was both a pleasure and a duty, but he found the opportunities in Australia uninspiring. The Communist Party and the gamut of left-wing organisations were unappealing. They had no relevance to Crawford as an intellectual, so he remained on the periphery. The Council now provided a haven of sorts, with a group of highly visible individuals who espoused a humanist liberal democracy that accorded with Crawford’s own sympathies. His initial experience in the ACCL and growing concern for academic freedom was expressed in a lecture, ‘The Burden of Freedom’, delivered to the Philosophical Association in Melbourne in June 1938. If the earlier address to the Melbourne University Association was a rationalisation of his proposed changes to the History Department, this address was an intellectual defence of both the Council and freedom of speech. In a sense Crawford was publicly defining himself. ‘For the liberal,’ he said ‘the burden of liberty is his sense that liberty cannot simply be given to those who are unprepared, and that it cannot simply be imposed’. His premise was that the growth of liberty and tolerance during the previous century had diminished. ‘Freedom is not the beginning or the end,’ Crawford maintained. ‘It is not a natural right taken away, but an apparition formulated by human consciousness.’132 Crawford was concerned about freedom on a philosophical and personal level.133 As a liberal and champion for the ACCL, he
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condemned apologists for censorship because they were not concerned with truth, but security.134 His solution was somewhat naïve: ‘to keep the field open to critics, to the continuation and conflict of various interests and opinions’.135 Yet free expression was being eroded. What was the liberal to do? ‘Is he to surrender his belief as hopeless’ or must he go on ‘maintaining the necessity of his belief and try to keep the field open for argument and discussion?’136 The Study of History The ACCL paper was in many ways a prelude to a more important engagement, one that advanced Crawford professionally and fused his approach to history with his conviction that the past should illuminate the present. In October 1938, he accepted an invitation to serve as President of the History Section of the ANZAAS Congress, to be held in Canberra during January of the following year. Displaying uncharacteristic temper, Crawford was offended by the lateness of the invitation and the fact that he received it by default. A.B. Walkrom, the General Secretary, was left to mollify him and explain the confusion. Stephen Roberts had originally accepted the Presidency, but had also arranged to be in Europe at the time of the Congress. Roberts had failed to inform anyone of his other obligation, nor had he relinquished the position. It was only by accident that Walkrom discovered Robert’s alternative plans.137 The historian and committee member, Laurie Fitzhardinge, was ‘glad indeed’ that Crawford accepted. The committee’s relief was well founded; they had by accident gained an enthusiastic President who, without the usual luxury of procrastination, was forced to complete the obligatory Presidential address. The circumstances surrounding the writing of the paper were later recalled with some dramatic license, with Crawford insisting he was given only twelve days notice.138 According to the surviving correspondence, he had actually over two months to complete the piece. Crawford was nervous about the public reception of his address and considering his lack of runs on the board, it is understandable that two months felt like twelve days. The paper, entitled ‘The Study of History’, was presented in 114degree heat, with the area circling Canberra ravaged by bushfires. Ignoring the chaos and soaring heat outside, Crawford delivered a
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paper in January 1939 that was autobiographical in nature and confident in tone. He documented his historical journey: a series of discoveries that began at Balliol, with Toynbee, Marx and Tawney, the last of whom moulded his liberalism, and Sydney and Melbourne, where he encountered the work of both Engels and Jose d Ortego. These influences culminated in the rejection of what he perceived as the insularity and narrowness of past historians such as Clarendon, von Ranke and Acton. Crawford proceeded to invalidate the claims to omniscience of the more aggressive adherents to the materialist school. Finally, he expanded his own case that a historian should by induction from his material, ‘attain to a really synoptic understanding’.139 The purpose articulated in the paper was to reach beyond mere politics and conduct and to engage in ‘the living past—ideas, assumptions, education and religious systems, institutions, the economic, social and political system dependent in the present by the past’. It was a striking debut that made an impression on its audience. The paper represented a well-worn historical road for Crawford. Many of its definitions and themes were lifted from the address delivered to the Melbourne University Association two years previously, with one important detour. Crawford was now resolved to examine the historian’s ‘true task’, a theme that was very much affected by the cathartic research undertaken for the Theory and Method subject and would have immense implications for his own political stance. He was now concerned with the individual’s response to the challenge of any given situation. This was what he termed the ‘drama of necessity and freedom’, the dualism of fatality and choice.140 It was, Crawford later argued, an essay of the 1930s, written at a time when he was intent on breaking away from the patterns of his own past. With conviction, he insisted historians should not merely reside in their cloistered ivory tower and assume distant objectivity, but assume a moral accountability. ‘I do believe’, Crawford insisted, ‘that he has the responsibility to make up his mind on the matters of which he writes, that the historian as such is not exempt from the universal duty of making up one’s mind.’141 Crawford’s enthusiasm for his Canberra paper did not fade with the disillusionment of his later years. In some ways, his position echoed the one adopted in G. A. Wood’s inaugural lecture of 1891. There Wood stated:
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that the business of the historian is to study the past that lives in the present...If history teaches anything, it teaches the solemn responsibility of every citizen to act strongly on his convictions.142 Crawford later remarked upon the ‘intriguing’ likeness’ of the ANZAAS paper and Wood’s vision of history, but he dismissed any suggestion of indebtedness by explaining that Wood’s views were unknown to him at the time.143 Certainly Crawford’s approach to historical causation was far more sophisticated and complex. Even if only on a subconscious level, Crawford remained faithful to Wood’s liberalism, moralism and interpretation of history. The Presidential address won admirers. Crawford proudly sent the published booklet to friends and colleagues, and the responses were universally complimentary. R. C. Mills wrote that he could not quarrel with it and was ‘disposed to accept Crawford’s point of view’.144 Nettie Palmer said he had answered nearly all the questions reverberating in her mind,145 and Humphrey Sumner ‘greatly enjoyed reading it’.146 Beyond his circle of friends and associates, however, Crawford’s first published effort was not without its detractors. Contemporary reviews cautioned the mainstream audience that it was a work essentially for students of history. The Advertiser bemoaned that its themes and terminology was acceptable for experts, but required simplification for general readers. Most of the critics had an axe to grind: The Advocate was critical of Crawford’s failure to attach full value to the religious dynamic in history, while the China Weekly Review accused him of being highly selective.147 Crawford’s lecture was audacious and unique for the time and had a profound imprint on the Australian historical landscape. The scope of his synoptic view was perhaps over-ambitious. The historian was now expected to synthesise a wide range of perspectives—political, economic, cultural, artistic and geographical—and exercise judgment and choice. As W. A. Townsley rightly observed, Crawford’s essay was suggestive and stimulating, but failed to erect enough signposts. ‘Someday we hope’, Townsley wrote in his review, ‘to be guided still further into this fascinating hinterland that forms somewhere the condominium of the realms of history and philosophy’.148 Crawford
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should have read the warning signs in the career of his mentor. Wood had never managed to advance his ideas beyond their infancy, and his body of research remained limited. The ANZAAS paper had an additional significance. Buoyed by its enthusiastic reception, Crawford became more firmly convinced that there was a need for the creation of an Australian school of research in history and for the profession to become more cohesive. Since 1937, Kathleen Fitzpatrick, Norman Harper, Jessie Webb and Frank Wilmot, the manager of Melbourne University Press, had all been privy to Crawford’s hopes for an Australasian journal. It had been thought that such a publication needed the interest and active support of Australian and New Zealand historians. A perceived lack of this meant the infant plans were temporarily shelved.149 On 6 January 1939, Crawford was introduced to Gwyn James, a gifted and disenchanted tutor at St Andrews College, Sydney, who had presented a paper arguing for the establishment of an Australian historical journal. Crawford had first heard of James in 1938 from Hancock, who thought he would be ‘an acquisition to any University department of history’.150 Crawford listened eagerly to James’ ideas, many of which confirmed his own thoughts about an Australian historical journal. The climate now seemed more conducive to such a project. After the conference, Crawford wasted little time in corresponding with James about their shared objectives. James, in a confessional mood, responded by describing his frustration in a College of the University of Sydney, a ‘glorified hostel’, with its petty disciplinary problems and simmering animosities. More importantly, he gave the Professor his unconditional assurance that if a Melbourne appointment came along, he would ‘subordinate everything!’151 One of Crawford’s most enduring talents was his ability to recognise and enlist others with potential. He quickly assessed that James would be a fine editor for a national journal. Crawford’s assistance was by no means self-serving, and he appeared to have felt empathy for a struggling and frustrated young historian. Gwyn James surmised he had found a sympathetic benefactor and ally. The overwhelming difficulty was financing the publication. In April 1939, Crawford wrote to Wallace, the Vice-Chancellor at Sydney University, requesting immediate expenditure to enable the beginning
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of the journal. The plan was to produce a publication of world standing, one worthy of export.152 Crawford’s instinct and enterprise were impeccable. Australia needed an historical journal of its own, and he intended to be at the forefront of its establishment. Progress was slow and to avert the risk of losing Gwyn James, Crawford established a lectureship at Melbourne for the young historian. The eventual debut of the journal was a resounding success, and Crawford diligently played the role of guardian, protector and mediator. Some Sydney historians were disgruntled. Wallace had refused to subsidise the publication and argued that the time was not ripe because the field was sufficiently covered by other publications. Sydney University was also infuriated by its perceived under-representation in the first edition. It was left to Crawford to explain patiently to the Sydney Registrar that he had written early to Roberts inviting his interest, but received no reply. James and ‘an unnamed Sydney man’ had also attempted to contact the elusive Roberts, but to no avail.153 Largely because of Sydney’s disregard, Historical Studies, which Crawford called ‘a piece of inspired madness’, became a Melbourne enterprise. In spite of the tremendous pressure on Crawford, this was the beginning of his most charmed and productive period. He was in the midst of transforming a prominent University department and expressing a genuine Australian consciousness in the country’s first professional historical journal; moreover, he was about to embark on important matters of political and public interest. Judgment and Conscience It was not only the providence of history and the infant historical journal that preoccupied Crawford. The Vice-Chancellor gave him the opportunity to enforce his synoptic and moralist view by inviting him to join the National Service Committee. The committee was formed by the Professorial Board to discuss the vexing question of mobilisation, defence and University resources in the event of a national emergency.154 The outspoken Douglas Copland, who had not been comforted by the Munich Agreement or Hitler’s assurances of peace, had precipitated such a committee. In December 1938, Copland had written a memorandum insisting that should England become heavily
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involved in a European conflict, Australia would be at ‘considerable risk’. The University, according to Copland, was in a unique position to strengthen democracy by forming a University corps that would infuse ‘a strong element of discipline and self sacrifice’ into the life of the community.155 Copland intended his controversial proposal for compulsory service to be tabled at the Council meeting and transmitted to the Professorial Board. The memorandum was not greeted with universal support, and Max Crawford was one of its most outspoken opponents. In a lengthy letter, he recorded his misgivings, the most fundamental being that it confused the function of the University with that of the national government. The University’s national service was to teach and train its research workers. ‘An integral part of the preparation for defence’, Crawford wrote, ‘must be criticism of national policy, particularly if, as I believe it is a policy which ignores the working of the anti-Comintern Pact and makes the dangers apparent’.156 In private, Crawford was less diplomatic and maintained that Copland’s proposal was dangerous and harmful, as it deviated from the University’s primary function of gaining the respect of the community and it fostered hysteria. Other members of the committee objected that the University could not participate in defence preparation unless the Commonwealth government demonstrated a stronger desire to participate.157 After a number of non-productive meetings during the summer vacation, the committee finally presented a detailed response to the Professorial Board at its first meeting in 1939 and announced it would adopt, in all essentials, Professor Copland’s recommendations. The Board did not underestimate the vehement opposition of the liberal fringe. During a heated meeting on 27 February, Kenneth Bailey suggested to Crawford that he should speak to members of his department to achieve a consensus.158 ‘I am not going to bring any pressure to bear on members of my staff either to favour or to oppose it’, Crawford retorted. ‘I shall leave their individual attitudes to their private judgment and conscience.’159 He had found a strong voice and could not resist giving Bailey a lesson in historical method that championed the qualities associated with the History School. The Department’s best performance, Crawford insisted, was to teach its students to think ‘honestly and cogently’ without propaganda and coercion.
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Embarrassed by his emotional outburst, Crawford wrote to the Vice-Chancellor, in a more conciliatory mood, with an explanation of his behaviour. His manner during that day might have been uncharacteristic, but it demonstrated Crawford’s susceptibility to stress and his unwillingness to resist the majority. If he had not been as ‘mentally tired’, he explained, he could have made his position clearer.160 Although he was prepared to defend his staff and had no intention of enforcing uniformity on them, he was also prepared to concede ground and did so by accepting voluntary national service. On 27 May 1939, a report was drafted that acknowledged the objections and dismissed them as unfounded. However, in the face of the opposition, the Board had no other option than to let the report ‘lie for the present on the table’ and proceed with other aspects on national service on which complete agreement existed. It was decided that a University National Service organisation ‘be formed on a voluntary basis to plan and co-ordinate staff and students’. Other aspects of the ‘agreement’ remained unresolved.161 While the University was awkwardly grappling with the defence debate, larger issues loomed over the Government’s National Registration Bill. Conceived towards the end of 1938, the Register was a voluntary aid to the assessment of manpower resources. By the following March, the government was convinced that compulsion was necessary and, in May, the Minister of Defence, G. A. Street, announced that National Registration would be enacted.162 The register required all men between 18 and 65 to answer eleven questions designed to indicate the individual’s potential value in the workforce. Advocates of the University’s National Service Committee felt vindicated by the government’s decision. Despite the grievances aired in certain departments (particularly History), it was decided that the University would compile lists of ‘reserved occupations’ and of material resources and personnel available for defence service. These decisions provoked further dissent within the student body, the Student Representatives’ Council, which announced that it was unwilling to co-operate unless the scope of the register was widened.163 The National Registration Bill was passed in the Senate on 16 June 1939. If the proposal for National Service had splintered the University, the national debate divided the ACCL. Crawford had
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become a more conspicuous player after he delivered a brief but controversial paper on the necessity of the Parliament as a safeguard of liberty at the fourth annual meeting of the Council on 18 May 1939. It expressed Crawford’s misgivings that the Australian Parliament was delegating too much and approaching the status of the British Parliament of the seventeenth century, which met for brief periods and dealt with only fundamental changes in constitutional or ecclesiastical matters.164 ‘The Parliament’, he said, ‘must debate the principles and effects of legislation and should be more responsive to the needs of the community or it would fall into contempt and become a political atrophy’.165 These statements were duly reported in the daily newspapers and brought a strong reply from the Prime Minister, Robert Menzies. ‘I am a great believer in regular parliament sessions and full parliamentary discussions of legislation and matters of policy’, Menzies reassured the press. Professor Crawford would no doubt agree the increased complexity of the problems which the government has to deal with means an increased delegation of powers since it would be quite impractical for Parliament to deal with a thousand and one matters of detail. 166 Menzies’ retort was patronising, as it dismissed Crawford and other ‘onlookers’ who suggested that the wellbeing of the community was served more by the number of days Parliament sat rather than ‘wise and well-considered legislation’.167 The National Registration Bill was possibly the judicious legislation Menzies was referring to. The government’s actions infuriated the ACTU, which considered the Register a device of industrial conscription that threatened trade unionism. After an endless round of meetings, an ACTU emergency committee urged a boycott.168 Melbourne University became implicated when Brian Fitzpatrick, the ACCL secretary, privately defended the ACTU decision, and the President, Herbert Burton, who assumed the unsanctioned role of public spokesman, opposed it. In July Burton became aware of Fitzpatrick’s views, and a misunderstanding arose when the rest of the University identities within the ACCL believed they were connected with the ACTU’s
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boycott. On 14 July Burton wrote to the Melbourne newspapers declaring that the boycott was ‘a dangerous procedure if we wish to maintain our democratic institutions’.169 His almost obsessive desire to ensure that the Council did not become a mouthpiece for the left was now apparent.170 The animosity surfaced at an Executive Meeting on 19 July 1939. The meeting was called by Fitzpatrick to acquaint all the state officebearers of the Council of ‘certain difficulties’ in connection with the conduct of the Council’s campaign. Fitzpatrick recalled that on 30 June, the committee for the Council advised the ACTU and prepared a statement that was published by the ACCL as The Case Against the National Register.171 Despite the avowed accord between the organisations, it was understood that the ACCL could not publicly support the boycott. It would, according to Fitzpatrick, inform but not ‘instruct any citizen in what their democratic duty was’. This policy was apparently discussed with Burton’s knowledge. Certain committee members were none too happy with Burton’s perceived arrogance and believed his unauthorised comments to the press had ‘damaged the campaign against the register and would create great internal discord as well as destroying the confidence of the trade union movement’. Vance Palmer claimed that Burton’s letter was ‘gratuitous and unnecessary’ and ‘weakened the cause of those who wished to see the Acts amended’. Brian Fitzpatrick’s response was to relay a stinging retort to the press that contradicted the President’s position.172 The University academics offered a united front behind Burton, who announced they were tired of being treated as ‘stuffed shirts’.173 The President informed the Executive Committee on the evening of the 19 July that unless they consented to publish a third statement of policy denouncing the boycott, he, Max Crawford, Sandy Gibson, Austin Edwards, Colin Badger and H. A. Woodruff would resign. ‘You have to choose whether you will accept this statement of policy,’ Burton informed the Committee, ‘at any rate the expression of opposition to the boycott, or whether you will become just another left organisation. If you don’t accept there will be a landslide of VicePresidents.’174 The remainder of the Council considered this threat as coercion and sought advice from Eugene Gorman. Although the image of rebel did not sit comfortably with Crawford, he began to have private doubts about the camp he was
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allied with. The following day on 20 July, Brian Fitzpatrick contacted him. Perhaps sensing his wavering commitment to Burton’s position, he implored Crawford, ‘whose judgment he respected’, to reconsider the ‘facts’ of his position. He reminded him of Burton’s prior knowledge of the publication of The Case Against the National Register, his own consistent aversion to self-promotion and the damage to the ‘good relations’ that would be caused by an exodus.175 Fitzpatrick’s letter and a frantic telephone call on the Thursday evening had the desired effect, and Crawford wrote immediately to Burton withdrawing his resignation. In doing this, he was not exactly aligning himself with the other side. In fact, he maintained that the National Register was not sufficiently menacing to civil liberties to warrant resorting to the ultimate safeguard of democracy: the right to resist. The manner in which Burton courted publicity infuriated Crawford. He believed that informing the public was a matter for the Executive Committee, not an individual. If the majority voted against the publication of the statement condemning the boycott, Crawford would abide by the decision and would not feel obliged to resign as Vice-President.176 With Crawford’s self-confessed penchant for compromise, it was surprising and revealing that he remained the only dissenter in the academic camp. Fitzpatrick sought to placate the remaining five and repair the damage and disunited image of the ACCL with a letter to the press that clarified the differences over the boycott and the intention to prevent the divisions from becoming ‘political propaganda’.177 Aware of Crawford’s ‘modification’ of attitude regarding the ‘sad issue’, Austin Edwards urged him to remain united on the University front.178 He reminded all the Vice-Presidents that they could not support the boycott because it conflicted with the task of informing the public impartially, and he appealed to their sense of honour. By supporting the ACTU they would leave themselves open to the suspicion that they were a group on the left masquerading as a legitimate Council for Civil Liberties. Unconvinced, Crawford resisted the pressure. The conflict of personal affiliations and public obligations began to punctuate Crawford’s life more frequently. He later attempted to resolve his ambivalent feelings towards the nature of politics and the perception others had of him. Defensively he recalled:
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‘I often found myself pushed by the circumstances of the late 1930s in particular into uncomfortable stands that were, in the terms of that time, radical’.179 His conduct at the time contradicts this recollection. Crawford was not pushed or cajoled. His decisions were measured, voluntary and deliberate. In the case of the compulsory University national service, he resisted the pressure imposed by Bailey. During the ACCL conflict, he found himself on the outer, a position he was not accustomed to, and he opposed the University camp. In both examples, Max Crawford was not forced and, on both occasions, he adopted the controversial and radical position. A temporary solution was found in the ACCL that placated the chief antagonists. Burton and Fitzpatrick agreed that in future neither would publish any material without the consent of the other. In August the Council adopted a more satisfactory and democratic resolution to preserve the unity of an organisation made up of divergent political sympathies and petty jealousies. The circular to the VicePresidents read: That in the event of any major political issue arising in which issues of civil liberties appear to be inevitable, and in which members of the Council might be expected to take different views, the Executive Committee may invite all members to give their views and to attend a meeting so that a policy of the Council may be thoroughly discussed.180 It was an astute provision, because events in Europe gave every indication that there would be much to debate. Several weeks after the circular was issued, the ACCL was confronted with a decisive and unexpected political alliance. On 23 August 1939, the Nazi-Soviet Pact was signed. On this occasion the ACCL managed to arrive at an agreed position with very little negotiation. Worse was to come when Germany attacked Poland in the early hours of 1 September and, two days later, England and Germany went to war for the second time. Australians learned of their fate when, on 3 September, a solemn Robert Menzies announced on the radio that they were to join Britain in the conflict.
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Notes 1
George Tibbits, The Planning and Development of the University of Melbourne (The University of Melbourne: History of the University Unit, 2000), 23.
2
Hancock, Country and Calling, 108.
3
Crawford to Registrar, University of Melbourne, 15 October 1936, Box 6, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
4
Memorandum on the Chair of History, 29 April 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA. For a complete account of Ernest Scott’s life and work, see Stuart Macintyre, Scott: A History for a Nation (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1994) and Stuart Macintyre, ‘Ernest Scott: ‘My History Is a Romance’ in The Discovery of Australian History.
5
Professor Scott died of a coronary thrombosis on 6 December 1939.
6
Rowse, Australian Liberalism and National Character, 91.
7
Ibid.
8
R.E. Priestley to D. B. Copland, 28 June 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
9
Ibid.
10
Ibid.
11
W.K. Hancock to D. B. Copland, 13 July 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
12
Hancock, Country and Calling, 126.
13
Keith Hancock to D. B. Copland, 13 July 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
14
Julian Thomas, ‘Keith Hancock: Professing the Profession’, in The Discovery of Australian History 1890-1939, 151.
15
Chair of History, 10 November 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
16
Kenneth Bell to G. V. Browne, 7 October 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
17
Ibid.
18
Ibid.
19
S. Roberts to Ernest Scott, 16 December 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
20
Ibid.
21
Deryck Schreuder, ‘An Unconventional Founder: Stephen Roberts and the Professionalisation of the Historical Discipline’, in The Discovery of Australian History, 134.
22
Ibid.
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23
A. D. Lindsay to R. Priestley, 13 October 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
24
Chair of History, 10 November 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
25
Stephen Roberts to Ernest Scott, 16 December 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
26
C. H. Currey to R. Priestley, 28 October 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
27
Kenneth Bell to G. V. Browne, 7 October 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
28
Chair of History, 10 November 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
29
R. E. Priestley Diary, 18 December 1936, R. E. Priestley Papers, UMA.
30
Macintyre, Making History, 44.
31
Report by the Chair of History Committee, 30 December 1936, 1936/202, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
32
R. E. Priestley Diary, 22 December 1936, R. E. Priestley Papers, UMA.
33
Argus, January 1937.
34
Macintyre, ed. Making History, 44.
35
Stuart Macintyre, ‘Ernest Scott: ‘My History Is a Romance’, in The Discovery of Australian History, 71.
36
Gordon Greenwood to Crawford, 5 January 1937, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
37
Christopher Cook to Crawford, date unknown, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
38
R. Priestley to Crawford, 8 January 1937, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
39
Registrar to Crawford, 9 January 1937, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
40
R. E. Priestley Diary, 8 February 1937, R. E. Priestley Papers, UMA. The Vice-Chancellor described a dinner attended by Crawford and his staff.
41
Memorandum on the Chair of History, 29 April 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
42
Crawford to Harry Crawford, 24 June 1929, Box 2, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
43
Crawford to Professor Todd, 21 May 1936, Box 6, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
44
Docker, Australian Cultural Elites, 156-8. See also Holt, Manning Clark and Australian History, 98-100; Manning Clark, ‘Melbourne: An Intellectual Tradition’, Melbourne Historical Journal (1962), 4; and Donald Horne, The Lucky Country: Australia in the Sixties (Melbourne: Penguin Books, 1964).
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45
Clark, The Quest for Grace, 29. Clark made a similar observation in Crawford’s presence at the History Institute’s forum in 1984, which was the genesis of Making History: Macintyre, ed., Making History, 56. Crawford’s favoured students constantly referred to his ability as a teacher.
46
Serle, Melbourne Historical Journal (1970), 4.
47
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 45.
48
Conversation with Frank Ford, 1998.
49
Kenneth Bell to G. V. Browne, 7 October 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
50
Macintyre, Making History, 35.
51
R. M. Crawford, A Bit of a Rebel: The Life and Work of G. A. Wood. (Sydney: Sydney University Press, 1975), 127 and 150.
52
Macintyre, Making History, 35.
53
Using Farrago, the student magazine from Melbourne University, as a barometer of undergraduate political expression, the reaction to the Spanish crisis was surprisingly gradual. The prevailing concerns were typical of student life: socialising, sport, essays and examinations. The only political issue of note that was written about was war and the growing pacifist movement. Spain was first mentioned in the context of civil war in August 1936: ‘That Spanish Business’, Farrago, 13 August 1936.
54
William Muir to Crawford, 13 June 1937, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
55
Christopher Cook to Crawford, 7 June 1937, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
56
Farrago, 23 March 1937.
57
Manning Clark, The Quest for Grace, 46. The speakers for the affirmative were S. J. Ingwersen, B. A. Santamaria and K. T. Kelly, and for the negative, Nettie Palmer, Dr. G. O’Day and J. W. Legge. The atmosphere of the public lecture theatre was corroborated by Farrago, 23 March 1937.
58
‘Open Letter to Mr Burton’, Farrago, 13 April 1937.
59
Raymond Priestley, Diary, 1 December 1936, R. E. Priestley Papers, UMA.
60
Clark, The Quest for Grace, 52.
61
‘Protect your Freedom. Dr. Priestley Condemns Abuses: Free Speech and Discussion’, Farrago, 4 May 1937.
62
Crawford to Editor of the Argus, April 1937.
63
Ibid.
64
‘Forward the Professors!’, The Bulletin, 28 April 1937.
65
‘Professors and Politics’, Farrago, 27 April 1937.
66
R. E. Priestley’s address to Country Party at Geelong, 15 April 1937, R. E. Priestley Papers, UMA.
67
‘Letter to Editor’, Herald, 29 April 1937, R. E. Priestley Papers, UMA.
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68
Crawford, An Australian Perspective, 64.
69
Crawford to R. E. Priestley, 4 May 1937, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
70
Ibid. The separation of Political Science from History was one decision that was not made by Crawford, although it coincided with his appointment.
71
Draft on Honours School, no date, History Department Papers, UMA. Please note that part of the History Department collection at UMA has not been given box numbers.
72
Crawford to Alison Patrick, 28 April 1978, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford described the foundations of the paper and the sense of urgency.
73
R. M. Crawford. ‘History’ Address to the Melbourne University Association, 11 June 1937, Box 8, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
74
Ibid.
75
R. M. Crawford, ‘The Antipodean Pilgrimage of Arnold Wood’, Royal Australian Historical Society Journal, vol 48 (March 1963), 26-31.
76 77
‘The Historian’s Task’, Farrago, 22 June 1937. Crawford to R. E. Priestley, ‘Proposed changes in the Department of History’, 22 June 1937, History Department Papers, UMA.
78
Lewis Wilcher to Crawford, 26 January 1937, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
79
Crawford to John Medley, 1 July 1938, 1937/233, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA. See also Macintyre, A History for a Nation, 202.
80
Ibid.
81
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 6.
82
R. E. Priestley to Crawford, 1937, History Department Papers, UMA.
83
See Robert Dare, Crawford on Theory and Method of History’, in Max Crawford’s School of History, 13-40.
84
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 47. See Horne, The Lucky Country, and also Holt, The Quest for Grace, for an analysis of the cultural elites in Sydney and Melbourne.
85
Max Crawford notes, Box 75, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
86
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 46.
87
Ibid., 45-6.
88
Memorandum to R. E. Priestley, 5 May 1937, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
89
C. H. Currey to R. E. Priestley, 28 October 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
90
Interview with Ken Crawford, 2001.
91
Crawford, Historical Studies (1971), 30. Macintyre, ed., Making History, 46.
92
R. M. Crawford ‘The Spanish Background’, drafted paper, occasion and date unknown, Box 10, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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93
Ibid.
94
R. M. Crawford, ‘The Troubles in Spain’, drafted paper, 1937, Box 10, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
95
Ibid.
96
R. M. Crawford ‘Spain or more’, drafted plan, 1937, Box 10, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
97
Ernest Scott to Crawford, 15 March 1937, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
98
Carey and Grimshaw, Women Historians and Women’s History, 11.
99
The bid for her promotion was unsuccessful. Jessie Webb was the first woman to hold a permanent position in an Australian History Department. For full autobiographical details, see Ronald Ridley, Jessie Webb: A Memoir (Melbourne: History Department, University of Melbourne, 1994); Susan Janson. ‘Jessie Webb and the Predicament of the Female Historian’, in The Discovery of Australian History, 91-110.
100
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, no date, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Kathleen Fitzpatrick’s biography is: Solid Bluestone Foundations and Other Memories of a Melbourne Childhood:1908-1928. (Melbourne: Macmillan, 1983). For other works relating to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, see Susan Davies, ‘Kathleen Fitzpatrick: Sculpture with Words’ in The Discovery of Australian History, 158-173; Susan Davies, ed., Dear Kathleen, Dear Manning: The Letters of Manning Clark and Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 19491990 (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1996) and Carey and Grimshaw, Women Historians and Women’s History.
101
Susan Davies, ‘Kathleen Fitzpatrick: Sculpture with Words’ in The Discovery of Australian History, 172.
102
Michael Roe, ‘E. M. Higgins: A Marxist in Tasmania 1936-1938’, Labour History, no. 32 (May 1977).
103
G. V. Portus to Raymond Priestley, 9 December 1937, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
104
Chair of History, 10 November 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
105
See Schrecker, No Ivory Tower, for a fine analysis of the plight of American academic communists in the 1930s and 1940s.
106
Max Crawford, ‘A Tribute’, given by ‘A Celebration of the Life of Kathleen Fitzpatrick by Former Students, Colleagues and Friends’ in the History Department of the University of Melbourne on 20 September 1990, R. M. Crawford papers, UMA.
107
Bolton, The Oxford History of Australia Vol. 5, 6.
108
A delegate to the All Australian Congress Against War and Fascism, Egon Kisch arrived in Australia in 1934. He was declared a prohibited immigrant and subjected to a dictation test under the Immigration Restriction Act. While the High Court declared this use of the Act invalid, legal arguments
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continued for four months while Kisch travelled the country on a speaking tour. The treatment of Kirsch was used as a test case of the quality of Australian democracy, as issues of Communism, opposition to Fascism and ‘foreign elements’ came to the forefront. Gollan, Revolutionaries and Reformists, 44-8. 109
Esmonde McDonald Higgins, A6126, 411, ASIO File, NAA. In its various guises, Security had been instrumental in intimidating, banning and imprisoning radicals. The Russian Revolution intensified distrust, although the CPA was not created until 1920. For another decade, the CPA was a small and uninfluential group that had little impact, due to its alienation from trade unions and the Labor movement. It grappled with rifts over doctrine and always had a furtive and secretive aura that terrified the establishment.
110
Hofstadter, Anti-Intellectualism in American Life, 40.
111
Macintyre, The Reds. 319-20.
112
Ibid., 325.
113
The Council approached Burton, the senior lecturer in Economic History at Melbourne University, on his return from Europe in March in 1936.
114
Sane Democracy, Vol 2, No.4, April 1938, 1.
115
Ibid.
116
R.E. Priestley to James Barrett, 13 April 1938, James Barrett Papers, UMA.
117
Clarke, The Quest for Grace.
118
Memorandum by Kenneth Bailey, 29 April 1938, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
119
Kenneth Bailey to James Barrett, 10 May 1938, James Barrett Papers, UMA.
120
Kenneth Bailey to James Barrett, 2 June 1938, James Barrett Papers, UMA.
121
Geoffrey Serle, Sir John Medley: A Memoir (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1993).
122
John Medley to James Barrett, 1 November 1938, James Barrett Papers, UMA.
123
Bolton, The Oxford History of Australia: Vol. 5.
124
‘These Professors’, The Bulletin, 6 April 1938. 12.
125
Stephen Roberts to Ernest Scott, 16 December 1936, 1936/201, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
126
Bulletin, 26 October 1938 and 16 November 1938.
127
David Rivett to Sir James Barrett, 9 September 1936, James Barrett Papers, UMA.
128
Don Watson, Brian Fitzpatrick: A Radical Life (Sydney, Hale and Ironmonger, 1979), 80.
129
ACCL Executive Committee Minutes, 22 October 1936, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA. See also Don Watson’s interpretation.
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130
For biographical details on Brian Fitzpatrick, see Watson, Brian Fitzpatrick: A Radical Life and Don Watson, ‘Brian Fitzpatrick’ in Australian Dictionary of Biography.
131
Watson, Brian Fitzpatrick, 81.
132
R. M. Crawford, ‘The Burden of Freedom’, Philosophical Association, June 1938, 1, Box 8, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
133
Ibid., 4.
134
Ibid., 10.
135
Ibid., 14.
136
Ibid., 21.
137
A. B. Walkrom to Crawford, 21 October 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
138
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 48 and Crawford, Historical Studies (1971), 33. The paper was actually drafted in November and December 1938.
139
R. M. Crawford, The Study of History: A Synoptic View (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1939).
140
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 12.
141
Ibid.
142
Wood, G. A. ‘Inaugural Lecture, ‘Criticism and Sympathy’, May 1891. Quoted by H. Partridge, The Contribution of Philosophy and History.
143
Crawford to Alison Patrick, 28 April 1978, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
144
R. C. Mills to Crawford, 9 June 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
145
Nettie Palmer to Crawford, 10 June 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
146
Humphrey Sumner to Crawford, 23 July 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
147
‘Book Review’, Advocate, 18 May 1939; ‘Review’, China Weekly Review, September 1939.
148
Townsley, W. A. ‘Review on the Study Of History’, Historical Studies (1940), 68-69.
149
Crawford to Wallace, 14 April 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
150
This information from Hancock is quoted in a reference written for James. Crawford to the Registrar of University of Witwatersrand, South Africa, 22 March 1944, Gwyn James Collection.
151
Gwyn James to Crawford, 24 April 1939, Gwyn James Papers, UMA.
152
Crawford to Wallace, 14 April 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
153
Crawford to the Registrar of Sydney University, 30 August 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The foundations of the journal were laid by the organising committee that comprised Crawford, Scott, Portus, Wood, Fitzhardinge, James, Ida Leeson and Merab Hearns.
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154
Medley also drafted Copland, Greenwood, Gibson, Giblin, Burstall, Laby, Bailey and MacCallum.
155
Douglas Copland, ‘Memorandum: The University and National Service’, 28 November 1938, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
156
R. M. Crawford ‘Comment on Douglas Copland’s Memorandum: The University and National Service’, date unknown, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
157
Ibid.
158
Crawford to Kenneth Bailey, 27 February 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. This exchange was described in Crawford’s letter.
159
Ibid.
160
Crawford to John Medley, date unknown, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
161
Draft Report from the Professorial Board with regard to proposals concerning the University and National Service, 27 May 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
162
Watson, Brian Fitzpatrick, A Radical Life, 94.
163
National Service Committee Report, 27 May 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
164
R. M. Crawford ‘The Necessity of Parliament as a Safeguard of Liberty’, 18 May 1939. Crawford maintained that Federal parliament had sat for periods ranging from 29 to 73 days a year.
165
Ibid.
166
Sun, 18 May 1939. Menzies’ response was also reported in the Argus, 19 May 1939, and The Age, 20 May 1939.
167
Sun, 18 May 1939.
168
Watson, Brian Fitzpatrick, A Radical Life, 94.
169
Argus, 15 July 1939.
170
Herbert Burton, ‘Memorandum from the President to members of the Executive Committee and Vice-Presidents on the internal affairs of the Council for Civil Liberties’, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
171
Brian Fitzpatrick, ‘7 September 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Memorandum to all Office Bearers.’ MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA. The Committee consisted of Fitzpatrick, J.V. Barry and Maurice Blackburn.
172
Ibid.
173
Ibid.
174
Herbert Burton, ‘Memorandum from the President to members of the Executive Committee…’
175
Brian Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 20 July 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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176
Crawford to Herbert Burton, 20 July 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
177
Watson, Brian Fitzpatrick, 100-2.
178
Austin Edwards to Crawford, 21 July 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
179
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 35.
180
ACCL Circular, 8 August 1939, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
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Chapter 3
War and Diplomacy
In 1940 Max Crawford wrote a weary and despondent letter to his mother in which he summarised the pressures of his life: I would like to pop over for a while, and even to forget for a moment the stresses of the time. Writing a text book (a thing I have steadily refused to do for five years); doing one’s best for those students who are trying to work on after having enlisted, and who are expecting to be called up at any time, and preparing to carry extra work in the hope that one of our staff who is going away with the AIF won’t have to lose too much salary; and the necessary and unpopular business of asking unpopular questions—all make this term seem interminable, though it is nothing to what we might be facing.1 Crawford had not embellished the problems facing him as a public intellectual. Nor did he elaborate on the unpopular questions and what compelled him to ask them. The key to his dispirited mood was the war and the government’s reaction to it. Neither he nor most of his ACCL associates welcomed Australia’s military support of Britain. Indeed, after Menzies’ announcement, the majority of
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Australians failed to react with the idealistic and patriotic fervour that heralded the corresponding call to arms in 1914. Brian Fitzpatrick and J. V. Barry had anticipated the Prime Minister’s loyalty to the Empire. On 6 September 1939 they formed an Emergency Committee within the ACCL, a select group of the more vocal and identifiable members. It comprised Barry and Crawford as Vice-Presidents, Rawson and J. G. Radford, the two members of the Executive Committee, Fitzpatrick as General Secretary and Burton as President. An uneasy truce had been established between Fitzpatrick and Burton since the threatened resignation of the academic contingent several months earlier. Crawford, however, was encouraged by the charismatic Fitzpatrick, who was ‘grateful’ for his participation and ‘good Chairmanship’.2 An experienced political activist, Fitzpatrick possibly charmed the more impressionable Crawford. The comfortable relationship between Fitzpatrick and Crawford was by no means shared within the entire group, and the war almost immediately punctured the tenuous compromises accepted by the principal figures in the Council. A. B. Gibson was the first to resign, offering two reasons for his decision. Firstly, he believed the exigencies of war diminished the importance of civil liberties and, secondly, he suspected that members of the Executive Committee were ‘active supporters of the USSR’ and therefore defenders of the Nazi-Soviet Pact, which Gibson blamed for the war.3 One week later, Joe Burton tendered his resignation as President, but not before discussing it over lunch with Crawford and the other ‘university people’. In a scrawled note to Crawford written on 15 September, he insisted that his decision was ‘in no way influenced by the present state of war’. ‘I am’, he explained, ‘still as attached as ever to the cause of democratic liberty’.4 In a long memorandum to the members of the Executive Committee and the Vice-Presidents, Burton identified the cause of his resignation as ‘internal affairs’. He observed that the left now outnumbered the ‘liberals’, who had formed a ‘homogenous block’ in the Executive in 1936.5 Burton believed that it was impossible to assure the public and government that the ACCL was more concerned with civil liberty than ‘promoting the political aims of the left’. He condemned Fitzpatrick specifically, defining his behaviour as ‘intolerable’ and blaming him for establishing ‘a self-
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perpetuating oligarchy’. The Council, he believed, could no longer claim to be an ‘independent body’.6 The memo caused considerable damage. Vance Palmer wrote to Fitzpatrick, concerned that various Vice-Presidents would use it as an excuse for resigning. Palmer suggested that ‘it would be different if the Council were a political body with clearly defined ends. But it isn’t, it rests on a vague basis of agreement in liberal views.’7 Burton’s resignation was short-lived and he was apparently coaxed back to the ACCL by Crawford’s moderate stance and calm presence. On Palmer’s advice, Fitzpatrick suggested that Burton discuss the ‘various acts and regulations regarding the National Security Act’ with Crawford.8 Palmer then urged Fitzpatrick to meet Burton and arrange for a ‘war cabinet’ presided over by someone like Crawford, whom he considered ‘outside the range of our present confines’.9 Crawford emerged at this time as a more confident, decisive and outspoken member for the Council. Supporting the ACCL, he believed was one way to sustain the ‘united efforts of democratic people’.10 Pacifism and anti-war protest were prominent on the campus at the time. ‘It was fashionable to be anti-war’, Niall Brennan, a student at the time, recalled. ‘Hitler’s blitzkrieg disconcerted some in the middle of the year, but even so the revue that year was full of anti-war sketches. The Labor Club was aggressively anti-war. There was graffiti all over the campus.’ The University Council became so concerned that it ruled that staff members could not become involved in the Labor Club elections. A ‘New No-Hate’ movement was also launched, involving students and staff.11 Crawford’s conviction that freedom needed defending was strengthened by the National Security Act, which curtailed liberties deemed dangerous in wartime. Enacted by Menzies five days after the grim announcement of war, the legislation was reminiscent of the War Precautions Act of World War One. For the older Council members such as Vance Palmer, Maurice Blackburn and Frank Brennan, it was a travesty, a sad repetition of the past.12 Indeed, for a whole generation of radicals, the previous war had been regarded as a mistake. None of the members of the Council denied that some restrictions were necessary to sustain the present war effort. They believed, however, that the Act was indiscriminate and that Menzies’ assurance that ‘institutions, Parliament, all liberal thought, free speech, free
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criticism, must go on’13 was hypocritical. Neither Fitzpatrick nor Crawford were convinced that Menzies genuinely cherished the values of a liberal democracy.14 The potential for political abuse was considerable. Section 8 allowed a judge to ‘hold’ a political trial in secret with provision for the detention of suspects by police for ten days without a charge. Any previous act of Parliament, according to Section 18, could be nullified by a ministerial regulation. The government was in effect free to govern by administrative rather than legislative practice and could introduce new regulations at its ‘discretion’.15 Some members of the Council thought the provisions were dictatorial and indicative of the government’s duplicity. Fitzpatrick likened the powers to Hitler’s methods.16 Most had three particular objections to the government’s measures: the Act did not protect civil courts and legal processes; it imposed censorship on the press; it deprived the public of their right to assemble, speak and protest.17 Accusations that the ACCL was a communist front were constant throughout 1939 and 1940. Although Crawford had made a ‘firm vow’ to avoid all public speaking and concentrate on research work, he made an exception for the ACCL.18 Undisturbed by the rumours of communist infiltration, he prepared for the ACCL summer school in February 1940 with enthusiasm. He chaired a session on the National Security Legislation, and was the featured speaker with Fitzpatrick in a session entitled, ‘What are we to do?’19 It is not known if Crawford attended another ACCL activity in the same month. Fitzpatrick had issued a request for the whole committee to meet at the tram station in Batman Avenue and ‘observe proceedings’ at the communist meeting on the Yarra Bank, where police had regularly obstructed meetings.20 Possibly in response to a series of these requests, one of the Vice-Presidents, Paul Dane resigned, claiming that the organisation was ‘a camouflage for communist or semi-communist ideas’. Dane emphasised that these ideas were ‘dangerous and foolish’.21 Fitzpatrick responded in a letter to Dane that there was no reason for his statement, and the Council was an organisation for the ‘defence of civil liberties’.22 Solidarity and Conscience The restrictions were extended in February 1940 when the Commonwealth government announced that censorship was no
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longer restricted to matters pertaining to the war effort. The amendment provided for all matter intended for publication to be scrutinised. Keith Murdoch, the press tycoon, was appointed DirectorGeneral of Information and given power to suppress information and censor newspapers. A letter protesting against the extension of censorship was published in April in a Western Australian newspaper. It was signed by a number of prominent people including the Archbishop of Perth, Professor Walter Murdoch and the Pro-Chancellor of the University of Western Australia. Crawford sent a telegram to Walter Murdoch asking for the text. In a mood of solidarity and ‘conscience’, he consulted with thirty of his University colleagues, and the group drafted a letter in support of the West Australian protest and offered similar objections.23 The letter acknowledged that a certain degree of censorship was necessary, but that the prohibition of communist press and trade union journals discussing the war, mentioning Russia or its government, or referring to industrial unrest within the Empire or any allied country, was excessive. The letter emphasised that the staff were writing as individuals ‘who cannot and do not attempt to express any official University view on the subject’.24 It was a courageous and radical move. Unfortunately, the protest was ‘badly timed’, for Germany had just invaded France, Belgium and Holland.25 With typical attention to proper procedure, Crawford had advised the other signatories that the Chairman of the Professorial Board, Kenneth Bailey, should be informed of the petition and be invited to sign. As a further precautionary measure, the letter was shown to the Vice-Chancellor. After their consultation, Crawford must have felt confident that the campaign was relatively safe. It was published on 14 May 1940 in all the daily Melbourne newspapers, with a glaring omission made by the editor of the Argus, who failed to include the reference to the Western Australian precedent. The letter provoked outrage, as critics identified the protest with the University. One of the signatories, Sydney Sutherland, immediately retracted his position and wrote to Medley to offer his ‘sincerest apologies’.26 A special meeting of the Professorial Board was called on the 22 May to consider the effect of the letter on the reputation of the University and whether any action should be taken against the
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signatories.27 Bailey, who was subtly reminded of the fact he had seen the original letter, chaired the meeting. In a confidential memo, he registered his ‘concern’ at the damage caused by the letter. In his opinion, the protest did not sufficiently disassociate the signatories from the support of communist activities, and as it was published at the height of the invasion of Belgium and Holland, ‘a demand for total freedom for the extremist press was most inopportunely timed’.28 A general meeting of staff and students was also held in Wilson Hall on 30 May to discuss the ‘University and the War’. In private, Crawford had great confidence in his students and was ‘pleased’ that they made up their own ‘minds, not in a stampede but after thought’.29 Crawford himself prepared a lengthy statement that reiterated the background of the letter and defined his intentions. ‘It was not his desire’, Crawford wrote, to weaken the war effort, but to prevent censorship that created suspicion of political oppression and accentuated ‘an enfeebling disunity in the community’. The letter was not written in support of communists or any other minority, he declared, but on behalf of civil liberties.30 One can hear cadences from Crawford’s mentors—Wood, Bell, Anderson—mingling with his current associates: William Slater, Palmer and Fitzpatrick. Within this company, he had become independently courageous and conspicuous. He had sympathy for those deprived of the freedom of thought and speech. Liberalism had sustained him in the present struggle. Crawford was less radical than the more sceptical Fitzpatrick, but not necessarily less dangerous in the eyes of conservatives. In a ‘constructive’ and slightly anxious statement that was circulated among University staff, Medley mildly admonished the signatories. Revisiting his much-used policy on ‘communication to the press and public’, he cautioned all his staff, as a matter of duty and common sense, to exercise ‘extraordinary care’ in the public expression of opinion.31 Without dissent, the Professorial Board resolved to disown the views of the thirty-one signatories in order to correct ‘the mistaken impression’ that the University was disloyal to the war effort.32 The letter Bailey drafted for this purpose had a malicious edge. He declared that a large majority of University staff disagreed with the action taken by their colleagues.33 This was actually a misrepresentation: Bailey had canvassed the staff on the issue of publishing a disclaimer, not on agreement or disagreement with the protest. He
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claimed that 201 members of staff responded to his invitation; 172 supported the disclaimer, 25 did not and 4 declined to express a view.34 On 24 May, Crawford and his thirty colleagues wrote another letter to the newspapers to declare their loyalty and express regret over the misunderstanding of their purpose.35 Crawford, who drafted the letter, also referred to the two omissions that had provoked particular outrage. The Argus had not made it clear that the signatories were only some of the teaching staff, and had not mentioned they were writing in support of Walter Murdoch, not in isolation. 36 Medley’s assurances of staff loyalty were accepted, but he reserved his own bitter feelings in a verse.37 The ACCL viewed Crawford’s predicament with sympathy. Maurice Blackburn, who had canvassed for nominations for the President of the ACCL, mentioned the limited number of possible candidates and could only think of Fitzpatrick, Crawford and Palmer. He realised that Crawford was in the ‘throes of a violent University dispute’ and was unable to accept.38 The Chairman of the Professorial Board announced that it ‘seemed best’ to regard the incident as closed, to avoid confusing the public and tarnishing further the reputation of the University.39 It appeared that in the opinion of the conservatives, Crawford had blundered in two ways. Firstly, he had failed to circulate the original letter widely enough, which offended the more troublesome members (although they might never have been satisfied); secondly, he had defended a political group considered indefensible. The Ban on the Communist Party of Australia On 15 June 1940 the government gazetted regulations giving it power to declare any organisation unlawful, confiscate its property, prevent its members meeting and prosecute anyone found in possession of its publications.40 Regulation 41 stipulated that ‘a person shall not endeavor to cause disaffection among persons engaged in the service of the king or the Commonwealth or in the performance of essential service’. According to the other more controversial regulation 42, ‘a person shall not endeavor whether orally or otherwise to influence public opinion in a manner likely to be prejudicial to the defence of the Commonwealth or the efficient prosecution of the war’. The passing of these regulations began a period of repression as the
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government outlawed the Communist Party of Australia. In the following weeks, offices and private homes were raided, literature was impounded and communist publications were outlawed41 This period was crucial to Crawford as he became increasingly distressed over the more extreme regulations. His concerns were circulated widely, and he spoke eloquently to the Melbourne University Labor Club, describing his dismay. Regulation 42 must be amended, he advised, on the basis that prejudicing public opinion should only be prohibited if achieved by false statement, false document or false report. Complete newspaper control, Crawford argued, was ‘too dangerous a power to entrust to any man or government’ and this form of surveillance would ‘result in harm, spiritual and political’.42 Not all the members of the University concurred with Crawford. James Barrett, the former Chancellor, circulated a confidential document entitled, ‘The Facts’ in which he referred to several political incidents involving Crawford and other academics.43 At a Council meeting on 3 June, Barrett vented his fury at the conspicuous public conduct of various staff members. He moved that ‘every officer of the University’ should be required to take an oath of allegiance to the Crown, and any ‘avowed Communist’ who was a member of staff should be ‘submitted to the Council for consideration and action if necessary’.44 Council resolved to discuss the matter confidentially and immediately appointed a Committee. The Council approved Medley’s earlier statement concerning communications to the press and public, and expressed satisfaction that no member of staff was disloyal to the national cause. It would ‘unhesitatingly carry out any obligation to prevent the University from being used in any way for the furtherance of disloyal or subversive activities’.45 The policy was less severe than those in America, where radical academics and teachers were dismissed. Ellen Schrecker maintained that these dismissals represented ‘a kind of academic background noise’ of political repression that tended to single out the academy’s most conspicuous and outspoken radicals.46 Barrett refined Medley’s policy on communication to the press. He wanted all staff members who wrote on educational matters to consult with the Vice-Chancellor, and when writing on other issues, they should not ‘include the name of the University in any circumstances’. The old guard in the Council, represented by Barrett, insisted that political views were completely personal and should not be
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associated with the University. He apparently considered Bailey a sympathetic ally. Although the latter regretted ‘keenly’ some of the incidents Barrett referred to, he rejected the former Chancellor’s accusation that some of the staff’s extracurricular activities and public statements were ‘disloyal or subversive’.47 Bailey was a particularly loyal supporter of Medley’s measured leadership and ‘deeply deplored’ Barrett’s action after the Vice-Chancellor’s ‘fine and comprehensive statement of the University’s position’.48 The Council concurred with Bailey and announced that it was ‘satisfied’ that no members of staff were disloyal to the ‘national cause’ and that the oath of allegiance was not necessary in the absence of a common rule applying to all public bodies.’49 Crawford had other related preoccupations. The government’s regulations and Barrett’s efforts attacked fundamental elements in the position he had formulated over the last decade. He borrowed Louis Halphen’s words to express his thoughts: History does not breed skepticism, but it is a marvelous school of wisdom. But only, one must add, if it is thought about, and if only the thinking is sharpened by the endless debate that had been our glory.50 In Crawford’s opinion, the historian’s responsibility to exercise moral judgment and maintain vigorous debate was now threatened by the Federal Government. There was no consensus within the ACCL. The ban on the CPA and affiliated organisations revealed the precarious nature of the compromises achieved within the Council during the previous summer. Some members opposed the ban out of sympathy for the Communist Party, some because they considered the regulations excessive. Brian Fitzpatrick reacted with characteristic outrage, reproaching the government during a speech in Wollongong. This was reported in the Sydney papers and prompted W. M. Hughes, the Attorney-General, to claim that Fitzpatrick was entitled to his opinions and the freedom he enjoyed to express them contradicted his criticisms. Still on the offensive, Fitzpatrick accused the government of hindering the war effort. Hughes responded by threatening to ban the ACCL.51
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Not everyone within the ACCL supported Fitzpatrick’s public campaign, and his new opponent was a former ally, the barrister J. V. Barry. Dismissive of criticism that he had brought the League under direct threat of being outlawed, Fitzpatrick happily described his exchange with Hughes to Barry. The latter responded by sending an urgent telegram: ‘You are not authorised to speak for Council and wrongful assumptions of authority will result in my and many other resignations’. Barry’s response was prompted by two considerations. Firstly, there was his belief that Fitzpatrick had breached the ACCL’s constitution by making an unauthorised comment. Secondly, he was convinced that the League should avoid ‘political activity’ lest it ‘damage’ its public image.52 Within a week, Barry decided that Fitzpatrick should resign. Accustomed to this now familiar scenario after his bouts with Burton, Fitzpatrick refused. There followed a dispute over the interpretation of the ACCL’s vague liberal objectives. Relations deteriorated further when Fitzpatrick dismissed Barry’s arguments and accused him of being uncomfortable when the Council was outspoken on controversial matters.53 To his credit, Barry did not resort to private recriminations and hoped they could keep their ‘personal relationship’ on the same ‘cordial basis’.54 The ranks divided. Crawford and Blackburn were Fitzpatrick’s strongest supporters, while Vance Palmer and J. M. Atkinson defended Barry. On 1 July the issue was raised at a meeting, but no vote was taken. The matter was resolved privately, and the antagonists resumed their friendship. Although Crawford had remained on the periphery, he was now identified as one of Fitzpatrick’s strongest allies. The episode revealed his pronounced stand in support of the controversial Secretary, a daring move when Barry’s position might have been the more secure option. In January 1941 the National Security Regulations were extended further. Statements that were considered likely to corrupt morale were defined as subversive and any criticism of the government could be interpreted as prejudicial to the war effort. Fitzpatrick, Crawford and Blackburn argued that it was the government and its excessive measures that created discord and hampered the war effort. In the previous December of 1940, two communists in Sydney came to symbolise this claim. Max Thomas, a twenty-nine-year-old
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printer and member of the Printing Industry Employees’ Union, and Horace Ratcliffe, a labourer and Gallipoli veteran, were tried and imprisoned under the National Security regulations for possession of unlawful documents, namely a communist publication. Both men denied the charge, and Thomas said the publications he was found with ‘represent the actual views of the working class. Far from stabbing the nation in the back, the fact that I stand in Court today is an indication of my hatred of the Nazi and Fascist creeds.’55 Thomas and Ratcliffe served a sentence of six months with remission for good conduct, but it appeared the government still considered them threats. After their release and just days after the German invasion of Russia, they were interned indefinitely and without trial under the powers conferred by Regulation 26. These men became a ‘cause celebre’ as they began a hunger strike that lasted seventeen days. On 24 July, Maurice Blackburn wrote in their defence to newspapers. He emphasised the government’s misguided and illogical position, since the change in political circumstances mitigated the potential danger Ratcliffe and Thomas presented. The government had now interned supporters of Australia’s ally.56 The ACCL, affiliated societies and unions organised petitions, public meetings, demonstrations and a twenty-four-hour strike. The press speculated that approximately 100,000 unionists would participate in the strike. The federal government refused to capitulate and resolved that Ratcliffe and Thomas would not be released. ‘Deliberately to hinder the war effort’, Menzies maintained to the press, ‘is to be guilty of something singularly like treason and represents a settled intention to deprive our fighting men of the support to which they are entitled.’57 In a public meeting called by the Council at Unity Hall on 27 July 1941 and chaired by Maurice Blackburn, Max Crawford, Brian Fitzpatrick and Jim Bergin, the Acting Secretary of the Australian Tramways & Motor Omnibus Employees’ Association, addressed a rowdy audience of over 2,000 people. Crawford had become an unlikely, if conditional, champion of Ratcliffe and Thomas. He was cautious in his support, as he cited Blackburn’s letter and professed his allegiance to the Allied cause.58 And more significantly, he avoided the communist minefield by insisting he was not primarily concerned with the past activities of Ratcliffe and Thomas, with which he was
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‘not in agreement’, but with the present. He said the potential to ‘reoffend’ under Regulation 26 did not warrant internment, and the use of such a power ‘invited abuse.’59 Ratcliffe and Thomas were unusual symbols for Crawford. He was not concerned with the legitimacy of their communist actions, but ‘the general defence of civil liberties’, which should not ‘depend on the will of a Minister’. Crawford also challenged the assertion that protest was an unpatriotic act. ‘The hardest test of loyalty’, Crawford claimed, ‘to the good of one’s country is unpopular protest against undemocratic action’.60 Other cases of forced detention occupied the ACCL. By the end of the war, 6780 Australians had been interned as potentially dangerous aliens.61 Crawford reported on the arrest of Victor Trikojus, a Lecturer in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Sydney, who was interned in January 1940 under Regulation 26. A further investigation was encouraged.62 Brian Fitzpatrick also cited the inconsistencies of government policy. ‘Grave scandals have been discovered’, he declared when he described woeful conditions at Tatura of anti-Nazi refugees who were ‘prohibited immigrants’. When Crawford asked what action should be taken, it was agreed that an ACCL representative would be sent to inspect the camp.63 The official attitude to ‘political’ refugees did not immediately improve with the formation of the Labor government in late 1941. Fitzpatrick raised the ‘inferior status of refugees’ again in early 1942, and Crawford suggested that a system of exemptions should be applied that would allow the release of approved refugees.64 Max Crawford had abandoned his earlier position of ‘detached intellectual’. He became a more committed activist and began to campaign vigorously for those denied their rights. Laurie O’Brien later recalled Crawford’s immense pride over his role with the refugees.65 It appeared that his activities exemplified far more of a commitment than the ‘Balliol fostered belief that diversity of opinion should be heard’—which he later suggested.66 Crawford was also struggling within the University with similar difficulties of coercion and censorship. One of the early conflicts involved research fellows and the issue of academic autonomy. In April 1940 G. L Wood, the Acting Head of Commerce, visited Crawford to express his ‘alarm’ over Brian Fitzpatrick’s research on economics
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for his fellowship grant, despite the earlier approval of Douglas Copland, the chairman of the Social Sciences Committee. Wood claimed that Fitzpatrick was working on territory marked out by others, notably the Economics School in Sydney and Roland Wilson in Canberra. Crawford was measured in his response. He emphasised that Fitzpatrick’s methodological approach was that of an historian. His work was an extension of his two recent volumes on economic history.67 Wood was momentarily satisfied and apologised for disturbing Crawford.68 Within six months, Wood wrote to the Vice-Chancellor and objected to Fitzpatrick again, claiming an absence of supervision and Fitzpatrick’s failure to report his progress. There was a more subtle inference in the letter. Wood appeared to condemn Fitzpatrick’s critical interpretation of capitalism and opposed research fellows entering such ‘controversial fields’ that were ‘likely to embarrass the University’.69 Due in part to Crawford’s support, Fitzpatrick was given the necessary independence for his work to continue. Fitzpatrick’s research was plagued by delays and controversy. Almost two years later in 1942, he applied for his research fellowship to be renewed. The request was dependent on a favourable report by Wilfred Prest. In a diplomatic letter, Crawford said he was ‘disappointed’ that Prest expressed reservations about Fitzpatrick’s limitations as an economist. He allowed that his work was ‘bound to arouse controversy’, but had no doubt of its importance.70 In the midst of the Ratcliffe and Thomas protest in 1941, Crawford had promised the renowned lawyer and chairman of the Australian Institute of International Affairs, Frederic Eggleston, to review Griswold’s book on the Far Eastern Policy of the United States. Attached to the letter and invitation was a memo from Amy Cryan, Eggleston’s secretary, who mentioned that a member of the Editorial Committee had already looked at the book. It was ‘suggested’ that the reviewer read a corresponding analysis by Eggleston, a letter to the Times and other articles. More significantly, the memo referred to inconsistencies and weaknesses in Griswold’s interpretation.71 Normally flattered by Eggleston’s high opinion, Crawford was appalled at the apparent ‘direction’ for his evaluation of the book. After careful consideration, he refused the request, partly because the book was too ‘long’ and required too much ‘attention’. ‘I would be
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unready’, Crawford continued, ‘to review any book sent to me with a memo indicating the lines of interpretation to be followed’.72 He received a prompt and icy reply from Eggleston, who was ‘upset at the rebuke’ over a harmless note that simply referred to certain sources, which were ‘surely the function of an editor’. It was Eggleston who then issued a reprimand: ‘I should have thought our mutual friendship would have prevented you from giving us credit for showing any disrespect for you in your position.’73 Duly admonished, Crawford apologised for his ‘pernickety’ attitude and hoped their valued friendship would continue. Not all of Crawford’s research proved problematic. A textbook, which several generations of schoolchildren would use, was completed in 1940 and published as Ourselves and the Pacific. Since the University Schools Board controlled the syllabus, Crawford was able to depart from the staple diet of British and Empire History prescribed by Scott and introduce a course on Australian and Pacific History in 1941 to the Year 10 Intermediate Certificate level.74 The course was not introduced without debate, and Crawford recalled members denouncing the ‘disloyal dropping of the British Empire’.75 A collaborative work, the book involved the assistance of teachers such as Mollie Baynes from Fintona Girls’ School, Norman Harper from Melbourne High School and Mary Lazarus from MacRobertson Girls’ High School. The preface resonated with Crawford’s interpretation of history and the need to avoid the robotic practice of memorising ‘facts’. ‘History is not a burden on the memory, but an illumination of the soul’, he wrote, citing Lord Acton.76 He hoped the nature of Pacific history would be intelligible and enlightening, provide discussion and promote understanding. Many schoolteachers assured Crawford that the book was ‘stimulating’ and popular.77 Brian Fitzpatrick congratulated him on a ‘fine trail-blazing’ text.78 ‘What a treat this will be for our kids not old enough to be spoiled by the Ramsay Muirish manner’.79 Fitzpatrick referred to his own school education, when he was fed a diet of monotonous facts and indoctrinated with the superiority of Empire. ‘I find nothing of our civilizing mission, or preoccupation with forcing freedom upon the lesser breeds.’ With the fascist and Japanese aggression, the purpose of the book was summarised in the conclusion: ‘We
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must study our Pacific environment. This book is simply such an introduction.’80 In Valerie Yule’s estimation, it offered far more and ‘extended Australia’s imagination about our future’.81 More pertinently, the book developed a consciousness of history in the community and spoke to a wider audience. Crawford’s writing assumed an urgency and direction with his increased political activity. In his review of R. G. Collingwood’s autobiography, it was difficult to gauge whether Crawford was writing about Collingwood or himself. He observed of Collingwood that the events of the 1930s destroyed his ‘pose of a detached’ intellectual. ‘The philosopher could not with integrity seek refuge in webs of his own devising.’ Crawford observed: And it follows from all his argument that the historian cannot with integrity turn his research into the past into a refuge from his present. The theme of the book is that the duty of both is to devise a science of human affairs, which may give us greater wisdom in handling our present situations.82 The myriad of activities within the University increased as the war continued. In January 1942, Crawford participated in a Conference of the Australian Vice-Chancellors Committee and the Department of War Organisation of Industry to discuss the war effort, the academic role and the invidiousness of discrimination directed at the outstanding students. While all students in faculties of strategic significance were to remain enrolled, it was decided as part of the national manpower administration that the ‘brilliant students’ in other faculties, such as History, should be preserved from the risk of military service. The continuity of universities had to be ensured by providing a nucleus of students in every faculty.83 Possibly inspired by his involvement with government or motivated by patriotism, Crawford became deeply involved with two other committees. The first was the University Voluntary Defence Corps in the summer of 1942. Although Medley first approached the AdjutantGeneral, Crawford briefed him and it was apparent that he was one of the main instigators of the Corps’ establishment.84 George Paton was another, although he had received ‘little reward for his efforts’ and
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encountered what Crawford described as ‘bone-headed rudeness by one of the administrators’.85 Crawford later contacted the ViceCommandant of the Volunteer Defence Corps, C. H. Foott, and explained that staff members on the list of reserved occupations were in a position to participate in ‘part-time military duties for Home Defence’. The University wanted to create a self-contained unit in order to maintain the closeness of staff and to defend the University with its considerable technical munitions work, and because of the convenience of arranging training around lectures.86 The second commitment arose from Crawford’s reputation as a public intellectual. A Prime Minister’s Committee on National Morale was established by John Curtin in 1942 to investigate and advise the government on the ‘problem of civilian morale’. Alf Conlon, a keen political operator and canny networker from Sydney, who enjoyed his ‘cloak and dagger’ reputation, chaired the committee.87 Considered advisory in character, the committee was responsible directly to Curtin and was only to consist of ‘distinguished and interested minds’.88 The expectations were high and Crawford joined a small, impressive committee that consisted of A. K. Stout, Julius Stone, R. D. Wright, W. Stanner, Ian Hogbin, Justice E. D. Roper, Keith Barry, Sid Deamer and, later, Charles Bean.89 It was Conlon’s contention that intellectual experts had the capacity to ‘determine outcomes for the advancement of the greater good’.90 The task would prove challenging because the idea of morale was elusive and subjective in its interpretation. Before the committee met, a list of ‘basic ideas’ was circulated. This list proposed that morale must transcend all classes; be both offensive and defensive; should provide the ‘ability to take it’; was endangered by rumour, ‘the secret weapon of the enemy’; and was dependent on unity and confidence in leaders.91 Crawford was an enthusiastic and active participant. He noted the absence of women on the Committee and argued the need to appoint one to ‘represent the woman’s viewpoint’.92 Crawford’s historical training was conspicuous as he emphasised the appeal of the ‘digger’ coined by Charles Bean and the impact on the Australian public of the German Army’s expressed respect for the Australian forces in Libya. Crawford undertook to research morale in China, Spain and Russia in July 1942. The Committee identified groups it deemed in need of attention: workers in mining industries,
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individuals who felt confused or aggrieved, and housewives. It raised issues regarding industrial fatigue, the need for recreation, propaganda, rehabilitation, the need to preserve the ‘conception of the digger’ and relations between the armed services.93 It avoided the crude racial propaganda disseminated by some sections of the press and radio.94 Although it proved an impossible task and the Committee was short-lived, it did publicly affirm the validity of liberal-minded progressive experts with a nationalistic agenda and willingness to play their part in the war effort.95 Although the Prime Minister’s Committee was a gratifying commitment and Crawford’s public reputation was flourishing, the development of his History School always took precedence. New proposals for the honours and pass courses were revised in early 1942 as he considered the reintroduction of Australasian history into both streams.96 Staff meetings emphasised the aims and methods of the study of history. The emphasis on honesty, accuracy and clarity revealed Crawford’s propensity for analysis and self-criticism. ‘A further possible aim is the training of historians’, he observed in allusion to Scott’s legacy. The question is how far this should be allowed to influence the undergraduate school. But one might suggest that we do not teach as well as our predecessors the difficult art of narrative.97 Crawford insisted his Department was ‘under established’ as it offered ten subjects and student numbers had risen to 450. His support of women, evident in his contribution to the Prime Minister’s Committee, was also apparent in his running of the Department: he negotiated with the Vice-Chancellor to promote Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Senior Lecturer. The University had procrastinated since October 1941, and Crawford wrote again to request the promotion on the basis of Fitzpatrick’s work and qualifications, as well as the burden she had accepted with Jessie Webb’s protracted illness.’98 ‘I am ready to be used’ In the closing months of 1941, Max Crawford wrote a hopeful letter to the Minister of External Affairs, H. V. Evatt, congratulating him on the
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formation of the Labor Government and offering his services. ‘If you wish to use me’, he stated, ‘I am ready to be used whether in Washington or Moscow, or Canberra or Melbourne’.99 This self-sacrificial letter partially obscured Crawford’s previously stated ambition to be posted to Russia. Since the Labor Government’s victory, Evatt’s plan to exchange diplomatic representatives between Australia and its newest ally had been common knowledge in Canberra.100 Like his two uncles before him, and contrary to later denials, Crawford had finally bound his conscience to the policies of a mainstream political party. In a euphoric letter to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, written on the same day, he elaborated on his offer and expressed doubt about his chances. He was, in fact, confident enough to inform Evatt that men of his type of ‘training’ would be useful, and he also prematurely informed the Vice-Chancellor about his plan. After almost a year had transpired, Max Crawford found himself at a reception at Clive Turnbull’s home in October 1942 to welcome the Tass Agency’s new correspondent. Also there were Vance Palmer and the Labor politician, William Slater, both colleagues of Crawford on the ACCL Executive.101 It was Palmer who confided to Crawford that Slater was to be appointed the first Australian Minister to the U.S.S.R. The news was greeted with delight amongst the intelligentsia, who had feared the Government would select a ‘Washington type’ rather than a man recognised for his ‘sympathy to the Soviets’.102 Crawford congratulated Slater and told him that if there were any preparatory work to be done, he and his staff would be only too pleased to assist. It is impossible to know whether Crawford was aware at this point that his name had been suggested to accompany the Legation. Slater responded to Crawford’s offer by asking him if he was ‘willing to go’ to the USSR. The invitation was unconventional, given the sensitive bureaucratic lobbying that typically preceded such postings. Bitter in-fighting had plagued the selection process. Outside the milieu that Crawford inhabited, the choice of Slater as Minister had caused disquiet. He had been officially approached at the Tik Conference and had offered his own reservations, protesting a lack of experience. Encouraged by his family and Evatt’s confidence, Slater’s hopes for the legation were high. He claimed it would be ‘a working
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mission concerning itself with the Russian people for whom his admiration was unlimited and genuine.’103 Permitted ‘carte blanche’ in the selection of his staff, Slater was impressed by ‘the courage and humanity of idea’ Crawford had displayed in the past. In Government circles, there was not such confidence in Crawford, and Evatt was forced to lobby on his behalf against the more reactionary members of the Department of External Affairs. It was reported by the local press in November 1942 that the appointment had been unexpected, and Evatt had negotiated it quietly and very effectively.104 Crawford believed that some of the curious appointments might have reflected Evatt’s ‘distrust of the career men’ or that was the impression that Evatt gave Crawford when he returned to Australia.105 Crawford later considered that the only intention for establishing the Legation and, therefore, the only real function was ‘to establish our claim to be an independent nation with a right to an independent voice in the peace making at the end of the war.’106 Unaware of the prevailing criticism, Crawford had no such qualms and confidently assured Slater he would be ‘useful’, happy to accompany him and liked his attitude.107 It was a tremendous coup. On reflection, Crawford expressed complete surprise that he had accepted the offer without hesitation. But it was hardly a shock, for the thought of going to Moscow had ‘obsessed’ him for over a year. ‘You will go there’, reassured Vance Palmer, ‘and live at the top of your being for the time and a man cannot say no to that’.108 Crawford’s acceptance aroused what he unconvincingly termed ‘private turbulence’, and before he agreed officially, he sought advice from his wife and colleagues. All the members of the History Department were transported by the thought of Crawford’s big adventure. Only Ian Milner, a member of the Political Science Department and possibly the only communist with whom Crawford actively socialised, offered a cautionary reservation.109 Clearly cynical about the worth of diplomatic postings, Milner wondered if, given his role as ‘one of the spokesmen of progressive ideas’, Crawford was of more value at home. Crawford insisted that his ‘training and ideas’ fated him for the job and flatly dismissed the concern.110 The sense of destiny was shared by most. Kathleen Fitzpatrick, who had been privy to Crawford’s aspiration, encouraged it from the outset and wrote how ‘proud’ she was that he was selected
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‘on grounds of sheer merit and suitability’.111 The historical fraternity was understandably enthusiastic about the appointment, which reinforced the Melbourne School’s belief in the purpose and value of its activities. For most historians, Crawford’s success symbolised the importance of their shared endeavours. Buoyed by this support, Crawford submitted his application for leave of absence to an understanding Vice-Chancellor, who was now accustomed to his academics opting for government experience. Copland, Bailey and Giblin had long been seconded to the Commonwealth Government. The Chancellor, Sir John Latham, was appointed Australian Minister in Japan, and Macmahon Ball later joined the diplomatic contingent after working in the Department of Information. The economists Richard Downing and Jean Polgaze joined the War Cabinet in various capacities; R. D. Wright became an army officer and was employed by the Army Directorate of Research, and Donald Thomson was on active service in northern Australia.112 Crawford went to the USSR in great hope. Although he assured Fitzpatrick that he did not want a political or diplomatic career, he was confident that he would be useful and could offer a sympathetic perspective on Russia.113 Other University colleagues outside the History Department, as well as students, shared a sense of excitement. David Rivett, who had previously expressed dubious idolatry of Hitler in 1936,114 was one of a chorus who articulated his approval for the selection of both Slater and Crawford. ‘That the requests should have been made to the two of you to undertake this work’, wrote Rivett, ‘tends to restore a waning faith in the wisdom of some of their rulers’.115 Curiosity also characterised the correspondence from those outside the confines of academia. Many were fascinated with the prospect of an Australian living in Russia and the enormous opportunity, after so long, of knowledge of the country and its communist regime. Members of various unions, the Australia-Soviet Friendship League, the Australian Red Cross and the Australian Institute of International Affairs all sent their congratulations. On 18 October 1942, Crawford and Slater were farewelled by an enthusiastic crowd of 4000 at a meeting of the Australia-Soviet Friendship League. Crawford had earlier been presented with a copy of Carnegie’s book, How To Win Friends and Influence People, from his appreciative staff and
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students.116 He had responded with an impromptu speech in which he declared that he had always been ‘exceedingly interested in the new culture and new standards of civilisation’ built up in Russia.117 After Crawford’s encounter with Slater at Turnbull’s home, he began keeping a journal. The thoughts are not unlike the diary kept during his Oxford pilgrimage: they are intensely self-conscious and deeply analytical. However, the tone is not private or confidential, and the contents suggest that the journal was written for public consumption and as a future reference tool. In addition to the diary, letters to his constant correspondents, Dorothy Crawford and Kathleen Fitzpatrick, provide further insight into his time in Russia. The correspondence began almost immediately after his departure and reveals his complex and distinct relationship with both women. To Dorothy, Crawford reported on private concerns: furniture, food, films, the standard of living. He enquired about the grind of her domestic life, the children, school, vacations and money. Although kind and affectionate, the letters are also at times simplistic in content and tone. Like his mother, Dorothy is sometime portrayed as overprotective and Crawford appeared to resent her, albeit subconsciously, with hampering his research career. In 1932, when he had considered the research work in Spain, Harriet had imposed formidable pressure on her son to accept work in Australia rather than seek overseas research projects. She constantly reminded Crawford of his family duties and it was Dorothy who symbolised these binding responsibilities. On hearing about Russia, Crawford to his expressed relief maintained that Dorothy ‘was at her best’ and fortuitously did not display ‘her earlier fear of having the normal routine and security upset’.118 Crawford’s reaction implied that he had every intention of going, regardless of any protestations that Dorothy may have offered. He also appeared to undermine her genuine concern. Crawford’s portrayal of Dorothy in his diary is at odds with Ian Crawford’s recollection that his mother ‘supported his volunteering for service in Russia, although it meant a long separation and some danger to him (flying through enemy air space).’119 If Dorothy was the contractual wife, Kathleen Fitzpatrick was his intellectual one. Without family concerns and independently wealthy, she encouraged Crawford’s every decision and his affectionate letters.
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Kathleen Fitzpatrick Photographer: Helmut Newton University of Melbourne Archive, Image UMA/I/1073
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‘I cannot tell you, dear, how much you have been to me’, Crawford wrote on his departure, ‘but you know what I think and the telling is not necessary.’120 While in Russia he reassured Fitzpatrick: You said you were going suddenly grey...but I can’t believe you will be less lovely because of it...Beyond that my opinion of you does not depend on the colour of your hair, though I have been very fond of it.’ Kathleen Fitzpatrick inhabited a different sphere from Dorothy, and they shared news of the Department, friends, politics, so Crawford’s hopes preoccupied his letters to her. The interest was also reciprocal. He enquired about her work in Shepparton as the officerin-charge of university women working in a tomato cannery and hoped she would send him a report to circulate among the Russian press.121 Their shared profession and interests intensified the closeness. ‘I think much of you and our common work, and our colleagues and students in the department.’122 The correspondence was conditional and at times cryptic. Kathleen Fitzpatrick was told whether the letters he sent were ‘personal’, and it was at her discretion that she typed what she judged ‘fit’ and then circulated the censored sections to those ‘sympathetically interested’. It was not only political speculation that governed his censorship; he also avoided private gossip as he confessed the difficulties of writing. To Fitzpatrick he wrote: ‘I would like you to have this letter to yourself and simply show the copies…I wish I could conclude as I was unable to conclude on our last uninterrupted meeting.’123 Ian Crawford observed that by modern standards, the letters between the two ‘are unprofessionally personal’. It is possible as Ian Crawford contended, to interpret the Fitzpatrick letters as ‘simply flattering and cajoling, and encouraging of her as she took on the administration of the History Department.’124 He speculated that his father’s ‘purpose in writing in this fashion was perhaps to get her to do the work which she was clearly nervous of doing.’125 Max Crawford was of course not adverse to flattering and manipulating when he wanted something. He was also inclined to write intimate and engaging letters to close friends, as his later correspondence with John La Nauze attests.
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Each woman remained apart from the domain of the other and were socially unfamiliar. Ian Crawford agreed that his father ‘kept his professional life and domestic life separate’.126 When Crawford wanted his wife to be contacted, it was Norman Harper who acted as the gobetween. The Tourist At 4.45 on a clear, still morning, Crawford said goodbye to his family and left for Sydney. Briefly reunited with his parents and sisters in Bexley, he enjoyed an official lunch seated next to Eddie Ward, with whom he discovered he ‘shared common ground’. Both were critical of the Labor Party’s strategy of pleasing its opponents and bemoaned the persecution of those in Australia who had sympathised with Russia. At the airport, while awaiting the flight to Brisbane, Max Crawford met the other members of the Legation. The group that Slater formed was an incongruous blend of experience, agendas and expectations. Indeed, the Minister, his First Secretary, Crawford and the industrial attaché, Bill Duncan, were diplomatic novices. There were only two experienced members of the Legation, Keith Officer and Peter Heydon. Officer, an impeccably qualified career diplomat, was appointed Counsellor and, as such, was senior to Crawford.127 A permanent officer of the External Affairs Department, Heydon was the Second Secretary of the Legation.128 The hierarchy, much to Crawford’s chagrin, was quickly established. Crawford and Duncan were banished to the bomb bay of their airplane, while Slater and Officer sat in relative comfort in the tail. Internal problems manifested early as Crawford jockeyed against Keith Officer for a more acceptable position in the pecking order. Accustomed to exercising authority and commanding respect, Crawford resented Officer’s manner, which he interpreted as ‘personal jealousy’. It might have been disdain, as Officer noted the inexperience and inadequacy of the team.129 To his dismay, Crawford discovered that Officer had recommended he give up his title as Professor in any public introduction or announcement, ‘lest it should create suspicion’. It was unconventional that a diplomatic group’s political sympathies should be so blatant. Officer’s insistence that others would be distrustful of an academic suggests as much about the widespread attitudes toward public intellectuals as his own grievances.
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In Crawford’s letters to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, Officer is portrayed as his nemesis. ‘If the Melbourne Professor of History’, Crawford wrote, echoing classic class stereotypes, ‘was more adaptable to the role of fag to the old school tie, it might have been more pleasant’. As Crawford’s very identity was shaped by his image as public intellectual and historian, he was determined to retain his title and was considerably more scathing in his diary. ‘I will not take it.’ Crawford declared, ‘I do not respect his mind or his outlook. He will be useful on knowing the routine, but I am afraid that his usefulness will be extinguished by his unsuitability for the USSR.’130 As Crawford was similarly unfamiliar with Russia, this suggests he might have been indulging in his own form of insecurity. Officer’s World War One service and impressive credentials of service in Nigeria, London, America and Japan apparently made Crawford defensive.131 Keith Officer, who kept his own wartime diary and also learnt Russian, rarely mentioned Crawford, who evidently made little impression on the experienced diplomat. Almost dismissive of the historian, Officer regarded him with detachment and rarely communicated with him.132 The tensions that began to emerge in Australia clouded the entire stay in America, and Bill Slater found himself playing mediator to two men who were behaving more like petulant, bickering children. Slater, however, managed to distance himself, and Crawford reported approvingly that the Minister was ‘captain of the ship’. He possessed all the qualities Crawford idealised. He was ‘wellinformed, sympathetic and humane’; what’s more, he carefully introduced Crawford as Professor.133 After a noisy and uncomfortable flight, the bickering was briefly alleviated when the group arrived in Honolulu and met the Australian representative, Mr. Maidment. They were starkly reminded of war as Maidment described the devastation of Pearl Harbour. It appeared that Crawford had re-invented himself: he emerges from his diary as an outspoken Australian patriot with high socialist ideals and an uncompromising manner. As Crawford surveyed Honolulu, he disparagingly compared the famed Waikiki with the beaches of New South Wales, though he confessed that the Hawaiian beach was ‘attractive in its millionaire’s pleasure ground style’. During lunch he preferred to watch the ‘cheeky’ Chinese children at the soda
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fountain than bask in the ‘wealthy degeneracy’ that hung over the hotel.134 On arrival in San Francisco, Crawford immediately contacted Karl Meyer, the Director of the Hooper Research Foundation and friend of R. D. ‘Pansy’ Wright. Meyer, with his ‘liberality and humanity of mind’, simplicity, ‘vividness of personality’ and impressive contacts (he was a friend of John Steinbeck), made an enormous impact on Crawford.135 It appeared the latter had not quite lost the tendency to put others on a pedestal. While Officer went to Washington, the remainder of the group visited the Berkeley campus and toured the rural California immortalised by The Grapes of Wrath. The campus, Crawford observed, possessed ‘surprising beauty’, was ‘state-endowed and free’, although they were informed, with a hint of irony, that the media baron and philanthropist Randolph Hearst had contributed a Greek theatre. In this lively company and the familiarity of a university, it is not surprising that Crawford confessed that he was ‘happier about the present and future’.136 He attributed his affinity with Meyer to a ‘community of outlook’, a shared experience of being dubbed a radical.137 The immediate rapport Crawford felt with this fellow liberal did not extend to the parade of diplomats and dignitaries he encountered in the States. After leaving Meyer’s company, he glimpsed the drudgery of diplomatic life and the entrenched anti-Russian sentiment. In the British Consul’s suite at the Fairmont Hotel, the Australians met a ‘conventional rather strident hospitality’ and endured ‘a good bit of prejudice’ about the American equivalent of the Australia-Soviet Friendship League and unspoken pressure not to attend ‘The Salute to Russia’.138 While Crawford’s sharp criticism of the British attitudes reveals his own politics, it also suggested a difficulty in adapting to his new environment. For the past five years, he had been in a position of unusual privilege: he selected his colleagues who, without exception, possessed a similar historical interest and ideological perspective. Although he was acutely aware that he preferred the company of intellectuals and despised the diplomatic corps, he did not perceive any potential difficulties with his own inflexibility. Indeed, the squabbles with the pragmatic Officer arose because the diplomat did not agree with Crawford’s intellectualising.
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The group remained in the United States for three weeks while it met diplomats, academics, business and industrial representatives, endured an endless round of inoculations, and visited the usual tourist haunts. The stay on the mainland confirmed Crawford’s misgivings. Appalled and impressed by the sheer wealth of the country, Crawford observed the expensive and beautifully prepared food; the comfort of the hotels; the train compartments with their luxurious amenities such as spring mattresses and flush toilets; the disposable nature of society; the high quality of clothes, well-crafted furniture and sophisticated electrical equipment. Yet as he wrote about these features, he was also struck by the vulgarity of the wealth and disgusted by the expense. After San Francisco, a strangely peaceful New York was the next destination. The group decamped to the Ritz-Carlton Hotel and later visited the Rockefeller Centre and Harlem. In the afternoon, the Australians arranged the first of a series of meetings with Soviet dignitaries and representatives. This initial meeting with the Russian consulate in its salubrious hotel revived Crawford’s flagging confidence. Using a translator, it went well until Duncan deviated from the mutual admiration narrative and criticised the officers. ‘B. D. has a heart of gold’, Crawford smugly reported, ‘but talks too much’.139 On the following day, the group went to Washington, ‘beautiful in parts’, and visited Congress and various galleries. Crawford enjoyed the city, but abhorred the ‘diplomatic fuss’.140 His annoyance was compounded when he travelled in a second car behind Slater, Officer and Sir Owen Dixon to a Legation reception. Also in attendance was the Russian diplomat, N. M. Lifanov (who was to loom large in the Petrov controversy) and Joseph E. Davies, author of Mission to Moscow. All apparently went well until an irritating ‘society woman’ interrupted Crawford’s monologue. The chaotic itinerary was resumed on the following day when Crawford returned to New York. To his delight he found himself alone for the first time since departing Australia and spent part of the time with an exuberant taxi-driver who pointed out the popular bars and brothels on offer. During the week, Crawford visited Boston and Harvard ‘to see people who know about Russia’, most notably Professor Arthur Upham Pope. It was on this pilgrimage that Crawford’s optimism came to the fore as he dismissed the warnings of those whom
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he thought disparaged the system. ‘I have been very encouraged’, he wrote to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, ‘despite the tales of foreigners being unable to do anything or go anywhere’.141 Professor Pope assured Crawford that the diplomat’s isolation was caused by his or her own ‘intellectual incest’. In the familiar terrain of academia, Crawford’s confidence was heightened, and he was assured that as a professor he would be shown ‘consideration’ in his attempts to study the country. However, any hope Crawford harboured of being an influential and important member of the cast soon diminished. He quipped that the First Secretary was the ‘over-worked jack-of-all-trades’.142 His duties were indeed varied and menial: organising meetings and press statements and supervising the travel arrangements. Crawford discovered that he was a small fish in a big pond. The most urgent requirement was to learn the Russian language and familiarise himself with a country about which he had only a superficial knowledge. Using his historical skills, Crawford voraciously read historical and political accounts and took extensive notes. He clung onto the belief that his main responsibility in Russia would be study.143 Despite the frustrations, America proved to be both a necessary stopover and an important political education. It was there that Crawford became more acutely sensitive to the hostile attitudes towards Russia; these galvanised his politics and forced him to reflect. The Australian contingent had the opportunity to consider the American left, which it perceived as more professionally organised, outspoken and ‘respectable’ than their own. Karl Meyer was considerably more optimistic than the Australians, who speculated that it was probable the vast resources of the United States would be exploited to combat socialist movements after the war. Meyer’s confidence can possibly be attributed to Berkeley’s tolerance of the left.144 Crawford was immensely positive about Russia and insisted that he found the Russians sympathetic. He soliloquised: ‘Perhaps because they represent a worker’s republic and we are close to the workers of our own country and represent a Labor Government’.145 His experiences in the United States appeared to refine his political beliefs and cause him to move closer to the left. This was particularly evident in Washington during a series of meetings with the Committee of Industrial Organisations and its rival, the American Federation of Labor. In the initial meeting with the CIO, Duncan passed on the
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‘fraternal greetings’ of the ACTU and Crawford assured its representatives of its commitment to the working-class movement.146 Crawford’s alliance with the working class was, however, an intellectual affinity rather than any real class identification. He never associated the working poor’s struggle with the difficulties of his own parents, nor did he feel rooted to his own past. These episodes heightened Crawford’s socialist rhetoric: ‘One gets the impression of a widespread raffishness and larrikinism here—the symptoms of a suppressed class.’ After his visit in Washington, Crawford recorded that The general white comment here is that the “niggers” get too much of their own way, and are not sufficiently down and apart as in the real south. The reality seems to be an unsatisfactory compromise between freedom and oppression.147 So Crawford found the American experience both repugnant and intoxicating. He was left with a suspicion of the United States’ nationalism. ‘There is much talk of freedom’, Crawford observed perceptively and years before McCarthyism and the race riots, ‘but I have heavy doubts that the influence of this country in the post-world war will not be for freedom’.148 He elaborated to Kathleen Fitzpatrick on his fears (largely influenced by Slater) and insisted that Roosevelt was fighting a defensive action against the reactionaries.149 On 2 December 1942 the group was briefly reunited and travelled through Virginia into the Deep South and down the peninsula to Florida. It would prove an exasperating episode as Slater, Officer and Heydon departed early and Crawford and the complaining Duncan, ‘the pack horses of the group’, were left in Florida to assemble supplies. The ‘repressive atmosphere’ did not help Crawford’s demeanour as he increasingly despised the suffocating heat, the sterile millionaires’ playground, the exclusion of the African Americans and the private ownership of beachfronts.150 After ten days dominated by daily visits to the airport and haranguing the authorities, Crawford and Duncan departed at dawn on 12 December 1942. The remainder of the journey to Russia was more a comedy of errors than a serious diplomatic expedition. After two months of
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travel, the two Australians were stranded in Africa when they missed their allocated plane, and discovered that they were at least ten days behind Slater and Heydon and a fortnight behind Officer, ‘who knew the Colonels’. These difficulties widened the fissures in the relationship between the travelling companions. Crawford described Duncan as a ‘decent, kindly fellow’, but he also complained that his colleague was ill-equipped for the work, except for good sympathy: ‘I will need to tell him what to say’.151 Banished with the enlisted men in army camps and dependent on the planes of the Air Transport Command, Crawford and Duncan were considered ‘transients’ with no priority in either the military and civilian hierarchy. In the midst of this confusion, suffering debilitating air sickness and great discomfort, a change in attitude can be detected in Crawford’s letters home. His resolve and patience were tested as he endured ‘oven-like’ rooms with no bathroom amenities, shared quarters with boisterous soldiers and was constantly forced to make sacrifices for a ‘glorious military person’. He began to sympathise with the troops and reveal an identification with the ‘intelligent’ men in the ranks he encountered and an inclination to echo class resentments. ‘Outstanding among them’, Crawford wrote, ‘for common sense and for being quietly and maturely civilised was Peter Paris’. Paris was a writer for Yank, the enlisted men’s newspaper. In Cairo he described his admiration for three A.I.F. men, ‘fit and brown, and about big things uncomplaining’. The men had survived the Battle of Britain (which left them with a view that the ‘best’ men in Britain were women) and had served in Greece and El Alamein. With their ‘common humanity and intelligence’, Crawford was struck by their resemblance to past students ‘hardened by four years of fighting’.152 The officers were characterised less sympathetically in contrast to Crawford’s youthful attitudes at Oxford, when he had been puritanical, an avowed Anglophile and generally appalled by the Australians he met. He now described with contempt the Lutheran chaplain who failed to conceal his anti-Semitism behind religious hypocrisy; the ignorant, young ‘Tories’; the ‘fresh complacent faces’ of the British officers who reminded him of the boys he taught at Bradfield, and the greedy enlisted men who hoarded the coffee. After a frustrating week in Africa, Crawford and Duncan arrived in Cairo to a disastrous reception. A representative failed to meet
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them, no message was available, the Australian contingent did not respond to calls and the British Embassy appeared to have no knowledge of the Legation or Crawford’s existence. After endless enquiries, he finally received a letter from Heydon. Apparently the other members had been in Cairo a fortnight before and Crawford speculated that they were now in Russia. He was advised that he would fly directly from Teheran to Russia without Duncan, who would take an alternative route. This was by no means a forgone conclusion and Crawford was again stranded and forced to endure an additional three weeks of waiting in Teheran. The only consolation was that the wait provided him with an opportunity to improve his Russian. When news finally reached him that the others had met Stalin in Russia, he noted that he was expected to make good the inefficiencies of the ‘two stuffed shirts whose skill consists of looking after their own interests’.153 The Accidental Diplomat In February 1943, Dorothy Crawford received a telegram from Canberra informing her that Crawford had finally reached Russia and would reside in a little known town called Kuibyshev. Since the end of September 1941, all the civilian ministries and foreign embassies had been evacuated from Moscow and dispersed to cities in the interior.154 The Australian lodgings consisted of a somewhat ‘ramshackled’, threestorey building with derelict plumbing. When considering the conditions most Russians were forced to endure, Crawford conceded he was living in relative comfort and warmth, as the second and third storeys of their residence were steam-heated. Crawford’s own bedroom afforded views over the rooftops and beyond the frozen Volga River and the woods. He shared a spacious office with the easy-going Heydon and could recline in the dining room or common sittingroom furnished with magazines, newspapers and a wireless broadcasting the news from the BBC.155 After the abundant amounts of food offered by the Americans, the embassy meals were decidedly spartan. Breakfast consisted of a slice of bread with butter and honey and tea or coffee; lunch was often the same, with occasional offerings of tinned meat, vegetables or cold tongue, and dinner was the most substantial, with soup, meat and vegetables or meat, vegetables and a dessert.156 Crawford readily admitted that the diplomatic contingent was fortunate; starvation
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and disease were prevalent among the Russian public. In 1942, it became common to see men and women falling dead of starvation in the street. 157 The early letters home conveyed a mixture of excited anticipation and a slight disappointment. After three months of itinerant life, this deeply disciplined man could now establish a routine. Awakened at eight o’clock by a maid, his morning was occupied by the day-today business of errands, meetings, writing reports and preparing new work. The remainder of the day was free for him to exercise and learn Russian. Unlike the multifaceted demands of the University, the work was constant but hardly difficult, and he admitted it showed signs of ‘developing quite well’. Crawford already looked forward to returning to Melbourne: ‘I am after all a teacher’.158 He hoped the imminent trip to Moscow, where he was to embark on the ‘major part’ of his job, the study of Russian ‘scientific, educational and artistic organization’, would satisfy him. In hindsight, the importance he placed on this work was ill-conceived and uninformed, more akin to a university sabbatical than a wartime diplomatic posting. This was not the only naive aspect. Crawford’s impressions of Russia revealed both his political sympathies and idealistic nature. In the first few days, he admiringly watched a group of marching soldiers chanting in clear and harmonious unison. ‘I knew from my reading’, Crawford recorded confidently in his diary, ‘that the Red Army was an educational as well as military organisation. This was one evidence.’159 And after observing a group of a hundred or so prisoners accompanied by soldiers with fixed bayonets on either side, he simplistically explained to Dorothy that they were ‘deserters, divisionists and criminals’.160 There was no curiosity about the men or their fate. Crawford appeared unaware of the darker side of Soviet Russia and distracted by the cultural and artistic aspects. He rhapsodised about an ‘enchanted’ performance of Swan Lake, the opera, the theatre and the exhibitions. When compared to home, these aspects of Russian life were variously described by Crawford as accessible, cheap, superb, ‘first class’.161 Perhaps this was an example of the Australian cultural cringe or possibly of events contrasted to the misery of the war. Crawford wrote more ambivalently to Kathleen Fitzpatrick and suggested the forced labour and primitive living conditions were a temporary evil. The ‘tremendous industrial rural development’ and ‘concern
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to spread the benefits’ were adequate compensation.162 The other important issue that influenced Crawford’s judgment about the Soviet system, and would plague him on his return, was an abiding and genuine affection for the people. Crawford described the Russians as ‘cheerful, absolutely confident of winning, and polite and friendly’. He never reconciled the repression he witnessed and the propaganda he accepted unquestioningly. Instead, he described Russia’s great sacrifices, the burden of war, the strict food rationing, the lack of resentment and absence of despondency.163 ‘The country was beginning to get its reward in prosperity in the middle 1930s’, he wrote, ‘and now the sacrifice of all comfort for victory in war, have cut that out’.164 The lack of public criticism assured Crawford that the people were in complete support of their system.165 It was not apparent to him that they did not complain out of fear of reprisals, rather than from patriotism. Among the many Russians Crawford met at this time, he would consider only three as ‘close’ friends. The depth to which they confided in him is, however, impossible to ascertain. Zolov was the head of VOKS and described as ‘friendly’. Ludmila Morosova was a guide and general helper, and impressed Crawford with her intelligence and university degree. But it was his translator and language teacher, Mina Moyseyena, who emerged as his closest and main ‘ally’; he thought she would most happily fit in his Melbourne ‘circle’. The product of a middle-class family, Mina allowed Crawford a rare glimpse of the difficulties for the educated in Stalin’s Russia.166 His tendency to reject the less appealing images of Soviet Russia might also be attributed to a form of defensiveness. Max Crawford was a confirmed progressive and in this period, sympathiser, and his aversion to criticism of it was particularly marked. In Kuibyshev he encountered an anti-Russian sentiment as pervasive and loathsome as it had been in the United States. Initial impressions, Crawford confessed, were ‘handicapped’ by Geoffrey Blunder, who was an English journalist stationed in the British Embassy, and whose antagonistic ranting about the Soviet regime disappointed him. Crawford rationalised Blunden’s attitudes by referring to the isolation and the poisonous influences of the diplomatic circles in which he moved. The daily routine in Kuibyshev was briefly interrupted when Crawford accompanied William Slater to Moscow for an introduction
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to Kemenov of VOKS. It took them four days to reach Moscow but, fortuitously, they had packed additional provisions, and Slater proved a ‘good companion’, with his simple tastes and kindness. But the sensitivity that Crawford found so appealing in his Minister was apparently masking a fragility. Rumours about Slater’s fraught emotional condition had begun to circulate around the embassy. Crawford observed that the Minister was more ‘cheerful’ than he had seen him since their departure from Australia, yet dismissed the rumours of Slater’s demons as the invention of Officer, who was ‘very English and full of an Englishman’s pomposity of taste’.167 After the brief interlude in Moscow, Crawford resumed his work and insisted that it was ‘taking shape’, although if he did not learn the ways of the public service, he would have a ‘disproportionate amount to do’. Crawford believed that he had overcome the reticence and suspicion usually reserved for foreigners.168 He maintained that he was ‘treated more kindly’ and was making ‘unusual headway’ because of his status as a professor rather than a professional diplomat.169 There is no evidence for these bold claims. The military hospital, crèches, kindergartens and factories he was permitted to visit were by no means closed to other diplomats. Indeed, he was afforded the standard itinerary and the usual symbols of the economic and social gains of communism that were paraded before foreigners.170 The darker aspects of Stalin’s Russia were not available for foreign consumption. Crawford’s brief reports on these visits were complimentary. The hospital was described as typically clean. Its most impressive feature was the egalitarian treatment of patients: according to Crawford, no distinction was made between privates or generals or different nationalities. Accompanying the Australian correspondent, Homer Smith, Crawford visited a small needlework factory. Smith, under the nom de plume of Chatwood Hall, had been Kuibyshev correspondent of the Australian trade union newspapers, Common Cause and Railroad. The staff consisted mainly of women between the ages of 16 and 45 (the director was male), belonged to a trade union, worked in light and spacious conditions, and ate a three-course meal in an attractive dining room. Despite the presence of the union, the women were forced to work eleven hours a day, six days a week and, when too exhausted, were forced home to rest.171 None of these inconsistencies appeared to raise Crawford’s curiosity, let alone his sense of injustice; nor did he
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note the similarity with the conditions of the American working-class and African Americans that he had condemned so strongly. Crawford remarked that he would get Slater included on these tours.172 The Minister, it appeared, needed little encouragement, and Crawford began to report less kindly that he was ‘handicapped’ by Slater’s insistence on being involved in everything.173 As the head of the Legation, Slater had every right to be involved, though Crawford’s complaint that the Minister’s mere presence made every visit more official and difficult might have been valid. Even without Slater, the occasions were invariably formal and contrived. The highest ranking Russian official that Crawford met was V. M. Molotov who he described as ‘humourless’.174 On Crawford’s visit to the University of Moscow, a campus still damaged by German artillery, he had an audience with Professor Shaskin, head of the History Department, Professor Apariorov, head of the Arts Faculty, two students and an interpreter. Undaunted by the language barrier, Crawford discussed his methodological perspective, the prevailing influence of Marxist theory and the problem of freedom — issues that gave him a ‘special interest’ in the Soviet Union. History was only justified, he insisted, if it made us a little wiser in the present; history must think, understand and explain. Shaskin, apparently closer to Ernest Scott’s thinking, shied away from Crawford’s metaphysics, but everyone provided ‘suitable replies’.175 Crawford’s exuberance began to diminish as he was swamped by constant meetings, repetitive tasks and endless phone calls (it took him five hours to contact one official). A particular disappointment was the cancellation of a ‘lovely little’ ABC broadcast to Australia. The Soviet authorities informed him that all diplomatic representatives were forbidden to broadcast, a major handicap when he was responsible for publicity. His account of life in Russia, apparently written as ‘a birthday message’ for Dorothy and an opportunity to talk to Fitzpatrick from ‘across the world’, was an innocuous piece. In a fit of frustration, Crawford considered sending the script to Fitzpatrick, who could relay it to the ABC. The Department of External Affairs had already approved it and Crawford, somewhat naively, did not think the Russians would be perturbed by such an act of disobedience. In a more pragmatic mood, he did not think it seemed ‘quite open to broadcast—per diplomatic bag—by proxy’.176
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Summoned to the Press Department, Crawford was confronted with the full force of Soviet bureaucracy. In a clever tactic, the head of the Department, Pulgunov, exuding a ‘suave and uncooperative manner’, communicated in French. Crawford offered three arguments in his defence: the Australian government was bound to feel hurt; he was a professor of ‘high standing’ in Australia and his opinions had far greater credibility than newspaper correspondents; and he was ‘politically friendly’ to the Soviet Union and would improve understanding. On a more personal level, Crawford was particularly affronted because his essay would be put to no use. His request to broadcast was denied and Pulgonov, with transparent charm, explained that Geoffrey Blunden, an English representative, was allowed to broadcast as ‘a privilege and as something exceptional’.177 This bureaucratic entanglement and overt example of favouritism caused Crawford to view the USSR more cynically. He began to enquire about the Soviet press, individual departments and sympathies. It appeared he had been somewhat indolent in his press duties. At the time of his appointment, he had received a report on the publicity services and the necessity to ascertain conditions in the USSR before specific plans could be made.178 Six months later in April 1943, John Fisher, who was the Legation’s Press Attaché, insisted that the onus was on Crawford to make the contact with editors, important journalists and prominent personnel.179 Crawford had begun to recognise the corruption and arbitrary inconsistencies of the system. He would later lament that neither Fisher not the Industrial attaché, Duncan, could have an ‘effective function’ in a country where both the press and opinions were controlled. ‘A controlled press gave no opportunities for news releases’, he contended. Meanwhile, Slater gave cause for concern. Crawford admitted to Kathleen Fitzpatrick that the Minister was psychologically ill and attributed it to a catalogue of personal grievances: the galling inactivity, wartime monotony, the isolation and the treason trials, which bred a distrust of foreigners. More diplomatically, Officer described Slater as being ‘far from well—very homesick’.180 Slater oscillated between dark depression and manic cheerfulness, and his condition began to affect the morale and efficiency of the Legation. Crawford received no assistance over the broadcast and Duncan, who had the unenviable task of ‘wet nurse’, complained that he too ‘would be
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driven to the madhouse’. The compassion for Slater expressed in Crawford’s letters masked a growing frustration. His diary allowed him a more private opportunity to complain about Slater’s obsessive concern for his physical health, silly arguments and exaggerated selfishness.181 After Slater’s third consultation, Crawford agreed that if Slater did not leave, a ‘good man will be ruined’.182 In Canberra, H. V. Evatt suspected a conspiracy and sent a coded, confidential, telegram to Crawford in April 1943 inquiring about the situation. This was, in Crawford’s opinion, instigated by Fisher, who had written independently to Evatt inviting him to visit the Legation. This was allegedly done without informing the chief of the legation, and was, in Crawford’s opinion, against the rules.183 ‘I hear good reports of you’, Evatt wrote to Crawford, ‘co-operate with Slater.’184 Fisher had been given strict instructions to decode the telegram, which suggested that Evatt suspected Officer and Heydon, the two career diplomats, of playing a role in the debacle. Crawford vigorously denied sabotage and reported back to Evatt that the Legation was working cohesively and that he himself ‘was well and interested in the work and fully intend to stay my term here’.185 Crawford maintained that he wrote the report ‘independently’ and ‘unwillingly’, because the ‘instruction was a vote of no-confidence in the chargé d’affaires, in that round-about way that Evatt had in common with Phillip II of Spain’.186 It was an unenviable position. Having written it, he showed it to Officer and Heydon and invited comment.187 Crawford later admitted he did not like Evatt much because he was always telling him what to do.188 In late April 1943, Slater was sent home. Relations between Officer and Crawford had improved with a mutual appreciation of each other’s talents. Slater’s breakdown consolidated their relationship, and Crawford confessed to Fitzpatrick that Officer had ‘behaved well’, allowed him ‘a free hand’ and did not attempt to hasten his own promotion to ‘chargé d’affaires’. More pertinently, in Crawford’s opinion, Officer had ‘got over the former distrust of the intellectual’. Crawford’s later assessment was still critical as he described Officer as ‘not particularly imaginative and sometimes irascible’, but was an ‘experienced man’.189 Nevertheless, the assurance to Evatt that the staff were unified was an exaggeration. In a series of letters to Fitzpatrick, Crawford
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gave an unflattering inventory of his colleagues. Heydon was described as ‘talkative and very, very Tory’; Miss Saxby was ‘just a warped spinster who needs a sense of grievance’ and was inclined to ‘distil her little drops of poison in our minds’; John Fisher was ‘completely inadequate’ and ‘distressingly inefficient’. The resentment of Fisher emerged when the press attaché, who had established an international reputation as a political correspondent and ABC broadcaster in Moscow before joining the Legation, corrected Crawford’s unsent broadcast. Much to Crawford’s chagrin, Fisher had injected his ‘own cliché-ridden journalese’ and a tribute to Stalin. Crawford had ‘great respect’ for the Soviet leader, but insisted that such a gratuitous inclusion would make the sincerity of his talk suspect.190 Crawford’s opinion of Fisher continued to be contradictory. In a letter written in 1984, he contended that the appointments of Saxby and Fisher gained Australia ‘some measure of distrust in the diplomatic community’, and they probably restricted a great deal of information to Officer and Heydon.191 Part of the suspicion was attributed to the recruitment of Saxby and Fisher, who were already living in Russia and given no instruction.192 Despite Fisher’s existing life in Russia, Crawford insisted that he was ‘very inexperienced, very naïve and inevitably a passenger in the Legation’, who could not ‘read and analyse the Russian language press’.193 The suspicions of sabotage were so heightened that rumours swirled about a ‘connection’ between John Fisher and Soviet intelligence. Resolutely diplomatic, Crawford contended that ‘it could have been the result of naiveté rather than any wish to be used as an agent. In any case he would have had very little but his opinions to give.’ Nor did Crawford ever think that there was anything secret or vital in Officer’s dispatches. ‘Of course, he (Fisher) like every member of the Legation was bound by his oath to observe the official secrets provisions; whether he really understood them, I do not know.’194 Despite these domestic troubles, life in Kuibyshev continued. The summer weather eased the claustrophobic atmosphere, and Crawford’s routine involved an increasingly spartan diet, a robust exercise program of rowing and swimming in the Volga River, and language classes. He assured his wife that Slater’s stories of hardship would be exaggerated, although illness and dysentery did interrupt his work and he lost four and a half kilos in two weeks. The echo of
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anti-aircraft guns could be heard, and there was an attempt to bomb the town. Crawford was not completely immersed in his diplomatic work; he allowed his anxieties about his family’s financial situation, an intense loyalty to Fitzpatrick and University politics to intrude. Sensing an ‘artificial brightness’ in her letters, Crawford scolded Fitzpatrick and expressed concern that ‘a good historian and teacher’ was taken away from her true vocation because of the war.195 When Crawford received news that Jessie Webb was away on sick leave, he sent two letters to the Vice-Chancellor. The first was to convey his best wishes to Webb for a quick recovery; the second expressed his outrage that Fitzpatrick had not been promoted to acting-head of the Department in Webb’s absence. ‘Our most growing days are still to come’, he promised Fitzpatrick, to buoy her spirits.196 ‘Seven months there, seven months to go.’197 Crawford began to calculate the months ahead. The nature of his work changed when the Australian Legation took over the protection of Polish interests. The Australian contingent was depleted with Slater sent home and Duncan, his escort, stranded in Teheran, while Officer and Heydon were absent in Moscow. Responsibility fell largely on Crawford’s shoulders as he distributed relief to Polish refugees, interviewed the displaced people (many of whom were sick, emotionally fragile and starving), and counted furniture and cars.198 The Australian goods did in fact reach the displaced Polish in Russia. Ian Crawford recalled a Polish friend in Perth who remembered receiving blankets during the war with ‘made in Australia’ on them.199 The tasks were more appropriate for a skilled linguist in Russian and Polish than an Australian historian. Crawford’s letters document the enormous pressures of this depressing work as his emotions wavered between pity and contempt for those who demanded particular privileges. Crawford was never quite defeated and looked forward to returning to his ‘proper work’; indeed, he considered he was ‘growing as an historian’. He managed to avoid becoming emotionally involved. Despite the grim stories of atrocities and suffering, he remained spellbound by the USSR. The fascination endured because the diplomatic post seemed to reinforce his historical thinking. Although he insisted that revolution was Russia’s only hope, he was by no means a complete convert. He assured Fitzpatrick: ‘Don’t think, I
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could ever become a member of the Communist Party after this experience’.200 Crawford remained a devout sympathiser, but not a confirmed Communist; an admirer of Stalin’s regime, but not an apologist. Perhaps the reason for this distinction was his aversion to full commitment to a political party. With the exception of the Australian Council for Civil Liberties, at this point in his life he was not a joiner. A correspondent for Smiths Weekly had commented at the time of his appointment to the mission on Crawford’s refusal to align himself outwardly with any ‘leftist movement’ and his inclination to speak on behalf of them.201 An unexpected instruction that all embassies were to return to Moscow gave Crawford encouragement. The logistics of packing the Australian and Polish goods and furniture in three days were left to him, but by September, the Australians were settled at the National Hotel in the Soviet capital. These were impressive lodgings; the hotel was opposite Red Square, St. Basil’s Church, Lenin’s Tomb and the Kremlin. With the promise of some stability, Crawford began to implement his longstanding plans. He intended to write two books, the first to appear once he was out of service, the second—a more ‘solid’, scholarly study—would be completed at greater leisure. Both books would attempt to capture the ‘life of the ordinary human beings building socialism’. Duncan had returned from the United States with the news that he had been approached by a publishing company offering 1000 dollars as an advance on a book they assumed Crawford would be writing. Sensing the urgency, he hoped that his book would ‘counter the distrust’ of Russia (he remained ignorant of the publisher’s name because Duncan had forgot it or failed to ask). ‘This book’, Crawford explained to Fitzpatrick, ‘rather than any normal diplomatic work I do while here will be my justification for coming away’.202 In a hand-written draft, Crawford sketched the themes and aims of the proposed second book. The emphasis was largely on the postrevolutionary period in Russia, and the chapter structure was organised into topics that included reconstruction, industry, agriculture, housing, food and clothing, social services, education, the academy of sciences and the Socialist state, the theatre, the cinema, Soviet patriotism and freedom in the Soviet Union. Crawford articulated
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three objectives in the outline: to analyse the promise and the actual achievement of the Soviet system, to depict the effect of war on the general population, and to comprehend their true standard of living. The theme of freedom—its historical development, present meaning and actuality in Russia—was central. The embryonic plan was also an attempt to grasp something positive as the heavy workload began to take a toll on Crawford’s health. A cold had developed into bronchitis, and his controlled demeanour began to crack. In a letter to Fitzpatrick, he responded angrily to her difficulties and the ‘whispering campaign’ that followed her work in Shepparton. He confessed that he was ‘really ill’.203 Indeed, the bronchitis developed into pneumonia (the doctor’s suspected tuberculosis) and on medical advice, a fragile and exhausted Crawford was sent to Cairo in September to recuperate. Three months elapsed before Crawford finally returned to the Soviet Union. After Cairo he was sent to Tel Aviv, then Turkey and back to Teheran. His days had been occupied with medical tests, sleeping and reading Australian novels and pulp detective books. It was the first complete break from work since Oxford, and Crawford confessed that after the ‘Moscow nightmare’, he would be relieved if he were unable to return, although the books were in their infancy.204 Teheran provided the usual obstacles and Crawford had to endure a two-week delay. His health was so fragile that he could not muster any curiosity about the Teheran Conference or his travelling companion, the powerbroker and diplomat, Averill Harriman. Even so, Crawford would dine out in Melbourne on the story of having seen both Stalin and Roosevelt surrounded by guards, in contrast to an exuberant Churchill, who waved his cigar to the crowds.205 Within two weeks of his return to Moscow, Crawford was confined to the Embassy with another ‘wretched cold’. Dr Wallace informed him it would be dangerous to stay, and it was decided that he must return home. Crawford expressed anger to Dorothy. He anticipated a battle with the Department about his salary and considered that his ill-health was its responsibility as well as the fault of the Polish work.206 The mood in Crawford’s letters to Fitzpatrick is more difficult to decipher as they are introspective and ambivalent. He veered from excitement at the prospect of returning home, to disappointment in leaving just as the work was becoming ‘interesting and fruitful’. As a
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concession, he intended to return the following summer to complete the research.207 So, despite the expectation that surrounded Max Crawford’s journey, it was ultimately anti-climatic. Two of the more inexperienced members of the Legation failed to survive a year of their overseas posting, which vindicated Keith Officer’s misgivings and punctured Crawford’s confidence. Crawford emerged as strongly supportive of the Russian people and an advocate of their culture, with a clear, if simplistic and idealised interpretation of life in Russia. His progressive liberalism was reinforced. But if the appointment was intended to distinguish him as an international historian, it failed. Notes 1
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 5 July 1940, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
2
Brian Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 13 September 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
3
ACCL Minutes, 18 September 1939, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
4
Herbert Burton to Crawford, 15 September 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
5
ACCL Memo, 18 September 1939, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
6
Ibid.
7
Vance Palmer to Brian Fitzpatrick, 24 September 1939, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
8
Brian Fitzpatrick to Herbert Burton, 11 October 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
9
Vance Palmer to Brian Fitzpatrick, 24 September 1939, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
10
Crawford to Mollie Baynes, 21 September 1939, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
11
‘New No-Hate Movement Launched’ in the Herald, 7 August 1939. The Movement was reported on by a series of newspapers at the time. A spokesman insisted it was not a pacifist group, but one that urged a ‘formulation of a just peace’.
12
Watson, Brian Fitzpatrick: A Radical Life, 103.
13
Robert Menzies in the House of Representatives, 6 September 1939. Reported in Civil Liberty, Vol. 2, No. 2, October 1939, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
14
Brett, Robert Menzies’ The Forgotten People, 75.
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15
Watson, Brian Fitzpatrick: A Radical Life, 104.
16
Ibid., 103
17
Civil Liberty, Vol 3, No3, February 1940, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
18
Crawford to Brian Fitzpatrick, 16 January 1940, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
19
ACCL Memorandum, 22 December 1939, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
20
ACCL Urgent Notice, 13 February 1939, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
21
ACCL Minutes, 1 April 1940, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
22
Brian Fitzpatrick to Paul Dane, 16 May 1940, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
23
R. M. Crawford’s statement for Special Meeting of the Professorial Board, 24 May 1940, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
24
Letter to the Editor of the Argus, 14 May 1940.
25
Serle, Sir John Medley: A Memoir, 25.
26
Sydney Sutherland to John Medley, 20 May 1940, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
27
Special Meeting of the Professorial Board, 21 May 1940, Professorial Papers, UMA.
28
K. H. Bailey to the Professorial Board, 24 May 1940, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
29
Crawford to Harriet Crawford, 5 July 1940, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
30
Crawford to John Medley, date unknown, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
31
Confidential Memo: Communication to the Press and Public by John Medley, 26 June 1940, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
32
Special Meeting of the Professorial Board, 21 May 1940, Professorial Papers, UMA.
33
Proposed letter of disclaimer by K. H. Bailey, date unknown, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
34
K. H. Bailey to the Professorial Committee, 29 May 1940, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
35
To the Editor of the Argus, 24 May 1940. The letter was published on the following day.
36
Ibid.
37
Poynter and Rasmussen, A Place Apart, 63 and 82-3. See Appendix 1 for Medley’s poem, ‘The Scarlet Letter, May 1940’.
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38
Maurice Blackburn to Brian Fitzpatrick, 26 May 1940, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA. Blackburn was appointed President of the Council on 31 May 1940.
39
Report to Members of the Professorial Board concerning proposed communication to the press by K. H. Bailey, 27 May 1940, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
40
Gollan, Revolutionaries and Reformists, 96.
41
Ibid.
42
Notes for an address to MULC, circa June 1940, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
43
James Barrett to Kenneth Bailey, 12 June 1940, James Barrett Papers, UMA.
44
Extract from University Council Minutes, 3 and 13 June 1940, Council Papers.
45
Ibid.
46
Schrecker, No Ivory Tower: McCarthyism and the Universities, 63. See Chapter 4 ‘Conduct Unbecoming: The Political Repression of Academic Radicals, 1932-1942’.
47
Kenneth Bailey to James Barrett, 12 June 1940, James Barrett Papers, UMA.
48
Ibid.
49
Draft Report of Committee, 10 June 1940, James Barrett Papers, UMA.
50
Crawford, Historical Studies (1971), 41. Louis Halphen was a French historian.
51
Watson, Brian Fitzpatrick: A Radical Life,111.
52
Ibid., 111-3.
53
Ibid.
54
Ibid.
55
ACCL memo, 9 July 1941, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
56
Maurice Blackburn, ‘Mr Blackburn states his view’, Herald, 24 July 1941.
57
‘Mr Menzies’ Comments’, Herald, 24 July 1941. Both men were freed after the election of Curtin’s Labor government.
58
R. M. Crawford ‘The Internment of Horace Ratcliff and Max Thomas’, ACCL, date unknown, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
59
Ibid.
60
Ibid.
61
Bolton, The Oxford History of Australia, Vol 5, 11.
62
ACCL Minutes, 3 February 1941, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA. Trikojus claimed that he was imprisoned because of his pre-war statements on Germany and his association with Germans. He was imprisoned for three months and his appeal was supported by the Vice Chancellor and Professor of the Faculty of Medicine. The Appeals Tribunal
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released Trikojus on the condition that he report to the police on a fortnightly basis and surrender the chairmanship of the drug committee. In 1944 Trikojus was appointed to the Chair of Biochemistry in Melbourne. His legal action against the Commonwealth was unsuccessful. W. F. Connell, G. E. Sherington, B. H. Fletcher, C. Turney, U. Bygott, Australia’s First: A History of the University of Sydney, Volume 2, 1940-1990 (Sydney: Hale & Iremonger, 1990), 12-3. 63
ACCL Minutes, 3 March 1941, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
64
ACCL Minutes 2 February and 2 March 1942, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA. A policy allowing the gradual release of refugees was adopted on 23 January 1941.
65
Interview with Laurie O’Brien, 2001.
66
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 35.
67
Ibid.
68
G. L. Wood to Crawford, 15 May 1940, History Department Papers, UMA.
69
G. L. Wood to John Medley, History Department Papers, UMA.
70
Crawford to Frank Johnston, 26 May 1942, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
71
Amy Cryan to Crawford, 29 March 1941, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
72
Crawford to Amy Cryan, 1 April 1941, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
73
Frederic Eggleston to Crawford, 6 April 1941, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
74
Macintyre, ed., Making History, 11.
75
Gregory, Jack. ‘Max Crawford and Ourselves and the Pacific’, in Max Crawford’s School of History, 67.
76
R. M. Crawford, Ourselves and the Pacific (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1941).
77
Mary Lazarus to Crawford, 1 December 1941, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. He also received letters from Melbourne Grammar, Brighton Grammar and other schools.
78
Brian Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 6 March 1941, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
79
Ibid.
80
Crawford, Ourselves and the Pacific, Preface.
81
Macintyre and McPhee, eds., Max Crawford’s School of History, 51. Ourselves and the Pacific may also have galvanised Crawford’s support for an archives department at the State Library. See his letter to the Editor of the Argus, 12 August 1940, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
82
R. M. Crawford Reviews An Autobiography by R. G. Collingwood, Historical Studies, Vol 2, No 3 (April 1941), 212.
War and Diplomacy
145
83
Australian Vice-Chancellors Committee, 20 January 1942, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
84
Crawford to John Medley, 9 February 1942, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
85
Crawford to John Medley, 11 February 1942, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
86
Crawford to C. H. Foott, 27 February 1942, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
87
John Pomeroy, ‘Morale on the Homefront on Australia During the Second World War’ (PhD thesis, University of Sydney, 1996), 203.
88
John Curtin to Frank Beaurepaire, 3 July 1942, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
89
A. K. Stout was the Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sydney; Julius Stone was the Professor of Law at the University of Sydney; R. D. Wright was Professor of Physiology at the University of Melbourne; Ian Hogbin was a Lecturer in Anthropology at the University of Sydney; Justice E. D. Roper was from the Supreme Court of New South Wales; Keith Barry represented the ABC and Sid Deamer was the Editor of ABC Weekly. Pomeroy, ‘Morale on the Homefront on Australia During the Second World War’, 203.
90
Ibid.
91
Lord Mayor’s Committee for Morale—Basic Ideas, date unknown, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. For biographical information on Conlon, see Peter Ryan, ‘Alfred Conlon’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, 479; Pomeroy, ‘Morale on the Homefront on Australia During the Second World War’ and Pansy: A Life of Roy Douglas Wright (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1999).
92
Notes of meeting of the Prime Minister’s Committee on National Morale, 26 June 1942, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford advocated that Group Officer Stephenson, a graduate of the University of Melbourne and Director of the WAAF, who impressed him by her wisdom, ‘directness and realism’, should join the Committee.
93
Notes of meeting of the Prime Minister’s Committee on National Morale, 18 July 1942, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
94
Pomeroy, ‘Morale on the Homefront on Australia During the Second World War’, 215.
95
Ibid., 231.
96
Proposals for alteration in history course, circa 1942, History Department Papers, UMA.
97
R. M. Crawford, ‘Aims and methods of Study of History in a University’, circa 1942, History Department Papers, UMA.
98
Crawford to John Medley, 1 October 1941, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The request was successful.
146
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99
Crawford to H.V. Evatt, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
100
Diary, September 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
101
William Slater was born in 1890 and educated at the University of Melbourne. After war service as a field ambulance driver in France, he returned to Melbourne and was elected MLA for Dundas in 1917. Slater graduated in Law and was admitted to the Bar in 1922. He was Attorney General in the Prendergast Ministry of 1924, Attorney-General, SolicitorGeneral and Minister of Agriculture during Hogan’s term of office from 1929 to 1932, and Speaker of the Victorian Legislative Assembly from 1940 to 1942. Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. See also Helen Slater and David Widdowson, eds., The War Diaries of William Slater (Melbourne: Astrovisuals, 2000).
102
Diary 20 September 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
103
Diary, 21 September 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
104
‘He’ll fight for civil liberty’, Smiths Weekly, 7 November 1942.
105
Crawford to Warwick Powell, 22 August 1984, Box 67, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
106
Ibid.
107
Diary, 21 September 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
108
Ibid.
109
Ian Milner to Crawford, September 1942, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Ian Milner was a graduate of Canterbury University with an MA with First Class Honours, Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, where he completed a B.A. in Politics, Philosophy and Economics; he joined the Communist Party and worked under the Commonwealth Fellowship at the University of California and at Columbia University. Despite these impressive qualifications, he was rejected when he returned in 1939 and applied to the External Affairs Department. Milner finally found a job with the Council for Education until 1940, when he received a letter from the Professor of Political Science at Melbourne University, Macmahon Ball, who suggested that he apply for a lectureship. After Milner’s appointment and on arrival in Melbourne, his Australian security file was opened. Robert Hall, The Rhodes Scholar Spy (Sydney: Random House Australia, 1991). See also Vincent O’Sullivan, ed., Intersecting Lines: The Memoir of Ian Milner (Wellington: Victoria University Press, 1993) and Phillip Deery, ‘Cold War Victim or Rhodes Scholar Spy: Revisiting the Case of Ian Milner’, Overland, 147 (1997): 9-12.
110
Diary, 24 November 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
111
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 19 October 1942, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
112
Poynter and Rasmussen, A Place Apart, 65-6. Some of these government commitments were on a full-time basis and others were part-time.
113
Diary 20, September 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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114
David Rivett to Sir James Barrett, 9 September 1936, James Barrett Papers, UMA.
115
David Rivett to Crawford, 29 October 1942, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
116
Interview with Betty Hayes, 1996.
117
‘He’ll fight for civil liberty’, Smiths Weekly, 7 November 1942.
118
Diary, 21 November 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
119
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2004.
120
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, date unknown, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
121
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 3 February 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
122
Ibid.
123
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 8 November and 4 December 1942, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
124
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2004.
125
Ibid.
126
Ibid.
127
Frank Keith Officer was born in 1889 and educated at Melbourne Grammar School and the University of Melbourne, where he graduated in Law and was Associate to Justice Higgins. After distinguished service in World War One, he returned to Australia and began his climb in the Diplomatic Corps as the Political Officer in Northern Nigeria, Private Secretary to Sir Hugh Clifford, the Governor of Nigeria, Adviser in the Department of External Affairs in Canberra from 1927 to 1933, Commonwealth External Affairs Officer in London until 1937, Australian Counsellor at the British Embassy in Washington and in Japan until the bombing at Pearl Harbour. With the declaration of war and under the diplomatic exchange system, Officer returned to Australia.
128
Although seven years Crawford’s junior, Peter Heydon’s early life was not dissimilar. Educated at Fort Street High School and the University of Sydney, where he graduated in Law, he was admitted to the NSW Bar in 1936. Heydon then joined the Department of External Affairs and worked as a Private Secretary for the Minister, Sir George Pearce, for Robert Menzies when attached to the Trade delegation to London in 1936 and for S. M. Bruce on his Australian visit in 1939. In the following year, Heydon was appointed Second Secretary in the Australian Legation in Washington.
129
Keith Officer Diary, 15 October 1942, MS 2629/2/62-196, Keith Officer Papers, NLA.
130
Diary, 5 November 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA
131
Ibid.
132
Keith Officer Diary, MS 2629/2/62-196, Keith Officer Papers, NLA.
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133
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 8 November 1942, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
134
Diary, 6 November 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
135
Slater was also impressed and described Meyer as an ‘adamant liberal’. Slater and Widdowson, eds., The War Diaries of William Slater, 104.
136
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 8 November 1942, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
137
Diary, 7 November 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
138
Diary 7 November, 8 November and 17 November, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
139
Diary, 13 November 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
140
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 8 November 1942, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
141
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 29 November 1942, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
142
Diary 17 November 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
143
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 4 December 1942, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
144
Schrecker, No Ivory Tower,151.
145
Diary, 17 November 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
146
Diary, 30 November 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
147
Diary, 14 November 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
148
Diary, 15 November 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
149
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 16 November 1942, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
150
Diary, 1 December 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
151
Ibid.
152
Diary, 1 December 1942, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
153
Ibid.
154
John Barber and Mark Harrison, A Social and Economic History of the U.S.S.R. in World War Two (Longman: London, 1991), 25.
155
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 3 February 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
156
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 5 March 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
157
The largest concentration of deaths from starvation was in Leningrad, where around 1 million people, approximately 40 per cent of the pre-war population, died of hunger and hunger-related causes during the winter of 1941 to 1942. Barber and Harrison, A Social and Economic History of the USSR in World War Two, 97.
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158
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 5 March 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
159
Diary, 6 February 1943, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
160
Diary, 7 February 1943, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
161
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 3 February 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
162
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, March 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
163
Diary, 11 February 1943, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
164
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 3 February 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
165
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, March 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
166
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 20 May 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. This possibly did not extend to a discussion about the series of purges inflicted on the intelligentsia by Stalin’s regime.
167
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 7 February 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
168
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 14 March 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
169
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 21 March 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
170
R. M. Crawford, ‘Visit to Military Hospital at Kuibyshev’, 13 March 1943, Box 13, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
171
R. M. Crawford, ‘Visit to Needlecraft Factory at Kuibyshev’, 26 February 1943, Box 13, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
172
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 14 March 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
173
Diary 21 March 1943, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
174
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2004.
175
Diary 18 April 1943, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The meeting was reported on in the article, ‘Moscow Strikes Back’, Farrago, 5 October 1943.
176
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 20 April 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
177
Diary 12 April 1943, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
178
Publicity Services in Relation to the U.S.S.R., 31 October 1942, Box 13, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
179
John Fisher to R. M. Crawford, April 1943, Box 13, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
180
Keith Officer Diary, 22 March 1943, 15 October 1942, MS 2629/2/62-196, Keith Officer Papers, NLA.
150
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181
Diary, 3 April 1943, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
182
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 2 April 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
183
Crawford to Warwick Powell, 22 August 1984, Box 67, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
184
H. V. Evatt to Crawford, 25 April 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
185
Copy of a telegram from R. M. Crawford to H. V. Evatt, 27 April 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
186
Crawford to Warwick Powell, 22 August 1984, Box 67, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
187
Ibid.
188
Interview with Ken Crawford, 2001.
189
Crawford to Warwick Powell, 22 August 1984, Box 67, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA
190
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 2 April and 18 June 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
191
Crawford to Warwick Powell, 22 August 1984, Box 67, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
192
Ibid.
193
Ibid.
194
Ibid.
195
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 20 May 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
196
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 18 June 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
197
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 31 May 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
198
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 13 August 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
199
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2004.
200
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 18 June 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA
201
‘He’ll Fight for Civil Liberty’, Smiths Weekly, 7 November 1942.
202
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 2 September 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
203
Ibid.
204
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 23 September and 8 October 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
205
Interview with Ken Crawford, 2001.
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206
Crawford to Dorothy Crawford, 12 December 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The Department had failed to pay Crawford’s full salary until he had reached Kuibyshev.
207
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 12 December 1943, Box 11, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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Chapter 4
Brave New World
The Homecoming In a brief announcement, the press noted Max Crawford’s return to Australia on 18 January 1944. The Argus and The Age both reported that he had returned because of poor health and would possibly be unable to resume his Moscow appointment.1 The information was vague. W. R. Hodgson, the Secretary of External Affairs, had instructed Crawford to refrain from making a statement to the press.2 The Government was possibly still particularly defensive about the Moscow post, the controversy surrounding Slater’s breakdown and the difficulties that arose with his eventual replacement, J. J. Maloney. There was little chance that Crawford would return. He had written in veiled terms to both Kathleen Fitzpatrick and Peter Heydon that the prospect of working in Russia was no longer appealing. When Crawford finally arrived back in Melbourne, he immediately consulted numerous medical specialists. The concern about his precarious health was confirmed when both Pansy Wright and the head of the Tuberculosis Bureau, Bell Ferguson, were emphatic that it ‘was sheer foolishness’ for him to return to Russia.3 So with ‘considerable disappointment’ and a medical certificate as required evidence, Crawford tendered his resignation on 10 February 1944.4 Evatt replied
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that on the basis of the certificate, the Department was obliged to accept Crawford’s decision with ‘regret’ and ‘great appreciation’ for his valuable work. Evatt also requested that if the need arose, he would call upon Crawford’s ‘advice and experience’.5 The Vice-Chancellor was informed of Crawford’s resumption of University duties in an uncharacteristically assertive letter. Although frail and severely underweight, Crawford insisted that he was able to do his ‘normal job’, but was incapable of resuming the herculean administrative task at the sacrifice of his own research and scholarship. He also noted the ‘absurdity of supervising the original work of graduate students at the expense of being able to do any himself’.6 Crawford discovered on his return that the University had undergone astounding changes. With Jessie Webb’s death in 1944, Fitzpatrick had been forced to accept an even heavier workload.7 One of the most important matters Crawford took up on his early return to the Department was the proposed Chair of Australian history. Rumours had circulated for some time that the next senior appointment would go to History. In a letter to the Vice-Chancellor, Crawford wrote that he had considered the prospect seriously, but felt the money should be used in ‘different ways’, and such an ‘expensive luxury’ was not what they presently needed.8 He offered two reasons for his decision. The first, he claimed, was democratically inspired. ‘Nearly all of us on the History staff’, he contended, ‘are interested in doing some work in Australian history’. The separate Chair would exclude everyone else from ‘serious Australian historical research’. The other reason was more pragmatic. As Crawford would remain the Professor of History ‘in general’, he believed that he would retain the heavier administrative duties.9 The letter to the Vice-Chancellor was also a blueprint of Crawford’s ambitions for the History School. Although he maintained that his apparent lack of enthusiasm did not arise from a desire to monopolise the Department, he was unwilling to relinquish control at the ‘developing stage’ until he had achieved ‘a unity of policy’.10 He therefore proposed that the funds for the Chair should be used to enable an equivalent expansion of lecturing staff. In Crawford’s opinion, this was fundamental to build a strong research school, expand its theoretical work, and develop Australian and Pacific history and other studies, notably oriental history and archaeology.11 It
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was also hinted that Crawford intended to lecture in Russian history as a component of his general theme of freedom. The advancement of Australian history had been a recurring dilemma and, at the time of the letter to Medley, a new course in Australasian history had been devised. Despite ill health, Crawford displayed tenacity and determination to achieve all of his objectives. Within six months in September 1944, he again wrote to Medley and informed him of the lectureship in Australian history, which would allow Manning Clark to transfer from Political Science to History, in addition to two other existing tutorships. In Crawford’s opinion, Clark shared his interest in the study of Australian history ‘through its literature as well as its more commonly used documents’.12 It is evident that Kathleen Fitzpatrick was not, at this juncture, a contender for the proposed second Chair, despite her research credentials, departmental responsibilities, additional teaching load and the fact that she, in effect, had acted as head in Crawford’s absence. This did not suggest that Crawford lacked confidence in her ability. Several years later, he compared Fitzpatrick to prominent Australian historians such as Arnold Wood, Keith Hancock and Edward Shann.13 There was no secret about Crawford’s admiration for Clark. He wanted his prized pupil back where he considered he belonged, but not in an autonomous Chair. ‘I believe that he has the makings of a very distinguished historian’, Crawford informed Medley. ‘Recent experience has made it clear that we will not get anybody approaching his quality for such a position.’14 Clark was the first of his favoured sons, and Crawford bestowed on him the professional support, paternal kindness and generous encouragement of ambition he himself had enjoyed as an emerging historian. Clark, however, did not display the blind loyalty that Crawford had held for his mentors and would remain somewhat ambivalent about his patron’s qualities. Crawford corresponded with Macmahon Ball regarding Clark’s future in Political Science and informed Ball of his intention to offer Clark the lectureship in Australian history. In his memoirs, Clark recalled ‘this unexpected turn in fortune’s wheel’. ‘Max Crawford...gave me the chance to discover whether I had anything to say.’ Clark wrote. ‘He knew history was my true love, and the department needed a teacher to give his or her all to the teaching of Australian history.’15
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155
Macmahon Ball was annoyed by the conflict between the Departments when both wanted a ‘particular man’.16 He proposed that a procedure be devised lest a similar situation arise in the future. Ball also enquired if a higher salary and status had been offered for Clark’s apparent promotion. Ball had good reason to feel aggrieved about the poaching of Manning Clark, for Crawford had slightly manipulated the situation. At the first sign of a vacancy at the University in 1944, he had ensured that Clark escaped school teaching and was appointed temporary lecturer in Political Science during Ball’s wartime secondment overseas. Crawford regarded this as a temporary arrangement, pending a vacancy in History. He was also, as Clark’s recollections attest, responding to Clark’s own aspirations. Any ill will between the two heads was concealed from the Vice-Chancellor, and Crawford assured Medley that Ball was ‘ready to support it as he thinks that this will be a promising field for Clark’.17 The Unofficial Expert on Russia According to the copious notes and the plans Crawford compiled, the original work that he emphasised to Medley on his return from the Soviet Union would be based entirely on the Russian themes that had enthralled him during his diplomatic post. Crawford’s emphasis on the people, their artistic endeavour, living conditions, education, cultural achievements and freedom were largely neglected historical topics. It was his intention that the first book would be published quickly and would be a commercial, accessible account. The second book would be a more conventional, scholarly work that would establish him as an academic authority on the Soviet Union.18 Neither book ever appeared, and the notes were instead converted into articles and addresses. Lack of time, enduring ill health, faltering motivation, and a prevailing sense of inadequacy about writing were the causes of their non-appearance. ‘I am sorry it has taken so long’, Crawford explained to A. McDonald in a letter accompanying a late article, ‘but I have too many things to do and in any case I have not found it easy to write. I am not a bit satisfied with it’.19 In late March 1944, the Friendship with Russia League requested a lengthy article on his Soviet experiences for the May issue of its journal. Crawford refused with apologies, citing ‘doctor’s orders’, but
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assured the Secretary that, depending on medical advice, he would reconsider the request later in the year.20 The first article that Crawford produced was published in The Retired Rail and Tramwayman, a journal that was edited by his father. Entitled ‘In Russia in Wartime’, it recycled the talk he had prepared for the ABC in Kuibychev, which had not been presented because of the rule prohibiting diplomatic representatives from broadcasting. Virtually identical in content to that script, with the addition of hastily completed references to the Teheran Conference, it retained Crawford’s cheerful optimism and admiration for the Russian people and their achievements. He recalled the view of Red Square, the inspiring singing, the contours and colours of the countryside and the feeling that he was ‘somehow at home’.21 Another article was presented in June 1944 when Crawford addressed the Melbourne branch of the Australian Institute of International Affairs on ‘Russia in the Post-war World’. Although the members could use the information, they were not permitted to divulge the source or indicate that the information was obtained at a meeting of the Institute. Despite the restrictions, Crawford did not consult confidential sources, but instead offered his impressions. Unlike the article he submitted to his father, this was a dispassionate address devoid of the great affection he felt for Russia. Even so, Crawford’s political naiveté about the repressive elements of the Soviet system was clearly apparent. Emphasising the tremendous sacrifice the Russian people had made before and during the war, he contended that the Soviet regime realised that it must ‘give the people a better time’. ‘It would seem’, he continued, ‘that the Russian Government is bound to prefer security based on co-operation to security based only on strategic and military preparations’. It was apparent that Crawford failed to distinguish between the Russian people he had encountered, and for whom he felt such an affinity, and the government that controlled them. He was also convinced that if the Soviet government were indeed so intolerable, his Russian friends would have told him.22 Crawford interpreted their very silence as confirmation of approval, rather than evidence of terror. Although he failed to complete any work of substance on Russia, Crawford enjoyed the public status his time there accorded him. An
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immense amount of attention surrounded Crawford on his return, and he was regarded as both a spokesman and an ‘unofficial expert on Russia’.23 In this capacity, he was expected to fulfil a number of obligations and did so with great enthusiasm, dedication and conviction. Crawford also corresponded with teachers and academics regarding Russia.24 During 1944 and 1945, Crawford remained in constant communication with his former Legation colleagues and various Russian officials he had met, notably Kemenov, the Director of VOKS, and Lifanov and Solatov, who were respectively Minister and First Secretary of the Soviet Legation in Canberra. Crawford performed the role of professional expert and humanitarian.25 In an unprecedented letter prompted by one of his students, he contacted Hodgson to request that three Polish orphans be sent to Palestine and enquired about the whereabouts of a girl last heard off in Vilna.26 It is also apparent that his enthusiasm for Russian artistic and cultural endeavours remained strong.27 In Crawford’s capacity as unofficial spokesman for Russia, he was requested to give talks and participate in commemorative events held by the numerous friendship organisations that promoted a better understanding of Russia. These included the Friendship with Russia League, Russia’s National Day Committee, the Australia-Soviet Friendship League and the Society for Cultural Relations with the USSR, for which Crawford travelled to Brisbane to deliver an address. It was not only the informal activity that occupied Crawford’s time. With his heightened reputation, he began to be invited in a more formal capacity to participate in Russian-Australian organisations. The first was the Australian Russian Society, a state-based organisation whose objectives included strengthening friendly ties, communicating accurate information about Russia and promoting all forms of cultural and social relations between the people of both countries.28 Australia-Soviet House was another official organisation that promoted friendship and the exchange of cultural information. Established in June 1943 by Canon Murray (who resigned when he was appointed Bishop of the Riverina), J. Barry and J. H. Skerry, Australia-Soviet House was quickly incorporated as a company, with premises purchased in an old tobacco warehouse at 330 Flinders Lane.29 With an impressive group of patrons, who included Justice
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Charles Lowe, John Medley and Mary Slater, the House was considered reputable by even the more conservative observers.30 In May 1944, Crawford was unanimously elected Vice-President. It was an honour, and he accepted enthusiastically. Given their status as allies, the Soviets enjoyed unprecedented support and even affection at this time. In celebration of Red Army Day, Curtin directed that flags be flown on Commonwealth buildings. Hundreds attended the Red Army Day reception and, in Melbourne, a salute to the Red Army was given. Those present heard the Lord Mayor, Sir Thomas Nettleford, honour the Russians and also messages from Evatt and General Blamey.31 Robert Menzies was the VicePresident of the ‘Sheepskins for Russia Movement’. The press was also co-operative and circulated friendly stories about the Russians troops and their wartime exploits. It did not take long for Crawford to become unintentionally embroiled in a political dispute. The trouble began in August 1944, when he drafted a letter to Curtin suggesting that a deputation (with ‘special knowledge’) meet the Prime Minister in Melbourne to express their ‘views’ on peace.32 Crawford, by his own admission, was the central figure behind the deputation, which was prompted by his desire to promote trust and direct knowledge of how the Soviet Legation was upset by the emerging anti-Russian sentiments and demonstrations. The deputation consisted of a group of individuals of differing political persuasions bound by a ‘common belief’ in the Teheran policy of peaceful cooperation between the allies. John Rodgers, a union secretary and communist, gathered a list of diverse signatories to accompany Crawford’s letter to Curtin. They covered the full spectrum of Australian politics, religious affiliations, public life, academia, the press, municipal politics, trade unions, major committees and organisations. Rodgers had selected the signatories to avoid the accusation of being politically biased and in order to choose the most ‘influential and representative as possible’. Unfortunately, his desire to avoid antagonising the Labor faction backfired.33 In September 1944, William Slater informed Crawford that although his views remained the same, he was forced to withdraw from the deputation because of the ‘serious difficulties with his party’. This development compelled Crawford to write to all the signatories to the letter informing them of Slater’s decision.34
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By 18 October 1944, Crawford appeared to have grown concerned by Rodger’s political motives. Citing an ‘exceptionally large and growing’ History Department, his struggle to write a book and illhealth, he wrote that he was only able to offer ‘spasmodic occasional assistance’. ‘I have come to this decision’, Crawford claimed, ‘only with thought and some reluctance as I believe in what you are doing’.35 He was not the only person who wished to distance himself from the growing political dissent within the Australia-Soviet House. Although the organisation had enjoyed public support in the immediate aftermath of the war, rumblings of discontent were beginning to be heard. A year after Slater’s withdrawal from the deputation, Justice Charles Lowe, the Chancellor of Melbourne University and possibly the greatest public drawcard, wrote to Crawford. Apologising for his inability to attend dinner on Russia’s National Day, he questioned whether his patronage was of any use. He ambiguously explained that he had originally supported the movement because he saw it as a ‘step towards international understanding implicitly linked to an Empire connection’.36 Crawford interpreted Lowe’s comment as a subtle but unmistakable hint that the Society had begun to move away from this patriotic alignment, and the judge wished to disassociate himself from the growing political suspicion attached to it. Responding immediately and revealing his instinctive diplomacy, Crawford wrote that he understood Lowe’s work demands, but hoped that he would not withdraw his patronage: I know that we cannot ask more from a busy man than the support of his name; and I should not ask you for that if it proved embarrassing to you, as, for example, through dislike of the policy of Australia-Soviet House. My influence has been entirely towards keeping the activities of the House on a cultural plane.37 Lowe was apparently reassured and dropped the matter. Crawford’s empathy with Lowe was sincere. The approaching demands of the University in the new year diverted his own attention from his obligations at the Australia-Soviet House. It was readily apparent that the University had underestimated the number of students for the new academic year. The enrolment in 1946 turned out to
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Photographer: Norman Harper University of Melbourne Archives, Image UMA/I/1961
VE Day in the History Department (l to r): Kathleen Fitzpatrick, George Paul, Max Crawford, Joyce Dunn, Pat Gray and Dorothy Crozier
be 5806.38 Over 1000 ex-servicemen were enrolled under the Reconstruction Training Scheme in the first full year of peace.39 The anticipated number of students in History was exceeded: instead of 950, the staff had to teach and accommodate 1443.40 With the realisation he would have to carry an even heavier workload, Crawford panicked. In a letter to the Vice-Chancellor, he requested an additional tutor ‘to act’ as his research assistant. ‘I am now at the point to bring some various pieces of research to a head or let them go.’41 He selected the highly ‘suitable’ Margaret Kiddle, who was available at the time and boasted some impressive publications, although she was not particularly robust and suffered a congenital kidney condition. Kiddle had been the first of Crawford’s students to research Australian history when she commenced her MA thesis on Caroline Chisholm in 1939. Crawford admitted that a research assistant ‘might cause an awkward precedent’, and was willing to pretend that Kiddle was a tutor.42 Described by Russel Ward as ‘a statuesque, blond daughter of the squattocracy’,43 Kiddle would emerge as one of Crawford’s most ardent admirers. Her letters to Crawford were filled with confidences and private jokes. Post-war The first day of teaching in March 1946 was pandemonium. The Union building was compared to Flinders Street at rush hour, the grounds were filled to capacity and the lecture rooms overflowed.44 The returned servicemen and women posed unprecedented challenges. Teachers commented on their enthusiasm, maturity and experience. But they also found them an anxious and, at times, agitated group, which worked unnecessarily hard and required additional advice and encouragement. Many staff members provided special tutorial classes for ex-service students. Crawford recommended the additional attention.45 Concerned about the plight of the returned soldiers, he wrote an impassioned letter to Brigadier Cremor, the Guidance Officer at the University. Perceiving that his staff could not provide the ‘urgent’ help required, Crawford requested that the History Department assign staff to advise them. He proposed that Ray Ericksen could be paid a lecturer’s salary to deal with ‘the problems of these students’.46 Ericksen was one of a number of ex-soldiers who had continued to
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communicate with his former teacher throughout the war. Laurie Baragwanath and David Dexter had also been in constant communication. These men had kept Crawford informed of the difficulties and violence of war, and Crawford in turn was extremely sensitive and considerate when they returned home, determined to find them work and ease the uncertainties associated with rehabilitation. The returned soldiers also wrought unparalleled changes to the student body. The Commonwealth Reconstruction Training Scheme was introduced in 1944 to provide funding assistance for up to five years for discharged servicemen and women. It brought a tide of new students from a variety of educational backgrounds who did not necessarily live on the ‘right side of the river’.47 One of the returned soldiers, Stephen Murray Smith, emphasised Crawford’s role, encouragement and legacy. ‘He and the school he built around him, sent many of their graduates out into the world well equipped, and many worked for a resolution of Australia’s problems and role in a new world after the war.’ Murray Smith recalled: This is distinct from the school’s success in training two generations of distinguished academics. Put less sentimentally, perhaps Crawford’s School of History gave many of those who studied in it a rare sense of the privilege of being even a junior member of an academic community.48 At the same time, Crawford was contending with problems in the Department of Political Science caused by the departure of Macmahon Ball, who had been seconded as a diplomat in Japan. At Crawford’s recommendation, Manning Clark was transferred back from the History Department and appointed acting Head of Politics. As the senior staff member of the Department, Ian Milner, who was working for the Department of External Affairs in Canberra and had articulated his interest in a University appointment, might have felt usurped. Instead, he betrayed no hint of ill will and appeared amused by the return of the prodigal son. ‘But you know, Max, Manning was obviously shaping into an excellent political science teacher until the fatal attractiveness of the Melbourne Clio stole him away.’ Milner wrote. ‘So I am sure you’ll suffer patiently this enforced temporary resistance to the Lady’s charms.’49
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Sensitive to his favouritism of Clark and abiding affection for Milner, Crawford wrote the latter a long letter of explanation. He enquired of Milner’s plans and informed him of the temporary staffing arrangements and the plan to appoint a Chair in Political Science.50 Milner was clearly out of the running by this time, but there were provisions, evident in Crawford’s letter, for him to return as a lecturer. Clark had also approached Milner and asked him to come back to the University in June of that year. Despite his ‘unqualified confidence in Clark as acting head’, Milner admitted that he was ‘not taken’ with the idea of returning to the University at the same level that he had left two years earlier; he declined.51 He did, however, express an interest in pursuing the Chair when it was advertised. Milner believed his politics excluded him from promotion at Melbourne University, and he expressed regret that he had not struck a better balance between academic and political activities, or at least exercised more discretion. ‘When people go away from the University they’re generally remembered for what they were at the time’, Milner confided to Crawford. He wrote: To some not uninfluential personnel I gather I am remembered as a young man with an incurably parti pris sort of mind and generally somewhat unwise in the ways of the world…I sincerely hope that the “political” tag will have worn thin… I realise of course that the rather one-track association of my outside activities in Melbourne (Russian relations) encouraged the label.52 Absence was not necessarily the issue. Though Crawford, Boyce Gibson and John Medley had provided favourable references for Milner when he applied for the post with the Department of External Affairs, not everyone was enamoured with Milner. Both Ida Leeson and Professor Bland protested at his appointment.53 Research and the National Approach In the midst of teaching, Departmental administration and faculty business, Crawford struggled with other related preoccupations in 1946. The most notable was the establishment of a National University in Canberra, officially announced to him in a lengthy and confidential
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letter from R. C. Mills on behalf of the Department of Post-War Reconstruction.54 In accordance with the decisions reached by Cabinet, Mills had completed a report that stipulated the proposed university should primarily provide the opportunity for research work at the postgraduate level. The general recommendations for the proposed university had been ‘generally approved’ by Cabinet in early January 1946.55 Although the letter was confidential, rumours regarding the creation of another Australian university had reverberated throughout the corridors of government and universities since the end of the war. It had first been mooted in 1927. In the interim years, Canberra University College was established to meet the immediate needs of the young public servants living in the national capital.56 Growing enrolments and the greater emphasis on original research suggested to the Government that the existing institutions were ill-equipped to cope with the unprecedented demand.57 Crawford was invited to serve on an advisory committee alongside his close friends Fred Wood, Ian Hogbin, W. K. Dunk and Colonel J. K. Murray. Despite the great urgency communicated by Mills in his initial letter, the recommendations made by the Committee were not greeted with much enthusiasm, and Mills warned that their deliberations ‘might be considered only tentative’.58 With acute building shortages and a realisation that the establishment of another university would require great planning, the Australian National University would have to wait. Crawford’s reaction to Mill’s measured letter is unknown. He always insisted that the Melbourne History School was beyond reproach in preparing and providing students with an exemplary foundation for postgraduate research overseas (and there was no evidence to disprove Crawford’s conviction). His devotion to student research had not waned, and he continued to implement changes to accommodate the increasing demand. Australian universities traditionally sent their ‘best and brightest’ to Oxford and Cambridge. Crawford never begrudged his students making the pilgrimage to England; indeed, he expected it and encouraged them. Most of his postgraduate students returned home, and the History Department gained from their overseas experience. For science departments, it was often a permanent loss. Many scientists
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remained in England and, later, the United States, where the research environment was richer and recognition greater. There was, however, a growing confidence that Australia could make an independent contribution to international research. With the influx of ex-servicemen and women, there was a discernible change in attitudes towards universities; higher education was no longer considered the exclusive domain of the elite.59 This change was reflected in the University of Melbourne Council’s decision to pass a Ph.D. regulation on 27 November 1945, six months after Professor John Turner’s formal recommendation. Although many Melbourne academics were involved in the planning of University College in Canberra, they had good reason for ambivalence about its formation and regarded it as a serious threat.60 They felt that one institution should not have a monopoly on government-funded postgraduate research and the nation’s outstanding students. Crawford’s interest in postgraduate study was evident in his unerring support for his students. He wrote to them constantly, encouraged them and sent ‘care packages’ to ease the hardships of rationing in England. Most retraced Crawford’s steps to Oxford, but there were several who looked further afield, with his approval and assistance. In a letter thanking him for the part he played in making it possible for her to get to Berkeley, Pat McBride passed on information useful to other students planning to undertake research in the States.61 Crawford also recognised the possibility that Melbourne could support students who, like Erica Wolff, preferred to stay at home and undertake postgraduate study.62 When Crawford had refused the offer of an Australian History Chair two years before, he maintained that he was motivated by the determination to shift the funds and develop a stronger research school.63 This was not an idle boast. The History Department began to look within, instead of promoting research overseas, and Crawford’s instinct was inspired. The year 1946 heralded the beginning of a significant interest in the study of Australian history that met a growing sense of nationalism. In the first term, he implemented weekly History Research Seminars, ‘the most convenient means of providing group supervision of research scholars’.64 Staff, temporary tutors and M.A. candidates were expected to present a seminar on their ‘original’ research, and most postgraduate students chose ‘subjects in Australian
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history which involve work on sources previously not used or not fully’.65 The practice continues today. Crawford’s own research interest was announced in the seminars. His interest in Russia had now faded, and a biographical study of George Arnold Wood was his new and somewhat surprising research topic.66 There was a growing belief that Australian universities could be research institutions in their own right. John O’Brien encouraged students to attempt archaeological fieldwork, and Leonhard Adam asked Crawford to propose to the Vice-Chancellor that he set up a small ethnographical museum. Although Crawford was ‘sometimes put off’ by Adam’s habit of lecturing him, he suggested that Adam look after the collections and teach and assist in the archaeological research that the History Department had embarked upon.67 Crawford’s attention was also drawn to the issue of preserving historical records. Prompted by the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Tasmania, the records of Tasmania became a particular issue. Crawford completed a report attesting to their value and judging they would ‘attract a good number of historical students’. He stressed that the historical records were in a ‘rather depressing state’.68 At the beginning of 1946, Crawford was consumed with the History Department and the new challenges presented by peace. Those who attended his lectures witnessed him in his element. Lean, fastidious and confident, he performed to a youthful audience on an austere platform. The University had cobbled together teaching rooms barely adequate to pass the rudimentary building regulations. Hugh Stretton recalled the shabby facilities: But in that year of constructive thought, hard benches and bare bulbs and unnoticeable walls were the correct environment for intellect. In the History Theatre we sat in a steep cliff of brown varnished seats. We didn’t look up at a duce on a balcony, we looked down at a virtuoso on stage.69 Stretton sensed in Crawford’s personal performance that history was a moral and artistic experience. ‘The historian has to understand the burden and complexity of statesmen’s (and historians’ responsibility)’. He reminisced, ‘he had to judge the justice and human effort of social structures, social changes, social philosophies. His work was
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necessarily moral.’70 Keith Sinclair, who visited the Department from New Zealand, was not as impressed, and observed that Crawford ‘acted like a god and was so treated. I have never been able to understand his high reputation among Australian historians, for he wrote nothing of consequence…Perhaps Crawford was an excellent teacher.’71 Written in 1993 after Crawford’s death, Sinclair’s sentiments are slightly disingenuous, as he had written affectionate letters to Crawford during the 1970s and had asked him to act as a referee. The principled conviction that Stretton observed was reflected in Crawford’s sincere attempts to create a better knowledge and greater trust between Australia and Russia. A dinner for the Minister of the Legation of the U.S.S.R. was organised, to which Crawford invited a ‘number of distinguished citizens’ who had the ‘grave sense of their common responsibility for promoting international understanding and good will’. Although Crawford had to cancel the dinner, he wrote in a courteous letter to Lifanov of his sincere hope for peace.72 The political calm ended in May when Crawford responded to a series of scathing newspaper articles written by J. J. Maloney, who had replaced Slater as Minister of the Russian Legation in 1944. Maloney had neither enjoyed his diplomatic mission in the Soviet Union nor felt an affinity with the people, and he was not prepared to conceal his contempt for the country to anyone who asked. Jessie Street maintained that Maloney ‘hated being in Russia …hated being a diplomat and all he wanted was to get home again’.73 Maloney had visited Australia briefly in 1945 and offered an unflattering version of life in Russia. An unsubstantiated report circulated that the Soviet Legation had protested about his unconventional behaviour. With Maloney’s permanent return in the following year of 1946, he remained silent for several weeks and then produced almost daily articles condemning the Soviet Union.74 Under the by-line, ‘Professor R. M. Crawford, President AustraliaSoviet House’, Crawford wrote a lengthy letter to the editor of the Herald that was transformed into a major article. ‘I have no more sympathy with those who see no fault in the Soviet Union than those who see nothing but faults’, Crawford wrote about a Minister he had never encountered during his tour of duty.
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My quarrel with Mr Maloney’s articles is not that he finds some faults but that he gives a distorted and misleading general picture. This is more serious because the words of one returning here after two years’ occupancy of the high and responsible post of Minister will have much influence.75 In this passionate article, Crawford described his qualifications as an historian, a Russian linguist, a former Secretary and an intimate friend of the Russian people. Citing the Guide to Diplomatic Practice, he also considered that Maloney had contravened the golden but not widely enforced rule that ‘a diplomatist ought not to publish any writing on international politics either anonymously or with his name.’ The rule also applied to retired members as well as to those still on active service.76 Maloney’s actions, Crawford claimed, were ‘embarrassing in the conduct of diplomatic relations’. He was here indulging in selective amnesia, for Crawford had objected to this rule himself while in Russia and, since his return, had written articles about his experiences as a diplomat during his diplomatic term. Crawford’s main objection was that Maloney, as ‘an amateur diplomatist’, was not sufficiently competent to understand Russia, because he failed to grasp its history. Instead of considering the Soviets’ ‘desperate’ problems, Maloney had jumped to ‘half-baked and unskilled condemnation’. Although Crawford admitted to Russia’s ‘bad mistakes’ and ‘bad things’, he felt compelled to contribute to some understanding of ‘the hardships, shortages and disciplines of Russia’.77 William Slater, who had been given the article by Crawford prior to publication, supported his ‘temperate and factual statement’, although admitting that his stay ‘was limited in point of time’.78 Whether Crawford asked for Slater’s letter of endorsement can only be speculated. Slater’s defence and plea for better understanding was timely. Crawford received numerous letters from supporters, including Percy Mills Cerutty, a notable athlete’s coach, who thanked him for the ‘sacrifices’ he was making in the cause of justice.79 In a letter acknowledging Crawford’s cancellation of an Australian Russian Society conference, the formidable Jessie Street pleaded that Crawford ‘counteract some of the misrepresentations and slanders’.80
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It had become obvious to Crawford that there was a drift towards anti-communism and anti-liberalism. Communist Party membership, which peaked at almost 23,000 by the end of 1944, was falling.81 The good will and understanding that Crawford had nurtured since his return from the Soviet Union was short-lived. In June the Russian and Chinese flags were removed from the State celebration of the Allied victory. The politicians were already exorcising the Russian contribution from official accounts of the war. An incensed John Rodgers wrote to Crawford: Such incidents, so reminiscent of the fatal drift to war during the late thirties, are a challenge, surely, to one’s sense of responsibility to do everything possible to save the world from the frightening consequences of a fresh onset of prejudice and ignorance.82 Another protest was organised several months later, and this time it involved Maloney, whom Crawford condemned for the damage he was causing to the precarious peace between the former allies. In a bipartisan move, Crawford drafted and sent a letter in November 1946 to the Lord Mayor, Councillor Connelly, and Dr Evatt, co-signed by Professors G. S. Browne, Bernard Heinze, J. N. Greenwood and R. D. Wright. The letter had asked for the postponement of Maloney’s speech on ‘The Soviet Myth Exploded’, which was to be delivered at the Melbourne Town Hall. The occasion coincided with a function to commemorate the anniversary of the Soviet Republic at AustraliaSoviet House, where a dinner was arranged in the Soviet Minister’s honour. Despite the implications for free speech, Crawford regarded Maloney’s actions as ‘diplomatic discourtesy’ and a deliberate slur to the House and Lifanov.83 Although the request was refused, Crawford’s role as an agitator was duly noted. The incriminating letter that Crawford drafted was apparently well circulated, and alerted ASIO’s predecessor, the Commonwealth Investigation Branch, to the Professor’s activities. The Australian security service was intended to protect the state against subversion, sabotage and espionage. Over 200,000 files on Australian citizens had been zealously created since 1916 and kept by the Commonwealth Investigation Branch. Dossiers were compiled on
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individuals who were considered political offenders, and the files were used for immediate issue of a reprimand, exclusion from employment or for future reference.84 There was an underlying assumption that the subject was considered politically suspect, potentially dangerous and, if not guilty of an actual crime, capable of committing one in the future. The most fundamental issue that emerges from the files is the attitude towards communism, which was not considered a political party, but a conspiratorial organisation. It followed that membership or an affinity with the Communist Party was incompatible with the professional obligations of an academic.85 On 1 November 1946, Crawford had come to the attention of the Deputy Director, who asked the Adelaide office of the Branch to supply his details. It appeared that Crawford had been watched as early as 1940, when he attended a farewell meeting for a Chinese nationalist on 5 August 1940 and a protest meeting for Ratcliffe and Thomas almost a year later, on 27 July 1941. The document chronicled Crawford’s activities with the ACCL and Australia-China Cooperative Association, his secondment to Russia and the controversies surrounding his return. After this information was received, a more extensive dossier was created on Crawford.86 D. A. Alexander reported on Crawford’s educational qualifications, career and work in the USSR, although the details of this government service were not available. Using the flattering but innocuous Smiths Weekly article about Crawford before his departure to Russia, the Deputy Director observed that he ‘has been active in defence of civil liberties’ and ‘pursued the ideal of the greatest good for the greatest number’.87 It was the responsibility attributed to Crawford for ‘directing a number of the protests’ in his capacity as President of Australia-Soviet House that incriminated him. It was also apparent that Maloney was associated with the Commonwealth Investigation Branch. The Deputy Director noted on 8 November that ‘we will have a visit from J. J. Maloney’.88 Crawford’s protest against Maloney proved extremely newsworthy. Several days after the ASIO report, the press noted that Lifanov did not attend the National Day Dinner, and his absence was interpreted by Australia-Soviet House as an expression of ‘diplomatic disapproval’ of Maloney’s address. Crawford informed the 100
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guests at the dinner of Lifanov’s decision. The 2,500 people who attended Maloney’s speech, which in essence maintained that conditions in Russia were a ‘threat to everything democratic minds held dear’, apparently gave him ‘a good hearing’ amid ‘heated arguments’.89 A week later Crawford received a letter of support from Doreen Apthorp, who informed him that at a public meeting to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the foundation of the Soviet Union, in Katoomba, New South Wales, a resolution in support of Crawford’s statement was carried. The resolution was in turn sent to Melbourne’s Lord Mayor and Evatt, who nevertheless felt no need to reprimand Maloney regarding his series of articles.90 Debates in parliament concerning the threat of communism and academic subversion began to occur with increasing regularity. Max Crawford remained largely remote from the fracas until he found himself personally and unfairly implicated in November 1946. He was, of course, unaware of the Investigation Branch’s continuing and increasing interest in his activities at the same time. The controversy erupted during the debate in the Legislative Council to establish a branch of the University at Mildura. The Country Party member for Korong and former Premier, Albert Dunstan, complained about communist academics. ‘From day to day we read utterances by a few pink professors who have wormed their way into the University.’ Dunstan urged the Education Department and University Council to keep agitators and those with communist inclinations out of important positions, and ‘weed’ them out from Melbourne University.91 Frank Crean, the Labor member for Albert Park, defended the University staff from the ‘delicate innuendo’. As a former student of Political Science, a supposed logical place for ‘pink professors’, Crean insisted that members of staff had only dealt with the subject and never ‘advanced personal views’. In the same debate, E. Hamilton associated communists with alleged attempts to propagate Marxist doctrines among teenage children at a girls’ school.92 It was Hamilton’s colleague, Frederick Edmunds, who caused the greatest damage. In support of Dunstan, Edmunds claimed on 14 November that it was well known that communist teaching found currency in the University. ‘I find it is my duty to mention Professor Crawford’, Edmunds announced, ‘for whom I have every respect, and
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whose sincerity I do not question for a moment; but he happens to be President of Australia-Soviet House’.93 As evidence that University lecturers pushed their private politics and opinions, Edmunds cited a student who was ‘advised’ that he would fail ‘purely on political grounds’.94 The unidentified student was apparently Edmunds, who already had a grudge against Crawford. Four years before, Edmunds had written an angry letter on behalf of the Freethought Society to Crawford, critical of the ‘Study of History’ and admonishing him for failing to keep an appointment.95 The outburst was by no means unexpected. Crawford had been conspicuous by his protest against Maloney and his association with an Australia-Soviet House pamphlet, Facts about the Soviet Union. It was criticised by Edmunds in parliament the evening before, and permission for it to be distributed in schools was withheld by the Education Department. In Edmunds’ opinion, Crawford had ‘used the prestige of the University to disseminate mischievous propaganda’ and had tried to suppress public ventilation of facts unpalatable to communists.96 In oblique but unconvincing support of Edmunds’ assertions, it was also reported on 15 November that five University of Melbourne professors held office in Australia-Soviet House.97 Concluding the rowdy debate, the Premier, John Cain, promised to investigate the complaint and said the Minister of Public Instruction would make a full statement on the Australia-Soviet House pamphlet.98 The University Registrar, J. F. Foster, responded swiftly, observing that there were ‘pinks in parliament’ and no one suggested ‘weeding’ them out. Foster insisted that the University must be open to all views. The University authorities were dismayed by the events that had embroiled Crawford. Council members consulted their minutes of meetings from 3 June and 13 June 1940 regarding the oath of allegiance and communism and communications to the press. 99 When contacted by journalists, Crawford informed them that he would leave public comment to the University authorities.100 Despite this, Crawford could not resist replying to Edmunds’ challenge in a letter to the editor of the Herald. He reiterated that he was not a communist, nor did he wish to prevent freedom of speech. ‘As a University teacher, I have endeavoured to maintain standards of scholarship, objectivity and integrity’, he wrote. ‘As for the presidency
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of Australia-Soviet House, it does not prove me a complete Russophile; it does indicate my desire for better relations with Russia.’101 The subsequent commotion in the press continued for several days. Colleagues and students wrote to the newspaper editors, who cheerfully reported the row and professed their dismay at the allegations levelled at Crawford and the University. There was a consensus that universities should cultivate freedom and diversity of opinion and speech.102 ‘Neither Professor Crawford nor any other member of the History staff has advocated communism or any other political doctrine in his official capacity’, a group of Crawford’s final-year students wrote. ‘Indeed, there has been a constant emphasis on the necessity for critical and impartial examination of historical evidence.’103 The Minister for Education, Francis Field, also spoke in Crawford’s defence and informed the Assembly that no University professors flavoured their tuition with Marxist doctrines. A University official resented the allegation that a student would fail because of his political beliefs.104 At the same time Crawford was forced to play the diplomat when he received a letter from Justice Lowe resigning as patron of AustraliaSoviet House. Lowe’s decision was hardly a surprise after his expressed concerns the previous year. By 1946, Lowe was convinced the association was simply too controversial. In his letter of resignation, he asked to have his name removed from the official letterhead. Referring to Facts about the Soviet Union, Lowe maintained, ‘I think that the pamphlet contains disputable material and in the light of the fact that a dispute has already arisen in circumstances leading to great publicity, I should put myself out of the area of criticism’.105 Crawford was clearly concerned by Lowe’s departure. It also became apparent that Lowe was not the only one distancing himself from the Soviet association. ‘I might say’, Crawford reiterated to Lowe, ‘that I had intended to write to you in the near future to tell you that I would not continue to be President of Australia-Soviet House… though I shall continue to be associated with it as a Vice-President’.106 There was a furore over the pamphlet, which Crawford thought was ‘not very good’. As President, he was technically responsible for it, although it was prepared and published during the war and before his association with the House, and was typical of the publications produced by similar organisations at that time. ‘A great deal of public fuss
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has been made with insufficient cause’, Crawford wrote to Lowe and he maintained it would have been very different if he had had anything to do with its production.107 Crawford contacted John Rodgers to report the contents of Lowe’s letter of resignation, which was apparently made in a ‘friendly tone’. He concluded that they should re-evaluate the pamphlet and endeavour to ‘produce something better’.108 There was no mention of Crawford’s own plans to resign from the Presidency. That information was communicated in a letter to Rodgers several weeks later, when he made himself unavailable for nomination as President for 1947. ‘This is a decision I made a year ago’, Crawford wrote, ‘and you will, I know, believe me when I tell you it has nothing to do with recent events’.109 Citing ill health, work obligations and family considerations, he reassured Rodgers he had his ‘full confidence’ and that he was still ‘happy’ to be associated with the House. Despite these comforting words, Crawford had clearly been disturbed by the criticisms levelled at Facts about the Soviet Union and the responsibility he had been forced to bear. Although ‘innocent’ in intent, Crawford considered the pamphlet had some ‘weaknesses’, which a publications committee would have prevented.110 Apart from the claims of a victimised student (which, if substantiated, would necessitate an enquiry), J.F. Foster’s expressed hope to Crawford was that they had ‘heard the last of the whole episode’.111 History as Science During the troubled year of 1946, Crawford presented a paper to the ANZAAS meeting entitled, ‘History as a Science’. It had originally been intended as a revision of the 1939 address on ‘The Study of History’, but he abandoned this plan and instead wrote something entirely new. Inspired by the philosopher George Paul, and by the empiricist philosophy of David Hume, the central theme of the paper was that explanations in history bear an important similarity to explanations in natural science.112 The genesis of the paper arose from Crawford’s experiences since 1942. His youthful idealism had diminished, and he was now convinced that there was a ‘consistency in human social behaviour’. ‘Given this assumption’, he wrote, ‘there is no essential difference between the fundamental presuppositions of history and those of other sciences’.113
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Robert Dare contends that the experience of war and revolution in Russia confronted Crawford with an inevitable contradiction: The intractabilities of Russian life depleted his confidence in the power of will and in the epistemology that flowed from it; but the positivism of science would restore him to explanatory certainty only in defiance of his intellectual obligation to comprehend the very complexities that were undermining his convictions. He would have complexity without certainty or certainty without complexity.114 This paradox went beyond Crawford’s Russian experiences and came to dominate his post-war public life. Until he could resolve the political stance, he was willing to accept that his historical methodology would also be in turmoil and confusion. Reflecting back on his work, Crawford, later wrote: I can still read the 1939 paper with at least some moments of pleasure, but not that of 1946. It is tired work, written in those flat years after the war. But the trouble with it goes deeper. To put it bluntly, I was flogging the dead horse. Ideas that had been exciting in 1940 had played their part and were by this time played out; and the multifarious demands of my second term as Dean of the Faculty Arts stood in the way of any new exploration.115 Crawford was selective in his recollection and failed to elucidate the political controversies that dominated his life at the time and caused him great personal anguish. Perhaps his political crisis emphasised his own feelings of powerlessness. The moral burden of protest that he advocated only a year before was difficult to sustain in light of the constant and unwarranted criticisms. ‘History as Science’ was possibly an attempt to make sense of his own life. The summer break at the end of 1946 promised temporary respite from a difficult year. Max Crawford had shown restraint and dignity throughout the attacks on his professional integrity, but it was apparent that he was devastated by the press exposure. With some relief, he returned to the obligations of the History Department as he
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planned the new year. In his capacity as Dean, he welcomed the ‘freshers’ in early 1947 and cautioned them on the disadvantages of embarking on their tertiary education at this juncture. ‘We will still be short of lecture theatres and shorter still of small class rooms,’ he warned: You will have to journey to the far corners of the University for lectures that once took place in the Arts building in theatres now too small to accommodate swollen numbers. Sometimes you will hear a lecture while sitting on the steps of the theatre, or even outside in the passage, so great is the passage of numbers.116 With determination to mould a consummate History Department, Crawford informed the Vice-Chancellor that with the departure or limited availability of his most ‘able tutors’, he would be forced to make do in some cases with ‘second-best’. As a solution, he suggested they postpone the permanent appointment required with the additional influx of new students, create temporary lectureships and wait for the ‘first-rate’ people to become available.117 He was, however, delighted with the return of Manning Clark, who was now in charge of Australasian history and General history.118 Crawford’s dual interest in anthropology and archival research were also apparent in the fieldwork introduced for the post-war influx of students. Leonhard Adam was an important addition to the Department and broadened the students’ experiences. When John Mulvaney began his study at Melbourne, he was not immediately drawn by the lure of Crawford’s reputation. Indeed, he found him a ‘distant presence’. This impression quickly faded. ‘I probably met him for the first time on Dr Leonhard’s almost legendary expedition to Phillip Island, during the May vacation in 1947.’ Mulvaney reminisced. ‘My recollections are vivid, for this was a refreshing and informal mixing of staff and mature students drawn from various years, with evening discussions and entertainment the highlight. It was then that I first heard of an Aboriginal prehistory, with Adam and Crawford discussing the origin of the Tasmanians.’119
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Edmunds Again Within weeks of the start of semester, Crawford found himself once more in the political spotlight as Edmunds again set his sights on the Professor’s extracurricular activities. This time the attack occurred on Crawford’s home turf. During a lunch-time lecture on campus in March 1947, at the invitation of the Liberal Club, Edmunds discussed ‘The Fight for World Supremacy’ in front of an estimated 900 students. Amidst hand-clapping, feet-stamping, heckling and the occasional calls of ‘throw him out’ from some of the students, Edmunds repeated his attack on Crawford’s communist sympathies. A history student, Murray Groves, who asked Edmunds about his attitude to teachers, prompted the outburst. In all probability, Edmunds did not need much provocation. ‘It is a disgrace’, Edmunds responded, ‘to the University that such a brilliant man as Professor Crawford should be associated with AustraliaSoviet House, a communist subsidiary’.120 Groves insisted that Crawford was merely a member of the Australia-Soviet Friendship League, which endeavoured to foster better relations with Russia. ‘I’ll tell you something about Professor Crawford,’ Edmunds announced amid the uproar. ‘In 1940 he was opposed to the motion of loyalty to the King, and with other disloyal members got it defeated.’121 On the evening of the speech, the Student Representatives’ Council passed a motion, by fourteen votes to eight, strongly condemning Edmunds’ ‘emotional and unsubstantiated attacks’ on Crawford.122 On the following day, the Chancellor and Vice-Chancellor issued a joint statement: ‘We know of no reason why we should not retain our fullest confidence in Professor Crawford as Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Professor of History’.123 A reporter later noted the serendipity of the appearance in the latest edition of Farrago of an article that examined the campaign against Professor MarshallHall. With Edmunds having repeated his accusation with the protection of parliamentary privilege, Crawford immediately obtained a transcript of his speech and placed the matter in the hands of his legal advisers and the University Council. The charges, he declared, were ‘completely untrue’.124 Under siege and ‘despite a distaste for such controversy’, he was forced to issue a lengthy denial to the press. Suspecting that Edmunds was harbouring an irrational, long-standing
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grudge, Crawford also consulted the politician’s student card and duly recorded his unimpressive results.125 Crawford declared clearly and unequivocally: As to my being either a communist or a “fellow traveller” with the communists, I must emphatically deny this. My differences with the Communist Party and doctrine are fundamental. If this were not so, I should not be afraid to avow it, and so long as I taught with integrity and objectivity, I should defend my right to hold unpopular opinion. But it is not so.126 In leaving no doubt of his stance, Crawford maintained that if Australia-Soviet House was indeed ‘a communist subsidiary’, he would not be associated with it. To prevent further libel, he challenged Edmunds to make a formal charge to the University Council.127 Crawford, of course, had never been a communist. However, he appeared to be willing to renounce the sympathy that he had previously always emphasised. In a play on words, he maintained that he found his personal inspiration in Britain rather than Russia. With good reason, Crawford was particularly troubled by any imputation of treason. The genesis of this had arisen when Edmunds charged that in 1940 Crawford had remarked that he did not know what the war was being fought for, opposed toasting the King and opposed a motion of loyalty to the King. Categorically denying these claims, Crawford accused Edmunds of misrepresentation and defamatory distortion. ‘I am now, and was then, a loyal citizen of the Commonwealth and of the British Commonwealth of Nations’, Crawford declared, ‘and I resent very deeply any imputation to the contrary’.128 Crawford had always been a liberal, if a rather conservative one at Sydney and Balliol. As the war loomed, he had become quite radical, though his political sympathies were consistent with progressive liberalism. In 1942, he had a genuine, romantic, (and not uncommon) naïve sympathy for the Soviet Union. By 1947 he began to be frightened out of his left-wing convictions as they threatened his career, and the public attention had been unforgiving. For Crawford to have found it necessary to engage in such a debate reveals the changing political mood and his predisposition to
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deny any hint of public suspicion. He might also have been concerned with the University’s response to the constant and unwarranted attention. In a letter acknowledging Francis Field’s congratulations on his dignity and restraint, Crawford confessed that he was considerably depressed by the entire episode, although buoyed by the ‘expressions of confidence’.129 The accusations were damaging. In his capacity as president, he presented a report to members and supporters of the Australia-Soviet House. At the outset, he repudiated Edmunds’ ‘uninformed prejudices’ and emphasised that it was an Australian institution and independent from the Communist Party and the Soviet Legation.130 Edmunds continued his tirade against Crawford at a crowded meeting at the Town Hall on 28 March 1947. Now setting his sights on the entire University, he vented his rancour. The language used and accusations levelled were malignant. Crawford was referred to as an ‘interesting specimen’, Farrago was ‘filthy libel’, the University was a ‘dunghill’ and communism was ‘total war’. Edmunds declared that Crawford should prosecute if he thought he was defamed. His attack was ostensibly designed to help Crawford ‘behave himself’ and assist the Victorian public to see what was going on ‘behind their backs’, that the University was sowing the seeds of disloyalty. Word had circulated about Edmunds’ poor academic record, for which he blamed Herbert Burton’s lectures, ‘soggy with socialistic prejudices’.131 A group of protesting students were refused the platform on the grounds that they had behaved as ‘a pack of dingoes’.132 This epithet inspired a song, ‘The Dingoes’ Revenge’, performed at the Labor Club revue later in the year. Written by Ken and Beth Gott, and performed by Nita Murray-Smith and Amirah Gust as two innocent history students, with a chorus of dingoes, part of it went: We’re red, we’re red, he’d rather see us dead Devoid of any intellect The facts we learn are incorrect Not giving Edmunds due respect We’re Varsity dingoes all.133 Crawford was not so amused. He immediately drafted numerous letters of defence to the newspapers on 31 March. Although he again
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denied the accusations, he announced he would no longer engage in the debate or flirt with the idea of litigation. ‘I shall not sue Mr Edmunds for defamation, for the conduct of an action would exact a toll on my work and health that I am unready to pay.’ The letters were not sent, but the drafts suggest Crawford was devastated and deeply angry.134 Although he had privately threatened it, he had never really demonstrated an eagerness to resort to a legal solution. Perhaps he had sought legal advice and was informed that he had legitimate grounds to sue, but that ‘no special damage or direct financial loss could be proved’. A new flurry of correspondence appeared in the newspapers debating issues of academic freedom and loyalty. Brian Fitzpatrick, who to this point had been largely silent, responded to the ‘unkindness’ directed at Crawford. ‘Mr Edmunds should not calumniate serious scholars by retelling childish inventions.’135 Students also entered the fray, writing to the press in defence of Crawford and expressing annoyance at Edmunds’ description of the student body as ‘dingoes’. The most animated debates occurred on campus. In the largest public meeting held at the University since the end of the war, the SRC passed a motion of protest against Edmunds, by 850 votes to 52. The SRC strongly condemned ‘the emotional and unsubstantiated attack’ and affirmed ‘its confidence in the intellectual integrity of Professor Crawford’. The meeting was by no means peaceful, and dissent was apparent when the President, Ian Turner, was voted out of the Chair because he was a member of the Communist Party. Accusations of political bias greeted vocal communist students. Some members opposed the motion on the basis that it was a ‘flagrant attack on the right of free speech’. The President of the Liberal Party, Ivor Greenwood, claimed that Crawford had ‘left himself open to attack’. Most believed that the assault by Edmunds was ‘a very direct and obvious menace to the freedom of thought and expression in the Melbourne University’. In an attempt to placate students, the SRC included an amendment that the meeting neither supported nor criticised the policy of the Communist Party. A second amendment was added that urged Crawford to take up Edmunds’ challenge to sue him for slander. This motion was not carried.136 Although Crawford had remained publicly silent during this
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latest altercation, he felt compelled to justify himself to the University Council in April 1947. The Council had taken the public brawl extremely seriously and was sensitive about accusations of impropriety, communist conspiracy and public scrutiny. In Crawford’s confidential History Department staff file, the document was consulted and filed regularly with numerous offending letters or clippings relating to public spats. In Crawford’s capacity as an historian and University representative, his activities were watched, noted and retained. Once again the Council revisited Medley’s ‘Circular to all Members of the staff on the Subject of Communications to the Press and the Public’.137 The Circular was one of the few documents that expressed the University’s expectations of the staff in the public domain. Medley devised four ‘classes’ of communication: the letter, article or broadcast relating to the staff’s specialty; the communication that was considered the right of the private citizen; communication concerned with the University; and communication signed by a number of members of staff. Medley advised that if a member of staff wished to exercise the right to speak out as a private citizen, he should not ‘designate the University as his place of writing or describe himself as an officer of the University at all’. Medley and the Council considered that the public and private activities of staff should remain mutually exclusive. Staff were to discuss all letters with Medley before they were sent.138 In his lengthy and determined defence, Crawford denied Edmunds’ innuendo that he had spread communist propaganda and assured the Vice-Chancellor that he was absolved from any involvement with the pamphlet distributed by Australia-Soviet House. Crawford emphasised he had informed the organisation of his intended resignation as President after the end of the term, and his involvement confirmed altruistic intentions rather than political support for Russia. This was a definite departure by Crawford, who was clearly troubled by the change in the political climate. Although he thanked Medley for his public expression of confidence, perhaps he detected a growing sense of unease concerning his position. He felt compelled to defend himself as a citizen, a public intellectual and head of the History Department:
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I know that the policy of the University is not to enquire into the political and religious beliefs of its teachers so long as these beliefs are not allowed to interfere with proper standards of integrity and objectivity in teaching… I have certainly tried to set myself proper standards of scholarship and objectivity as a teacher, and I would vigorously refute any notion, either that I have tried to inseminate one-sided doctrines, or that I have allowed political prejudice to affect my examining, or that done by members of my staff.139 At the same time as Crawford found himself harassed by politicians, scrutinised by the press and suspected within the University, a cautionary article was written and distributed by the ACCL. Although Crawford had not continued his association with the Council on his return from Russia, he had kept in contact with some of its members. The ACCL Bulletin reported that ‘red-baiting’ in Australia, reminiscent of the pre-war period, was following a worrying trend established by the United States. On 23 March 1947, President Truman had ordered a ‘purge’ of all Government employees where there was ‘reasonable grounds to doubt their disloyalty’. Citing Crawford’s experiences as an ‘object lesson’, the ACCL warned of the precedent that a person’s membership or known sympathy with a fascist, communist or subversive group was considered ‘evidence of disloyalty’.140 Crawford was forced to wait for the final decision of the University Council at its meeting on 15 April. The Chancellor, Justice Lowe, drew attention to the Council resolution that the University must not be used in any way for the ‘furtherance of disloyal or subversive activities’. Lowe expanded on this edict and introduced a new dimension that considered the importance of academic freedom. ‘As long as members of staff teach their students objectively and do not seek to inculcate in their students any particular view they hold or support’, Lowe declared, ‘the University does not enquire into the political or religious views of any member of staff’.141 In his opinion, to do otherwise and demand political or religious adherence from staff, would threaten the University’s tolerance, liberty and intellectual vitality. The Council announced that it was not aware that Crawford had
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contravened the principles set out by the Chancellor. It was noted in the Council memorandum that the press cited Crawford’s resignation from Australia-Soviet House and his denial of being either a communist or fellow-traveller.142 The disquiet did not diminish after the Council’s public support. A month later in June 1947, P. H. Partridge, the Head of Political Science, revisited the controversy when he wrote to Medley to defend the literature prescribed for the courses he conducted. It was old territory. Manning Clark and Ian Milner had written a report observing that the study of politics bore ‘closely on common prejudices’ and asked for precautions and protection to be put in place.143 During his assault, Edmunds had complained that the University ‘forced’ students to read Soviet literature and in some cases the students had to join various Soviet organisations to have access to the literature. Partridge vehemently denied the accusations and wrote that it was his intention to discourage partisan attitudes and for the students to be exposed to both pro and anti-Soviet literature in order to develop intellectual integrity. Partridge insisted that ‘we do not encourage either uncritical devotion to or hysterical fear of any particular view’.144 The Investigation Branch remained unconvinced and its investigations intensified. An operative reported in July that: the University of Melbourne is often referred to as a “breeding ground” for communists, whilst some of its Professors have been labelled “pink”. Inquiries produced sufficient evidence to substantiate all that had been said in this regard.145 Crawford resigned from Australia-Soviet House. It had become apparent to the committee that the support enjoyed by the organisation in the aftermath of the war was waning visibly. In March, Crawford had announced that the House would be forced to close unless it could raise 5,000 pounds. John Rodgers had written to all the members appealing for financial and intellectual support. ‘Never have certain people been so active in fostering prejudice and hostility toward the Soviet Union’, he wrote in response to Edmunds’ attacks.146 Crawford continued to give assistance, providing references, offering
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support for a Soviet delegation to visit Australia and raising the possibility of an Australian delegation to the USSR. His signature was interpreted as ‘proof of sympathy towards the Soviet Union’.147 However, Crawford had become more cautious with his support and recognised the pitfalls of public association. He refused to sign a petition protesting against the arrest and proposed deportation of a Soviet citizen. In an ambiguous letter written in June 1947, Crawford stated that while he supported the intention, he could not sign the petition because it implied knowledge of Zoubek 148 On 15 September 1947, Crawford resigned as President of the Australian Russian Society, citing work commitments and his intention to travel overseas during his year’s leave in the following year.149 The latter explanation can be verified from the letters of Kathleen Fitzpatrick, who mentioned Crawford’s long-term plans. He had not communicated his intentions officially. Although he had now distanced himself on an executive level from all Soviet-associated organisations, he continued as an ordinary member of both the Australia-Soviet House and the Australian Russian Society. The resignation was received with ‘regret’. A year later, Crawford formally resigned from both organisations, allegedly in protest at the events in Czechoslovakia. This was possibly disingenuous. The replacement of the coalition in Prague by the Soviet regime did not occur until 1948, the year after Crawford resigned as President of Australia-Soviet House.150 Crawford claimed at the time he did not announce his decision publicly to avoid embarrassing his friends. ‘I shall continue’, he wrote, ‘to work as a teacher against the rise of prejudice and passion in the place of reason’.151 Winning Recognition It would seem that by 1947 Crawford had not just abandoned any significant political alliance with the Russian organisations; he had also quietly renounced his research plans on Russia.152 Humphrey Sumner had earlier enquired about Crawford’s ‘Russian interests’ and concluded that ‘it takes a lot, trying to follow things there’.153 All Souls College had apparently invited Soviet historians to a small historical conference, and Sumner was awaiting news of who was permitted to visit.154 Ian Milner, who was working for the United Nations in New York, also corresponded with Crawford, describing the newly
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established Russian Institute at Columbia University. Crawford did not express any desire to visit.155 The workload that Crawford had mentioned in his letters of resignation was compounded by the absence of Kathleen Fitzpatrick, who in 1947 was researching at the Scott Polar Institute, Cambridge, on the final stages of her book on Sir John Franklin. Fitzpatrick enjoyed a lengthy sabbatical that took her to the United States, Cambridge and Italy. Travelling intermittently with her father and sister, Lorna, she had written constant letters to Crawford, describing the sights, experiences and her thoughts. The trip proved challenging and on occasions problematic, as Kathleen coped with her ailing father, transportation difficulties and the squalor, food shortages and black market. ‘‘The great pleasure resorts of old, Cannes, Nice etc.’, she wrote, ‘are indefinitely sad—cities of ghosts, the great luxury hotels are all empty, their shutters closed, and dirty with the rust of hinges.’ Fitzpatrick found Europe decimated by war and in great contrast to the extravagance and prosperity of the 1920s. Resolved to live only on the meagre and monotonous English rations, she instructed Crawford not to reproach himself for failing to send food packages156 Crawford replied with news of their beloved Department, his work and regular reports of his fluctuating weight. Fitzpatrick wrote: ‘It is lovely to get all the news of Baragwanath’s safe arrival, Manning’s excellent talk to the Research Seminar, and your own stimulating T. and M. classes.’157 Both were supportive and generous to a legion of students who were, at the time, enjoying various successes.158 The letters reveal a great deal about their friendship, as well as the personalities and dynamics of the Department. Apparently after Crawford’s remarriage, his letters to Fitzpatrick were subsequently destroyed. Fitzpatrick was the quintessential confidant: reassuring, placating and advising. Concerned that Crawford was delaying his leave for another year, Kathleen enquired, ‘what am I to make of the general statement that you have “decided to do Modern History again” and the particular that you “are not meeting the pass students?”’159 This was the first hint that Crawford was concerned that he was becoming remote from students who were not part of the honours stream.160 It appears Fitzpatrick attended to Crawford’s ambitions at the expense of her own research. She discussed her enjoyment of Cambridge, which she likened to ‘temporary infidelity’, as well as
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‘tremendous’ Oxford and the redoubtable Humphrey Sumner. However, her interest was constantly drawn back to Crawford. On hearing news of his proposal for a book on Australia, she imagined it would be an immediate success and would replace Hancock’s seminal work: Chiefly it is so delightful, to hear of your work winning recognition outside Australia, and by the sheer weight of its merit without any of the wire-pulling, University politics or other distasteful factors which one knows so well often contribute largely to the building up of big names.161 Although Fitzpatrick was highly regarded and accomplished, Barbara Falk suggests that she was a product of her gender and generation, and was reluctant to draw attention to herself or her achievements.162 She adhered to an exacting form of etiquette. Crawford wrote her a letter of introduction to the editor of Cambridge University Press regarding her book. She required a formal introduction to Professor M. M. Postan and insisted that Sumner’s interest was only raised when he received a letter from Crawford. Fitzpatrick was an odd combination of vulnerability and confidence, modesty and cruel wit. ‘I suppose I should be grateful for the gracious intimation that the Interim Council would be prepared to consider financial assistance in publication’, she wrote with sarcasm, ‘but I am not a bit, they’ll get no cheap credit for my book, I’ll sell my Chinese carpet first’.163 While Fitzpatrick was missed, several other important matters preoccupied Crawford in the remaining months of the year. The most urgent issue was the plans for the Australian National University. In August 1947, the University was finally and publicly confirmed. Crawford had accompanied a delegation to Canberra, and it was unanimously agreed that the lecturers in Canberra University College would have a closer association with the University of Melbourne, and the Melbourne professors would assume more substantial advisory and supervisory roles. Crawford’s response to these additional responsibilities is unknown. There is no evidence that he resented the extensive involvement with Canberra, although he found the flights exhausting. Indeed, if his previous determination to exert an influence on Australian
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history—and the importance he attached to this role—is any indication, he would have encouraged it. Crawford was also pragmatic about the serious overcrowding on the existing campuses. However, he might not have anticipated the suggestion that he should be appointed Professor and Dean of Canberra University College. The idea was not publicly stated and was more a subject of gossip. Crawford ‘brushed the suggestion aside’ and appeared somewhat angered by Fitzpatrick’s insistence that he give it ‘very serious consideration’. Her reasoning was insightful and characteristically generous in spirit: While you stay in Melbourne you will never have enough time and energy to give to any serious creative work of your own. Of course I know that building the Melbourne History School was a creative work – but not the only kind you can do. You have given and given of your time and strength to others – if you go on doing so, your health won’t last…the work of the past 10 years will march on in the History graduates of that time. I need hardly say I’d hate you to go, and not be terribly enthusiastic about Hist. Dep. If it were not yours…164 Crawford did not accede to Kathleen Fitzpatrick’s evangelical belief in his historical approach and insistence that he should expand his horizons and seek new ‘disciples’. He did not agree that his work in Melbourne was complete, nor did he ‘think highly’ of Fitzpatrick’s ideas. ‘I felt it a matter of conscience to point out that it would give you a chance for creative activity in writing which you value highly’, Fitzpatrick claimed in her defence. ‘But the disadvantage you put rather more than outweighs the advantages and I can’t help being glad of it.’165 In an attempt to bring a semblance of levity to the exchange, she responded with some humour to Crawford’s reference to William Friedmann in Law as an asset and his ‘struggle’ to like the economic historian John La Nauze, an attempt that was failing dismally.166 A concern over publication and wider recognition punctuated Crawford’s life. While Fitzpatrick referred constantly to her frustrated plans for writing, Crawford was in heady demand. These early post-
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war years were perhaps his most successful, and his mixture of humanity and experience made him an intriguing figure. The productivity might ironically be attributed to his precarious health, which forced him to insist on a leaner teaching and administrative load. It might also have contributed to his concern that he was becoming a distant presence from many of the students. Publication, however, gave Crawford professional credibility and eased his recurring selfdoubt. It is also evident that his political notoriety had not damaged his academic reputation. In August 1947 C. E. Carrington of Cambridge University Press approached Crawford to devise a series of schoolbooks on the British Commonwealth.167 At the same time, the venerable Reginald Coupland contacted him on a similar but unrelated project. With Coupland as the General Editor, Hutchinson’s University Library was prepared to publish a multi-volume history of the British Empire. ‘Like most University folk these days, I expect you to be pretty heavily burdened’, Coupland wrote in an informal letter to tempt Crawford: But is it possible that you might care to undertake the volume on Australia? It would not take long and it seems to me just possible that you might welcome an opportunity to give to a wider circle of English readers your conception of Australia’s character and destiny.168 The Hutchinson book had greater appeal than the Cambridge one, and Crawford entered a contract to deliver the ‘little book’ by June 1949. Titled Australia, it was finally published in 1952. Crawford apologised to Carrington and cited his ‘appalling weight of commitments’.169 Several months after Carrington’s approach, Crawford had met an American, Frederick Dibley, who on Crawford’s behalf, approached the American publisher, Harper & Brothers. He asked for ‘a detailed copy of the outline of the manuscript’ for the Theory of History.170 This project was still very much in its infancy and was possibly an offshoot of Crawford’s article on ‘History as Science’ and the substantial lecture notes he had compiled on Theory and Method. Despite the interest in Crawford’s distinctive approach to the theory and method of history, once again nothing came of the project. While Crawford’s perceived lack of productivity caused him
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great anxiety, it did not mean that he was ineffectual or unaware of the growth of Australian historiography. In October 1947 he produced an original and perceptive report for Keith Hancock on ‘Research in the Social Sciences in Australia’. The report confirmed Crawford’s grasp of the field and his insight into its future development. Discerning the impending boom in original work in Australian history, he set out the need to improve and integrate historical research and plot the direction the research should take. According to Crawford, the most urgent requirement was to cultivate and ‘cross fertilise’ various social sciences with history: philosophy, political science, economic history, anthropology, sociology and geography. The report also emphasised the need to promote all Australian history, not merely the official and standard narratives. Crawford espoused the importance of war history, regional history, Australian biography and the study of private and semi-private institutions: banks, industries, schools, businesses, hospitals. He avoided the ‘main controversial problems in the study of Australian history’, and referred to Manning Clark as the person to write a report on contemporary difficulties. Crawford always intended that Clark should tell the Australian story and in refusing Carrington’s request, he generously suggested Clark should be approached: It is not easy to find someone who writes well and simply. Who has, if possible, some experience of school-teaching together with a sufficient mastery of Australian history, who knows everything of England as well as Australia, and who has the imagination to make such a book come alive. Manning Clark has these qualities.171 Another ‘urgent’ task identified in the report was the collection, preservation and cataloguing of documents so they would be accessible to researchers. Under the direction of Crawford and with a Commonwealth Research Grant, the History Department had become engaged in such work. Research difficulties were more acute in Melbourne, where a state archive had yet to be created. Dorothy Crozier, Pat Ingham and Althea Stretton embarked on the preparation of an annotated guide to manuscript collections and historical source materials in the state.172 Crawford overlooked the difficulties the work
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imposed on the women and the limited funding that forced them to depend on their families for financial support.173 This oversight was characteristic of the time when most women in academia were expected to have a private income or be supported financially by their parents. The study of Australian history had become important to Crawford. His enthusiasm and energy for this work made the retreat from public life even more glaring. Politics, the improvement of the human condition and the enlargement of freedom were issues he no longer actively pursued. In February 1948, Crawford received a request from Brian Fitzpatrick to sign a ‘pretty representative’ petition to the Australian press that would draw public attention to the Palestine partition, protesting about the British activities and countering the effect produced by the local news presentation that terrorist Jews were attempting to drive the British out.174 ‘I must ask you to do without my signature on this occasion’, Crawford responded in a polite, distant and somewhat self-protective manner: My general sympathy with the matter is not supported by sufficient knowledge, and I do not like joining in public pronouncements when I am in no position to defend my action. Moreover, I have lost so much time in such controversy that I am determined to have a spell in order to get on with some long overdue writing.175 This calculated rebuff suggests that political activism had lost its appeal. Wearied by personal attacks, Crawford had consciously begun to withdraw from political life. The year of 1948 would be the first in more than a decade in which a political controversy did not interrupt his life. Manning Clark and others were not so fortunate and, in that year, drew the wrath of Crawford’s old foe, Frederick Edmunds. In a rowdy address to the University Liberal Club on ‘Education versus communism’, Edmunds attacked Clark. During a radio broadcast, Clark had apparently claimed that the working class could not succeed without the support of the armed forces, which Edmunds declared was ‘a monstrous misstatement’ of historical fact. ‘This man is totally incapable of teaching the subject he is supposed to teach.’ Edmunds claimed of Clark. ‘He is
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either woefully ignorant of what he is teaching or he is a paid agent of the Communist Party.’176 Throughout his career (and well after his death), Clark would be a target for similar accusations. On this occasion, he remained silent, even though Edmunds’ criticisms had an impact.177 Crawford had been involved in the Melbourne University Staff Association since its inception in 1944 and was its Chairman by 1948. He came to Clark’s defence with a warning that if such attacks were successful in intimidating staff, then the University would become ‘timid and colourless’.178 It was an outraged Kathleen Fitzpatrick who led the counter-attack on 19 March 1948.179 The Vice-Chancellor, now accustomed to Edmunds’ obvious contempt for the Melbourne History School, also intervened. Medley made an immediate announcement in the press criticising Edmunds’ ‘unsubstantiated’ statements about staff. ‘I need only add’, he proclaimed, ‘that Mr Manning Clark is a teacher in whom the University has complete confidence’.180 The excuse Crawford offered to Brian Fitzpatrick for his political inaction might well have been insincere, given that he later abandoned his plans for a ‘spell’ of writing. Due for a year’s sabbatical, he wrote to Medley to inform him that he had originally intended to defer the leave until the following year, but now proposed to postpone it indefinitely. Once again, he cited the demands of his ‘own school’ and his precarious health. In reality, Crawford had not done the necessary preparation for a research trip to England; in fact, he had not even devised a research topic. He again altered his plans and asked for a leave of absence in second term, to spend it in Perth, where he intended to write the biography of Wood, which he had been preparing during ‘stolen moments’ in the last two years.181 Why the Sheep Died! Crawford’s request was granted, and he left Melbourne in May 1948, ‘genuinely frightened’.182 For the first time in ten years, he was free from administrative work, and he wondered if he were capable of writing every day for two months in order to complete a book. Perth appeared a curious destination, given that the primary source material he needed to consult was in Sydney.183 One reason for choosing Western Australia was its recently created archives.
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Crawford had devised a new subject for research. He intended to study why the settlement of a group of Victorian settlers who took sheep to Camden Harbour in 1864 had failed. He implied that this research topic had been properly devised before his departure. Sceptics in the Department referred to the project as, ‘why the sheep died’.184 Kathleen Fitzpatrick appeared surprised by the intended trip to the Kimberleys in July and did not consider it a shrewd decision. ‘I am sorry about Camden Harbour, (except of course that you may enjoy it, in which it will be a refreshment and a good thing) because of the interruption’, she wrote, ‘it is awfully hard to start again, once you’ve dropped the thread.’185 Fitzpatrick knew only too well of Crawford’s tendency to procrastinate, his preference for research rather than the labour of writing, and his substantial record of aborted research projects. The first week was spent on the long train journey to Perth. The following eight weeks were occupied by writing. Despite his apprehension, the work on George Wood flowed freely. Crawford calculated that he had completed 45,000 words, although the quality of the draft was open to debate. He was devastated by Fred Alexander’s criticisms of his manuscript. ‘Take no notice of Freddy Alexander, I should think he is about as creative as a piece of Cheddar cheese.’ Fitzpatrick responded in Crawford’s defence. ‘Also, don’t show him any more work—children and fools etc.—and while one knows the judgement is not worth two pence, still it’s depressing anyway.’186 Crawford also began his research on Camden Harbour. As preparation he interviewed descendants of the Victorian settlers and gave talks on the settlement. In August he embarked on a trip to Camden and, with the assistance of the BHP magnate, Essington Lewis, visited Cockatoo Island. He then sailed to Camden Harbour on the ‘Watt Leggatt’, a lugger that belonged to the Presbyterian Mission at Kunmunya. The mission ‘provided’ Crawford with two Aboriginal guides, Albert Barunga and Edward Gunnamurryamoi, and five donkeys (one of which he learnt to ride precariously). The former, Albert Barunga’s talents were somewhat wasted. Barunga had been raised at the Kunmunya Mission and was befriended by the Reverend J.R.B. Love, who relied on Barunga to provide him with the knowledge to write on linguistics and for biblical translations. When Kingsford-Smith’s plane was forced down in the
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Kimberley area, it was Barunga who found it. After the air raids on Broome in 1942, he worked for the navy, which used his expertise for patrol work. Barunga encouraged the promotion of Aboriginal culture before it became fashionable and would become an important Aboriginal leader in the 1960s.187 With this exceptional company, Crawford explored the sites of the attempted settlement, collected grasses and made a film. The group then travelled north and watched corroborees, observed the work of the Mission and collected Aboriginal implements for the University’s ethnological collection (failing to keep a record of the ‘transactions’). Two days later Crawford sailed back to Derby in the lugger, visited the Leprosarium there, flew on to Perth and then Melbourne.188 Despite the break, the research and writing in Perth had not rejuvenated him. Fitzpatrick sensed that it had not been ‘fun’, and his letters were devoid of ‘authentic cheer’.189 The enthusiasm, wonder and political and social commentary in the earlier diaries and letters are not evident in the Camden Harbour series. This was a more subdued Crawford, who recorded the factual details in a distant and detached voice. Crawford claimed in the University Gazette that he ‘looked into the work of the mission’ and ‘discussed the native question’.190 ‘It was a difficult problem—people ranging from bush natives to civilized half caste, & coming from diverse tribes and places with no single tribal law to impose order.’ Crawford observed. ‘The bush natives looked least happy—but in general air of contentment despite disease about.’191 The Aborigines are occasionally described as ‘intelligent’ or ‘happy’, but Crawford did not elaborate on their conditions, health and attitudes. There is no significant evidence of attention to the Aborigines, or any record of Crawford actively interacting with them. For an historian who celebrated research in the field and now had a unique opportunity to explore uncharted territory, it might seem a wasted effort. John Mulvaney, however, recalled the expedition differently and praised Crawford’s unorthodoxy in ‘leaving the library’:
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His fieldwork in the Kimberleys brought him into contact with the Aborigines. In those days Aboriginal prehistory was unknown and untaught, so that it was exciting to hear his comments. He appreciated that the Aborigines were factors in Australian story and he attempted to understand their role by reading extensively of anthropological literature.192 Perhaps Crawford’s diffidence was provoked by the sense that he did not possess the required expertise. ‘For my own work’, he ambitiously announced, ‘I needed a geologist, a soil chemist, a geographer and a botanist, and with the addition of an anthropologist and zoologist, and equipment for recording the native language and the marvellously interesting music of the corroborees, and for filming the corroborees at night time.’193 Crawford hoped to organise a combined Melbourne and Western Australian expedition during the following May vacation, but these intentions were unfulfilled.194 He was clearly willing to follow R. H. Tawney’s dictum ‘that a tolerable pair of boots should figure prominently among the essential equipment of the historian’.195 However, he did not appear to have the confidence or impetus to produce any substantial writing from the experience. Despite his absence in 1948, Crawford was kept informed of the gossip, personality clashes and crises in the History Department. Alan McBriar, who had been expected to teach in third term, was delayed overseas. Dorothy Crozier had left the staff, thanking Crawford for ‘making a difference’ to her young career and his encouragement and faith.196 Manning Clark had begun to ruffle feathers with his supreme confidence and the ‘lordly manner’ that had stuck in Fitzpatrick’s throat.197 Crawford also learnt that Gwyn James’ wife, Evelyn, had finally succumbed to depression and taken her own life by walking into the sea on a cold winter’s morning and drowning.198 Fitzpatrick apologised to Crawford for bringing him into the fray during his ‘miserable bit of leave’, but could not refrain from ‘exploding’ at the University bureaucracy for the delay in her appointment as Associate Professor.199 Despite her frustrations, the Committee eventually recommended the appointment when it came before the Council on 6 September. The Registrar was confident that it ‘was in
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the bag’, but Fitzpatrick expressed anxiety about what could go wrong. She relished ‘holding the fort’ and assured Crawford that on his return that she would be ‘full of ideas and suggestions’ to enable him to have more time for his own work.200 Fitzpatrick’s promotion had originally been raised in a letter Crawford wrote to Medley earlier in the year, in which he argued that it was appropriate since Fitzpatrick had completed her book on Tasmania. It was becoming apparent that publication was a prerequisite for academic advancement. Crawford, who had yet to produce his definitive book, was both motivated and debilitated by his failure. He returned to the University in October in a gloomy mood. Once more mired in administration and even distracted by ‘hack work’, he was, at the very least, looking for an excuse: So the days and terms and years slip by and one reaches that strange reversal of all University values, that conscience is quiet when the administration is up-to-date and the classes held, and that conscience is uneasy if there is an hour of leisure within working hours to read an article bearing on one’s chosen field.201 The new emphasis on publication was particularly evident in the selection process for the Chair of Political Science. The lengthy process consumed much of Crawford’s time when he returned. Personal qualities, Oxbridge credentials and political sympathies had previously been central criteria. Boyce Gibson had been shopping in Oxford to fill the Chair and provided four potential candidates for consideration; he even approached one with an offer. In his letter to Paton, Gibson reported an applicant with ‘a working class origin but no gaucherie’, another as ‘a straight government man and not a fellow traveller’.202 Although William Friedmann claimed it was useful to have ‘personal knowledge of as wide a field of candidate’, he was slightly disconcerted by Gibson’s actions. Crawford and Paton shared Friedmann’s alarm at Gibson’s antiquated practice of approaching Oxford and politically ‘safe’ candidates rather than following the process of open advertisement. As a non-Australian and overseas appointment himself, Friedmann believed that ‘research and publication standards’
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should be the primary criteria. He thought Gibson’s approach could create ‘an awkward situation’ and that a University of the standard of Melbourne should look beyond junior Oxford men. In a letter to Gibson, Friedmann urged him to wait for reactions to an advertisement. ‘There are, also, we think, at least a few scholars in Australia whose qualifications and experience seem, prima facie, at least equal to those people mentioned in your letter.’203 The belief was deeply ingrained that Australian universities should recruit Oxbridge graduates. Crawford’s appointment had been testament to the practice. Graduates from other English universities and American counterparts were seldom considered. Friedmann’s criticism of the emphasis on Oxford was unusual, though he implied that Crawford agreed that the Political Science candidate should not necessarily have Oxford credentials. This did not prevent Crawford from advising that the General History lectureship vacated by Dorothy Crozier at the end of 1948 would ‘be sought most probably from Oxford’.204 One of the unspoken requirements was a candidate who had no political baggage. When news reached Ian Milner about the Chair in Political Science, he contacted Crawford and enquired whether the ‘atmosphere’ clinging around his name had affected his chances. In a careful and sensitive letter, Crawford claimed that he was unsure. ‘People influenced by that sort of prejudice’, Crawford confessed, ‘commonly fail to recognise it as such, and rationalise it in other ways. It would not influence Friedmann; but there is a cautious mood which could influence the choice for the Chair more than the choice for a senior lectureship.’205 It was now apparent that Milner’s communist sympathies handicapped his academic prospects. Milner was one Oxford graduate who was considered beyond the pale. By January 1949 Crawford judged that the ‘post-war market’ in staffing was more favourable, so that the posts he had filled temporarily with the ‘second-best’ could be advertised as permanent.206 The one exception in this process was Manning Clark. Crawford recommended Clark for early promotion to a Senior Lectureship, even though he expected that Clark would be offered a vacant Chair elsewhere. The attraction of the newly founded Graduate School in Canberra could well have been another reason for Crawford’s desire to secure his best staff.
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Keith Hancock had returned to Canberra to head the Graduate School of Social Sciences at the new Australian National University. ‘The whole thing hinged on getting staff’, he confided to Crawford in a long letter announcing his resignation in May 1949.207 Concerned that he was abandoning a job that he had scarcely begun, Hancock elaborated on his grievances to Crawford and ‘how the negotiations broke down.’ Hancock’s situation illustrated the problems of staffing universities at the time. Determined to create an exemplary institution consisting of the finest scholars, Hancock had surveyed the field and recommended the ‘best man they could get’. Despite this ‘thorough and pertinacious’ search that encompassed English, Australian, American candidates and ‘even one Hungarian—a few of them were interested, but not one would accept’.208 It was apparent that as early as 1947, R. C. Mills, the Chairman of the Interim Council, was irritated by Hancock’s demands. Crawford was asked to arrange a meeting with a ‘select few’ for Hancock’s visit to Canberra to consult with the Interim Council on the future development of the proposed Research School of Social Sciences. Mills warned Crawford that Hancock showed a ‘very definite desire to “vet” any list which we may send’.209 Hancock believed that the National University would fail unless one or two professorial colleagues accompanied him to Australia. When the Vice-Chancellor, Douglas Copland, refused on behalf of the University, to wait until 1952 or 1953 for one of these favoured colleagues to begin, Hancock resigned amid a ‘first class dust up’.210 He remained saddened, shocked and sensitive to the accusation that he ‘preferred England to Australia’.211 Crawford empathised with Hancock’s predicament. He understood that to ‘staff a University with the highest standard, one must begin with the persons rather than with the paper schemes’.212 He revisited his own frustrations: I’ll confess that I half believe that you are well out of it. For it is doubtful whether the job of building a completely new school would have left you time and energy for your own original work…I know in my own case the satisfaction that one gets from building a big and active, and I think, good
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school; but I do not cease to regret the original work which can go no further than the conception in this busy life.213 Privately Crawford did not favour the creation of a pure research institution, since it would be deprived of the stimulus of teaching. With Hancock’s departure, he was undoubtedly the pre-eminent Australian-based historian of his generation. One of the reasons was that Crawford played a pivotal role in nurturing careers. He assiduously followed the progress and achievements of those he sent to England. By 1949 five postgraduate students were ensconced at Oxford and Crawford received reports on all, including one student who gave Humphrey Sumner the ‘shuddering horrors’.214 Graduate studies were mostly pursued at Oxford, although Dorothy Crozier was ‘sitting avidly at Raymond Firth’s feet’ at the London School of Economics. The beginning of the shift to America was also occurring, with Hugh Stretton’s success at Princeton and Pat Gray’s less satisfying experience at Columbia.215 Research possibilities were growing, too, for those postgraduates who remained in Australia.216 The History School produced successive groups of highly regarded graduates who were considered unorthodox and progressive.217 The esteem in which they were held delighted Crawford. He was less used to displays of independence. Despite the promises that he had dangled before him, Manning Clark resigned from Melbourne University and left at the end of September 1949. In his inaugural lecture at the ANU, Clark declared that ‘the first move to be made in the re-writing of Australian history is to drop the ideas of the past’ and especially the ‘bankrupt liberal ideal’.218 Crawford confided his disappointment to Humphrey Sumner, who responded with soothing advice. ‘Of course you will miss him very badly, but he is obviously due for promotion.’219 Crawford accepted Sumner’s interpretation and put an extra spin on it. ‘I shall be sorry to lose Manning’, he wrote pragmatically to Tom Truman, ‘but I am glad that he has got a promotion that he has well deserved. I shall take over Australian history with a great deal of pleasure.’ Crawford insisted that he gave up teaching the subject because a head of a department has to consider the best use of his people rather than his personal preferences. Manning Clark ‘was the obvious person’.220
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Cold War Apart from his anguish over writing, Crawford was content with his academic life. Political controversy, however, once more punctured the calm. By 1949 the Cold War had become vicious. Any intellectual who was rumoured to have even flirted with communism was an easy target for politicians protected by parliamentary privilege, journalists eager for a salacious by-line and a public largely uncomprehending of the life of an academic. The History School had a reputation for being radical and rather Marxist.221 Allegations of bias, undue influence and even subversion were levelled at it. John Poynter observed that the History School tended to employ far more students as tutors than other departments and, by virtue of their youth, they were often ideologically motivated and attracted to the left.222 Serle concurred and emphasised the role the history students played in student affairs. However, he insisted that Crawford was never an ‘ideologue’, who laid down a line or attracted followers.223 His commitment was to a progressive and humanist liberalism, not a political line. Nevertheless, the accusations against Crawford and his School were growing. Even the teaching of the history of the Communist Party was now condemned.224 The University of Melbourne was constantly scrutinised in newspaper articles and letters. The powerful Labor Club was widely assumed to be a communist front and to exercise baleful political influence.225 During the 1949 Federal election campaign, Menzies was heckled, booed and greeted with fascist salutes and shouts of ‘Heil Hitler’ on a visit to the campus. The gathering of 2500 people was considered the largest ever held at the University and the ‘most disorderly’ and ‘unruliest’ of the Opposition leader’s tour. The lecture theatre was filled to capacity; adjoining rooms, passages and windows were crowded. The microphones amplified Menzies’ call for war on communists. He said that as Prime Minister he would immediately ban the Party. His condemnation of the Melbourne University Labor Club as ‘the first to admit frankly that it was communistic’ was greeted with howls of derision.226 Demonstrations on campus by those on both the right and the left had become highly organised. Although the actions of the radical students were widely condemned, there remained a persistent suspicion that they were merely puppets of academics who had poisoned
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their minds with communist propaganda. On 20 May, it was announced that Sir Charles Lowe of the Supreme Court would conduct a Royal Commission to inquire into communist activities in Victoria. Arthur Calwell immediately responded that the University should be investigated because undergraduates ‘were being made dupes of the Communist Party’.227 The Royal Commission on Communism had been expected, and the Staff Association had prepared for the mud-slinging a month before the public announcement. In a rowdy annual general meeting of the Association, chaired by Crawford and with an attendance of 120 staff, it was resolved that the ‘Committee be asked to take such action as it thinks fit to safeguard the freedom and other interests of members of the University’, and to ‘defend members of staff from unwarranted attacks on political grounds’.228 An unsigned document that was circulated at the meeting claimed that ‘real intellectual advance’ was attainable only if intellectuals were free to hold ‘any political, religious or other views’, and students were presented with a truly representative selection of material.229 While Crawford supported academic independence, not all members of the Association shared his position.230 Crawford was protective of his staff and determined that they should avoid unwarranted pressure and adverse publicity. He quietly chided the Secretary of the Student Historical Society for arranging a debate on historical materialism between an official of the Communist Party and one of his lecturers, Arthur Burns. Crawford thought this put Burns ‘at risk’. Another young lecturer would prove far more conspicuous than Burns. Jim Cairns, of the Department of Economic History and later Deputy Prime Minister, was highly critical of the Royal Commission, which allowed a judge the ‘unusual’ power to enquire into political matters and to discipline recalcitrant witnesses.231 In a lengthy discussion in May 1949, the Staff Association finally agreed that ‘sound legal advice’ should be available to staff members summoned to give evidence. William Friedmann of the Law School informed the Committee that his colleagues would be ‘glad to assist’, and recommended that the University should itself brief Counsel to protect its own and its staff’s interests.232 The Vice-Chancellor had previously upheld the principle of academic freedom. In the emotive climate attending the Royal Commission, he became greatly alarmed. Medley urged discretion
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and caution. The University realised that some members of staff would be subpoenaed to give evidence. Under a Council directive (and on the advice of Friedmann), Medley instructed his staff that they should consult him before doing so: I rely upon members of staff to retain the objectivity of outlook which is the hallmark of a University teacher and to remember that in the present state of public opinion the less we say the less we are misrepresented.233 Crawford had every reason to dread the Royal Commission, considering the past attacks on him as a teacher and public intellectual. Academics who were either communist members or who had associated with the Party would be accused of ‘inefficiency or misconduct’ by the Commission. Even so, it was apparent that he was not willing to be silenced. In June, he joined Friedmann in advocating peace and understanding by those not ‘blinded by ideological hatreds or by power’.234 It was not a ‘manifesto’, but decried the ‘growing trend of totalitarianism and the regimentation of thinking’ that came from ‘the extreme right as well as from the extreme left’.235 Crawford’s political stance had changed from support for Russia to a stance advocating freedom of speech. Although Crawford was not called to give evidence, the ‘renegade communist’, Cecil Sharpley, denounced him as part of a circle of communists with influence.236 The University was of interest to the Royal Commission as it attempted to ascertain whether staff or students were members of the Communist Party. The Melbourne University Labor Club and Ian Turner came under particular scrutiny. So, too, did Australia-Soviet House; the Royal Commission claimed it was controlled or directed by the Communist Party.237 The Council of Civil Liberties was also investigated and Brian Fitzpatrick interrogated. Lowe observed of Fitzpatrick that it was ‘correct to say he was favourable to many movements supported by the Communist Party’.238 Several members of staff were named in evidence, and the Staff Association believed this was prejudicial to their ‘personal and professional reputation’: Jim Cairns, Kathleen Fitzpatrick, Maurice Brown and Geoffrey Sawyer drafted a statement of general principles. This
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was intended for Medley to present in evidence, and it emphasised the allegations of bias and indoctrination. It called for the continuation of the study of communist theory; argued that no restriction on political membership should be placed on staff, and stated that the teaching of a doctrine should not be taken as evidence of political opinion.239 At the conclusion of the Commission, Lowe produced a sober report and dismissed the exaggerated reports of a communist conspiracy. Crawford did not participate in the protest and, by the end of 1949, he appeared to absent himself increasingly from any overt political activity. Notes 1
‘Professor Crawford Back from Moscow’, Argus, 18 January 1944; ‘Professor Crawford back from Moscow’, The Age, 18 January 1944.
2
W. R. Hodgson to Crawford, 14 January 1944, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
3
Crawford to Vice-Chancellor, 15 February 1944, 1944/501, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
4
Crawford to Secretary, Dept of External Affairs, 10 Feb 1944, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
5
W. R. Hodgson to Crawford, 3 March 1944, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
6
Crawford to Vice-Chancellor, 15 February 1944, 1944/342, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
7
University Calendar, 1944. The History Department now relied on two Senior Lecturers, two Acting Lecturers and three part-time Lecturers. Fitzpatrick and Harper were the Senior Lecturers, Alan McBriar and Joyce Dunn were Acting Lecturers, Brian Fitzpatrick was the University Research Fellow, Orwell de Ruyton Foenander was a part-time Lecturer, Lewis Wilcher was on service leave and Gwyn James was a part-time officer.
8
Crawford to the Vice-Chancellor, 6 October 1944, 1944/501, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
9
Ibid.
10
Ibid.
11
Ibid.
12
Ibid. UMA.
13
Crawford to C. Carrington, 5 August 1947, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
14
Crawford to the Vice-Chancellor, 6 October 1944, 1944/501, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
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15
Clark, The Quest for Grace, 159.
16
Macmahon Ball to Crawford, 6 August 1945, 1945/655, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
17
Crawford to the Vice-Chancellor, 6 October 1944, 1945/655, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
18
R. M. Crawford, Hand-written notes for book, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
19
Crawford to A. H. McDonald, 8 February 1945, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
20
Crawford to Colin Tannock, 17 April 1944, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. In all probability, Crawford would never have been able to complete a 13,000-word article in two months.
21
R. M. Crawford, ‘In Russia in Wartime’, The Retired Rail and Tramwayman, 1945.
22
R. M. Crawford, ‘Russia in the Post-war World’, Australian Institute of International Affairs, June 1944, Box 12, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
23
‘Professor Crawford Back from Moscow’, Argus, 18 January 1944; ‘Professor Crawford Back from Moscow’, The Age, 18 January 1944.
24
Correspondents included A. D. Hope and Ian Clunies Ross, who requested Russian periodicals and literature on history, politics and economics. Curiously, Crawford told Ross he was of little assistance because he did not retain notes about the Department of External Affairs procedures, nor did he apparently keep a book list. It is an unexpected omission considering Crawford’s intended research work. Crawford to Ian Clunies Ross, 15 May 1944, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
25
Crawford to A. Sodatov, 26 August 1944, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. He provided letters of introduction to Kemenov, and Lifanov for other academics and graduates. With A. Sodatov, Crawford discussed the exchange of Australian publications with the Lenin Library, with the intention of creating a superlative Russian Library in Melbourne.
26
Crawford to W. R. Hodgson, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
27
Crawford to Edward Borovanky, 6 August 1944, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford congratulated Edward Borovanky, Director of the celebrated ballet academy, on opening night and compared the performance with the best he saw at the Bolshoi Ballet.
28
Australian Russian Society Constitution, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. It is evident that Crawford’s extracurricular interest was confined to Russia, and he rejected Maurice Blackburn Junior’s bid to sponsor the ‘Free German Youth Movement’, which assisted victims of German fascism. Maurice Blackburn to Crawford, 4 September 1944, Box 27, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
29
Within a year the building boasted a library, services canteen, recreation centre and picture gallery. Australia-Soviet House was intended not only as
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an educational and cultural centre, but an affiliate of the Patriotic Funds Council. It was also a place of rest and recreation for the Allied Services and Merchant Navy. 30
Report by the President of the Australia-Soviet House on behalf of the outgoing committee, 20 March 1945, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
31
Meredith Burgmann, ‘Dress rehearsal’, in Curthoys and Merritt, eds., Australia’s First Cold War. Vol. 1. Society, Communism and Culture, 50-1.
32
Crawford to John Curtin, date unknown, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
33
John Rodgers to Crawford, 8 August 1944, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The nominated conveners included Crawford, A. Hughes, J. Chapple, William Slater, David Rivett and Sir Isaac Isaacs.
34
Open letter from R. M. Crawford, 14 September 1944, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
35
Crawford to John Rodgers, 18 October 1944, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
36
Justice Lowe to Crawford, 18 October 1945, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
37
Crawford to Justice Lowe, 29 October 1945, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
38
University of Melbourne Calendar, 1947.
39
‘University’s Record’, Herald, 17 June 1946.
40
Ibid. This did not include late enrolments of students discharged from the services. In the year 1946 Crawford was also appointed Dean of Arts, which posed additional challenges.
41
Crawford to Vice-Chancellor, 16 February 1946, Box 1946/495, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
42
Ibid. For information on Margaret Kiddle, see Carey and Grimshaw, Women Historians and Women’s History.
43
Russel Ward, A Radical Life, The Autobiography of Russel Ward (Melbourne: Macmillan, Melbourne, 1988), 230.
44
‘5500 Students—A record—at University Opening’, The Age, 20 March 1946.
45
University of Melbourne, Annual Report of Dean – Faculty of Arts, University Calendar, 1946.
46
Ericksen was a returned soldier, a history honours student of enviable potential and staff member of the Army Education Rehabilitation Centre. Sensing the logistical difficulties of such an arrangement, Crawford asked for Ericksen to look after the ex-servicemen at appointed and stressful times of the year. Crawford to Brigadier Cremor, 19 July 1946, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Ericksen was not the only staffing change. John O’Brien joined Fitzpatrick and Harper as Senior Lecturers; Alan McBriar and Ailsa Grey were Lecturers (the latter was listed as Acting); Alan Shaw
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was Temporary (post-war) Lecturer; Joyce Dunn, George Yule and Laurie Douglas were Senior Tutors; Dorothy Crozier and Colin Williams were Temporary (post-war) Senior Tutors; Orwell de Ruyton Foenander, Lewis Wilcher (still on service leave), Herbert Burton and Gwyn James were parttime Lecturers; James Main, Kurt Menz and Margaret Kiddle were Tutors. University Calendar, 1946. 47
Dow, ed., More Memories of Melbourne University: Undergraduate Life in the Years Since 1919, 131.
48
Stephen Murray Smith to Geoff Serle, 29 May 1971, Box 65, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
49
Ian Milner to Crawford, 27 April 1946, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
50
Crawford to Ian Milner, 19 March 1946, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
51
Ian Milner to Crawford, 27 April 1946, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
52
Ibid.
53
Robert Manne, The Petrov Affair (Sydney: Pergamon, 1987), 181-2.
54
R. C. Mills was a member of the inter-departmental committee that included the highly regarded H. C. Coombs, George Knowles, C. S. Daley and H. T. Goodes.
55
R. C. Mills to Crawford, 30 January 1946, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
56
University Gazette, 18 August 1947.
57
University Gazette, May 1946. Under the proposed name, the ‘Australian National University’ would be the seventh in Australia and the first to be founded since the University of Western Australia was founded in 1913. It was intended that the existing Canberra University College would eventually be incorporated in the University and end the dependence of the College on the University of Melbourne.
58
R. C. Mills to Crawford, 21 March 1946, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The committee expected to advise the inter-departmental committee on the general field of research; staff, students, buildings and equipment; method of organisation of research and postgraduate work, and other relevant matters. The group responded quickly and met in a preliminary meeting in February and drafted and completed the report in less than two months.
59
Poynter and Rasmussen, A Place Apart, 96.
60
Ibid., 97.
61
Pat McBride to Crawford, 24 November 1946, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford had developed important links with Berkeley during his brief time in California in 1943.
62
Erica Wolff was awarded the first Ph.D. in Arts in 1948.
63
Crawford to Vice-Chancellor, 6 October 1944, 1944/342, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
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64
R. M. Crawford, ‘The Function of the Research Seminar’, 16 March 1949, School of History Research Seminar Book, Department of History Papers, UMA.
65
Ibid. The research was exhilarating, with an emphasis on Australia, and topics included Australian–American relations, Caroline Chisholm, Italian immigration, Australian policy, RAAF history, irrigation in the Shepparton District, the development of Commonwealth Government Social Services, crises in Victoria. See Research Seminars for 1946, School of History Research Seminar Book, Department of History Papers, UMA.
66
George Arnold Wood, 1 May 1946, School of History Research Seminar Book, Department of History Papers, UMA.
67
Crawford to Vice-Chancellor, 25 July 1946, 1946/495, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA. See John Mulvaney’s comments about both O’Brien and Adam, in Historical Studies, (1971), 13.
68
Report on Tasmanian Historical Records, History Department Papers, UMA. As early as 1913, Crawford’s predecessor, Ernest Scott, had approached the Tasmanian Government and made a plea for the appropriate preservation of the records.
69
Hugh Stretton, Historical Studies (1971), 11.
70
Ibid.
71
Sinclair, Highway Round the Harbour, 86.
72
Crawford to Lifanov, 27 February 1946, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The press duly reported Crawford’s absence and the successful and joyous evening where Professor G. S. Browne introduced ‘greetings in Russian’ and the Minister ‘beamed and clapped’. ‘Said it in Russian’, The Age, 4 March 1946.
73
Burgmann, ‘Dress rehearsal’, in Australia’s First Cold War, 50-1.
74
Ibid., 55.
75
‘This Is Russia As I Saw it’, R. M. Crawford, Herald, 22 May 1946. The Commonwealth Investigation Branch duly noted Crawford’s stance. B. Richards to the Deputy Director of the Commonwealth Investigation Branch, 8 November 1946, A6126/16, R. M. Crawford ASIO File, NAA.
76
Ibid.
77
Ibid.
78
William Slater, ‘Views Endorsed’, Herald, 22 May 1946.
79
Percy Mills Cerutty to Crawford, 22 May 1946, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
80
Jessie Street to Crawford, 8 July 1946, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
81
Stuart Macintyre, ‘Communism’ in Davison, Hirst and Macintyre, eds., The Oxford Companion to Australian History, 144.
82
John Rodgers to Crawford, 19 June 1946, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Rodgers suggested a deputation made up of academics, religious
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leaders, intellectuals and writers assemble and meet the Premier, which proved unsuccessful. 83
The letter no longer exists. As reported in ‘In Parliament, Too’, Argus, 15 November 1946.
84
Capp, Writers Defiled. 15.
85
Schrecker, No Ivory Tower, 74.
86
Crawford has an ASIO file with 108 folios in the open access period; 50 folios with partial exceptions and 17 folios for which total exception was sought under sub-section 33 (1) of the Archives Act 1983.
87
ASIO letter, 8 November 1946, R. M. Crawford ASIO File, A6126/16, NAA.
88
Ibid.
89
‘Soviet Envoy Stays Away’, Sydney Morning Herald, 11 November 1946.
90
Doreen Apthorpe to Crawford, 16 November 1946, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
91
Commonwealth Parliamentary Debates 1947, Vol 224, House of Representatives.
92
‘Mr Dunstan complains of “Pink” Professors’, Argus, 15 November 1946.
93
Ibid.
94
‘Utterances By a Few Professors’, The Age, 15 November 1946.
95
Frederick Edmunds to Crawford, 26 January 1942, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. See also McQueen, Suspect History, 39-3, for a discussion of Edmunds.
96
‘Utterances By a Few Professors’, The Age, 15 November 1946.
97
‘In Parliament, Too’, Argus, 15 November 1946. The newspaper noted that the Australia-Soviet House President was Professor Crawford, and the four Vice-Presidents were Professors G. S. Browne, Bernard Heinz, J. N. Greenwood and H. A. Woodruff.
98
‘‘‘Pinks” in Education: Assembly Attacks’, Sun, 15 November 1946.
99
The copy of an extract from the Council minutes, dated 3 June 1940 and 13 June 1940, was found in the Vice-Chancellor correspondence files and dated 15 November 1948. 1948/501, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
100
‘In Parliament, Too’, Argus, 15 November 1946.
101
‘Prof. Crawford Replies to MLA’, Herald, 19 November 1946.
102
‘Freedom of Opinion Essential in Academic Life’, Sun, 20 November 1946, and Argus, 20 November 1946.
103
Letter to editor signed by J. Hodgetts, June Rowley, D. F. Mackay, A. G. Serle, Nancy Wann, Dorothy Munro, R. A. Edgerton and A. P. Cosgrave, Argus,19 November 1946.
104
‘Minister Rejects “Pink Professor” Charge’, Sun, 20 November 1946. Although Francis Field’s title was Minister of Public Instruction, by 1946 he is also reported by the press as the Minister for Education in several newspaper reports and on his own letterhead.
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105
Justice Lowe to Crawford, 19 November 1946, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
106
Crawford to Justice Lowe, 22 November 1946, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
107
Ibid.
108
Crawford to John Rodgers, 25 November 1946, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
109
Crawford to John Rodgers, 16 December 1946, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford advised Rodgers that in future a publications subcommittee with legal advice should be formed.
110
Ibid.
111
J.F. Foster to Crawford, 18 December 1946, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
112
‘Crawford’, Historical Studies (1971), 37.
113
R. M. Crawford, ‘History as a Science’ in Historical Studies. Vol. 3, No. 11 (November 1947), 19.
114
Robert Dare, ‘Crawford on Theory and Method of History’, in Max Crawford’s School of History, 22-3.
115
Crawford, Historical Studies (1971), 37.
116
R. M. Crawford, ‘A Welcome to Freshers’, date unknown, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
117
Crawford to Vice-Chancellor, 12 December 1946, Department of History Papers, UMA.
118
Ibid. The former subject continued to be a preoccupation for Crawford. In a letter to the Vice-Chancellor asking for Clark to receive an increased salary, Crawford reiterated that Clark was responsible for ‘the development of work in Australian History’, which would also involve the supervision of research students. The weekly Research Seminars were now important. The emphasis was almost completely on Australian history, and the topics were increasingly more ambitious. They included Australian foreign policy, Australian Workers’ Union, the assignment system and a history of the working-class conditions. Although Crawford championed Manning Clark’s research on select documents in Australian history 1780 to 1850, it was evident that Clark’s Australian focus was not unique. Research Seminars, 1947, School of History Research Seminar Book, Department of History Papers, UMA.
119
Mulvaney, Historical Studies (1971), 12.
120
F. L. Edmunds ‘The Fight for World Supremacy’, The Age, 18 March 1947.
121
Ibid.
122
‘Professor Accused of Red Sympathies by M.L.A.’, Sun, 19 March 1947.
123
Joint statement by Justice Lowe and J. D. G. Medley, The Age, 19 March 1947.
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124
Statement to the Herald, 19 March 1947.
125
Edmunds, a former teacher at Scotch College, had studied history unsuccessfully in the early 1920s under Ernest Scott, then re-enrolled for an Arts degree in 1945.
126
‘Denial by Professor’, The Age and Herald, 20 March 1947.
127
Ibid.
128
Crawford to Vice-Chancellor, 10 April 1947, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
129
Crawford to Francis Field, 25 March 1947, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
130
Australia-Soviet House Report, 25 March 1947, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
131
Town Hall speech by Edmunds, 28 March 1947, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
132
Farrago, 2 April 1947.
133
Macintyre and McPhee, eds., Max Crawford’s School of History, 109. See also Amirah Inglis, The Hammer & Sickle and Washing Up (Melbourne: Hyland House, 1995).
134
Crawford’s drafted and unsent letters to the editor, 31 March 1947, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. See also ‘Students Discuss Attack by MLA On University Men’, Herald, 1 April 1947. For an examination of the ‘genre of the unsent letter’ see Janet Malcolm, The Silent Woman, 172.
135
Brian Fitzpatrick to the editor, ‘Independent Voice’, The Age, 1 April 1947.
136
‘Students Discuss Attack by MLA On University Men’, Herald, 1 April 1947.
137
Circular to all Members of the staff on the Subject of Communications to the Press and the Public, John Medley, 1940, Box 7, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
138
Ibid.
139
Crawford to Medley, 10 April 1947, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
140
Civil Liberty, April 1947, MS 4965, MS 4965, Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
141
Memorandum by Chancellor for Council on matters raised by Professor Crawford, Council and its Committees, Vol. 34, 14 April 1947, Council Minutes, UMA.
142
Ibid.
143
Political Science Report from C. M. H. Clark and I. F. G. Milner, date unknown, Box 26, History Department Papers, UMA.
144
P. H. Partridge to Vice-Chancellor, 9 June 1947, MUSA Papers, UMA. Partridge’s argument was similar to the line constantly offered by Crawford, but it was a more detached and effective letter and Crawford, with good reason, appeared to feel more personally involved.
145
Report on the University of Melbourne, 28 July 1947, ASIO File, NAA.
210
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146
John Rodgers to Members, Australia-Soviet House, 16 April 1947, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The appeal, much to Rodgers’ relief, was temporarily successful.
147
John Rodgers to Crawford, Australia-Soviet House, 6 June 1947, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
148
Crawford to A. Benjamin, 30 June 1947, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
149
Crawford to J. Ferguson, 15 September 1947, Box 24, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
150
Macintyre, Old Bebb’s Store and other Poems, 18.
151
Crawford to President, Australia-Soviet House, 31 March 1948, Box 22, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
152
Both Manning Clark and Geoffrey Blainey travelled to Russia and would write about their experiences. See C. M. H Clark, Meeting Soviet Man (Sydney: Angus & Robertson, 1960) and Geoffrey Blainey, Across a Red World (South Melbourne: Macmillan, 1968).
153
Humphrey Sumner to Crawford, 25 February 1947, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
154
Ibid.
155
Ian Milner to Crawford, 7 April 1947, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Milner wrote principally to ask Crawford for a reference for the Chair of Political Science at Victoria University College at Wellington.
156
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 3 May 1947, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
157
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 17 May 1947, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
158
Notably Clark, Williams, Pat Gray, Jim Main and Don Mackay.
159
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 31 May 1947, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
160
The trip also offered Fitzpatrick the opportunity to be reunited with several favoured students and former colleagues. The latter included George Paul, ‘very happy in his natural academic setting’, and Medley, who had invented a rather elaborate solution for Fitzpatrick to get back home. Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 27 July 1947, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
161
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 1 September 1947, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The Theory and Method course was also a particularly important emphasis, and Fitzpatrick looked for a similar methodological approach at Oxford, informing Crawford of Professor Postan’s course on ‘Selected Problems of Historical Method in Social Sciences’. Whether this constant reference to Theory and Method was a reflection of Crawford’s own preoccupation is impossible to gauge.
162
Interview with Barbara Falk, 2000.
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163
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 4 September 1947, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
164
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 15 August 1947, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
165
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 4 September 1947, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
166
Ibid. Wolfgang Friedmann was commonly addressed as the more anglicised William.
167
C. E. Carrington to Crawford, 19 August 1947, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. It was intended that there would be five groups on subjects that included a general volume, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. Other perspective contributors included Professor G. S. Browne, J. R. Darling (Geelong Grammar School), Dorothy Ross (Church of England Girl’s Grammar) from Melbourne, Professor R. C. Mills and H. Wyndham (Education Department) from Sydney, Professor J. S. Portus and Dr. A. G. Price from Adelaide, Professor J. Moulden from Perth and Professor C. D. Hardie from Tasmania.
168
Reginald Coupland to Crawford, 10 August 1947, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
169
Crawford to C. E. Carrington, 14 December 1948, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
170
Frederick Dibley to Crawford, 14 November 1947, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
171
Crawford to C. E. Carrington, 14 December 1948, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
172
R. M. Crawford, ‘Foreword’, 1948. Crawford also recommended that a similar guide to manuscript collections throughout Australia was imperative if a national history was to be developed. He hoped the new University in Canberra would coordinate the work. R. M. Crawford, ‘Research in the Social Sciences in Australia’, January 1948.
173
Dorothy Crozier to Crawford, 15 August 1948, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
174
Brian Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 13 February 1948, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
175
Crawford to Brian Fitzpatrick, 19 February 1948, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
176
‘Staff Attack by M.L.A., Sun, 19 March 1948.
177
Interview with Dymphna Clark, 1997.
178
Crawford to John Medley, 25 March 1948, MUSA Papers, UMA.
179
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Secretary of MUSA, 19 March 1948, MUSA Papers, UMA.
180
‘Mr Medley’s Reply’, The Sun, 19 March 1948. Crawford, wearing the Chairman’s hat, acknowledged Edmunds’ damage and thanked Medley for
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his ‘prompt and effective comment. Crawford to John Medley, 25 March 1948, MUSA Papers, UMA. 181
Crawford to John Medley, 5 February 1948, 1948/501, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA. Crawford also claimed that he had begun the Wood research three years earlier. See R. M. Crawford, ‘One Term’s Leave’, University Gazette, Vol. IV, No. 9, 22 October 1948.
182
R. M. Crawford, ‘One Term’s Leave’, University Gazette, Vol. IV, No. 9, 22 October 1948.
183
Ibid. Crawford later insisted that he chose Western Australia for a number of reasons, including the temperate climate, isolation from telephones and committees, closeness to libraries and colleagues appropriately informed to discuss his research with. One of them was Fred Alexander, head of the Department of History.
184
Macintyre and McPhee, eds., Max Crawford’s School of History, 50.
185
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 26 July 1948, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
186
Ibid. The biography of Wood took twenty-five years to complete. Alexander, despite his unwelcome criticism of the Wood manuscript, proved an exemplary travel agent, and Crawford benefited from the hospitality at the University of Western Australia. A flat in the Vice-Chancellor’ house, a study in the University with the usual privileges and a secretary to type the manuscript and letters were all made available. In return, Crawford presented ‘two short courses of three lectures each’ (already used in Melbourne) and ‘shared in the work of a weekly seminar’. It was no wonder Crawford felt the trip was ‘completely justified on all grounds’.
187
http://www.magabala.com/authors/authatoh2.htm. Barunga was a regional chair of the Aboriginal Theatre Foundation, and an inaugural member of both the Aboriginal Cultural Foundation and the Aboriginal Arts Board of the Australia Council. Ian Crawford would write about Albert Barunga in We Won the Victory: Aborigines and Outsiders on the North-west Coast of the Kimberley (Western Australia: Fremantle Arts Centre Press, 2001).
188
R. M. Crawford, ‘One Term’s Leave’.
189
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 10 August 1948, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
190
R. M. Crawford, ‘One Term’s Leave’.
191
R. M. Crawford diary, 31 August 1948, Box 55, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
192
Mulvaney in Historical Studies (1971), 13.
193
R. M. Crawford, ‘One Term’s Leave’.
194
The only evidence of the trip is a colour film of Camden Harbour, which Crawford declared was a ‘great success’. Unfortunately, the film of the corroboree failed. Crawford to Fred Alexander, 21 September 1948, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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195
This version of Tawney’s famous dictum is given in Russel Ward, The Australian Legend (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1962), viii.
196
Dorothy Crozier to Crawford, 15 August 1948, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
197
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 19 July 1948, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
198
Ibid. Gwyn James had regularly confided in Crawford about his work for MUP, Evelyn’s precarious ‘illness’ and his own desperation. See also Gwyn James Papers, UMA.
199
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 6 August 1948, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
200
Ibid.
201
R. M. Crawford, ‘One Term’s Leave’.
202
A. Boyce Gibson to George Paton, 20 October 1948, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
203
William Friedmann to A. Boyce Gibson, 8 November 1948, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
204
Staffing for 1949, R. M. Crawford, 3 October 1948, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
205
Crawford to Ian Milner, 22 November 1948, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
206
Crawford had used the description ‘second-best’ in his staffing proposals to the Vice-Chancellor, 12 December 1946, 1946/495, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
207
Keith Hancock to Crawford, 29 May 1949, Box 29, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. For elaboration see W. K. Hancock, Country and Calling (London: Faber and Faber, 1955) and S. G. Foster and Margaret Varghese, The Making of the Australian National University (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1996).
208
Keith Hancock to Crawford, 29 May 1949, Box 29, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
209
R. C. Mills to Crawford, 31 July 1947, Box 29, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. See also R. M. Crawford, ‘Research in the Social Sciences in Australia’, January 1948, Box 29, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
210
Foster and Varghese, The Making of the Australian National University, 43.
211
Ibid.
212
Crawford to Keith Hancock, 7 June 1949, Box 29, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
213
Ibid. Crawford now listed four research projects: Australia, George Arnold Wood, Camden Harbour and the Royal Melbourne Hospital.
214
Humphrey Sumner to Crawford, 17 November 1949, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
214
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215
Crawford to Joyce Dunn, 17 February 1949, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford claimed that Pat Gray was not ‘greatly impressed by Columbia’ and was forced to attend all sorts of courses of low undergraduate level.
216
Research Seminar 1949, School of History Research Seminar Book, Department of History Papers, UMA. The Research Seminars continued to reflect a fascination with Australian history.
217
R. G. Neale to Crawford, 12 August 1949, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Neale described Greenwood and contended that Greenwood’s method was ‘at odds’ with some of the older conservative members of staff. This conflict was unimportant in the long-term because the staff were retiring.
218
Crawford, Making History, 24.
219
Humphrey Sumner to Crawford, 2 December 1949, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
220
Crawford to Tom Truman, 9 September 1949, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
221
Arthur Burns wrote the latter comment in R. M. Crawford Special Issue Historical Studies, 9.
222
Interview with John Poynter, 2001.
223
Serle, ‘R. M. Crawford and His School’, Melbourne Historical Journal (1970), 4.
224
‘Communism in our University’, Herald, 31 April 1949. The unknown student claimed that this teaching was instructive because it was ‘of great value to Australia; it is as vital to know your enemy in a “cold war” as it is in open hostilities’.
225
Ibid. See also ‘Labor Club at our University’, Herald, 4 May 1949 and letters to the editor of the Sun, 6 May 1949.
226
‘Mr Menzies Heckled by Crowd at University’, The Age, 7 May 1949; ‘Menzies ends tour with lively day’, Argus, 7 May 1949; ‘Menzies winds up tour with rowdy University meeting’, Sun, 7 May 1949. This allegation prompted an almost immediate open debate on campus, involving the Liberal and Labor Clubs. It was a peaceful exchange, but there had been rumours of definite antagonism, and the President of the Labor Club claimed that three ex-servicemen in the Union building had attacked him.
227
‘Probe into University Communism Suggested’, The Age, 28 May 1949.
228
Staff Association Annual General Meeting, 27 April 1949, MUSA Papers, UMA. See also Poynter, and Rasmussen, A Place Apart, 482.
229
Author unknown (either Crawford or Cairns), MUSA papers, UMA.
230
The hysteria prompted rational and thoughtful responses from many students. Margaret Burgoyne, the Women’s General Representative of the SRC, estimated that there were only about 60 Communist students out of a University of 9,000. She conceded that they were ‘amazingly active’,
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but would ‘hate any person banned from the University merely because he was a Communist’. ‘University no hot-house for the reds’, Argus, 29 November 1949. Another stated that most students derided the very notion of the University as ‘training ground for rebels and traitors, an institution seething with sedition and conspiracy’, as absurd, always humorous and usually profane. ‘How strong are the reds in the University?’, Argus 7 July 1949. 231 232
MUSA Committee Meeting, 19 May 1949, MUSA Papers, UMA. MUSA Committee Meeting, 30 May 1949, MUSA Papers, UMA.
233
J. D. G. Medley, Note to Members of Staff, 6 June 1949. See also Poynter and Rasmussen, A Place Apart, 94.
234
Crawford to G. V. Portus, 7 June 1949, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford asked Portus for his comments, but did not urge him to sign it because he had ‘too much unhappy experience of being pressed to sign things’.
235
‘Dangers to Democratic Principles and Liberty’, The Age, June 1949.
236
Crawford, Old Bebb’s Store and other Poems, 18.
237
Commonwealth Parliamentary Debates, 1950, Vols. 207-210, House of Representatives, 116.
238
Ibid., 119-20.
239
Draft Statement on Political Views, September 1949, MUSA Collection, UMA.
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Chapter 5
Academic Freedom and the Australian Story
In 1950, Robert Menzies made a stunning announcement in the Federal Parliament: he introduced legislation to outlaw the Communist Party. The Communist Dissolution Bill would give the government the power to ‘declare’ people as communists; jail ‘offending’ individuals for up to five years if they continued their communist activity; and remove communists from the Commonwealth Public Service.1 Menzies claimed that he had a mandate for the Bill and that it was part of a worldwide strategy against communism, led so effectively in America by Senator Joseph McCarthy. These witchhunts were constant between 1949 and 1954, the era named ‘McCarthyism’ after its chief prosecutor. Even in this most chilling era of the Cold War, however, the Communist Party was not outlawed in the United States, because the constitution protected freedom of speech and assembly, and politicians feared the legislation would drive the Party underground.2 If the University expected the Victorian Royal Commission to end the political and public obsession with subversion and communist conspiracies, it was to be sorely mistaken. As the glare of the Commission faded, a more ‘ruthless war’ on communism took its place.3 The onus of proof in Menzies’ Bill allowed for anyone to be accused as a ‘communist’ and then have to disprove the allegation.
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217
Max Crawford had been particularly active and conspicuous in the groups that now came under renewed attack. He had been condemned in parliament and his allegiances speculated upon by the press. Crawford knew how easily he could fall prey to misrepresentation. Many intellectuals contemplated the new legislation with dread.4 The Staff Association responded immediately and created a subcommittee consisting of Jim Cairns, Kathleen Fitzpatrick, Pansy Wright, Oscar Oeser, William Friedmann and Macmahon Ball on 25 November 1949. The Committee declared that the Dissolution Bill was a ‘danger to academic freedom’.5 A statement intended for the Vice-Chancellor was drafted, although not universally agreed upon. It referred to America, where less extreme legislation had devastated academic life. The concern was with damage to reputation and the fear that a ‘more insidious growth of self-censorship and timidity’ would prevail among University teachers.6 The sub-committee conveyed the need for all intellectuals to be free from intimidation, enquiry and political scrutiny. The sub-committee met several times and was eventually disbanded when it was announced that Melbourne University would not be seriously implicated. This did not ease the academics’ anxiety. On the eve of his retirement, John Medley, a tireless advocate for academic freedom, responded to the threat in a daring newspaper article. ‘There is no propaganda in our lecture rooms’, Medley insisted, ‘and I defy anyone to refute me with facts’.7 In response to the cliché that he presided over a ‘hotbed of Communism’, he maintained that the role of the University was to incite free discussion and provide intelligent opposition. Medley later declared that he was proud of his staff and that the University should be a place for diverse and passionate opinion.8 ‘You must make allowances’, Medley pleaded, ‘for the hasty idealism of youth in a world that has lost the old certainties and has replaced them with little or nothing that is worthwhile’.9 Drafts of the Staff Association’s statement were written and revised in May and June 1950, as the Association struggled with the political consequences. One provocative letter signed by various academics declared that the Anti-Communist Bill was ‘a dangerous and unwise method of opposing communism’.10 The Bill, they claimed, was vague in its drafting and would replicate the American situation, where intellectuals were constantly vulnerable to the ‘wildest and most unscrupulous allegations’.11 At this time three Associate
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Professors had been dismissed from the University of Washington. Two were allegedly self-confessed members of the Communist Party and the other was dismissed as a ‘sympathiser’.12 In an aggressive letter to the Vice-Chancellor and Council, the Staff Association predicted the effect of the legislation on teaching: it would lead to the imposition of ‘self censorship’ and influence the decisions of selection committees, which would do their utmost to avoid the taint of ‘Marxist tendencies’.13 The Association, however, could not agree on a common position. It finally announced that the Bill constituted ‘a danger to civil liberties’, and listed four principles that should prevent suspicion and foster vigorous intellectual development. The first declared that the criteria for appointment should remain knowledge and ability in teaching and research; the second that teachers should be free from intimidation; the third that staff should be free to expound all relevant matters, and the fourth that there should be full freedom of enquiry, research and publication.14 The resolution was finally passed by a general meeting of the Staff Association and presented to Medley for submission to Council. It was approved by a vote of 65 to 34, with five abstentions. When Medley received the list of principles, he assured William Friedmann that it was the duty of the University to provide safeguards against the dangers anticipated by the Staff Association. ‘Council sees no reason to suppose that the spirit of your principles will be contravened in the future’, Medley wrote on 9 August 1950, ‘any more than it has in the past’.15 This would be one of Medley’s final duties, for in late August it was announced that George Paton would be the new ViceChancellor. Crawford’s role during the debate over the Bill is difficult to measure. He was certainly not one of its outspoken opponents and appeared at times to be irritated by the Association’s militancy. In a cryptic note to Garnet Portus, Crawford expressed annoyance about having ‘things sprung’ on him; he also suggested various amendments to the proposed statement.16 The only other written evidence of Crawford’s stance is his acknowledgment of the principles established by the University Democratic Rights Commission. Deviating slightly from the Staff Association’s statement, the Commission was insistent that no teacher should be dismissed because of political or
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219
religious beliefs, or race, but only on clear and proven grounds of incompetence or prejudice.17 Crawford explained that ‘the search for truth’ could not be pursued in an atmosphere where society was not free. ‘The proposed legislation is unnecessary’, he observed, ‘because of existing powers to deal with disloyal activity, and dangerous because of the possibility of injustice to individuals and the probability of increased intolerance in general’.18 As the debate over the Anti-Communist Bill continued, Crawford arranged his sabbatical and applied for a grant from the Carnegie Corporation to fund a year’s leave in 1951. It was not intended as a research trip. ‘I want to do the things that being the head of one of the largest departments in the University does not leave time to do’, Crawford wrote to Whitney Shepardson, Director of the Carnegie Corporation, ‘reading, meeting my counterparts elsewhere and thinking out afresh the principles and methods of a University School of History’.19 Despite his complaints about being ‘frantically busy’, Crawford enjoyed his authority and was surprisingly productive during 1950.20 He discovered that in Clark’s absence, he ‘liked’ teaching Australian history, a reminder of Stephen Roberts’ early confidence. Although it had been a ‘sweat’, the series of lectures on Australian history had been a great success and apparently ‘represented the proper standard of a University public lecture’.21 At the same time, Crawford was also in the process of completing Australia.22 The book began with a brief examination of the land and its original inhabitants. This short history is a book of its time, devoid of any analysis of the legacy of dispossession and race relations. It is also dependent on secondary sources, rather than any original research. However, Crawford expanded and developed other issues: aggressive democracy, the growth of a predominantly urban society and the Australian legend. In the last chapter on ‘Australia, Past and Present’, he examined the future of Australia ‘on the fringe of crowded and restless Asia’.23 He believed Australia’s security was endangered in three ways: firstly, it was undermined by the ‘chaotic domestic uncertainties’ of Asia; secondly, the attachment to the British Commonwealth had diminished with the realisation that Australia’s interests lay with America; lastly, the immigration policy was ‘increasingly provocative’.24
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Crawford did not advocate the dismantling of the White Australia Policy. He thought that a complete reversal would be ‘politically impossible and foolish’, and he espoused the conventional sentiments about assimilation. However, he was progressive in other ways. He expressed his reservations about the existing restrictions and thought immigration would prove to be ‘important’, and if controlled, immigrants would ‘greatly enrich’ the country.25 The future character of Australian democracy was the other unresolved issue raised in the concluding chapter. Crawford considered the welfare system, the economy, nationalisation of banks, the flexible adjustment of public controls and the threat of external pressures on democracy. ‘The vast majority of Australians’, he observed, ‘are neither tempted nor persuaded by totalitarian or revolutionary ideologies.’26 Alan Shaw later attributed this interest in Australian history to the anti-communist controversies that threatened Crawford’s treasured British liberal tradition and forced him to redefine both his liberalism and historical approach.27 Indeed, in Crawford’s discussion of the attempts by the Menzies’ government to outlaw the Communist Party, his concern was unequivocal: The matter is not at an end; and it remains to be seen whether Australian democracy can discover means of defending itself against illiberal threats without ceasing to be a liberal democracy. It is unfortunate that Australian public life has been marred by a small number of intolerant people who readily brand any independent opinion with the unpopular label of ‘communist’; the ignorant clamour has not grown less with the advent of the Communist Party Dissolution Bill.28 Ultimately, Crawford argued that while Australian political life had developed a resilient tradition of compromise, it had at times grown ‘unfriendly to its tradition of progressive liberalism’. Despite the country’s strong, mature economy and a community increasingly complex and sophisticated, Crawford was nevertheless disturbed by the ‘gravely challenged political tradition’ and expatriate inclination, and was excited by the existing need to forge an intellectual and artistic culture.29 Australia was a distinguished and elegant
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piece of writing, and the last chapter was the most perceptive and personal. Crawford was delighted that his application to the Carnegie Corporation was successful. He had never managed a full sabbatical year and always regretted the failure of the Rockefeller Scholarship. By December 1950, the itinerary was organised. He would depart on 10 January for Naples, then transfer to Paris and Antwerp. Summer would be spent in residence at All Souls in Oxford and punctuated by a trip to Italy with Jim Main, Hugh Stretton and Mick and Althea Williams. On behalf of Oxford University, Stretton asked Crawford to teach the final-year students for four hours. Although he had not had a lecturing tour in mind, Crawford did not regard the minor teaching commitment as a ‘catastrophe’.30 He remained particularly enthusiastic about his return to the United States at the conclusion of the European summer. ‘I Am Not a Member of the Communist Party’ In December 1950, the Victorian Director of ASIO sent a letter to Canberra that listed local applicants for passports; he said that none of the names on the list were of ‘interest with the exception of Raymond Maxwell Crawford’.31 Following Robert Menzies’ proposal to outlaw the CPA, the early 1950s saw a growth in the size and power of ASIO.32 It became a vehicle for spying on anyone suspected of disloyalty. It now compiled a six-page summary list of Crawford’s suspect activities. ‘He has on several occasions associated with members of the Communist Party or communist sympathisers sponsored by the Party.’ The ASIO operative wrote, ‘While not on record as a communist it is considered that Professor Crawford is strongly inclined to the “left” in his political views.’33 If Crawford was oblivious of ASIO’s interest in him, he quickly became aware of the attitude of another security agency to his ‘suspect’ past. In January 1951, he was informed that his visa to America would not be forthcoming because of the ‘ninth proviso action in the case’. The ‘ninth proviso’ was applied to politically ‘suspect’ applicants and permitted the authorities to reject the visa application. Norman Harper expressed his ‘shock’ and ‘disgust’ on hearing the news and assumed it was Edmunds’ ‘mud that had stuck’. ‘It sounds
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like our own security people to me’, Harper wrote. ‘The screening process is done through them as far as I know.’34 He appeared unusually well informed about ASIO, although his assessment was only partially correct. The most incriminating evidence against Crawford was not Edmunds’ accusations, but his involvement with the ACCL and Australia-Soviet House. Pacifists and activists of every ilk provoked ASIO’s interest. Those who criticised the political system were collaborating with the devil. In early January Crawford pleaded his case to the Vice-Consul at the American Consulate. ‘I wish first to state emphatically that I am not and have not been in the past either a member of the Communist Party or a sympathizer with it.’ Crawford asserted. ‘Nor have I been a member of or sympathizer with any other totalitarian party, fascist or other. My political views are liberal and democratic.’35 The letter revealed Crawford’s devastation. He vowed that he had ‘no intention or desire’ to mix politics with his study in America. As evidence, he mentioned the Melbourne graduates studying in the United States and the first full-time American history course that the Department had introduced.36 There was no doubt in Crawford’s mind that the damage had been caused by his association with Australia-Soviet House and that ASIO was ‘behind it all’.37 To placate the authorities, he explained the circumstances of his resignation in 1948 and attached Sir Charles Lowe’s Royal Commission report on the organisation. The letter was less than completely candid. In the immediate post-war years, Crawford had genuinely believed there was more than ‘a slight chance that wartime experience might produce a closer relationship between Russia and the Western World’.38 Despite his protest, his position as president of the Australia-Soviet House was more than nominal. Yet his belief that he needed to defend himself so strongly reflected the shift in the political landscape. Since the letter did not have its desired effect on the American authorities, Harper became involved on Crawford’s behalf. Appealing to the Director-General of ASIO in March, he argued that the prevention of Crawford’s travel would be to Australia’s disadvantage. ‘Crawford is recognized throughout Australia as its most distinguished historian’, he wrote, ‘a man who has shaped, and will continue for another twenty years to shape, the pattern of historical research and
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teaching in the country’.39 Once again, Crawford’s lack of political interest was emphasised: his interest in Russia was purely historical and cultural, he was a ‘balletomane and keen theatre-goer’, he was a Fabian, but had never had any formal connection with any political party and he was keenly critical of the Communist Party.40 Although the last claim is debatable, Harper’s assessment was perceptive. Crawford was ‘a liberal in the true sense of the term, and had the courage to defend both academic freedom and civil liberties’.41 It was no accident that Crawford would have consulted with Harper. He may well have hoped that he could have resolved it. Harper was very influential in certain circles and had spent considerable time in diplomatic activities. He told Ian Crawford that he had been involved in the negotiations of the future of Germany at the end of the war. The discussions on both sides, east and west, agreed that Germany should not be divided, but the Americans had vetoed the arrangements at the very last moment.42 His tutorials were notorious for the mysterious phone calls. In one apocryphal story, Ian Crawford recalled: ‘Norman answering the phone “Yes! Drop the bombs! I can’t talk now – I have a tutorial. I’ll ring you back.’43 Harper kept Crawford informed of his progress with Spry. His letter resonates with some of the same words and sentiments employed in Crawford’s correspondence with the Vice-Consul and might have been written with Crawford’s assistance. Acknowledging this ‘important information’, Spry thanked Harper for his account of Crawford’s ‘severance of his connection with a certain activity’.44 If ASIO was noncommittal, Andrew Schoeppel, who represented the United States government, gave a loaded explanation. To another of Crawford’s supporters, Alamada Barrett, Schoeppel blamed the administration forces that were hostile to the Anti-Subversive Bill, and he alleged they sabotaged it by distorting its implementation and rendering it unworkable. By February 1951 and on Barrett’s testimony, Schoeppel assumed Crawford would be cleared and the visa would be forthcoming.45 Barrett was the wife of a Political Science student, and a copy of Schoeppel’s letter circulated around the campus. The Argus contacted Kathleen Fitzpatrick to comment and she stalled. Concerned that publicity would expose Crawford and lead to another ‘dreary and utterly unfounded charge of communism’, Fitzpatrick warned Paton. Convinced the Argus would publish the story, Fitzpatrick believed the
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public would interpret security intervention as proof of communism. To Fitzpatrick’s surprise, the Argus did not proceed with the story. She concluded that either she had been successful or else the newspapers had failed to obtain confirmation from officials.46 William Stephenson from the United States Consulate expressed sympathy for Crawford’s ‘uncomfortable situation’ and offered a clarification, which differed from Barrett’s more cynical explanation. Critical of the recent legislation, Stephenson maintained it had been ‘passed in haste’, and the provisions were so wide that it had been taken more literally than the legislators had anticipated.47 Despite Norman Harper’s efforts and John Medley’s enquiries, the visa was not ‘favourably processed’ until December 1951. The visit to the United States was summarily removed from Crawford’s itinerary. It is possible that the American government’s concerns about Crawford piqued ASIO’s interest or that the American authorities enlisted ASIO, which was desperate to correct the perception that Australia was a poor security risk. Despite Spry’s assurances to Harper in March 1951, ASIO intensified its surveillance of Crawford in 1951. Operatives followed him to London in July and spent an inordinate amount of time establishing the identity of his companion, Ken Crawford. ASIO appeared to have become slightly more skilled, and both brothers were unaware of their shadows.48 The ineptitude of some of the operatives was legendary. Many of the reports on Brian Fitzpatrick described his brown overcoat. It later transpired that Fitzpatrick had never owned one.49 The American Consulate’s rejection of Crawford’s visa application and the slurs on his integrity were devastating. They marked the beginning of a complete retreat from political activism. Tim Rowse has defined the frailty of the liberal intellectual and, in many ways, Crawford’s experiences conform to his definition. Rowse refers to certain Melbourne intellectuals, who vacillated between optimism and pessimism about the Australian political system. The source of this fragility lies in the premise of liberal thought, collective will, human nature and national character. ‘In times of adversity’, Rowse asserts, ‘the liberal intellectual bemoans the “treason of the people”, and adopts a pessimistic view of his or her own fate’.50 Crawford had never experienced official rejection of this magnitude and revised his liberalism accordingly.
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The Improved Field In his application to the Carnegie Corporation, Crawford extolled the values of the Melbourne School. He already had a weakness for selfcongratulation and a tendency to assume that other History departments did not matter. Stuart Macintyre would later describe the romanticising of the Department as ‘nostalgic parochialism’.51 Even so, it was a golden age for the School, and Crawford was its illustrious figurehead. Since 1937, enrolments had grown from 300 to over 1200, and in this, a University of under 9000 students. It had the largest number of students of any Department of the University.52 The staff had increased from two full-time and three part-time members to twenty full-time and two part-time staff members.53 The number of history subjects offered to Bachelor of Arts students had increased from five to eleven. Postgraduate research had grown and involved a weekly seminar series and individual supervision.54 More than three times the number of students were undertaking the Honours year. There was a growing interest in the teaching and study of Australian history, as students became immersed in the Australian experience. In 1948 Frank Crowley completed his Ph.D. on the history of Australian working-class conditions, and Syd Ingham and George Nadel had been awarded Masters degrees on their Australian research work. The permanent staff felt compelled to match their students’ achievements and completed a succession of books. The extensive list of Victorian historical documents was near completion. By the early 1950s, the Department had produced several of the country’s most promising historians. Manning Clark was now firmly entrenched in Canberra, Hugh Stretton was a Fellow at Balliol and unofficial guidance counsellor for the new arrivals from Australia, Alan McBriar returned to teach at Melbourne. The ‘full flowering’ of the Department occurred in the post-war era, when it produced almost ten first-class honours graduates a year.55 Stretton’s role at Oxford proved considerable, as many of Crawford’s favoured sons were making the pilgrimage there: Laurie Baragwanath, John Legge, Jim Main, Creighton Burns, Geoff Serle, Owen Parnaby, Alan Shaw, Ken Inglis, Mick Williams, Frank Crowley, Sydney Ingham, and soon, George Yule. Baragwanath observed that ‘with a nucleus of Melbourne, one does not feel the stranger’ at Oxford; rather ‘he is given a hearty
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welcome into the colony’.56 The rivalry for overseas scholarships was fierce, and Crawford’s role was often clouded by allegations of patronage and favouritism that created gratitude or resentment, depending on the outcome. The ‘power’ that he wielded did cause disquiet amongst a few. In this respect, Franz Philipp remained critical of Crawford, believing himself disadvantaged, and that he did not get a scholarship to study at Oxford because he was an art historian and his training was European rather than Melbourne inspired.57 In his lengthy letter to Whitney Shepardson of the Carnegie Corporation, Crawford had wanted to return to the United States to learn about the ideas and organisation governing graduate schools, so that he could advise Australian postgraduate students who were looking beyond Oxford. Joining the exodus overseas was George Nadel who, in 1951, was struggling in largely un-charted territory as he negotiated postgraduate work at Harvard. The Melbourne School had adopted a similar seminar system to that at Harvard, which baffled the Americans from other universities, but struck Nadel as an ‘old and familiar acquaintance’.58 Nadel kept Crawford and Fitzpatrick informed, praising Harvard’s merits—its ‘tremendous prestige’ and ‘dazzling staff’—and bemoaning the pressure on students, who had five full-time psychiatrists to pick up the inevitable pieces.59 Crawford continued to play the role of a father-confessor, encouraging and directing his young prodigies. In a letter to Jim Main, he advised that Oriel College was unaccustomed to ‘our people and needs to learn by experience what their quality is’.60 To Crowley, Crawford suggested he should give himself a ‘chance to meet interesting people’;61 in confidence he remarked to Stretton that Crowley would be either ‘loved for his cheekiness or much hated by those who felt its sting’.62 Crawford was sympathetic when Alan Shaw wondered about the job prospects in Melbourne.63 Hugh Stretton observed that the job market was so woeful ‘good historians are starving all over the place (though of course some bad ones are eating very well)’.64 The letters home capture the responses of young men basking in the privilege of Oxford, negotiating difficulties abroad, embarking upon careers, coping with homesickness, marriage and all the possibilities of youth. The flaws of the Department were not mentioned in Crawford’s application to the Carnegie Corporation nor in his retrospective
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recollections. Women postgraduates were largely absent from the overseas honour call. This was despite a letter from the Registrar of Oxford to the Vice-Chancellor to acknowledge that the ‘young people from Melbourne had done so well’ and to ask for more, including at ‘least one woman’.65 Mick Williams remarked that Nonie Gibson had at last got a supervisor who ‘probably won’t die before she finishes’.66 Joyce Dunn’s position also proved problematic as she attempted to establish a full-time academic career.67 Crawford had been frustrated by Dunn and observed that she had not enlisted the network in Melbourne sufficiently, nor had she stated her claims ‘strongly enough’.68 In a letter written later, Crawford was uncharacteristically harsh, because Dunn had dared to contradict him, which he found ‘distasteful’.69 The dearth of women pursuing postgraduate studies overseas reflected on the prevailing attitude of the era, rather than on women’s aspirations and ability. The ANU began as a ‘male preserve’, and marriage bars were still maintained in the Public Service.70 One former student remarked that the attitudes to working women were so entrenched even Kathleen Fitzpatrick was not a particularly strong advocate of female advancement.71 The prospect for most women in the 1950s was to retire from their working life upon marriage. Many of the students fulfilled this destiny, despite distinguishing themselves at University. Valerie Tarrant was one student who remembered the double-edged sword; there were many ‘stars’, but the women were never mentored in the same way.72 However, Betty Hayes thought Crawford’s attitude to women students was far more advanced than those of his contemporaries in other Departments.73 Another former student, Sylvia Morrison, recalled his ‘graciousness, warmth’ and the ‘individual acts of kindness’.74 Inga Clendinnen provided an evocative metaphor for her teachers: ‘I was the girl from the provinces and they were my Paris’.75 Several graduates, including Alison Patrick and June Philipp, remained in the Department after marrying and having children. They worked as part-time academics for decades. To some it was a form of exploitation: these women were rarely promoted, usually underpaid and employed on a casual basis. Crawford’s own response was ambiguous, as he pushed for Patrick, whose achievements were as significant as her male counterparts, to be appointed a half-time
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lecturer. In Crawford’s opinion, Patrick, a graduate of 1941, had ‘considerable experience’, was ‘an excellent teacher’ and would strengthen the Department at a ‘weak point’.76 He was not averse to using her, but he was also supportive of her domestic situation. ‘She is not available full-time’, he wrote, ‘ but I should like at this stage in her career to be able to keep her services and use them widely by offering something better than a part-time tutorship’.77 Alison Patrick was aware of Crawford’s assistance and was eager to correct the ‘grossly unfair’ suggestion that he hindered women’s careers.78 Nina Christesen insisted that Crawford promoted women, and indeed he always championed her career. Still, she conceded ‘he treated men differently’.79 The Department and Crawford profited from the use of women graduates in subordinate posts. If Crawford never completely challenged this system, he did attempt to alter some of its anomalies and was prepared to do so both for his own staff and for those in other departments. Protesting against the inconsistency in treatment of part-time lecturers, who received half the annual increment, but did not get half of the cost of living adjustment, Crawford requested that the Vice-Chancellor ask the Staff and Establishments Committee to include the adjustment. In his appeal, he cited his part-time lecturers, Arthur Burns, Patrick and Philipp, who had other commitments. ‘They give us a very generous half’, Crawford wrote to Paton, ‘and in all the intangibles beyond the actual number of teaching hours they play the part of full-time members of staff’.80 It would appear that the History Department was more supportive of its female students and staff than many institutions of the time. There is no evidence that Crawford discouraged female graduates from pursuing scholarships and academic appointments.81 It was often observed that he genuinely liked women and their company. Indeed, Clendinnen was one of the few junior colleagues who were allowed a ‘remarkable intimacy’.82 She observed: ‘he was my text, and he knew it. He permitted it. He encouraged it.’83 However, a survey conducted by Geoffrey Serle in 1970 suggests that the handicaps according to gender were marked. Women represented 41% of history honours students between 1937 and 1966, yet they received only 19.5% of the first-class degrees.84 The number of women who attended overseas universities was disproportionately
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low. Much later, Inga Clendinnen offered a telling interpretation of the role of women in the Department. ‘In my time I think women were rather cherished in the department as personalities’: You were certainly given a large amount of space in which to disport yourself. However, it was certainly true that academically you were not regarded as a contender. We were meant to be carers, the primary carers, as it were of the tutorial classes, but as for being groomed for greatness, no.85 It is John La Nauze, not Crawford, who is retrospectively demonised for his treatment of women, because he publicly stated he would never recommend any woman for a scholarship. Laurie O’Brien insists that behind this misogynist façade, he was extremely generous and often made outrageous statements for effect.86 This remains a contentious issue, about which there is no agreement.87 Crawford’s influence was also evident at Canberra University College, which remained under the Melbourne Department’s control. The demands of the College were exacting but Crawford was unwilling to relinquish control. Manning Clark, now the head of Canberra’s History Department, was given little independence and treated with parental authority. When he asked in November 1951 to teach students in the Honours School, he was greeted with guarded enthusiasm and a delay awaiting Faculty’s approval.88 He responded with a mixture of irritation and deference. Appealing to Crawford’s vanity, or possibly in order to irritate him, Clark addressed Crawford as Professor despite their years of familiarity.89 Of course, Clark himself did not exactly lack self-confidence and might well have just enjoyed baiting Crawford. If Crawford had total control over the Melbourne School and, to a lesser extent over Canberra University College, he also enjoyed influence in other history departments in Australia. Most looked to him for new staff, informed him of vacant appointments and asked for advice and recommendations. Crawford also acted as the intermediary for many overseas requests.90 The students themselves were willing to accept guidance and, as Joyce Dunn’s situation exemplified, they disobeyed their mentor at their peril.
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A Series of Disappointments The protracted refusal to issue an American visa proved a bad omen: the sabbatical seemed doomed before it began. Delayed three weeks by industrial problems on the wharves, Crawford saw his stay in Italy reduced from seven weeks to four; these included a fortnight absorbed by the Easter vacation, when most academics deserted the campuses. On board the ‘Toscana’—by no means ‘the Great Place’—the journey was treated as a recuperative cruise; Crawford ‘revived’, talked and read.91 Dividing the four weeks between Naples, Rome, Florence and Venice, he discovered that the twenty-two years away had not ‘dimmed the enjoyment and stimulus’ of Europe.92 Despite Crawford’s spin, his report on the trip was unconvincing. He had not sounded happy to Fitzpatrick.93 The letters of introduction did not suffice in Italy (and were received after Crawford’s arrival). He had failed to arrange meetings before his departure so had to accept, instead, impromptu sessions and informal conversations in a foreign language with academics, authors and students in restaurants, with vague promises of future contact and a professed understanding of the ‘nature of Italian University teaching and organisation’.94 Crawford attempted to be cheerful. Although he confessed that the visit had been time-consuming and he had met fewer historians than he hoped, it was, he insisted, ‘worthwhile’. In spite of the bleak weather, Oxford was an ‘unalloyed delight’.95 Reunited with old friends and many of his students, who were ‘all winning golden opinions’, he basked in their reflected glory.96 The visit was touched by the deaths of William Muir and Humphrey Sumner, the latter ‘a rare spirit’ for both Crawford and Fitzpatrick.97 Oxford had been a ‘great good place’ for Crawford, and his visit was hardly arduous.98 The first three weeks there had been consumed by reading, attending occasional lectures, walking in the fields and watching cricket in the park. In Crawford’s absence, Kathleen Fitzpatrick took over once again. By 1951, the tone of her letters had changed, as the relationship had become warmly professional rather than intimate. There was a marked absence of the girlish flirtation that characterised her correspondence with Crawford when he was in Russia. There was also a subtle tension that Fitzpatrick acknowledged. ‘It’s a pity my first epistles created an impression of tetchiness’, Fitzpatrick confessed. ‘You
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did have things in fine running order, but the beginning of first term is a hectic one.’99 Crawford directed instructions to Fitzpatrick, who was expected to exert authority, despite her position not affording her the necessary influence. ‘Yes, Max, I shall do my best to keep and even extend our hard won accommodation, but the matter is out of my hands.’100 Understating the workload, Fitzpatrick grappled with ‘dreary’ business and the challenges of the Department as one staff member suffered a breakdown,101 gastric flu decimated the staff, Leonhard Adam irritated Fitzpatrick by his ‘detestableness,’102 and a new Dean of Law, ‘one Zelman Cowen’, exerted his authority. A former student particularly irritated Fitzpatrick because he had the audacity to address her as Kathleen. ‘He is superb’, she wrote sarcastically, ‘rings bells, calls in lecturers, dismisses them…with an air we could never risk. However, he is OK, much nicer than he used to be.’103 ‘Domestic intelligence’ was dominated by Fitzpatrick’s purchase of her first home and ‘general gossip’.104 It had not been an easy time for her. She had been ‘bruised’ by a particularly harsh review of her book, and her confidence had collapsed. News that Dorothy had suffered a coronary occlusion disrupted Crawford’s sojourn, and he immediately returned home by plane. He regarded the interrupted sabbatical with a degree of pragmatism and maintained that he was never tempted to stay at Oxford, knowing that his ‘deepest roots were in Melbourne’. Vote ‘No’ – 1951 When Crawford returned from his interrupted leave in August, the University was embroiled in yet another crisis. A year after Medley’s confident assurances to William Friedmann, pandemonium erupted over the Liberal and Country Party government’s intention to hold a Referendum on the banning of the Communist Party, after the High Court declared the Communist Party Dissolution Bill unconstitutional. In a public lecture theatre brimming with 1,000 students overflowing into the aisles, the Political Science Society held a meeting. With Macmahon Ball as Chairman and Douglas Wright, Ian Maxwell and Zelman Cowen as speakers, the Professors condemned the Commonwealth Powers Referendum Bill and advocated a ‘No’ vote. Wright described it as a power for political repression that was
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essentially bad, Maxwell insisted that the repression would create sympathisers and Cowen simply and effectively described the bill as ‘bad’ and ‘unsound’.105 The University responded immediately, alarmed that the professorial opinions would be misconstrued as University policy.106 After discussions with George Paton, Chancellor Charles Lowe issued a ‘carefully prepared’ statement to the Council about his concern that ‘a section of the press so reported the meeting that many thought the views expressed were those of the University’.107 It was decided that the Referendum meeting exposed two questions that needed to be ‘fully considered’: the proper use of University premises and the ‘limits to the conduct of professors toward students’ within the University.108 The press foreshadowed a ban on such meetings. It reported that ‘partisan political activity by professors and other staff may be banned’ for ten years by Council.109 The Students’ Representative Council took Lowe’s announcement literally and expressed ‘alarm’ that Council might censor student meetings. ‘We consider’, the SRC executive statement read, ‘that freedom of expression by both University staff and students is essential for the full development of the University’s traditional role as a centre of free and unfettered inquiry’.110 An editorial in the Argus concurred with the need for tolerance and University autonomy.111 In an emotive Council meeting on 12 October 1951, Lowe deemed that the University should ‘not allow itself to appear to enter the arena of controversy’ and must avoid partisan attitudes.112 The Referendum, in Lowe’s opinion, was ‘a party political issue’, and it was ‘undesirable’ for only one side of the political divide to be heard. George Paton agreed and, in an attempt to resolve the crisis, stated that it was unlikely anybody would be forbidden to hold University meetings. Council was assuming a proprietary policy, and Paton admitted that rules were being devised. Permission to hold such a meeting had to be sought, with seven-days notice and an opportunity provided for the opposing group to speak. It was also announced that academics could write to the press to give their political views, but only as private individuals.113 Despite the insistence that it simply wanted to avoid accusations of political bias, Lowe was actually intent on exercising control and preserving public relations. He appeared irritated by the longstanding
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practice that allowed members of staff to organise meetings on any issue without the permission of the Vice-Chancellor. ‘This seemed’, Lowe announced, ‘to be a position which the University could not tolerate any longer’.114 He denied there would be action against the Professors. Lowe’s defence smacked of fear that the University would lose the ‘confidence and support of the public’ if it became identified with a political controversy. Hence his belief that academics should exercise ‘care’ when teaching and that the University was not ‘a machine for propaganda’.115 ‘In the present political atmosphere in Australia and elsewhere’, Macmahon Ball wrote, ‘Any expression of liberal thought is in danger of meeting misunderstanding and hostility’.116 Wright, who was a member of the Council, rejected Lowe’s contention that the Referendum was a party issue. Yet in a conciliatory mood, he agreed that Council should give a ruling.117 The SRC representative, John Mackinolty, opposed such rules and suggested that Council was looking for an excuse to stifle opinion. The Staff Association also intervened and issued a statement to the ViceChancellor regretting that the opinions expressed at the public meeting had been construed as the ‘official opinions’ of the University. It recommended that staff be advised in what circumstances they were allowed to use the name of the University when making public statements. ‘We affirm the right of staff’, the statement asserted, ‘to address a student meeting, irrespective of whether the opposing point of view is presented by another person at that meeting’.118 The State Opposition leader, John Cain, accused Lowe of criticising the professors and stifling freedom of speech in December 1951. It was a charge promptly denied by Lowe and Paton, who had altered his statement and maintained that Council had not changed the rules governing meetings.119 Lowe defended his Council and academic freedom. In a lengthy article, he claimed to be ‘disconcerted’ by the response to his guidelines and appeared surprised by the reaction to them. He argued that staff did not lose their right as citizens, but insisted that freedom is not an ‘unrestricted license’.120 Ball wrote an article in response and informed Crawford that although it was not published in the Gazette, the subject was of concern to the Professorial Board. He acknowledged the principles enunciated by Lowe, that the University was not responsible for the views
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of the staff and that it was not the business of teachers to try to indoctrinate students. Ball maintained that the idea of seeking permission for public meetings was flawed. He insisted the University should encourage staff to gain a ‘full knowledge and understanding of public questions, however controversial’. The Referendum meeting was, in his opinion, ‘the best University meeting I have ever attended, the kind of meeting which is the duty of a University to encourage’. 121 Contradicting Lowe’s assertion that there had never been any question of taking action against the Professors, Ball responded with ‘respect’ that the ‘brief and negative phrasing of this statement may have caused some astonishment and anxiety’.122 Although Crawford remained publicly silent during the entire episode, many of his colleagues observed Council’s response with alarm. The controversy exposed the University’s fixation with its public image, the lack of support for staff if they deviated from a politically neutral stance and the fear surrounding the mere taint of political impropriety. In private, Crawford played a different role. Shortly after Wright’s outburst in March 1952, he wrote a letter of support to Paton, perhaps feeling an affinity with Paton’s dilemma. Paton ‘appreciated’ the gesture and Crawford’s ‘graceful and delicate manner’.123 ‘Between ourselves,’ Paton confessed, ‘I have not enjoyed the business, I assure you’.124 He confided that he was sorry Lowe ‘ever raised the matter’; the ‘hot heads’ on the Council had dealt with it wrongly; Wright had made an error of tactics and the press had become involved. Paton hoped to discuss the matter with Crawford at length and in a more ‘peaceful atmosphere’.125 Many academics were involved in the referendum debate, but the degree to which they influenced public opinion is unclear.126 The fear of communism and its perceived corruption of social and moral order cannot be underestimated.127 There was still a distrust of intellectuals in the Australian community and a gulf between the principles of liberal intellectuals and the values that governed public life.128 Max Crawford was now a bit player, no longer the political protagonist. The peaceful atmosphere Paton hoped for never transpired, as the government was now intent on ensuring that intellectuals of the left would have no voice at all.
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‘Suspect’ academics, 1952 Canberra intensified its vigilance. Despite the High Court decision and the failure of the Referendum, dossiers were created, revisited or compiled retrospectively. Australia did not reach the hysteria of America’s McCarthyism, but careers were just as effectively ruined and individuals broken by the atmosphere of hostility.129 Former members of the CPA were damned if they admitted membership and damned if they attempted to conceal it. The Australian authorities echoed McCarthy’s willingness to condone serious violations of civil liberties in order to eradicate what they believed was a far more serious threat, communism. A climate of political repression and profound conservatism dominated public debate. The ranks of the CPA dwindled to 6,000 and many became reluctant to protest.130 In 1952, at the height of this frenzy, Colonel Spry had instructed his agents to vet all academics at Australian universities. ‘I am sure that you will readily appreciate’, he wrote to Menzies, ‘the inadvisability of employing, in any University, lecturers who are likely to infect students with subversive doctrines’.131 This exchange suggests that ASIO and the government threatened academic freedom and intellectual autonomy. However, it was also evident that universities did not always embrace academic freedom. University administrators monitored communists and liberals on campus long before ASIO began its intense and official campaign of surveillance of ‘suspect’ intellectuals. The comments regarding the applications of Herbert Burton and Esmonde Higgins in the 1930s and Ian Milner’s lack of promotion were evidence of this. ASIO had long been hostile towards intellectuals and threatened by the power of language and ideas. In March 1952, Colonel Spry ordered his regional offices to investigate all academics and scientists at Australian universities. Lists were then compared with existing ASIO dossiers and a register of subversive intellectuals was compiled. It was not vetting in the strict sense of the word, because the radical academics that had attained a high position were protected by tenure and could not easily be removed. After Spry had discussed with Menzies the inadvisability of employing suspect intellectuals, the Chancellor of the ANU, Douglas Copland, was contacted. Copland responded that the ANU Council did not like a political test, but suggested that it could ‘ensure that people who are suspected of being a security risk will not
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be appointed to responsible positions’.132 This had been unofficial practice for years. Copland’s compromise to avoid employing ‘security risks’ reeked of political discrimination and relied on untested allegation.133 On the instruction of Spry, ASIO increased its surveillance of Crawford in April and wrote a lengthy report on his activities, opinions and suspected seditious activities. Much of the material was new. His activities were apparently serious, but what compelled ASIO’s interest were Crawford’s opinions. ASIO’s assessment was damaging and dominated by innuendo. It was noted that on 6 March 1952 he attended a memorial for his former student and member of the CPA, Noel Ebbels. Crawford spoke and said that he was very ‘sorry that Ebbels was dead, even though he did not agree with his political views that he was sure that the History Dept. would do all it could to get the Ebbel’s thesis published.’134 The document concluded with a note from a former student and Crawford’s friend, Tom Truman, who appeared to be an ASIO informer. ‘He is not a party member or a communist.’ Truman claimed. ‘Difficult to know where he stood politically. Susceptible to flattery. Caused a lot of students to become Socialists possibly because of period in History which he chose to teach.’135 Crawford’s belief that Asian immigration and imports should be encouraged was also noted, as was his insistence, articulated in his book Australia, that Australia should look to America for security.136 ASIO’s interest now extended from the subject’s political activity to the scrutiny of his or her writing. Both Manning Clark’s and Russel Ward’s files are dominated by examples that ASIO agents cited of their nationalistic writing and, by implication, ‘subversive’ content. This presumed the power of the pen, disproportionate to the influence of intellectuals in the Australian culture.137 Unlike scientists and intellectuals, who were protected to some degree, many peace activists struggled against victimisation. Some, unable to find employment, moved overseas, where their reputations were not tarnished. They could not escape the constant gaze of the agents, who followed them for years, parked outside their homes and monitored their mail and telephone calls. Others resisted the harassment, and the peace movement staged a major national congress every three years. The Cold War served to restrain and sustain peace politics.138
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The malice of some of the agents and informers towards their subjects was striking. Brian Fitzpatrick was never a Communist Party member, but accrued a large dossier that dated back to the 1920s. Fitzpatrick was variously described as ‘a pleasant rogue’ and ‘a gobetween’ for the CPA. In a 1950 profile, his facial features were described as ‘repulsive’.139 As Fiona Capp observes, denial of membership was never a defence.140 One agent remarked that secret communists were ordered by the Party to deny membership and affiliation under oath. A recurrent theme in the discourse of anti-communism was the notion that once someone joined the Party, it was impossible to leave.141 Language as Capp wrote was vital.142 The words uttered in lectures, tutorials and public addresses either betrayed subversion or demonstrated innocence. The use of informers became a particularly effective and unnerving weapon. Many were students or colleagues who were either paid or were voluntary agents, motivated by patriotism, strong anti-communist sentiment or simple malice. These informers’ reports were often based on rumour, unfounded suspicion or hearsay and most ASIO files contain their reports.143 Arthur Turner, who was a staff member of the Law School and the nephew of John Latham, recalled being approached by a man he suspected was an ASIO informer. The unidentified man asked Turner about the political situation in the University and ‘who the dangerous people were’.144 The identity of these informers falls in the realm of exemption under the Archives Act, so the researcher rarely learns who the accusers are. Some of Crawford’s informers were, however, not obscured in his file. ASIO assembled lists of all notorious, red academics. At Sydney University, 17 members were on file; Canberra University College and ANU had 16; Adelaide had 12 staff on file, Perth 17, Hobart 4 and Melbourne University hit the jackpot with 63 suspect staff members.145 ASIO’s analysis of academic staff at the University of Melbourne was further refined. One agent claimed Melbourne was often referred to as: A breeding ground for Communists, whilst some of the professors have been labeled “pinks”. Inquiries some time ago produced sufficient evidence to substantiate all that has been said in this regard.146
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Undergraduate politics and political clubs apparently corroborated the ‘evidence’. None of the other clubs could ‘counteract the sinister influence of the Red and Pink hordes of the Labour Club’. The list of 63 ‘suspect’ staff (9% of the University’s 700 staff ) who had existing ASIO files were then categorised as A, B, C or D. Category A denoted CPA members, B stood for persons suspected on ‘reasonably well founded’ grounds to be members, category C applied to sympathisers and category D were ‘all other persons recorded by ASIO about whom insufficient evidence is held to warrant placing’ them in the other categories. It was noted that the 9% of the whole staff was ‘disproportionally high’ and explained that a ‘considerable number of those recorded fall into category D, many solely because of the manifestations of their advocacy of free thought’.147 Surveillance was more systematic at the universities of Melbourne and Sydney because of the presence of known and highly suspected communists. ASIO also compiled lists retrospectively on students and staff of Melbourne between 1942 and 1946. The individual’s politics and character were assiduously analysed. Even if there was no basis for suspicion, the agent ensured that the analysis was in some way derogatory. Stephen Murray-Smith might have served with the AIF and come ‘of a good family’, but his apparently ‘scandalous’ marriage to a Jewish girl from Central Europe was enough to cause agitation in the ASIO ranks.148 Women were either deemed seducers or victims. Nina Christesen, the founding head of the Russian Department and a close friend of Crawford, was by virtue of her gender considered ‘impressionable’ and under the influence of male authority.149 ASIO was never able to vet all university staff, but it made a concerted effort to hamper the work of academics and terminate certain appointments, with the assistance of the universities, whose very autonomy was supposed to protect their staff from such political interference.150 In 1949, when Manning Clark applied for the position of Chair of History at Canberra University College, the Registrar requested a security report from the Commonwealth Investigation Service.151 Clark was of particular interest to ASIO and was summarily removed, allegedly for ‘security reasons’ from the Departmental External Affairs Committee, which selected diplomatic cadets.152 Both Clark and Crawford were possibly unaware of the depth of official
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suspicion. Crawford certainly did not mention the political implications when he sent his condolences to Clark for ‘losing’ the position with the Diplomatic Corps.153 ASIO’s interest might have manifested itself in other ways. By October 1951, Crawford had become concerned that the Melbourne graduates, given their ‘calibre’, were not being readily accepted for the diplomatic cadetships. ‘I am not going to ask you whether there is any prejudice of this sort’, Crawford wrote to Clark, but he hoped Clark would ask ‘some questions’.154 The government made no secret of its interest in the ANU. Menzies announced on 29 August 1952 that he would report to parliament on his investigations into communist activities there. The investigation was prompted by the appointment of Lord Lindsay, a senior research fellow who was alleged to have been a member of the Chinese Communist Army.155 Robert Manne contends that McCarthyism was a uniquely American phenomenon that was not replicated in Australia.156 McCarthyism was admittedly not as extreme in Australia, but its spirit was imported and the atmosphere possibly more pernicious because of the secrecy. There was a disconcerting and growing similarity of methods in Australia. The effect of the secret inquisitions into the work of historians went beyond surveillance or the designation of ‘security risks’ who were denied appointments. Ellen Schrecker claims that in America the repression affected intellectual work and that universities lost their critical edge as they retreated into political reticence: Marxism and its practitioners were marginalized, if not completely banished from the academy. Open criticism of the political status quo disappeared…The full extent to which American scholars censored themselves is hard to gauge. There is no sure way to measure the books that were not written, the courses that were not taught and the research that was never undertaken.157 An equivalent Australian study has still to be undertaken. An Omen On a humid day in January 1952, fire gutted the imposing Wilson Hall. Although the shell of the hall survived and the stonework was not
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completely destroyed, the landscape of the campus was dramatically altered. The building, ‘with its elegant fusion of Italian Gothic and English Perpendicular Gothic styles’, took Oxbridge as its model.158 In the immediate aftermath of the fire, the University decided to rebuild Wilson Hall, and a public appeal was launched. However, it became quickly apparent that the expense would be excessive. Opinion was so polarised about options for repair that a consensus could not be achieved. It was decided to demolish the damaged hall and build a new modern one. Max Crawford was one who enthusiastically supported the appeal, although he declared he did not belong to either the ‘old Hall’ or the ‘modern Hall’ faction. Yet he was so appalled when the Building Committee demolished the surviving shell that he asked for his donation back.159 While the University maintained that donors to the appeal had been given every opportunity to disagree with demolition, many academics were aggrieved that they had been ‘kept in the dark’.160 A stylish booklet, written by Crawford and commissioned by the University before Wilson Hall burnt down, emphasised its symbolic importance: It is our task to teach our students to see beyond the surface of things, to be honest with themselves and their evidence, and at least to understand ideals beyond the gratification of private-interest. It is these shared interests, which make us a University, a Guild of Learning, and the Wilson Hall our Guildhall.161 Perhaps the fire was portentous—the next two years would prove challenging for Crawford. Despite ASIO’s conviction that the University of Melbourne was a place of intrigue and communist plots, most academics were consumed by more mundane priorities. Staffing and the acute shortage of rooms dominated Crawford’s life at the beginning of first term in 1952. Appealing to the Dean of Arts, he observed that the tutorial rooms were insufficient to accommodate over 100 tutorial classes and the spread of rooms was inconvenient. He argued that the History Staff Room had to be retained as a refuge.162 ‘Can we hope for some relief?’ he asked in a moment of desperation.163
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The hardships of the overseas postgraduates were a recurring cause of concern. Many found life more challenging than their predecessors. Mick Williams persisted in ‘turning good fortune into selftorture’, and George Nadel found doctoral studies in the American system protracted and difficult.164 Costs were exorbitant. Murray Groves had been sent down from Oxford because he could not pay the quarterly bills of 100 pounds and, as a Diploma student, was not eligible for the University’s Higher Studies funds. ‘Through a mixture of accident and robbery’, Groves had paid a great deal to get to Oxford. Stretton thought the interruption to Groves’ study a pity.165 In a letter of explanation about his difficulties, Groves confessed he had run out of money, and other Australians had either ‘worried themselves to distraction raking up funds’ or gone heavily into debt.166 ‘The Master was quite helpful and sympathetic’, Groves observed, ‘he is tired of impoverished Australians and intends to take advantage of the situation to lodge complaints with Melbourne University’.167 Concerned for his postgraduates and the Department’s reputation, Crawford discussed the need for further assistance for overseas students with the Standing Research Committee. While a decision was pending, an additional 100 pounds was plundered for Groves’ completion. Groves’ difficulties emphasised a general problem in the early 1950s. Travelling postgraduates were ‘floundering’; the University lacked funding to support them and was dependent on government assistance. It particularly troubled Crawford that if certain institutions proved too expensive, postgraduates would be ‘driven to dimmer Colleges’ and inadequate company.168 ‘No, neither of you nor Balliol is out of favour because of the Groves manoeuvre’, Crawford reassured Stretton. ‘But we have a problem to solve if a traffic that has by and large been profitable to both of us does stop.’169 Groves, whose reputation was ‘to act and not simply drift’,170 provided Crawford with the ‘startlingly’ high costs of a Balliol postgraduate degree—figures that Crawford needed.171 For the first time, Crawford was directing his most talented students away from the well-trodden path to Oxford in favour of more creative options. When he tried to guide Geoffrey Blainey with an initial offer of tutoring in February 1952, Blainey had the confidence and
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temerity to reject the offer. ‘I would enjoy tutoring’, he wrote confidently, ‘but as I wouldn’t be an academic for more than a few years, I would be marking time in one sense. I did appreciate the offer, and decline it with mixed feelings.’172 In an unprecedented move, Crawford then recommended the young student to Walter Bassett as ‘a good man’ to write a history of the Mt Lyell Company. Crawford had a canny knack of recognising his students’ ‘unusual qualities’, although Blainey’s unconventional response to the usual academic path may have initially taken Crawford by surprise. It was one of the few times that his career guidance had been rejected. Blainey’s decision, unprecedented for a man who achieved first-class honours, also revealed his enthusiasm for Australian history and his conviction that it would sell. Blainey proved idiosyncratic and also refused the Mt Lyell Company’s offer of further work. In a remarkable letter to Crawford, he gave his reasons: the job was only temporary, it was underpaid, and he considered that his research would give the company ‘greater profit or longer life’.173 ‘My regards to my rough old mates in the history school’, the letter concluded.174 Blainey lacked the deference and obedience usually accorded to Crawford. To his credit, Crawford deemed him ‘a man to be interested in’.175 The experience with Blainey might have convinced Crawford to consider an alternate direction for such graduates. ‘All this points to the necessity of building up strong, postgraduate research schools staffed by qualified research workers specifically selected’, Crawford insisted in a memorandum on the principles of research policy. He wished to cater for an occasional ‘mind of particular brilliance’ who found teaching distasteful and a distraction. ‘For such people’, Crawford perceptively advised, ‘and for the untried but promising graduates there should be suitable posts available with adequate salary and security’.176 After Dorothy’s partial recuperation, Crawford returned to Oxford for one term in 1952, with no promise of accommodation at Balliol. Generous offers were nevertheless extended from Mick Williams and Christopher Hill.177 Having travelled by plane, Crawford based himself at Oxford, where he spent time with the Tawneys, and then made trips to Amsterdam to visit Professor Romein and to Italy to extend his knowledge and contacts. The plans for America had
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been cancelled because of Crawford’s time constraints, although in December his visa had finally been processed.178 While away, Crawford was once again dependent on Kathleen Fitzpatrick for information and guidance. Their relationship continued to be complex. Efficient and enthusiastic, Fitzpatrick lacked boldness. After a ‘feeler’ from Penguin publishers to write an Australian volume, she was plagued with self-doubt. ‘What could I find to say that would be different without being merely inferior?’179 When Crawford failed to respond to this in his next letter, her unhappiness and desperate need for his approval were exposed. ‘I must confess to disappointment that you made no comment on the Penguin project’, she wrote in July ambiguously: Do you a) dislike the idea…b) do you think I won’t make a good job of it…If so, I’d be truly grateful for your advice, as I am by no means bursting with self-confidence…c) did you first forget to comment? I’m rather excited about it, because truly it was the only single nice thing (I mean being asked) that has happened to me since 1948.180 Apologising to Crawford, Fitzpatrick assured him that she would ‘try hard to be a good friend and a good colleague’. Acknowledging her vulnerability, she warned him she had ‘lost her sense of direction’ and would sometimes ‘grope blindly’.181 Their personal relationship might have become more fraught because Crawford, when in Melbourne, was often seen in the presence of Ruth Hoban, the Associate Professor of Social Studies, whom Fitzpatrick did not like. She did not conceal her alarm when she confided some years later in La Nauze: I made a useless and generally calamitous protest in 1953. I think—that the interests of the Department of History were sacrificed to those of the Department of Social Studies. Of course I think the Department of History of the first importance and the Department of Social Studies a lot of unnecessary rot.182
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‘He Will Recover’ After the Christmas break, Crawford contended with the usual grind of preparing for the new year of 1953. The ‘dull lethargy’ returned as he made the usual plea to the Vice-Chancellor for improved conditions.183 Privately, he confided that the History School needed two more professors, and he was in a ‘mood of rebellion’.184 The beginning of the year was marked by his teaching of the fourth-year honours course, an increase in his marking of matriculation students and a serious depletion of staff, with six positions empty or to be imminently vacated.185 Crawford argued that despite its ‘exceptionally large honours’ school’ and vast number of supervisions, the Department had a ‘poor staff-student ratio’, even for the Faculty of Arts.186 At the end of February 1953 Crawford went on an enforced term’s sick leave with ‘eye trouble’, and Kathleen Fitzpatrick was again forced to take over the head’s duties.187 The euphemism employed by Fitzpatrick concealed a far more serious condition, an organic disease that threatened Crawford with partial blindness. He received letters of encouragement, compliments and good wishes. La Nauze, firmly ensconced in Hancock’s ‘odd little show’ at London University, was ‘distressed’, and Tawney was concerned.188 Manning Clark was more circumspect, although he retained a begrudging affection for his former mentor. While the flattery was overt, he tended to be ambiguous. Making an oblique reference to Crawford’s eye problem, he observed: ‘Teachers in Australia should be fit enough to help the young to have “vision” and the old to have their dreams. I hope you will be back soon at the great work you began in 1937.’189 If most were unaware of the reason for Clark’s grudge, Fitzpatrick, it seems, had been informed. ‘Only about one in five years that I get a really bad attack of self pity’, she gently chided Clark, ‘and you have had your turn’.190 Kathleen Fitzpatrick’s spirits appeared to improve. ‘Have you made a New Year’s resolution?’ she bantered with Clark. ‘I have made two—to get thin and charitable.’191 Her intended sabbatical overseas also contributed to the lift in her mood. Seeking funding for Fitzpatrick’s trip, Crawford had written a glowing reference to Whitney Shepardson of the Carnegie Corporation, emphasising her role in the development of the Department, her ability to see the relevance of the American experience to the problems of Melbourne, her standing
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as the ‘Australian authority on Henry James’, and the previous absence of any financial assistance for her study leave.192 The depression that had plagued Fitzpatrick in the previous year quickly returned. News of Crawford’s recovery in mid-1953—the specialists concurred that it was neither a disease nor degenerative—did not alleviate her unhappiness. In his absence, she had to cope with the challenges of teaching large student numbers, the fire that ravaged Canberra University College, and the constant demand for references.193 Beyond this, Fitzpatrick was disillusioned. Crawford’s health was now so precarious that she had been forced to assume the professorial responsibilities four times in six years. His lack of assistance and recognition was endemic. Despite Clark’s offer of moral support had he been in Melbourne, Fitzpatrick felt at a loss, with ‘no one to help’, much less ‘talk to’.194 ‘Well, Katy isn’t as tough as supposed,’ Fitzpatrick announced defiantly to Clark. ‘In six years I’ve done absolutely nothing of any permanent significance and not really for want of trying. I just don’t get a go…no one else, not even Max, ever seems to realise that I have a predicament.’195 The voluminous correspondence between Clark and Fitzpatrick, intensely personal, intimate and humorous, sprang from these early years of frustration and shared resentment. Fitzpatrick’s exploitation is in part attributable to her gender and related to being a woman in a male-dominated workplace, but it was also due to her own sense of self. If Crawford did not acknowledge her predicament, it was because he was not willing to, and she was not prepared to articulate it to him. This pattern of quiet obedience was not about to change. ‘A Second Chair Is Needed’ The bitterness contained in Manning Clark’s correspondence to Crawford in 1953 had been caused by an incident a year before. On Crawford’s return from the ill-fated sabbatical, Clark had told him in March 1952 that he wished to move back to Melbourne and resume teaching Australian history.196 Clark might have been aware that Crawford had considered advertising for a lectureship in Australian history, but Crawford delayed doing so, convinced he knew every available candidate and it was a waste of expense and work to invite applicants.197
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The reserved but ambitious Geoff Serle informed Clark in no uncertain terms that he was in ‘charge’ of the subject. Crawford lobbied on Serle’s behalf in January, and insisted he ‘was extremely unlikely to find anyone better suited to my needs’ and recommended appointment without advertisement.198 Crawford might not have been aware of Clark’s plans. Serle’s aim for Australian history had worried Clark, who believed he had proprietary claims on the subject. Crawford characterised Serle’s ‘obtuse obdurateness of manner’ as youthful insecurity.199 Crawford suggested Clark wait until a new Chair was created in Melbourne. ‘With many regrets’, Clark accepted the advice.200 Correspondence between Crawford and Clark ensued, as the latter felt isolated and frustrated and attempted to negotiate his return, without much encouragement. The relationship deteriorated. ‘You never told me before any hint of your 1952 experience with Crawford’, Russel Ward wrote to his friend. ‘The knowledge makes many things easier to understand.’201 Neither Ward nor Clark expanded on the ‘experience’, but it was certainly Crawford’s unwillingness or inability to assist him to return to Melbourne.202 During his absence in 1953, it became increasingly apparent to Crawford that he could not delay the creation of another Chair of history. There was doubt whether the appointment should be in British history and allow the promotion of Kathleen Fitzpatrick, or in another field. Crawford, who had been dependent on a series of confidantes and advisors, found that Fitzpatrick was no longer so available, and he began to test his ideas on a receptive John La Nauze, then Professor of Economic History in the Faculty of Commerce. By this time Crawford had got over his initial dislike of La Nauze. Known by his detractors (and admirers) as ‘Jack the Knife’ or simply ‘the Knife’, La Nauze did not reveal an interest in the Chair, but spoke to Fitzpatrick and confided in Crawford that she was anxious about the process: I should add that I have not heard of any hostile comments but Kathleen hints that she feels uneasy about an unadvertised Chair and is inclined to feel that from the beginning it should be proposed as a new Chair to be advertised. I think she is scrupulous, and that the case is clear enough for her appointment. 203
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In a lengthy reply to La Nauze, Crawford revealed his feelings about Fitzpatrick and his intentions regarding the Chair. He was considering a Chair in general history that would alleviate his burden and allow the ‘restriction of my own to Australian’.204 Australian history had become too compelling for Crawford to ignore. The praise for his book on Australia had been gratifying, and the sources were readily available. Despite this, he realised he was ‘best’ as a teacher in general history and would feel ‘stunted’ if he were confined to Australian history. With clarity, he saw that the advantage of Fitzpatrick lay in her malleability and her contribution to the ideas that ‘moulded’ the School. ‘To decant the major part of my department’, Crawford confessed, ‘to some person unknown, would be to take the major control of what is after all my main life’s job out of my hands’.205 With Crawford’s indecision, John La Nauze continued to be actively involved in discussions about the Chair, and he raised Australian History as the specialisation in June 1952.206 ‘If there were a second Chair’, he reassured Crawford, ‘it would be whatever you recommended’.207 At this juncture, La Nauze also continued to write on behalf of Fitzpatrick, who appeared immobilised by anxiety. La Nauze’s arguments for a new Chair were pragmatic. It would provide ‘much needed’ specialisation and release Crawford from his administrative prison; promotion of the existing Associate Professor would be a ‘cheaper way’.208 Expense was an important factor, as the University faced a financial crisis. An emergency meeting to discuss the crisis was so unusual that Fitzpatrick confessed she had never experienced one like it. Paton was ‘at his best’ and explained that the University was losing 2000 pounds a week, with ‘no likely relief in sight’.209 The reduced University finances temporarily took the decision out of everyone’s hands. A year later in 1953, the second Chair of history was raised again. Fitzpatrick struggled with the implications. She acknowledged that the direction of the School was simply too onerous for one person, yet she appeared to be equally determined to reject an offer to share it permanently. Instead, Hugh Stretton emerged as the front-runner because of his newfound ‘availability’.210 Perhaps Fitzpatrick was in no condition to make a judgment; her comments were influenced by her own discontent as she emphasised the qualities expected of a new person: youth, vitality, and a lack of disillusionment. Her own feeling
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of inferiority and failure came to the fore.211 As a solution to the financial predicament of the University, she offered two extreme proposals: first, to voluntarily revert to a lecturer’s position, and second, to resign and apply for the Adelaide Chair.212 If Fitzpatrick intended to frighten Crawford, she succeeded. While on leave in May 1953, he wrote a determined letter to Paton, emphasising the desperate need for a second Chair in British and Australian history and reiterating Fitzpatrick’s observations and her plans. The University, he insisted, ‘could not do better than promote’ her, and he believed that, despite her protest, she would accept a Chair if asked by Council. He wrote of Fitzpatrick’s threatened departure with genuine concern, ‘I believe it would be a grave loss to the University and my Department to lose one of the most distinguished people we have’.213 Yet it became clear that he was in a dilemma and absolved himself from the responsibility of making the decision. Instead, he ‘begged’ that a second Chair be established and a Council Committee discuss whether the appointment should be by promotion of Fitzpatrick or by advertisement. The new Chair was not a secret in Australian academic circles. Two potential contenders, John La Nauze and Manning Clark, began campaigning. La Nauze, who was given the most encouragement by Crawford in unguarded letters, was privately the most overt. In a breach of confidence, Crawford informed La Nauze of Fitzpatrick’s suggestion that she stand down, but insisted that it would give him ‘satisfaction’ if she were appointed to the second Chair. At the same time, Crawford also favoured La Nauze and confided in him: Apart from Kathleen, the people I think as interesting for a Chair are Wood, Stretton, Madden (British Lecturer at Oxford) and J. A. La Nauze—the order is not one of preference. I should prefer you to any of them and I wish you would seriously think about the pros and cons of transferring to such a Chair if the opportunity arose.214 Unconcerned by conflict of interest, Crawford provided an annotated inventory of the contenders. ‘Hugh Stretton has the best brain of any former student known to me—with Baragwanath and A. L. Burns close in the running’, he informed La Nauze, but reflected,
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‘Whether he will make much I don’t know, the setting of high standards may prevent that. Strong personality (though terribly silent) and judgment and poise in crisis.’ Fred Wood was described as a ‘dullish writer’.215 La Nauze at last stated his claims in a ten-page letter. He professed his ‘interest’ and emphasised a friendship with Crawford that was ‘beyond comparison’. He was not unhappy or dissatisfied, he assured Crawford, but Economic history was never his intended field, rather a digression influenced by Edward Shann. La Nauze admitted that a Chair in the History School would give him credibility and authority, whereas Economic history was an ‘outside edge of the faculty’ and would restrict him as a ‘visiting amateur’ to any other department. Displaying some tact, La Nauze could not see why Fitzpatrick need accept a reduction in status if she chose to teach less and concentrate on her writing. He even invented a press release that explained Fitzpatrick’s decision, although he maintained that he was not ‘approving the idea’. La Nauze was essentially pragmatic and realised that if Fitzpatrick were ‘available that of course puts an end to discussion’.216 As for Stretton, he assumed he would apply for the Adelaide Chair and hoped this indiscreet missive would not ‘do him some harm’.217 Several facts emerged at this early stage. The first was that ‘Jack the Knife’ was negotiating and manipulating. The second was that the Chair in Australian history had probably been inevitable in some guise since 1946; the only doubt was when it would be established and advertised. Australian history had caught the imagination of historians and the public. The School’s research seminars for 1953 were dominated by Australian topics; the highest number of research students chose to work in Australian history (under Serle’s supervision), and an arrangement had been established between the ANU and Melbourne for visiting lecturers in the subject.218 ‘I acted reluctantly and out of a sense of loyalty’ By mid-1953, Crawford had put on much needed weight and returned anew. ‘I am physically in better condition than at any time since 1940’.219 Although the second Chair dominated his thoughts, he made a ‘wholehearted’ return to teaching and discovered he enjoyed getting to know some of the students personally. The ‘therapy’
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rejuvenated him, but some of the students of this era found him distant and intimidating; the informality that had characterised his early teaching had diminished. The University was undergoing fundamental changes. The perceived lack of leadership from the Vice-Chancellor fermented discontent and division. The foundation of a staff club, University House, and the Staff Association’s agitation for reform revealed dissatisfaction. University House was intended to unite the Melbourne academic community and it gave, as Crawford observed, ‘the impression of a vigorous, happy University’—but appearances were deceptive.220 In Crawford’s opinion, Paton was ‘so very nice and so heading for failure’ as he struggled with the demands of the academics and the obduracy of Council. University House quickly came to represent the hierarchical nature of the University, rather than foster unity. To the outrage of Crawford and Fitzpatrick, a ‘Senior Statesmen table’ was created, which Fitzpatrick thought a ‘great impertinence’. Crawford opted to boycott the place, but Fitzpatrick advised a cooler approach: ‘Let them stew in their own juice until ultimately they get bored with their own society’.221 Several months later in 1954 Fitzpatrick sympathised with Crawford’s irritation: I am sorry that you feel frustration of drift so strong an element in the Melbourne University scene. I am afraid that the time has come when we do little but cultivate our own garden (fortunately very well planted) and University House and Staff Association.222 The Association, with Crawford as its primary speechwriter, was at this time campaigning for greater staff recognition by Council. Crawford called for the revision of a system that suited a smaller university in a simpler time. ‘We are at a stage at which things can go seriously wrong’, he warned, ‘and at which this University could begin to become an unhappy and divided one’.223 Staff salaries and bursaries for disadvantaged students were the issue that propelled the agitation, but the lack of autonomy and representation also irked Crawford.224 The University Council had complete power. At a whim it could cut women’s pay rates, restrict sabbatical leave and curtail academic
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freedom.225 The Association was demanding greater recognition, consultation and a place in the University structure that went beyond the assumption that it was a ‘mere pressure group’.226 Crawford was calling for the Association’s acceptance as an advisory body that would strengthen University government and help make it a ‘happy place’.227 On 18 November 1953, Crawford presented a motion at the Staff Association meeting that proposed a small committee be appointed to consider and report on the present and future place of the Staff Association in the structure of the University.228 The purpose of the motion was to challenge the University Act, which denied the Staff Association any capacity ‘to advise in matters determinable by Council’.229 The justification for Crawford’s motion was clear. The Staff Association needed legitimisation to diminish the ‘uncertainty and vagueness’ of its position.230 Although Crawford was willing to act politically under the collective umbrella of the Staff Association, he became agitated when this was interpreted as an individual stand. A leading professor, Leslie Martin, approached Crawford and asked him ‘what he was getting at in moving a motion at the Staff Association’.231 To Crawford’s dismay, someone had given Martin a ‘different impression’ of the events at the meeting. Crawford assured Paton that there was no ‘hostility’ from Martin, but ‘obvious bewilderment’, and a copy of the motion pacified him. Crawford also sent copies to both Paton and the Registrar, fearing that the ‘mistaken impression’ had been conveyed to them. ‘I acted reluctantly and out of sense of loyalty to the University’, Crawford wrote. ‘It is rather disturbing if such a simple action can become a subject of misrepresentation.’232 Ironically, Crawford’s purpose in promoting the committee was to avoid the appearance of agitation and to avoid the ‘morass of difficulties and suspicions’.233 Instead, the accusation of agitation had been levelled at Crawford personally. Fear of rumours and a concern for his own reputation now preoccupied him. Crawford could be excused for feeling frustrated by the constraints and neglect he encountered at the beginning of 1954. After two years, the second Chair was discussed openly, but the ViceChancellor was still not willing to establish it. The part-time lecturers had not received their ‘proper salaries’, which moved Fitzpatrick to
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comment that ‘the battle seems to have to be fought from scratch every year’. Other anomalies in staff status and pay absorbed much of Crawford’s time. 234 A great deal of time was also spent co-ordinating other people’s writing. Carrington from Cambridge University Press again contacted Crawford to ask for recommendations for an historian to write the Australian volume in a series on the history of the British Commonwealth.235 Ernest Scott’s widow, Emily, had written to Crawford, greatly concerned about a freelance historian who had ‘approached’ her to write her husband’s biography. She had asked Crawford for his opinion of Reynolds and whether she had been wrong to judge ‘an unknown and unseen person on his casual Australian manners and accent’.236 The most interesting of these ‘consultancies’ was one that transpired during an ANZAAS meeting in March 1954. Manning Clark had suggested that a series of volumes in Australian history should be written. Other questions concerning co-operative enterprises in Australian history also emerged. In the immediate enthusiasm of the Congress, a committee was formed, with Crawford as its Chairman. He insisted the arrangements were ‘informal’, but they were also a way of resolving the increasing number of problems of ‘mutual interest’.237 An invitation from Crawford was issued to Jim Davidson (ANU), John Ward (Sydney University), Max Hartwell (Sydney Technological University), Gordon Greenwood (Queensland University) and of course, Clark, who had originally raised the idea.238 Crawford insisted on Clark’s involvement as a ‘particularly necessary member of the group’.239 The Principal of Canberra University College, Joe Burton, pleased that Crawford was ‘setting afoot such an enterprise’ and wishing it every success, agreed to fund Clark’s travel to Melbourne.240 Kathleen Fitzpatrick also found the idea of a history group meeting in Melbourne ‘interesting’.241 In the sanctity of his own office and away from Clark’s infectious excitement, Crawford wondered about the feasibility of such a project. He doubted whether it was the time for the venture and thought it might have been better to wait because of the ‘radical reconstruction now going on’ by the Menzies’ government.242 The form of the book was also of concern to Crawford. He disagreed with Robin Gollan’s suggestion that a large number of historians
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contribute. In Crawford’s opinion, such works were unsatisfactory. Instead, he preferred a series based on the model of the Oxford History of England, with one author for each volume. The remaining questions concerned the number of volumes, the scope, the selection of authors and the general editor. With the need to co-ordinate the busy schedules of six heads of departments, the meeting was delayed from March to a reduced group in May and then September, when Greenwood, who found it difficult to leave Queensland, could come. Crawford was pleased about the delay because he felt responsible for arranging the meeting and needed time to prepare.243 Like many collaborative plans for publication, the arrangements for the Oxford history moved slowly, and the group disintegrated as other demands and commitments took precedence. Manning Clark learned from the experience. A member of the group, he completed the second volume of his documents and was determined to write an Australian history. The idea of doing so independently became increasingly appealing. Kathleen Fitzpatrick was not informed about the outcome of the scheme because she had managed to take a well-deserved, year-long sabbatical in 1954. The Carnegie Corporation had come through for the third time and funded a trip that crisscrossed the United States, Italy (where Fitzpatrick intended working on her manuscript on Henry James) and England, where she was variously based at Oxford, Cambridge and London. The trip was beautifully planned, but its implementation became complicated when Fitzpatrick was put through a protracted and gruelling series of interviews to obtain her American visa in November 1953. During the initial interview at the American Consulate, Fitzpatrick was finger-printed and made to sign the declaration that she had not been a member of the Communist Party. She was then ushered in to see the Vice-Consul, who produced a letter and proceeded to question Fitzpatrick about her attitude to communism. The offending letter had appeared in the Age three years earlier and objected to the Government’s statement that it should have the power to dismiss communists in the Education Department. Fitzpatrick had signed the letter with eight others (including Lloyd Churchward and Geoff Sharp) and insisted that ‘political or religious belief’ should not be sufficient reason for dismissal.244 The Vice-Consul
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asked Fitzpatrick to submit a written statement about her beliefs. Fitzpatrick refused and insisted it was a private matter.245 The visa was issued immediately after Fitzpatrick wrote to Givon Parsons, the Consul-General, describing the meeting. Parsons explained the ‘exacting requirements’ of the United States and informed Fitzpatrick that her ‘oral statement’ sufficiently explained her attitude.246 There was no further delay, possibly because ASIO did not become involved.247 Fitzpatrick was discouraged by what had transpired and flirted with the idea of avoiding America altogether. Crawford urged her to go, saying that their colleagues in the States needed ‘a gesture of friendship from the luckier ones’ who did not work under such repressive conditions.248 As Crawford had not managed to get to the United States, Fitzpatrick served as his representative in 1954. She visited campuses, attended seminars and recorded her impressions of the American history departments and their postgraduate facilities and programs. She was a useful emissary and wrote about the ‘happy results’ of having a number of professors who could take turns as heads of the department; it created a less rigidly hierarchical system and ensured a high concentration of ‘maturity and experience’.249 Fitzpatrick described her adventures in a series of witty letters. She loved basketball, found herself in an earthquake, appeared on television made up ‘with a face as yellow as jaundice and coal-black eyebrows’, visited the United Nations, adored New York, despised Los Angeles and was enchanted by Wisconsin.250 The latter was a particular revelation. Fitzpatrick, who held an ‘ancient prejudice’, described the University’s History Department as the ‘best’ she had encountered; its scholars were distinguished, its Professor, Paul Knapland, ‘dignified’, with a lifelong interest in the history of the British Commonwealth. The particular appeal of Wisconsin was its ‘strong sense of existence’, a ‘mysterious entity’ that Fitzpatrick likened to the Melbourne School, and its ‘outstanding personality’, Merle Curti.251 The trip was not completely happy, however, as Fitzpatrick experienced the baleful effects of the Cold War. Reluctant to describe the atmosphere until she had left the shores for fear that her mail was being checked, Fitzpatrick did not know if the rumours she heard were true or a ‘mere symptom of widespread, vague and often unfounded fears’. She found life under McCarthyism disturbing
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and confusing, and had quickly adopted the prevalent paranoia.252 If Fitzpatrick proved an exemplary representative in the United States, Margaret Kiddle, who was on temporary leave as research fellow at the ANU, was a fine messenger in Canberra. Crawford depended on Kiddle’s news as she described the ANU’s staff, personalities, programs and seminars. The letters reveal affection and generosity as Kiddle grappled with severe illness and occasional bouts of homesickness, as well as her research. She had become Crawford’s most ardent admirer, and with her he could indulge in the kind of intimate letters he had once written to Fitzpatrick. Hence he wrote of ‘the love and support you have given me for so long, never obtruded and never withheld’.253 Kiddle’s gossip was also enjoyed and encouraged. It is difficult to detect whether she echoed Crawford’s views or influenced them. Preoccupied with Laurence Fitzhardinge, Clark and Russel Ward, Kiddle wrote in vivid detail about the three historians. The former was ‘a dreadful man—nice enough—but an ineffectual, gutless, muddler’.254 Crawford concurred and described his sadness at seeing ‘a first-rate University beginning its downhill slide under gutless and unimaginative leadership’.255 The Clarks had experienced a terrible bout of luck, culminating in the hospitalisation of Dymphna, the farming out of the children and a seminar given by Clark that was ‘excellent but a little haywire in parts’.256 Ward was new on the horizon and entered Kiddle’s life as a doctoral student she was required to supervise. Kiddle found the task ‘fun’, although on one occasion she endured Ward ‘earbashing on prostitution and homosexuality’, which she said caused her to turn a ‘bit pink’.257 The Life of Brian Another Fitzpatrick re-entered Crawford’s life after Kathleen’s temporary departure in 1954. It has been observed that Brian Fitzpatrick may not have achieved an academic career for three reasons. His political reputation was an impediment, he was an alcoholic, and his failed marriage meant he could never work in the History Department.258 The last explanation might seem curious since the separation occurred almost twenty years earlier, but Kathleen continued to be devastated by the divorce. When Brian invited her to his birthday celebration in 1964, she refused in an achingly frank letter:
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Your marriage to me was a youthful mistake from which you made a quick and happy recovery but mine to you was a mistake of another order as the effect of it was to make it impossible for me ever to marry again and thus deprive me of much that makes life worth living. I say this without reproach; gamblers have no complaint when they lose and must pay, but neither of course, can they be expected to dance and sing! And so I shall not come to your banquet.259 Indeed, Kathleen found the presence in the Department of his daughter Sheila upsetting and never uttered a word to her, either when she was an undergraduate or later a tutor. It is revealing that Brian Fitzpatrick was calling in all his old contacts while his former wife was overseas. Brian Fitzpatrick was struggling by 1954 and forced to accept tedious writing commissions and work at the GPO sorting Christmas mail in order to make a living.260 His political commitment, however, was unwavering, and he still ran the ACCL (now a one-man show) and was involved with a number of Jewish and refugee organisations.261 On several occasions, he unsuccessfully approached Crawford about working in the Department. Crawford encouraged Fitzpatrick’s idea of writing a documented history of Australia to consolidate his three earlier books, but the History Department had apparently exhausted its research funds. Instead, Crawford recommended the ANU as the only University that could afford to underwrite the history.262 He promised to get in touch with the ANU on Fitzpatrick’s behalf. Fitzpatrick followed Crawford’s advice and wrote to Leicester Webb and Fitzhardinge.263 Jim Davidson, at the Research School of Pacific Studies, made more effort to assist Fitzpatrick and recommended a number of options, including various foundations. Fitzpatrick’s confidence soon waned as he came to the realisation that there was no likelihood of support.264 The response to his other request, for lecturing work, proved just as dispiriting. ‘We simply have no vacancies’, Crawford wrote, ‘even for occasional lecturers’.265 Barely a month later he told Paton that he had arranged for a ‘galaxy’ of stars to work as part-time lecturers, but as a ‘frivolous afterthought’ had not included it in the University Calendar.266 The Department employed Jim Davidson,
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Manning Clark, John Ward, Max Hartwell and Gordon Greenwood in a program that supported the honours students. This was also a way to get the group to Melbourne to discuss the planned history of Australia. The Social Science Research Council, on the encouragement of Crawford and La Nauze, authorised a 700-pound grant for Fitzpatrick to cover living expenses during the period of his research. The Liberal backbencher William Wentworth was immediately informed. ‘You will be aware, I think, that Brian Fitzpatrick is a Communist agent and a consistent Communist propagandist.’ Wentworth wrote in a letter of protest to Menzies. ‘We are, therefore, really subsidising Communist propaganda. Is it right that government funds should be used for this purpose?’267 There are unfortunately no surviving records, to confirm whether Fitzpatrick received the funding or the government intervened and prevented it. By 1958, when Fitzpatrick applied for a lectureship in Economic History at the University of Melbourne, it was clear that he was considered beyond the pale. He sensed impropriety when the selection committee suddenly decided not to make an appointment. After he enlisted the assistance of Herbert Evatt, the rumour emerged that the committee was split between those who wanted to consider Fitzpatrick on his merits and others who wanted to ‘rake over old controversies’.268 Fitzpatrick speculated that two controversies had hindered his chances. The first was the dissolved marriage. He considered the second reason: Another possibility: from time to time over many years I have been described as a Red in one Parliament or another but it must be well known to the University and the Government that I have not and never had any ungentlemanly political associations.269 Although Crawford expressed sympathy, the issue was never resolved. Within three years and whilst continuing to subsist on casual jobs, Fitzpatrick became completely convinced that political sympathies did influence academic appointments. ‘Political opinions and associations of candidatures are considered’, Fitzpatrick lamented
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to Manning Clark, ‘whether overtly or not, before appointments are made’.270 In 1965, when Crawford learnt of Fitzpatrick’s death, he did not express surprise, but ambivalently recalled ‘the great gifts, if the character had been different’.271 His sympathy had also diminished. ‘I did a lot to give him the means of working at his historical studies in those days’, Crawford maintained to Clark, ‘and got into enough hot water for doing so but Brian’s resentments towards the academic world did not allow him to remember these things’.272 ‘The Revenge on the Intellectuals’ Australia can boast of few Cold War events of international significance. In the United States, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were both executed in the electric chair at Sing Sing in 1953 for allegedly trading secrets with the USSR. The United Kingdom grappled with its Cambridge spies, who either fled to Moscow or were finally exposed living in upper-class affluence. Australia only had the Petrov Affair— the defection of a Soviet Diplomat, Vladimir Petrov, and his wife Evdokia. Vladimir promised to provide evidence of espionage activities in Australia on the eve of the 1954 federal election. The defection of the Petrovs and subsequent Royal Commission into Espionage overshadowed the election, to the detriment of the Labor Party. The Petrov Affair took ASIO’s campaign against suspect individuals to another level. Evatt, the leader of the ALP, was convinced that Menzies had stage-managed the defection to ensure that it occurred on the eve of the election. Hence Menzies told the House of the defection in an ‘inappropriately rhetorical manner’ that ‘it was his unpleasant duty to inform the House’ of Petrov’s claims, and he insisted that a Royal Commission to investigate espionage was necessary before the election.273 The defection dominated the press for the remainder of the year and assumed soap opera status. Many found it difficult to accept that Petrov was a spymaster and considered him a plant.274 ‘I believe the Petrov episode’, Manning Clark observed in April, ‘will be the beginning of the revenge on the intellectuals of the left; the bohemians, the drinkers, the free lovers, the emotionally unstable will be persecuted and most will suffer’.275 Clark was perceptive. Although the revenge had started years earlier, the Petrov affair did much to legitimise it. Many intellectuals, Crawford among them, were greatly alarmed
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by the implications of the affair. The issue of intellectual freedom reentered their lives, but was discussed in confidential conversations, personal letters and even more private diaries. Few dared to protest publicly. Crawford was well aware of the legacy of McCarthyism. Kathleen Fitzpatrick endeavoured in an eight-page letter to describe the hysteria of the assault on communism in the United States, the pathological ‘national introversion, the national self-esteem and selfgratulation’, and the fear. Fitzpatrick thought ‘corruption by discretion’ prevailed among American intellectuals. ‘I thought I was prepared for America.’ She wrote to Crawford. ‘I thought I knew about McCarthyism—but I was mistaken; it was far worse than I was prepared for…People just won’t talk, unless they know it’s safe.’276 At the same time Crawford described the ‘hysteria and smearing’ in Australia to Richard Tawney, the English historian for whom he felt such an affinity: But the Prime Minister’s public profession of ‘painful duty’ and the Royal Commission smack too much of electioneering and innocent people whose names happen to be mentioned, however, vaguely, will suffer in their minds, reputations and livelihoods. We have no better hopes on the other side, for our Labor Party…It is in the wilderness and shows no sign of finding a way out of it.277 Crawford also appeared to have become deeply cynical about the political process and more critical of those on the left. ‘Our Communists’, he wrote in April 1954, ‘behave according to pattern and need watching and countering here as they do elsewhere’.278 It appeared that he was influenced by the very media coverage that he criticised, likening media personnel to ‘hovering vultures’.279 Here we detect a marked departure from Crawford’s past political stance. The Royal Commission into Espionage was the culmination of a long ASIO operation that began with Petrov’s arrival in 1951. Evatt was convinced it was a Liberal Party conspiracy. This was a dark period. Left-wing activists were called before the Commission and cross-examined regarding their activities and opinions. Most were intellectuals, public servants, trade unionists or scientists. The Inquiry heard evidence of successful espionage activity in External Affairs
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ASIO Surveillance photograph of Manning Clark Photographer unknown NAA: A9626,25 National Archives of Australia
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between 1945 and 1948. Evatt had reason for alarm because it was during his term as Minister for External Affairs that the leaks to Moscow were supposed to have occurred, and he was aware that ASIO had been probing his colleagues and associates. It seemed to those caught up in the Royal Commission that they had been betrayed by their colleagues. ‘The trouble may have been at school—at the University, they are the political informers’, Clark suggested.280 Kenneth Bailey, who was now the Commonwealth Solicitor General and had been Crawford’s nemesis, came under particular attack from Clark: ‘such a bastard’, he scribbled in his diary.281 Bailey was indeed considered the ‘most Machiavellian of the servants of the Crown’ and was the first to suggest the advantages of holding a royal commission into Soviet espionage.’282 Crawford was not called before the ‘spy probe’, but many intellectuals were, including Clark, Nina and Clem Christesen and John Legge. Clark, who made two appearances, was interested in the ‘types’ brought before the Commission and observed they were ‘rebels of a certain kind’.283 The press began to leak rumours that ASIO was approaching students and staff to act as informers or ‘listeners’.284 At first the reports were confined to Sydney University. Almost a year later, a pile of leaflets were left near Union House at Melbourne University in May 1955, and referred to the presence of security agents in the University and branded three students and a lecturer as ‘spies, pimps, stooges and perjurers’. All of the University political clubs denied knowledge. The leaflets caused an uproar and provoked the Vice-Chancellor to announce, somewhat inaccurately, that he did not know of any security activity within the University. He concluded that it sounded like ‘a lot of Communist propaganda to me’.285 The most damaging accusation was against Ian Milner, whom Petrov had encountered in Canberra. Milner had first come to the attention of ASIO after joining the ACCL. He had left the Department of External Affairs in Canberra, where he was appointed Special Investigative Officer, and worked for the United Nations in New York in 1950. After the Royal Commission named Milner, he suddenly left for Prague, where he became an English lecturer at the University. Milner has been portrayed as a Cold War victim, who was never a Party member and settled in Czechoslovakia only because of his wife’s illness. Phillip Deery, who consulted the secret police archives in
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Czechoslovakia, has recently disputed this claim. There is evidence that Milner was a communist agent when he worked for External Affairs, and even spied on fellow-academics in Prague. Deery shows he submitted hundreds of reports on colleagues and visiting ‘westerners’.286 This was unknown in 1954. Few of the individuals named at the Royal Commission were serious offenders, let alone spies. Brian Fitzpatrick’s prediction—‘what a squib the Petrov disclosures promise to make’—was borne out.287 Crawford’s brother Jack, a celebrated Canberra public servant, would be more seriously implicated when one of his subordinates was under suspicion during the spy probe. John Crawford investigated, was satisfied and then defended the man behind the scenes, so the staffer’s reputation and career were never tarnished.288 No evidence was forthcoming about the operation of a ‘spy ring’ in Canberra in the late 1940s, partly because it was impossible to submit intercepts of radio traffic between the Soviet Embassy and Canberra without revealing to the Soviets that their code had been broken. Many intellectuals, including Milner and Wally Clayton, were damned, but not charged. Milner was found to have provided Soviet intelligence with secret documents on the Allies’ post war military plans. He had been identified in radio transmissions from Australia to Moscow that had been intercepted and decoded by the Americans. The details of the operation remained secret and so the transcripts could not be given as evidence.289 Milner’s activities were never exposed. Other intellectuals were implicated without a shred of evidence. It was a Cold War spectacular.290
Notes 1
‘Hands off Freedom’, Argus, 19 May 1950. For an historical analysis of the Communist Party Dissolution Act, the Referendum and the implications on the University, see Frank Cain and Frank Farrell, ‘Menzies’ war on the Communist Party, 1949-1951’ in Curthoys and Merritt, eds., Australia’s’ First Cold War, Vol. 1. Society, Communism and Culture; McPhee, Pansy: A Life of Roy Douglas Wright; Leicester Webb, Communism and Democracy in Australia: A Survey of the 1951 Referendum (Melbourne: F. W. Cheshire, 1954) and Fay Woodhouse, ‘The 1951 Communist Party Dissolution Referendum Debate at the University of Melbourne’ (BA [Hons], Victoria University of Technology, 1996).
Academic Freedom and the Australian Story
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2
‘An Analysis of the Anti-Communist Bill’, The Age, 8 May 1950. Stringent measures were, however, imposed by the United States Government, which initiated the Smith Act in 1946. This made it a crime for a person willingly or knowingly to advocate the overthrow or destruction of the Government by force of violence.
3
‘Reds Outlawed in New Bill’, Argus, 28 April 1950.
4
The University became aware of Menzies’ intention in November of the previous year.
5
Report of Sub Committee on Royal Commission, 25 November 1949, MUSA Collection, UMA. Crawford was still its Chairman and President.
6
Ibid.
7
John Medley, ‘No Propaganda in Our Lecture Rooms’, The Age, 24 February 1951.
8
‘University Should Be a Hotbed’, Argus, 5 October 1950; ‘Some see University as Communist Hotbed’, The Age, 5 October 1950; ‘University Must Be a Hotbed, Not Refrigerator’, Sun, 5 October 1950.
9
‘University Should Be a Hotbed’, Argus, 5 October 1950.
10
Unsigned letter, date unknown, MUSA Collection, UMA. It was noted that Victor Trikojus opposed it, Joseph Burke was in agreement and John La Nauze had some reservations.
11
Ibid.
12
Ibid.
13
MUSA letter, 19 May 1950, MUSA Collection, UMA.
14
MUSA Principles, 2 June 1950, MUSA Collection, UMA. The statement was originally drafted in November 1949 and was revisited during three prolonged Staff Association meetings.
15
John Medley to William Friedmann, 9 August 1950, MUSA Collection, UMA.
16
Crawford to G. V. Portus, 31 May 1950, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
17
University Democratic Rights Commission Charter, September 1950, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
18
Crawford to Secretary, University Democratic Rights Commission, 11 September 1950, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
19
Crawford to W. H. Shepardson, 17 August 1949, Box 22, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. It was a plan in its infancy as Crawford thought that he would be based at Oxford and visit ‘people in other places’: Romein in Amsterdam, Tawney in London, Butterfield in Cambridge. Citing his Department’s notable progress, Crawford could afford to be unclear. Shepardson had met him on a committee for research in Social Sciences in Melbourne and was impressed.
20
Crawford to Hugh Stretton, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The teaching also involved field trips. One was a three-day visit to the caves at
264
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Glen Isls to look at rock paintings. Leonhard Adam influenced this method of working in the field. 21
Ibid.
22
Crawford to W. Ashton, ABC, 8 November 1950, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. There were other commitments that Crawford simply did not have time for. ‘The Burden of Freedom’ lectures for the ABC had to be postponed to his regret. Intent on reaching a ‘wider audience’, Crawford asked for a delay.
23
R. M. Crawford, Australia (London: Hutchinson’s University Library, 1952), 179.
24
Ibid., 180-2.
25
Ibid., 183.
26
Ibid., 189.
27
Macintyre and McPhee, eds., Max Crawford’s School of History, 77.
28
R. M. Crawford, Australia, 190.
29
Ibid., 194.
30
Crawford to Hugh Stretton, 3 January 1950, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
31
ASIO file, 18 December 1950, A6126/16, R. M. Crawford ASIO File, NAA.
32
David McKnight, Australia’s Spies and their Secrets (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1994), 4. Despite ASIO’s unerring support of Robert Menzies’ zealous pursuit of Communists in the 1950s, ASIO was actually created in 1949 by the Labor Government. This was incongruous, given the conservative attitude of ASIO’s predecessor, the Investigation Branch. Indeed, the very individuals who were suspected of vile and subversive crimes were largely innocuous and simply felt a political affinity with the Labor government and its reforms. Chifley was prompted by political expediency and an intention to remove power from the military, and by the conservative pressure that insisted the country needed a new security organisation with far-reaching control. The real crisis emerged when the US, alarmed by the communist influence in the Australian labour movement, banned the transmission of virtually all classified information. The US announced that Australia was a ‘poor security risk’.
33
ASIO report, 21 December 1950, A6126/16, R. M. Crawford ASIO File, NAA.
34
Norman Harper to Crawford, 22 January 1951, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. In America at the time, Harper had sent lengthy letters to Crawford, Fitzpatrick and Margaret Kiddle describing the bleak political mood and its effect on academic freedom.
35
Crawford to Vice Consul, American Consulate, 11 January 1951, Box 22, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
36
Ibid.
37
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, exact date unknown, 1951, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
Academic Freedom and the Australian Story
265
38
Crawford to Vice Consul, American Consulate, 11 January 1951, Box 22, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
39
Norman Harper to Charles Spry, 21 March 1951, Box 22, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
40
Ibid.
41
Ibid.
42
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2004.
43
Ibid.
44
Charles Spry to Norman Harper, April 1951, Box 22, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
45
Andrew Schoeppel to Alamada Barrett, 28 February 1951, Box 22, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
46
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
47
W. H. Stephenson to Crawford, 8 March 1951, Box 22, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
48
Interview with Ken Crawford, 2001.
49
Interview with Sheila Fitzpatrick, 2001.
50
Rowse, Australian Liberalism and National Character, 186.
51
Macintyre, Making History, 4.
52
Crawford to W. H. Shepardson, 13 January 1953, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. This claim was made in Crawford’s reference for Kathleen Fitzpatrick.
53
Crawford to John Medley, 9 November 1951, 1951/488, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA. Crawford did not admit that many of the appointments were temporary and, by the end of 1951, was pushing for ones with a permanent status, now the field had ‘improved’ and his favoured graduates were about to return.
54
Crawford to W. H. Shepardson, 17 August 1949, Box 22, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
55
Serle, Melbourne Historical Journal, (1970), 3.
56
Laurie Baragwanath to Crawford, 13 May 1950, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
57
Interview with June Philipp, 2001.
58
George Nadel to Crawford, 7 February 1951, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
59
Ibid.
60
Crawford to Jim Main, 21 March 1950, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
61
Crawford to Frank Crowley, 18 January 1950, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
62
Crawford to Hugh Stretton, 1 May 1950, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
63
Alan Shaw to Crawford, 24 May 1951, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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64
Hugh Stretton to Crawford, 25 November 1951, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
65
Registrar of Oxford University to George Paton, 6 December 1949, Professorial Board Papers, UMA.
66
Mick Williams to Crawford, 15 February 1951, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
67
Joyce Dunn to Crawford 8 November 1951, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. After Dunn achieved first-class honours at Melbourne and postgraduate work at Oxford as a British Council Scholar, where she was awarded a second-class honours, the employment prospects proved disappointing. She was offered an assistant librarian’s job at the ANU (a position deemed appropriate for her solid qualifications) and a lectureship at the University College of Ibadan. She accepted the latter and resigned within six months. Destitute, Dunn returned to England and was unemployed for six months.
68
Crawford to Joyce Dunn, 25 October 1951, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
69
Crawford to Joyce Dunn, date unknown, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
70
Foster and Varghese, The Making of the Australian National University, 59.
71
Interview with Valerie Tarrant, 2001.
72
Ibid.
73
Interview with Betty Hayes, 1997.
74
Macintyre and McPhee, eds., Max Crawford’s School of History, 56-7.
75
Ibid, 41.
76
Crawford to John Medley, 6 January 1950, 1950/489, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA. Alison Patrick gained first-class honours in 1941 and was awarded the Dwight’s Prize and R. G. Wilson Scholarship.
77
Ibid.
78
Macintyre and McPhee, eds., Max Crawford’s School of History, 75.
79
Interview with Nina Christesen, 1998. Crawford to George Paton, 6 February 1953, Box 14, History Department Papers, UMA.
80
81
Carey and Grimshaw, Women Historians and Women’s History, 14. This was the contention of Carey and Grimshaw, although the History Department Papers are full of letters of references written by Crawford for women graduates. History Department Papers, UMA.
82
Macintyre and McPhee, eds., Max Crawford’s School of History, 42.
83 84
Ibid. ‘A Survey of Honours Graduates of the University of Melbourne History School, 1937-1966’, Historical Studies (1971), 43-58.
85
Macintyre and McPhee, eds., Max Crawford’s School of History, 75.
86
Interview with Laurie O’Brien, 2002.
Academic Freedom and the Australian Story
267
87
For a comparison of the Honours graduates according to gender, see Appendix 4: Occupations of the History School Honours Graduates 19371966, and Appendix 5: Place of Higher Degrees.
88
Crawford to Manning Clark, 16 November 1951, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
89
See letters from Manning Clark 1950-1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
90
C. E. Carrington to Crawford, 22 October 1950, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Christopher Hill proposed that Crawford be adviser and collaborator for Past and Present, 5 December 1951, Box 18. His influence was not confined to international requests or to history departments. The Economics Department at the University of Sydney asked Crawford to contribute to a publication on Social Sciences. Partridge to Crawford, 10 August 1950, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
91
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 19 March 1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
92
Ibid.
93
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 10 March 1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
94
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 30 April 1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA
95
Ibid.
96
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 25 April 1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
97
Ibid. Muir was Crawford’s only close friend from his postgraduate years.
98
Ibid.
99
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 19 March 1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
100
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford , 21 April 1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
101
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 30 March 1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
102
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 15 February 1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Evidence according to Fitzpatrick was Adam’s demands for a higher wage and ‘his health’, which made it impossible to remain at the University after five o’clock.
103
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 22 February 1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
104
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 10 March 1951, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The history profession had gossiped ferociously about the recently appointed Professor of History in Western Australia. His clothes had been found on a beach in Bondi, and he had simply vanished.
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105
Other University opponents included Kathleen Fitzpatrick, Geoffrey Leeper, Oscar Oeser, Sidney Rubbo and Pansy Wright.
106
‘Political Curb at the ‘Varsity is feared’, Sun, 3 October 1951.
107
Council Meeting, 1 October 1951, University of Melbourne Council Minutes, UMA.
108
Ibid.
109
‘Political Curb at the “Varsity” is Feared’, Sun, 3 October 1951.
110
Ibid.
111
The mainstream press reported on the meeting and the University response from 2 to 6 October 1951.
112
Council Meeting, 12 October 1951, Council Minutes, UMA.
113
‘Free Speech Not One View at University’, Sun, 14 October 1951.
114
Council Meeting, 12 October 1951, Council Minutes, UMA.
115
Ibid. Lowe tended to refer specifically to ‘professors’ rather than staff.
116
Ibid.
117
As reported in ‘New Ruling on Political Debates in University’, The Age, 13 October 1951.
118
MUSA statement, 31 October 1951, MUSA Collection, UMA.
119
‘Didn’t Rebuke Professors’, Herald, 6 December 1951; ‘University Denial to Mr Cain’, The Age, 7 December 1951.
120
Charles Lowe, ‘Freedom of Speech and Association and the University’ in University of Melbourne Gazette, 18 December 1951.
121
Macmahon Ball and attached letter, 14 March 1952, MUSA Collection, UMA.
122
Ibid.
123
George Paton to Crawford, 20 March 1952, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
124
Ibid.
125
Ibid.
126
Woodhouse, ‘Anti Communism and Civil Liberties: The 1951 Communist Party Dissolution Referendum Debate at the University of Melbourne’, 41.
127
For a discussion of ‘paranoid politics’, see Brett, Robert Menzies’ The Forgotten People, 92-7.
128
Lasch, The New Radicalism in America. 1889-196, 294.
129
For a comparison of American anti-communism and Australia’s more parochial version, see Brett, Robert Menzies’ The Forgotten People, 97-108.
130
Macintyre, ‘Communism’, Davison, Hirst and Macintyre, eds., The Oxford Companion to Australian History, 144-5.
131
McKnight, Australia’s Spies and Their Secrets, 146-7.
132
Ibid.
Academic Freedom and the Australian Story
269
133
Ibid, 147. McKnight described Copland’s response as ‘pathetic’. Others have not been as critical. Fiona Capp maintained that Copland rejected any interference, but did not mention his compromise. Capp, Writers Defiled, 91. Copland was also described as ‘vigilant’ and characterised as a protector of academic freedom. See the chapter on ‘Academic Freedom and leadership’ in Foster and Varghese, The Making of the Australian National University, 113-16.
134
Report, 1952, A6126/16, ASUI File, NAA.
135
Ibid.
136
Ibid. See Crawford, Australia, 183.
137
Capp, Writers Defiled. 34.
138
Curthoys and Merritt, eds., Australia’s’ First Cold War: Vol. 1. Society, Communism and Culture, 138.
139
Capp, Writers Defiled, 11.
140
Ibid., 32.
141
Schrecker, No Ivory Tower, 133.
142
Capp, Writers Defiled. 90.
143
For a discussion of informer’s methods, see F. M. Cain, The Origins of Political Surveillance in Australia (Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1983), and The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation: An Unofficial History (London: Frank Cass, 1994).
144
Interview with Arthur Turner, 2002.
145
Capp, Writers Defiled, 90.
146
Report, CPA Activity and interest in Melbourne University, A6122/2, NAA.
147
Ibid. See Appendix 2: ASIO’s Interest in Melbourne University.
148
Report, CPA Activity and interest in Melbourne University, A6122/2, NAA.
149
Capp, Writers Defiled, 102.
150
McKnight, Australia’s Spies and Their Secrets, 145.
151
Capp, Writers Defiled, 95.
152
McQueen, Suspect History, 99. ASIO constantly parked outside Clark’s home and assiduously recorded the communists and suspected communists who visited the family.
153
Crawford to Manning Clark, 10 February 1954, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
154
Crawford to Manning Clark, 5 October 1951, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
155
‘Report Soon on Leftism’, Argus, 29 August 1952.
156
Manne, The Petrov Affair, 113.
157
Schrecker, No Ivory Tower, 404.
158
Tibbits, The Planning and Development of the University of Melbourne, 89.
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159
Crawford to Frank Johnston, exact date unknown, 1952, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
160
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 24 April 1953, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
161
R. M. Crawford, Wilson Hall: Centre and Symbol of the University (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1952), page unnumbered.
162
Crawford to Joseph Burke, 31 March 1952, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
163
Crawford to John La Nauze, 15 January 1952, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA. Select staff from the Department were also expected to mark matriculation papers every January which, in Crawford’s opinion, made the period more ‘hellish’ than usual. Crawford to La Nauze, 15 January 1952, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA. The matriculation exams were a constant source of complaint. A year before, Crawford had referred to the ‘gloom’. Crawford to John La Nauze, 3 January 1951, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
164
Ibid.
165
Hugh Stretton to Crawford, 21 January 1952, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
166
Murray Groves to Crawford, 17 January 1953, Box 14, History Department Papers, UMA.
167
Ibid.
168
Crawford to Hugh Stretton, 3 February 1953, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
169
Ibid.
170
Ibid.
171
Murray Groves to Crawford, 22 February 1953, History Department Papers, Box 14, UMA. Stretton responded and provided Crawford with some comparative figures.
172
Geoffrey Blainey to Crawford, 9 February 1952, Box 21, History Department Papers, UMA.
173
Geoffrey Blainey to Crawford, 22 October 1952, Box 21, History Department Papers, UMA.
174
Ibid.
175
Crawford to Appointments Board, 26 August 1954, Box 19 History Department Papers, UMA.
176
‘Principles of Research Policy’, Memorandum from the Professorial Board to the Council to the Professorial Board, 1954, History Department Papers, UMA.
177
Hugh Stretton to Crawford, 24 January 1952, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The only hazard was apparently Hill’s eight-year-old daughter, who was a ‘rowdy charmer’.
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178
Crawford to S. H. Stackpole, 10 December 1951, Box 22, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
179
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 16 June 1952, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
180
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 22 July 1952, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
181
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 3 September 1952, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
182
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to John La Nauze, 15 June 1961, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
183
Crawford to Hugh Stretton, 3 February 1953, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
184
Ibid.
185
Crawford to George Paton, 23 December 1952, Box 14, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
186
Ibid.
187
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Manning Clark, 6 March 1953, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA. Fitzpatrick loyally informed Paton about Crawford’s virus and his physical and mental exhaustion, aggravated by work and his wife’s illness. Fitzpatrick also appealed on Crawford’s behalf for full pay and additional funds for his recuperation at Gippsland Lakes, where he stayed with Ruth Hoban’s relatives.
188
John La Nauze to Crawford, 8 February 1953, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Despite Crawford’s advice to the contrary, La Nauze had accepted Hancock’s offer and was based at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies at London University.
189
Manning Clark to Crawford, 1 March 1953, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
190
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Manning Clark, 17 April 1953, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
191
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Manning Clark, 5 January 1953, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
192
Crawford to Whitney Shepardson, 13 January 1953, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
193
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Manning Clark, 27 March 1953, MS 7550 Manning Clark papers, NLA.
194
Ibid.
195
Ibid.
196
Manning Clark to Crawford, 5 March 1952, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. By 1952, Crawford found permanent lectureships most effective once he had decided on the teaching program and the staff member (not in that particular order). Two lectureships remained temporary at this time
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because he had not fully developed the teaching of Pacific and Oriental History, ostensibly ‘very big gaps’ in the program. 197
Crawford to George Paton, 22 January 1952, History Department Papers, UMA.
198
Ibid.
199
Crawford to Manning Clark, March 1952, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
200
Manning Clark to Crawford, 17 April 1952, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
201
Russel Ward to Manning Clark, 8 April 1956, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
202
Interview with Dymphna Clark, 1998.
203
John La Nauze to Crawford, 13 May 1952, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
204
Crawford to John La Nauze, 23 May 1952, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
205
Ibid.
206
John La Nauze to Crawford, 2 June 1952, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
207
Ibid.
208
Ibid.
209
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, exact date unknown, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
210
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 24 April 1953, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
211
Ibid. In many ways Crawford recognised this. See Crawford to John La Nauze, 12 August 1953, Box 28, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
212
Ibid.
213
Crawford to George Paton, 1 May 1953, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
214
Crawford to John La Nauze, 12 August 1953, Box 28, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
215
Ibid. Crawford’s reticence about Stretton was curiously similar to Roberts’ judgment about Crawford in 1937. It was fortunate that the Selection Committee replacing Scott had displayed more generosity when the inexperienced Crawford applied.
216
John La Nauze to Crawford, 27 August 1953, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
217
Ibid.
218
Professor Jim Davidson, who lectured on Pacific History at the ANU, launched the program. There were eight Australian papers out of thirteen for the second- and third-term research seminars. In a list of staff research
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projects, there were fifteen projects, all based on Australian history. Research Seminars, 1953, Box 3, History Department Papers, UMA. 219
Crawford to John La Nauze, 12 August 1953, Box 28, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
220
Crawford to John La Nauze, 4 November 1953, Box 28, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
221
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 15 March 1954, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
222
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, exact date unknown May 1954, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
223
R. M. Crawford, ‘Statement’, 18 November 1953, MUSA Papers, UMA. See also Crawford’s hand-written notes, undated. MUSA Papers, UMA.
224
MUSA general meeting, 18 November 1953, MUSA Collection. MUSA suggested a scale of salaries that was not implemented by the Council.
225
Notes entitled ‘Staff Association Relations with Council’, author and date unknown, MUSA Collection
226
Ibid.
227
R. M. Crawford, ‘Statement’, 18 November 1953, MUSA Papers, UMA.
228
MUSA meeting, 18 November 1953, MUSA Papers, UMA.
229
Ibid.
230
‘Notes for talk to Staff Association’, 25 November 1953, MUSA Papers, UMA.
231
Crawford to George Paton, 4 December 1953, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. This conversation was repeated by Crawford.
232
Ibid.
233
‘Notes for talk to Staff Association’, 25 November 1953, MUSA Papers, UMA.
234
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 22 March 1954, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
235
Crawford recommended Douglas Pike or, if unavailable, Alan Shaw. Crawford to C. E. Carrington, 5 February 1954, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. In the event, Pike wrote the volume.
236
Emily Scott to Crawford, 8 October 1954, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Emily Scott had always considered Keith Hancock ‘the only person to tackle it’. The man referred to as Reynolds was not given a first name. Nevertheless, Crawford confirmed her reservations about Reynolds. Emily Scott to Crawford, 10 November 1954, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
237
Crawford to Manning Clark, 2 March 1954, Box 25, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
238
In his letter to the Vice-Chancellor, Crawford refers to the New South Wales University of Technology as the Sydney Technological University. Crawford to John Medley, 8 March 1954, History Department Papers, UMA.
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239
Crawford to Herbert Burton, 16 March 1954, Box 25, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
240
Herbert Burton to Crawford, 18 March 1954, Box 25, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
241
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 1 February 1954, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
242
Notes on Australian History volume, date unknown, circa 1954, History Department Papers, UMA.
243
Crawford to Manning Clark, 29 April 1954, Box 25, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. In the same year, Gordon Greenwood had edited a book entitled Australia: A Social and Political History and used almost the same group of contributors, with the exception of Ward and Clark. Gordon Greenwood, ed., Australia, A Social and Political History (Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1955). The authors were Frank Crowley, Max Hartwell, Robin Gollan, Gordon Greenwood and Partridge.
244
Letter to the Editor, The Age, 26 September 1950.
245
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Consul General, 17 November 1953, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
246
Givon Parsons to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 18 November 1953, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
247
ASIO had a file on Kathleen Fitzpatrick, but it has been subsequently destroyed.
248
Crawford to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 5 April 1954, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
249
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 22 March 1954, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
250
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 12 January 1954, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
251
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 22 March 1954, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
252
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 5 April 1954, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
253
Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, exact date unknown, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
254
Margaret Kiddle to Crawford, 17 March 1954, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Kiddle would later reassess this earlier impression and grow to like him.
255
Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, 3 May 1954, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
256
Margaret Kiddle to Crawford, 28 April 1954, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
257
Ibid.
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258
Interview with Sheila Fitzpatrick, 2001. This is speculation. There is no evidence that Fitzpatrick’s failed marriage was a factor outside the University of Melbourne. However, it may have certainly precluded him working at Melbourne, a scenario that Brian Fitzpatrick also considered. See Brian Fitzpatrick to Woodruff, 23 December 1957, MS 4965 Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA. For further elaboration of Brian Fitzpatrick’s employment difficulties, see also ‘No Vacancies’ in Watson, Brian Fitzpatrick: A Radical Life, 252-281.
259
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Brian Fitzpatrick, 7 April 1964, MS 4965 Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
260
‘Obituary for Dorothy Fitzpatrick’ by Don Watson, The Age, 13 December 2001.
261
Ibid. See also Watson, A Radical Life. Sheila Fitzpatrick observed that, for much of her childhood, she believed she was Jewish because of her father’s involvement and friendships. Interview with Sheila Fitzpatrick, 2001.
262
Crawford to Brian Fitzpatrick, 13 February 1954, MS 4965 Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
263
Fitzhardinge maintained that ANU was not ‘geared to assist such a project’, and Webb affirmed there was ‘nothing that the University can offer’. Elaborating, Webb explained ANU’s contradictory attitude to freelance historians. They were reluctant to award fellowships to ‘fairly senior people’ because of their precarious employment futures and did not want to be seen turning them ‘loose’ after the funding with no prospects. Leicester Webb to Brian Fitzpatrick, 5 March 1954, MS 4965 Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
264
Brian Fitzpatrick to Jim Davidson, 3 June 1954, MS 4965 Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
265
Crawford to Brian Fitzpatrick, 13 February 1954, MS 4965 Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
266
Crawford to George Paton, 8 March 1954, 1954/494, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
267
William Wentworth to Robert Menzies, 15 November 1954, A6119/190, Brian Fitzpatrick ASIO File.
268
Brian Fitzpatrick to Herbert Evatt, 17 April 1958, MS 4965 Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
269
Brian Fitzpatrick to Woodruff, 23 December 1957, MS 4965 Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
270
Brian Fitzpatrick to Manning Clark, 20 July 1960, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
271
Crawford to Manning Clark, 11 September 1965, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
272
Ibid.
273
Manne, The Petrov Affair, 74. Menzies was also apparently pleased to
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announce that ASIO’s ‘growing efficiency’ had made espionage more difficult than in the past. Petrov, Menzies assured the public, no longer believed in Communism since he had ‘seen the Australian way of living’. 274
Ibid. Menzies’ denial that the defection was stage-arranged was finally supported in the ASIO files, which were opened in 1984.
275
Manning Clark diary, 20 April 1954, MS 7550, Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
276
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 28 March 1955, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. On her return, Fitzpatrick addressed a meeting of the Victorian Women Graduates Association on Academic Freedom in America.
277
Crawford to Richard Tawney, 15 April 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
278
Ibid.
279
Ibid.
280
Manning Clark diary, 30 June 1954, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
281
Manning Clark diary, 16 March 1954, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
282
Manne, The Petrov Affair, 46.
283
Manning Clark diary, 25 July 1954, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
284
‘Varsity Spy Protest’, The Age, 1 November 1954. See other reports in Sun, 1 November 1954.
285
Argus and Sun, 25 May 1955.
286
See Deery, ‘Cold War Victim or Rhodes Scholar Spy: Revisiting the Case of Ian Milner’, Overland, 147, 1997, 9-12, and News Weekly, 26 July 1997, 20-21.
287
Brian Fitzpatrick to Jim Davidson, 3 June 1954, MS 4965 Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
288
‘Sir John does not shirk a whit of work’, The Age, 8 March 1979.
289
Stuart Macintyre and Fay Anderson, ‘History in the Headlines’, draft, 12.
290
It was also an era when there were plans for the internment of 10,000 people. Manne, The Petrov Affair, 112. The Royal Commission destroyed any hope of bipartisan policy on security and derailed ASIO’s investigation of espionage. ASIO continued its spy hunt based on the case into the 1960s. The great beneficiary of Petrov’s evidence was the CIA and British intelligence after the Petrovs identified over 500 KGB agents. Whether justified or not, the Petrov Affair represented the injustices that kept Labor out of power, the conservative press that never gave Labor a go, the duplicity of Menzies, the role of ASIO in harassing innocent Australian citizens and the use of Communism to frighten conservative voters. The affair also cemented ASIO’s reputation, and left-wing critics increasingly suspected links between ASIO and conservative politics. By 1955 CPA membership had dropped to 5000 to 6000 from its peak at 23000 in 1943. Most of the 23000 would have gained a file by virtue of the membership. By October, Evatt’s obsession regarding a Liberal Party and ASIO conspiracy split the Labor Party, and the Democratic Labor Party was created in its wake. McKnight, Australia’s Spies and Their Secrets, xiv.
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Chapter 6
‘Things Will Never Be the Same’
Bruised by a series of political controversies, Max Crawford had largely withdrawn as a public figure by the mid-1950s. The refusal of his American visa and the interference of the Australian authorities had taken their toll: he was no longer prepared or able to endure political scrutiny. His liberalism had altered from progressive sympathy with the left to a more restricted affirmation of the need for tolerance. The Cold War had deterred many intellectuals. Open criticism of the academy and the government became unusual, self-censorship and political reticence the norm. Ellen Schrecker observed that it is possible that McCarthyism also had ‘a malign intellectual as well as political effect, but we cannot accept such a conclusion without evidence.’1 At the same time of the inquisitions, Crawford appeared to become critical of the far left. He thought that communism bordered on fanaticism. This rejection of political activism did not diminish his status as one of Australia’s most important and creative historians, for Crawford continued to exercise significant intellectual authority on the discipline. Musical Chairs In mid-1954, the Vice-Chancellor finally agreed to a second Chair of History. The ‘staggering tidings’ reached Kathleen Fitzpatrick during
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her sabbatical in June 1954. ‘Congratters Wharton’, she replied to Crawford’s news, but her ambivalence was marked, and her sadness barely concealed.2 ‘Things will never be the same again. Will they?’ Fitzpatrick asked nostalgically as she sent her appreciation of his express wish that she ‘sit in state in the Second Chair’.3 Evidently Crawford had forgotten that he had offered the same prize to La Nauze barely a year before. Fitzpatrick was in a quandary. ‘For me I really don’t know, my predominating feeling is pride in this public marking of the accomplishment of the Department of History since the days when we compiled the very first edition of the “New Groans”.’4 For the remainder of her period abroad, Fitzpatrick wrote about the Chair and her own uncertainty, and for the first time she raised John La Nauze’s name as a likely candidate. She was informed by friends in Canberra of the speculation about La Nauze or Clark applying, which in Fitzpatrick’s mind influenced whether or not she would enter the fray.5 Within a week, Fitzpatrick had a sudden revelation, after ‘devouring’ Keith Hancock’s autobiography, Country and Calling. The book completely altered her misgivings about Hancock, with its revelations of an ‘authentic love’ of Australia and his ‘shattering disappointment’ at the loss of the ANU post. Hancock’s praise for Crawford in Country and Calling, that if he had accepted the Melbourne job in 1937, he would not have done ‘such good work as Crawford’, seemed to Fitzpatrick to indicate an endearingly self-deprecating quality.6 ‘To have such a big shot choose to come would be a terrific feather in the Melbourne history cap.’7 Fitzpatrick wrote but anticipated that Crawford might have reservations. She emphasised that Hancock’s field of work differed from that of Crawford, so there would be no ‘redundancy’. She even offered to visit Hancock and ‘plant the idea in his mind’.8 It was an inspired idea, but ‘the big shot’ might have posed too great a threat. Crawford had been in Hancock’s historical shadow ever since he had retraced his pilgrimage to Balliol in 1927. Twelve years Crawford’s senior and an exceptionally distinguished scholar, Hancock had made an indelible mark on Australian historiography with Australia. As Fitzpatrick put it, ‘You couldn’t read a page of it without knowing the colours of his stable’. The Melbourne History
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School was Crawford’s best ‘creation’ and he might not have wished to share it with Hancock, who was simply too notable to play second string.9 Fitzpatrick’s assumption that it was too late for Hancock to return to Australia was, in hindsight, incorrect, for he would become head of the Research School of Social Sciences at the ANU in 1957. But Fitzpatrick was right to assume that Crawford would prefer La Nauze.10 Although the advertisement was drafted during the following month, it took until December 1954 for Crawford to agree on the description of the new Chair. The process revealed more about him than the future incumbent, and the emphasis was on his own role as the ‘intellectual lead’. Crawford had always found the reduction in his teaching hours ‘frustrating’, because he considered that teaching had a ‘humanising role to play in the University’. More urgently, the second Chair would also ensure that Crawford’s research and original work need no longer be postponed.11 ‘We are prisoners of our success’, he wrote, revealing his preoccupation with his own lack of original historical writing.12 The Standing Committee for the Second Chair of History first met in December. Crawford was not willing to show his hand and, despite clear private evidence that La Nauze was Crawford’s preferred candidate, he was co-opted to the Committee as the Dean of Economics and Commerce.13 The conditions of the appointment specified that the Chair would be for general history, with ‘the view that history remains one study irrespective of the age or region studies’.14 This was suggested by La Nauze to avoid accusations if he were appointed above another candidate for Australian history. Indeed, La Nauze warned Crawford that he needed to have a series of justifications for his selection to avoid it being received badly ‘by people like Manning’, and thereby create tensions and damage to the History Department and himself for years.15 Crawford had insisted to Clark that if the Chair were primarily created for the furtherance of Australian history, ‘I should clearly give my vote to you’.16 When O’Brien urged Clark to apply, he too insisted that there was no-one in Australia with his ‘qualifications and authority for the job’.17 In an extraordinary display of confidence a year earlier, La Nauze had devised Crawford’s responses in preparation for the Selection Committee and for the backlash to his appointment:
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You would very likely get some quite good applications. If you had it in mind to appoint me you would have to find reasons for their being unsatisfactory…you wd probably have Manning, perhaps Hartwell, (even in some circumstances) Greenwood or Ward. I know why you might not want any of these (and others – eg James) but all the reasons can be explained fully to a committee.18 By January 1955 the serious campaigning began. The most likely contender, Kathleen Fitzpatrick, was still away and had been at a distinct disadvantage in communicating by letter for almost a year. Fitzpatrick admitted that she had only spoken to her sister Lorna on the matter. The latter, however, proved to be persuasive and apparently echoed some of Fitzpatrick’s own doubts. The primary factor for Lorna was her sister’s health; in her view Kathleen had ‘nothing to gain except some extra hundreds a year’ (which she did not need) and ‘more chains’.19 For Fitzpatrick herself, the reservations went deeper. She listed four reasons for declining to apply for the Chair. Firstly, she was not a ‘good enough scholar’. Secondly, it did not suit her temperament, which she characterised as ‘highly-strung and nervous’. Thirdly, she thought it would render her ‘less adequate’ in the care of her elderly father. Lastly, it would hinder her literary ambitions.20 Would Kathleen Fitzpatrick have accepted the second Chair, which many people assumed should have been hers, if Crawford had pressed her? Or did Crawford hinder Fitzpatrick’s advancement? The answer to both questions is open to debate. Other than the reasons she gave in refusing the position, there is no conclusive evidence to suggest that Fitzpatrick was waiting for Crawford to convince her. Kathleen Fitzpatrick might have wanted to be persuaded that she deserved the appointment, rather than accept it as a foregone conclusion. Crawford told Clark that it was ‘his dearest hope that Kathleen Fitzpatrick, as much an architect of this school as I am’, would have accepted the Chair.21 This, however, might have been written after her refusal to apply and so cannot be really tested. There are other versions. Barbara Falk suggested that gender was an issue, and women in the period did not ‘sell’ themselves. To do so would be undignified.22 At the time, Alan McBriar observed that he had heard that ‘big Max was peppery with her, presumably for not applying’,
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which weakens the prevailing assumption that he in fact did not want her.23 June Philipp believed that Fitzpatrick was ‘vulnerable despite her coats of armour’, had reservations about her own ability and thought she ‘did not want the professorship’. Philipp has said recently that it was ‘scuttlebutt that Fitzpatrick was shafted’ for the job.24 Other potential contenders had strong claims. Hugh Stretton, however, was unaware of the opening or unwilling to bide his time. Instead, he applied for and was appointed to the Chair in Adelaide. The other main candidate was Clark, who Crawford confessed ‘knew more about Australian history than anybody in the country’, yet was not limited to his field of specialisation.25 In hindsight, Clark did not have a chance. Crawford confided to La Nauze in 1953 that ‘his health and its consequences make him too much of a risk’.26 This was slightly disingenuous, and there were other unspoken obstacles and biases against Clark, of which La Nauze was well aware. Since then, Clark had written affectionate letters to Crawford. His ‘only wish’ was to teach Australian history, produce his second volume of Australian historical documents and develop an exciting seminar series.27 Clark was definitely interested, but he was apparently deliberately discouraged. Conscious of Crawford’s aloof manner, Clark embarked on a less than subtle campaign to win him over in March 1955. ‘This is not an easy letter for me to write’, he began. ‘I am writing it though because you may think that my coolness in Melbourne means my respect, admiration and affection for you have declined.’28 Requesting confidentiality, Clark provided a list of his difficulties at Canberra, including interference from those teaching Australian history in Melbourne, their divergent opinions and the refusal to allow him to supervise MA theses.29 Crawford wrote a lengthy letter in response to Clark’s distress in March. ‘I have never believed in producing pupils in my own image’, he insisted and assured Clark that it was inevitable that their beliefs and opinions would become divergent and that to contradict him did not mean rejection. He reiterated that Clark had the ‘respect and admiration’ of the Department, and it was a ‘waste of spirit worrying over suspected slights in hostility’.30 Sensing the resentment, Crawford insisted it was unfair to suggest that he had somehow sabotaged Clark’s teaching of Australian history at Melbourne. He had ‘kept
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things fluid’ to enable Clark’s later return, but saw no sense in his return unless it was for a promotion. If Crawford expressed solace to Clark, he was more flippant about the matter to Margaret Kiddle in the same month. ‘I’ve had two letters in two days from Manning in the tune of a distracted lover seeking to repair or avert a non-existent quarrel.’ He wrote, ignoring Clark’s request for discretion. ‘But you will know all! I think there is a lot to be said for plain blokes who have never read a line of Dostoyevsky.’31 Crawford was clearly annoyed by Clark’s approach. Fitzpatrick was also the object of Clark’s strained manner. ‘I greeted them and received a cool nod, but not one word, despite any efforts to create some conversation’. Fitzpatrick wrote, scoffing with Crawford, ‘What a joke it’s going to be when he discovers that whatever my crimes may have been, applying for the Ernest Scott Chair’ was not one of them.32 The litany of offences that eliminated Clark as a suitable candidate for the Chair was, in Crawford’s opinion, long and decisive. ‘It turns on my belief’, he wrote to Claude Bissell (who was looking for a visiting scholar at the University of Toronto), ‘that his imagination and personality are not fully in control. He would be found neither dull nor disappointing; yet he could irritate and even alienate.’33 These comments were made before Crawford’s reassuring letters to Clark in March. He was even less restrained to Kiddle and insisted that all the characteristics from Clark’s undergraduate years, when he suffered a breakdown, remained. ‘Could too much cortisone’, Crawford speculated, ‘have disturbed the rational control that kept the eccentricities of mind during his lecturing days here?’34 Clark did not imagine Crawford and Fitzpatrick’s ‘apprehension’ towards him, for both were convinced he was unpredictable and unstable. Crawford alluded to his ‘difference with Kathleen’, but did not elaborate. The series of churlish letters Clark wrote to Melbourne did not help. Referring to an unnamed source, he listed grievances and disappointments that dated back to 1952. He insisted he would never consider applying for the second Chair if Fitzpatrick did, but he had now heard that she had no intention of doing so.35 If this approach was supposed to cajole Crawford, it backfired. In a fit of self-destruction, Clark had aggravated the very man he wanted to charm. He would later concede that he was ‘unduly touchy’ and thanked Crawford for his assistance.36
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Clark had not helped his cause. June Philipp thought his conduct was sometimes ‘childish and unreliable’, and she believed there was no possibility that Crawford would have selected Clark as his senior colleague.37 In one memorable episode, Philipp recalled that Clark was acting up at a Departmental function and referred in a speech to Fitzpatrick as ‘Aunty Katy’. A hushed group looked to Crawford and Fitzpatrick, who were both frozen in disbelief. For Crawford, who was ‘very keen on decorum’, it betrayed a fatal flippancy. ‘Manning was a loose canon and they disapproved’, Philipp recalled.38 An equally compelling issue was Clark’s refusal to teach Australian history. He had given the subject to Don Baker to avoid communicating with certain members of staff in Melbourne, which disturbed both Crawford and Fitzpatrick.39 Clark might have been briefly encouraged by Crawford’s ‘generous testimonial’40 and was probably ignorant of Fitzpatrick’s real feelings, but news from his close friend, Creighton Burns, diminished any hope he may have had. Despite Burns’s insistence that he could not find out much about the Chair, he was in hindsight, remarkably well informed. In concise point form, Burns listed his information: 1. Katie is definitely not a starter. She has apparently told a number of people privately that she definitely won’t apply. 2. Crawf has apparently indicated that he is looking for someone to relieve him of a large part of the time burden…3. Nobody knows whether John La Nauze is a starter. But it’s thought that if he did apply he would be a hot candidate.41 Clark was convinced that there was a great deal of animosity towards him. Diplomatically, Burns assured him that this was not the case, but that there was ‘a vague feeling’ that Clark ‘might just be a little too effective as a catalyst’.42 This impression was confirmed by a friend, Allan Sachin, who reiterated the view that Fitzpatrick would not apply and alluded to Clark ‘annoying’ a number of people connected with Australian history, but ‘wouldn’t know what effect, if any that would have’.43 Clark could not contain himself. He approached La Nauze about the ‘ambiguities and confusions’.44 In a dilemma due to his conflict of
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interest, La Nauze attempted to evade Clark’s accusations without provoking him further. Maintaining that he was incapable of interpreting Crawford’s attitude, La Nauze asked Clark to consider his situation under the circumstances. ‘If any carelessness of phrase implied that I thought you were attempting to affect my friendly relations with Max’, La Nauze disingenuously wrote, ‘I am sincerely sorry. Of course you wouldn’t.’45 With Crawford’s insistence that the advertisement for the Chair was ‘genuine’,46 Clark applied in a formal letter to Crawford on 29 April 1955. It was, however, an open secret a month before the appointment committee even sat that La Nauze was the hot favourite. Thus Burns told Clark that ‘La Nauze could now have the job for the asking’.47 La Nauze, however, had still not publicly declared his interest. Unfortunately for Clark, one of his referees, Joe Burton, sent a damning reference. Confirming all of Crawford’s prejudices, Burton observed that Clark was the most ‘touchy’ of his staff and was likely to grow more argumentative as he grew older48: ‘I would have been glad to see Kathleen occupy the Chair it would have been such a fitting recognition of her excellent work.’ Burton wrote to Crawford. ‘However, if she does not “choose to stand” then I can think of no one that you would fill as well as John.’49 Burton could see no advantage for Clark in leaving a Chair in Canberra for one in Melbourne. Despite these disparaging remarks, he then suggested that he wanted to keep Clark in Canberra. He expressed his hope that Clark would not apply or if he did, his application would be unsuccessful. On 24 May the Standing Committee met and the shortlist was reduced to four candidates, Clark, Harper, Hartwell and La Nauze. After further ‘thorough, fair and searching’ discussion, it was ‘unanimously resolved’ to recommend the appointment of John La Nauze.50 Crawford insisted to Kiddle that the discussion at the Standing Committee was confidential. However, the history fraternity, which was still relatively small and incestuous, was abuzz. La Nauze had not formally resigned from the Committee, but was no longer to be an exofficio member of it because of the changes in the deanship of his faculty. He remained involved and informed Crawford that he had upset Wilfred Prest over his impression of another of the candidates, Max Hartwell.51 Prest concurred with Crawford and felt Hartwell was
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‘beyond the pale’ because he had dared to criticise publicly a colleague.52 The unfortunate Hartwell had heard that La Nauze was to be appointed and sent his congratulations before the decision was even announced.53 It had almost been a year since Crawford had privately anointed La Nauze. Naturally he was ecstatic with the appointment. ‘I look forward to very great happiness for us both’, he wrote, ‘and to very great things for our school in collaboration and indeed I am conscious of a revival of the feeling of eager anticipation with which I first walked up to the Balliol Lodge in 1927’.54 The delight was mutual. ‘I have never been so soberly happy in my life’, La Nauze responded.’55 Once a peripheral subject that attracted a scant fifteen students, Australian history emerged after the war as one of the most popular, alongside the perennial British history.56 By 1956 the Department had 29 MA and Ph.D candidates and 21 were researching Australian topics.57 Despite this growing demand, the importance of selecting a Professor who could shape Australian history seemed to have been subjugated to Crawford’s friendship with La Nauze. He had selected ‘his best friend’.58 Crawford had also been insistent that he did not want to lose the control of the Department to the new appointee.59 A form of nepotism had often been practised in the Melbourne School and was rife in the wider Australian academic environment. Crawford congratulated himself on the intricate shaping and development of his Department. John La Nauze was not necessarily the natural choice even after Fitzpatrick excluded herself. If the two men were elated, Fitzpatrick was bereft. La Nauze’s behaviour towards her was spectacular in its insensitivity and demonstrated a reluctance to acknowledge that if she had applied, the Committee could not, in the eyes of the history fraternity, have overlooked her. ‘Well, instead of being left to your knitting, you will now have the double burden of keeping two men sane and charitable and calm.’ La Nauze wrote. ‘I have never imagined that it would be anything, but a partnership of three, in which if two are active in the eyes of the world, the third will often bear burdens but not get applause.’60 Apparently Fitzpatrick did not take umbrage at La Nauze’s tactless comments, and her response was affectionate but irresolute. ‘No
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John, I shall feel no sadness about not being a big shot’, she wrote. She went on: The only sadness I feel—have felt, I should say, because I have had to accept it, and have consequently become accustomed to it and feel it no more—is that Max, for all his kindness, is egocentric and he’s never really known at what cost I have so long been his second-in-command. That is the first and will be the last time I shall speak of this, please forgive me, if I take advantage of your kindness of your letter to say it once for the relief of speaking the truth.61 The resentment towards Crawford was unmistakable, but the reasons are clouded. Perhaps Fitzpatrick had expected Crawford to make a greater effort to promote her or merely to appreciate her. A barely concealed disappointment would characterise her relationship with Crawford for the rest of her time at Melbourne University. She insisted she felt relieved and wrote optimistically that with La Nauze, the Department would not sink as she had feared, but was ‘in first rate order’. With the announcement of La Nauze’s success in May 1955, news quickly spread that Manning Clark had actually withdrawn from contention before the decision was made. Clark had encouraged this rumour and told Kiddle, Burton and others in Canberra that he decided not to continue with his application and had withdrawn from consideration. This caused Crawford’s confidants much mirth. Kiddle thought it ‘a face saved in the nick of time’,62 and Norman Harper considered the withdrawal ‘rather foolish’ under the circumstances.63 Clark’s withdrawal did not reach the Committee by the 24 May meeting, but even if it had, it would not have influenced the outcome. Indeed, no letter from Clark was formally received, and its absence casts doubt on his story. ‘Whether he did so or not does not matter’, Crawford wrote philosophically in June, ‘if he did, it won’t do any harm for him to cherish the belief that it might come off’.64 Clark felt duped, yet the two men were never able to break from one another, and an abiding, if strained, affection remained.65 Within a month, Clark sent Crawford a telegram, ‘Inspire them as you inspired me’, and offered to read Crawford’s work on Wood.66 Although
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Photographer unknown University of Melbourne Archives, Image UMA/I/1958
History conference, University of Melbourne, late 1950s. Alan McBriar (second from left) and John La Nauze (middle)
Crawford had insisted to La Nauze that ‘in this peaceful spot Manning’s comings and goings have no power to disturb’, his protestation was not entirely convincing. Crawford was concerned by Clark’s distress and anger, and proceeded to make amends. When Clark learned that he had won a Rockefeller Grant in June 1955, and that Crawford had provided a glowing letter of endorsement, he wrote to Crawford that, ‘in Melbourne I would imagine this would be astonishment’.67 Crawford’s response distorted the truth. ‘My very real pleasure in hearing of the award is somewhat marred by this evidence that you continue to misunderstand the goodwill that exists towards you here…Forgive plain speaking from an old friend; it does worry me to see you labouring under the misapprehension.’ 68 Only a week before, Crawford confessed to La Nauze the palpable ‘relief’ in the Department when it received news that Clark was not appointed.69 Stephen Holt, Clark’s biographer, maintains that his failure to be appointed to the Melbourne Chair was, in hindsight, a positive thing. The administrative grind might have impeded his creativity, whereas in Canberra, Clark was able to adopt a more uninhibited approach to the writing of Australian history.70 The Melbourne School might have imparted intellectual rigour, which some of Clark’s critics considered that he needed. The Department itself would have also been significantly different under Clark, and he would have brought vitality, daring (and unpredictability) to the teaching of Australian history. With La Nauze, it could be argued that the Department did not receive the central creative presence that it so badly needed, but the School acquired a dedicated scholar and stability. Yet John Poynter believes that La Nauze was ‘an under-estimated figure in Australian historical scholarship’ who would become a ‘crucial player’.71 ‘A shrewd administrator’, La Nauze’s other major contribution was bringing with his remarkably adept secretary Gwenyth Williams who would remain in the Department for twenty years. William’s title would later be changed to Organising Tutor (and eventually Administrative Assistant), and her contribution was significant.72 Crawford had also clearly opted for a safer option with La Nauze. He
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was aware that La Nauze would not be entangled in any political controversies, and Clark carried the brand of a marked man. Invitations, Advice and Refusals As the new academic year of 1955 loomed, the normal grind of work and research oppressed Crawford. Staffing arrangements were made after much lobbying and protracted negotiations.73 The bane of Crawford’s existence remained his own writing and the few ‘stolen moments’ he devoted to it.74 His frustration with the ‘Moloch of administration’ and his ‘unfulfilled aspirations’ were evident. He had come to the realisation that he could not participate in the Australian history volume and began to leave this project to others and devote himself to the Renaissance. To his delight, Australia was reprinted, yet he had only managed to complete two articles in 1954, and the new year did not look any more promising. Crawford completed ‘The Renaissance Mirror’ and an untitled article on war, which was to be published in ‘a mixed bag’ called Paths to Peace. He hoped to develop both articles into books, but the second article had been so slow in taking shape that Crawford feared it ‘would be unnecessary or too late’.75 An article on Australian nationalism was due in March, but delayed until December. Friends also enquired about Crawford’s books on Wood and Deakin, the latter a collaborative project with John La Nauze. The Deakin book was eventually taken over completely by La Nauze. The biography of Wood remained half-finished, and Crawford hoped vaguely to complete it by the end of 1955, then by 1956.76 Desperate for more time, he solicited Richard’s Tawney’s advice. Tawney had deemed the Renaissance article ‘illuminating’ and the article on war a contribution to ‘sanity’ in the UK and the USA.77 ‘Let me beg you,’ Tawney advised, ‘if I may without presumption, not to postpone longer their publication, or the publication of a book based on them…So cut other duties now.’78 The creation of the second Chair of History had not yet reduced Crawford’s workload, and he was still forced to refuse invitations from abroad. He declined one from Claude Bissell in early 1955, who offered to accommodate him as a visiting Australian scholar at the University of Toronto for four months. He was not completely prepared to relinquish control over the discipline and other Australian
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historians. However, when making alternative recommendations to Bissell, Crawford sabotaged Clark’s chances by expressing a ‘slight quirk of doubt’ and gave his unreserved support to Fitzpatrick, ‘the most distinguished writer among our historians’.79 Reputations and careers could be easily promoted and just as easily damaged. There was a constant flow of ‘strictly confidential’ and personal notes to Crawford asking for his impressions of candidates. With seniority, he became more absolute. There was a complete absence of doubt in his judgments of people. He was also increasingly assertive about the role of the Melbourne School. On learning of John Legge’s failed application for a Rockefeller scholarship to study in America and Indonesia, Alexander felt that ‘the substantial progress recently made’ in Indonesian studies at Melbourne had ‘cut across’ Legge’s chances.80 ‘Just to get the record right’, Crawford corrected Alexander, whom he considered had failed to recognise Melbourne’s contribution before 1952.81 This appeared to annoy Crawford more than Alexander’s serious suggestion that the Foundation was imposing an ‘exclusionist approach’ in their selection of candidates.82 Nor did he appear to mind that the Foundation was ‘anxious to split up research work on South East Asia and Pacific countries among the several Australian universities on some regional or geographical basis.’83 In late January 1955, Crawford introduced Richard Tawney to his staff. The visit of this renowned historian and Professor of Economic History at the University of London had occupied Crawford almost as fully as the establishment of the second Chair. He had first suggested it informally to the Vice-Chancellor in 1953, after he had re-established his friendship with Tawney during his sabbatical. It was Crawford’s ‘dearest wish’ for Tawney to visit.84 The reasons for inviting a frail 73-year-old at considerable expense were varied and caused some derision among younger historians. He was ‘a great man and a great historian’, Crawford observed. ‘In the historical education offered to students in this University, his work has played an outstanding role, for its broad humanity and tolerance, its imaginative understanding and its literary distinction.’85 Crawford had not exaggerated Tawney’s international standing. He was also regarded as one of Britain’s leading intellectuals, and it was an inspired invitation. After the visit of three American professors under the Fulbright
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Scheme and in an attempt to redress the balance, Crawford wanted Melbourne to host this ‘great Englishman’.86 He had considered it fair for Melbourne to meet the costs because Tawney’s work had been so influential in the development of the History School, and he had also assisted Melbourne’s postgraduate students in England. It was, moreover, a tactical move, for if the University accepted the costs, Crawford could control Tawney’s travels and ensure that he was not ‘exposed to the wear and tear of visits to several Universities’.87 A gentle, shy and self-deprecating man, Tawney complied with Crawford’s suggestions.88 His wife, however, was not as accommodating, and during her stay at Women’s College, she ‘fought viciously’ with Myra Roper.89 Although Tawney did not wish to curtail his visit to Melbourne, his ‘spiritual home’, he realised that other universities also ‘desired’ him to visit.90 Crawford, on the other hand, was determined that other institutions could not simply request a visit.91 To satisfy the Interchange Committee, he devised Tawney’s program and insisted it could not be altered or extended. The itinerary included Adelaide University, Sydney University and both the Canberra University College and the ANU. Western Australia, Tasmania and Queensland were, in Crawford’s opinion, ‘pleasant places’, but required too much travel.92 In response to the ‘competing demands’, Crawford was forced to placate many of his interstate colleagues and apologise for being ‘difficult’.93 He instructed the universities to be vigilant against ‘importunate lecture-hunters’ and not let his guest be overwhelmed by hospitality.94 Crawford was both proprietary and assertive. He defended his conduct by stating that Melbourne had provided the bulk of the funding and insisted that the benefit of Tawney’s visit would be derived from informal meetings and discussions. The other excuse for Crawford’s caution was less diplomatic, but no less compelling: ‘We must not kill Tawney’.95 Although Crawford told Tawney he could plan his work, he also advised him to bring notes on British history, social history and economic history and ‘anything’ he needed for work on his book.96 One public address in Melbourne was arranged for the ‘lecture hungry community’. La Nauze counselled against lecturing on political subjects.97 Seven hundred people attended the Wood Lecture in Sydney and, despite Crawford’s panic, Tawney was ‘in good form’. The entire
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trip was a resounding success,98 and Tawney described it as a ‘really delightful experience’.99 Crawford’s friendship with Tawney strengthened during preparations for the visit, and their correspondence flourished after his return to London. The elder statesman of the profession became another mentor, someone in whom Crawford confided about his work and life. Tawney encouraged Crawford to write more, work less and publish widely. Crawford responded by deciding to let others write about Australia, in order to concentrate on Renaissance studies for the remainder of his career. This decision was apparently inspired by a promise given to Tawney100 and the short visit to Italy that ‘stirred an old enthusiasm’.101 It might have also been prompted by Crawford’s desire for international recognition. At Tawney’s suggestion, he sent a copy of the ‘Renaissance Mirror’ to Hans Baron, the venerated American historian, who in turn contacted Crawford.102 The correspondence led to a close and intimate friendship. Crawford shared with Tawney a commitment to liberal scholarship. When introducing him to the Melbourne audience, he likened Tawney to Marc Bloch, Eileen Power, Henry Pirenne and Jan Huizinga. ‘While they observe the strictest demands of detached scholarship, they do not stand outside the human story and are not indifferent to it,’ Crawford declared, and added: Rather, they are deeply involved in it and do not disdain to play their part. Blinded neither by fanaticism nor by timidity, they have the courage of their reasoned convictions, to express them without fear or favour and not only in words but also in action…These are the necessary ingredients in the recipe of a good teacher, for who can teach well without that mixture of faith and realism?103
Unavoidable Intrigues The ideals Max Crawford had tried to uphold were increasingly challenged by the mid-1950s. He was endeavouring to avoid taking a public stand or involvement in any political action, whether as a representative of the Staff Association, in the public arena or in the
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private realm. Crawford was never a career activist. The backlash against his earlier activism had disturbed him. Crawford suggested to Margaret Kiddle (possibly to elicit sympathy), that Dorothy Crawford was not keen on conspicuous political causes, and the marriage had become so strained that he now attempted to placate her by avoiding political controversy.104 This is contradicted by Ian Crawford who always believed that his mother’s views were the more radical. ‘She firmly espoused’, he wrote, ‘anti-racial views which were rare in the post-war period when we just defeated the “Yellow peril”. They were both committed Labor voters.’105 Yet if Crawford was not eager to take up causes, he often found himself caught in the web of politics. The focus of the Cold War extended from alleged traitors to domestic dissenters, and the prime targets were radicals, progressives and reformers.106 In March 1955, an old political colleague from the ACCL, John Rodgers, contacted Crawford and asked him to write to the Immigration Minister, Harold Holt, to assist in an application to renew his passport. Rodgers needed a passport to promote trade with Russia, and assured Crawford he had no intention of attending conferences or engaging in any political activity.107 Only days before, the Age had decried Holt’s refusal to issue passports to certain individuals and maintained that he should have the ‘confidence in the strength of Australian institutions, and the integrity of the Australian people’. Crawford’s response to this request is unknown.108 When Crawford learnt that the Rockefeller Foundation had rejected John Legge for ‘security’ reasons, he was sympathetic, but not prepared to challenge the Foundation’s decision.109 He mused to Fred Alexander: I know from personal experience how upsetting John must find this business. He will not need to be told, however, that he has the complete confidence of us all, in his integrity and independence of mind. Indeed, these are qualities he has always displayed, and there is, for me, some irony in the situation when I recollect that even in his undergraduate days when Marxist ideas were more popular than they are now, his approach to them was marked by a calm and critical detachment.110
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The matter went no further, and Crawford was even ‘encouraged by implication’ that other Australian universities could hope for the Foundation’s help, despite its arbitrary and dubious methods of selection. It is surprising that Crawford did not articulate more concern that research was hampered by virtue of the historian’s political affiliation. By August 1955, Crawford came to the attention of ASIO once more. The agency initiated additional investigations when Crawford was seen to be associated with the historical journal, Past and Present, which had links to the Communist Party of Great Britain. The head office of ASIO asked its Victorian office for ‘current information’ on Crawford and the publication, which was described as ‘a journal of scientific history’. ‘It is controlled by members of the British Communist Party’, ASIO reported, ‘and although the Editorial Board includes one or two non-communists, there is no doubt that it exists to reflect Marxist outlook’.111 ASIO was possibly referring to Christopher Hill, the distinguished historian and Crawford’s old friend from Balliol who had asked him to be an adviser and collaborator for the publication. When it was confirmed that one of the foreign advisers might be ‘the same Professor R. M. Crawford’ who had attracted a considerable file, a body of additional information was revisited and a photograph attached that had been taken at Australia-Soviet House almost ten years earlier. The report referred to the formation of the AustraliaChina Association in 1947 and Crawford’s appointment as its VicePresident. It also recalled that he was ‘shown’ to be a Vice-President of the Executive Committee of the ACCL in 1953. Tom Truman’s impressions were repeated to Peter Ryan, who in 1954 had commented for ASIO on ‘University personalities known to him’. Ryan referred to Crawford as ‘a liberal scientific historian’.112 In his own defense, Ryan denied contact with ASIO, although he did admit to having a meeting with an ASIO operative at his home about a University identity. He also maintained that he would not have used the phrase ‘liberal scientific historian’ because he did not know what it meant. ‘It could by innuendo be used to suggest I was a pimp for ASIO. I won’t lose any sleep over it’, he insisted, adding:
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ASIO did some useful work but were sometimes hamfisted. Perhaps someone heard me talking in a relaxed way about friends or perhaps they were using second hand information. I can’t imagine things so lost in history stirring people these days.113 The Travails of Ward It was often difficult for Crawford to avoid the controversies that plagued his students and colleagues. The public criticism of Melbourne University as a breeding-ground for sedition had diminished and, after Menzies’ public investigation in 1952, the ANU was drawn into the spotlight. Tawney viewed the ANU with grim humour and insisted on calling Manning Clark, Professor Burgess. Margaret Kiddle reported that certain historians ‘for purely political reasons were dead and should go to safer waters in Melbourne, Sydney or Brisbane’.114 An atmosphere of fear pervaded the campus. ‘I’m really scared to even open my mouth’, Kiddle confessed to Crawford, ‘because of the things I’m not supposed to talk about’.115 By 1955 some academics felt more optimistic. They hoped that media coverage would expose the ANU’s intolerant treatment of its left-wing staff. ‘As you probably know we are at the beginning of a light on academic freedom at the ANU’, Jim Davidson informed Brian Fitzpatrick in May.116 Russel Ward did not share this optimism. Ward had come to Crawford’s attention through the efforts of his self-proclaimed admirer, Margaret Kiddle. Despite his evident talent and the near completion of his seminal and celebrated doctorate, later published as The Australian Legend, he was unable to gain an academic post. Kiddle forwarded his ‘horribly depressed’ letter to Crawford after Ward had failed to secure an ANU fellowship.117 She had spoken earlier to Fitzhardinge on Ward’s behalf and was greeted by a noncommittal response and advice that Ward should ‘get out into the world’.118 Kiddle attributed Fitzhardinge’s response to envy. ‘Russel is a beautiful hunk of a man (though not much sex appeal to me).’119 With children at school, Ward wanted to stay in Canberra ‘rather than go anywhere else’, and intended to apply for a lectureship in Australian history at the College. It appeared that the ANU did not want him.120
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Margaret Kiddle Photographer unknown University of Melbourne Archives, Image UMA/I/1952
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When he was informed that he had been successful in his application for a history lectureship at the University of Technology (by 1958 it had become the University of New South Wales), it seemed as if Ward’s luck had finally changed. The joy vanished when, in January 1956, he was told that the job was to be re-advertised, after the ViceChancellor had learned from Wallace Wurth, the Chairman of the Public Service Board, of Ward’s reputed activities in ‘seditious circles’. Rumour spread of ASIO’s role and Wurth’s involvement. Kiddle wrote to Crawford. ‘I’m so angry about it—I could tear the bastard limb from limb—who is the fellow…I’ll bet it would be possible to dig up some dirt in his past.’121 Kiddle no longer felt any doubt about Ward’s work. She described his thesis as a ‘beautiful and lingering piece’, and was prepared to ‘fight anything and everything in sight’ on his behalf.122 While Ward’s plight was no secret, there was a degree of naivety in academic circles about the extent of collusion between the government and universities. Ward had told Kiddle that Wurth had been provided with an ASIO report. Kiddle was shocked, and doubted that ASIO would work in such a manner. She believed that only members of Cabinet would be privy to such a report. In confidence, she consulted her brother Keith, who was a friend of Charles Spry and often met him at the Melbourne Club.123 Kiddle claimed that Keith ‘hit the roof’. She wrote conspiratorially that her brother ‘doesn’t believe anyone but Cabinet would see the reports—no one could just ask for it. He says Spry is not a man who could ever be “got at”.’124 Kiddle asked her brother not to speak to Spry at this point, and his response suggests he was either attempting to cover security practices or he was not well informed. It did not occur to Kiddle or Crawford to ask why Ward had an ASIO file in the first place or how Ward knew that Wurth had seen his file. Robert Manne has claimed that McCarthy’s excesses had been largely discredited in the United States by 1954.125 Western communists were in difficulties by 1956 as Khrushchev denounced Stalin and recounted his crimes against his own people. With the Soviet invasion of Hungary, the influence and appeal of communism diminished further. It seemed, however, that the Cold War was being used for reasons other than the fight against communism.126 There is no better example of this than the case of Russel Ward.
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His ASIO files make compelling reading.127 Ward won a scholarship to the ANU in 1953, and ASIO promptly ran a check, despite an admission by one agent that he could not confirm Ward was a member of the Party. Ward had actually left the Communist Party in the mid1950s, though ASIO still reported that he was a ‘constant Associate of known Communists, or fellow travellers’ and had ‘pronounced communist ideals that caused his father considerable concern’.128 Ward had no illusions about ASIO’s role during the debacle at the University of Technology because a similar thing had occurred four years earlier, when his appointment as lecturer to the Wagga Wagga Teachers College had not been approved. Margaret Kiddle had been warned before Ward applied that the College was an ‘appendage’ of the Public Service Board, but she did not make the connection. ASIO would deny that it had supplied information to the University of Technology, but the University had clearly instigated its own form of ‘security check’. ‘As you know,’ one agent claimed in June 1956, ‘we do not vet for Universities as they are state instrumentalities’.129 Yet, several months before in April, Ward’s file was sent to Menzies with a note: ‘PM was informed in writing of Ward’s record’.130 Several years later, Hartwell insisted that when he was on the Selection Committee, the Vice-Chancellor informed him that its decision to appoint could not stand and that Ward was not acceptable because he was ‘a security risk according to a Commonwealth report’.131 Frank Crowley has more recently contradicted this version of events. He claimed that in 1965, Sir Phillip Baxter, the Vice Chancellor at the University of New South Wales had told him that Ward had ‘falsified the reason for the decision for his own personal advancement, as had others intent on promoting their own political views.’132 Baxter apparently told Crowley that there were imputations about Ward’s ‘questionable’ conduct as a teacher and relationship with a female student in his public service file.133 There were no actual charges or complaints recorded against Ward and Crowley did not actually see the incriminating file. The absence of academic freedom that had plagued Ward would now draw in a reluctant Crawford. Ward, who was not ignorant of Kiddle’s loyal campaigning (although he may have been unaware of her tendency to send his letters to Crawford), did not know Crawford well, and his knowledge was tainted by Clark’s troubled relationship
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with his former teacher. Yet Ward travelled down to Melbourne in early February 1956 and met Crawford to discuss the predicament, possibly at the instigation of Kiddle. Ward emerged from the meeting with the impression that Crawford would not support anyone else for the job.134 It was also apparent to Ward that Crawford had received a number of ‘heavyweight letters of support’, including a very odd one from La Nauze, ‘hedged about with queasy qualifications and de haut en bas double talk’.135 Buoyed by the meeting (although deeply suspicious of La Nauze’s motives), Ward appealed to Crawford directly and asked if he could cite him as a referee for a research fellowship in the Research School of Pacific Studies at the ANU. Ward explained the referees he would normally call were likely to be ex officio members of the selection committee.136 He acknowledged the unorthodoxy of his approach, but believed Crawford (who was an examiner of Ward’s thesis) would have completed the examination by the time the reference was called and thus would be in a position to write ‘authoritatively, whether in praise, qualification, or warning’.137 Ward was not confident about the job, and confessed privately to Clark that ‘P. H. Partridge and David Campbell were starters on the selection committee, no known leftists, JWD and others are excluded on this ground’.138 Speaking from experience, and acutely aware of the suspicion of intellectuals of a left political bent, Crawford advised Ward on 13 February 1956: I am not really convinced that your cause will be best served by public outcry at this stage which might reduce your prospects in other and happier places. But I can assure you that you will get the best backing that I can give in the search for an academic post and I believe that you are so well thought of by academic people that you will get what you want in time.139 It would appear that in Crawford’s opinion, no political cause was worth sacrificing a career, however precious the honour or principle. His bitter experience showed that to be politically conspicuous was to risk reputation and security. It was a warning from a man familiar with how universities operated. Even those institutions with
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a liberal reputation took a dim view of an academic who caused public notoriety, particularly at the commencement of career. Despite his reassurances to Ward, Crawford confessed to Kiddle that he felt ‘a little sick’ for his chances and ‘the whole wake of unpleasantness and smearing that will accompany public protest’.140 The advice was partially self-motivated, because Crawford was anticipating the costs to himself of protesting on Ward’s behalf. He wrote to Kiddle: If it comes to personal protest I’ll have to play my part but you will know what it will mean, the end to the American visa, the end to Wisconsin and so the prospect of a trip which saved my marriage from going quite on the rocks a few months ago.141 Crawford suggested to Kiddle that the Melbourne Department might offer Ward a temporary position, but could not undertake to do so. He declared that it would not be his decision alone and La Nauze would make the ultimate call.142 It is hard to gauge whether Crawford’s advice was influenced by cynicism or whether he simply was not outraged by Ward’s predicament. While grateful for Crawford’s advice, Ward did not heed it. Instead, angered by what he considered the influence of ‘anonymous and ignorant policemen’, he urged Max Hartwell on 26 February to take the dispute to his Council. He stated: I feel so incensed about the monstrousness of the practice in general…It seems to me that academic freedom and autonomy is being whittled away here, and in America, quite largely because though all the University people agree on the importance of the principle, each individual victim of heresy-hunting usually chooses to go quietly rather than face the nauseating publicity and probable repercussions on his personal chances of getting another job.143 By 1955 Australian universities were dependent on the Commonwealth for a large part of their funds, and many intellectuals detected a conflict of interest if this support was conditional on political ‘purity’.144 Cold War innuendo provided sufficient justification
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for Menzies to authorise ‘investigation by Security of all names put forward for fellowships’ at the ANU. In the years that followed, the Menzies’ ‘list’ and the involvement of ASIO in policing the Commonwealth Literary Fund would play a major role in preventing left-wing writers from obtaining government assistance or even funding for publication.145 As the protest about University funding, accountability and autonomy gathered, the Chancellor of the University of Melbourne appealed for the establishment of a University Grants Committee to operate independently of the government. The responsibility of the committee would be to select researchers of ‘distinction with outstanding qualifications’. This would mitigate sectional interests and meet national needs.146 Sir Charles Lowe might also have been motivated by the political controversies over government interference with academic freedom. Jim Cairns urged an investigation into the functions and financial needs of universities, so they could be placed on a more secure and autonomous footing.147 Douglas Copland, the Vice-Chancellor of the ANU, came under particular attack. It was suggested that he had urged his staff involved in a delegation to Indonesia that they should not associate themselves with a certain kind of political activity. The resignation from the Advisory Board of ANU of the acclaimed scientist, Sir Howard Florey, did not help. Although Florey offered study at Oxford as his reason, rumour abounded that he felt compelled to resign because academic freedom was ‘threatened’.148 Meanwhile Ward’s prospects remained poor. Max Hartwell and the Professorial Board at the University of Technology were still ‘battling on’.149 Despite his encouragement, Crawford did not or could not offer him a position in Melbourne. Enjoying a successful sabbatical break at Balliol College, Clark sent letters to both Kiddle and Crawford.150 By this time Crawford had examined Ward’s thesis and judged it ‘a substantial study in a relatively unexplored field’.151 It was anticipated that Keith Hancock’s return to ANU would rectify many problems; as Arthur Burns put it, the ‘Knight’ would raise the ‘tone of the place’.152 Copland hoped that it would distract the press and academics from the recent problems of an institution that Burns described as a ‘closed and corrupt corporation’.153 Manning Clark suggested to Crawford that Hancock could improve the ‘standards’ and ‘raise the quality of Australian work’. Of course, Clark might
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have been baiting Crawford, who prided himself on the research of the Melbourne School. Hancock’s re-appointment certainly generated optimism. Russel Ward hoped that La Nauze and Crawford would urge Hancock to appoint him. Yet his hopes were quickly dashed. ‘I hope he falls dead’, Ward wrote bitterly in May to Clark about Hancock, ‘which is a better fate than being married to an insane wife as I understand he is’.154 Within several months, Ward was urged to apply for another Fellowship at the ANU or to move to Armidale. Despite Clark’s ‘gravest reservations’ about Crawford and La Nauze, Ward still believed they would support him.155 It finally dawned on Ward by October 1956 that Hancock was not prepared to offer him a position. He was defeated: It is now 14 years since the Thought Police began to artificially keep me in that station of life to which it pleases them to allot me…It seems clear that Hancock and Fitzhardinge between them are about to refuse another job which I believe I have earned—not primarily for political reasons, but out of fear in the case of the latter and simple cantankerous prima-donna-ishness in that of the former.156 Max Hartwell was the only colleague willing to challenge the victimisation of Ward.157 He insisted that if Ward were not appointed to the University, he would resign his own Chair. After a series of professorial and Council meetings, ASIO observed that Ward ‘was of such character and reputation that no Australian University could or would possibly employ him’.158 Hartwell resigned in protest, and Ward was finally appointed lecturer at the University of New England after producing what Hartwell considered ‘one of the most important books on Australian history of his generation’.159 Hartwell’s motives have also been retrospectively challenged by Crowley.160 By this time, Max Crawford was in no condition to offer any assistance. He was preparing for another sabbatical in the United States in 1957 as a visiting British Commonwealth Professor at the University of Wisconsin.161 When in 1956, Crawford told Dorothy about the invitation, she became ‘angry and upset’, his daughter, Margaret Cheshire recalled.
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After all, her health was precarious and she would be left to handle as best she could, three (now teenage children). A compromise of sorts was worked out, whereby Max, Dor and myself were to go to Wisconsin, as I would have finished my schooling by the end of 1956.162 At first, Crawford claimed he was tempted to decline the invitation because it was to lecture in Australian and British Commonwealth History, which he ‘hoped to leave to others’. On reflection, he decided the postponement of his Renaissance studies would be more than compensated by the opportunities the visit would afford.163 It was not to be. By October 1956 it was apparent Crawford would have to cancel the trip. Dorothy Crawford had suffered another coronary occlusion in May. He wrote to Paul Sharp at the University of Wisconsin to inform him that he fully intended on coming according to their arrangement, in spite of Dorothy’s cardiac arrest and pneumonia, because he had been given no ‘hope of her recovery’.164 Eventually, La Nauze officially cancelled the trip, and Crawford remained home. On a Wednesday evening in November, Crawford scrawled a letter to John La Nauze. Dorothy Crawford was dying. ‘It has been a long and sad day here,’ he wrote in a poignant note. Dorothy is so desperately ill—so tired and so conscious of the difficulties of breathing—that I cannot believe she can last much longer…If she has another attack I hope that it will be quick and decisive; she has pleaded with me not to let them save her again.165 Unable to leave her to even use the telephone, Crawford asked his friend to tell Fitzpatrick and Hoban. The former was travelling to Europe and had written about Crawford’s ‘troubles’.166 By some accounts, the marriage was deeply troubled. Crawford had always ensured that his private life was kept completely separate from the University and his colleagues. Most had not even met Dorothy, and Crawford had always looked to others for intellectual support and comfort. On hearing the news of Dorothy’s death, which had been ‘quick in the end’,167 Margaret Kiddle confessed that there
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was so much between Crawford and his wife of which she knew nothing. ‘I’ve admired you more this year than I ever have before’, Kiddle wrote, as she assured him that he had helped his wife more than most men.168 During Dorothy’s last year, Margaret Cheshire recalled that her father nursed Dorothy ‘devotedly, taking leave from the university in order to be with her.’169 In many ways according to Crawford, Dorothy’s lingering illness had its ‘very great compensations’. It reconciled husband and wife. ‘She had become so ready to depend on me’, Crawford wrote to Kiddle, ‘and so trusting and affectionate that all the scars were removed’.170 Ian Crawford has later claimed that it ‘may have been University gossip that he was misunderstood at home, but I do not think this was strictly true.’171 His mother was ‘uncomfortable in academic society’, however, in his opinion the marriage was a happy one. ‘Of course mine is a child’s perspective’, he wrote, ‘and if they had differences, they would have kept them from us children.’ Max and Dorothy Crawford enjoyed common interests – gardening, the house at Edward Street—as well as the children. Ian Crawford recalled the Sunday drives, Sorrento holidays and backyard cricket.172 Dorothy’s death also forced a more resolute Crawford to avoid any misunderstanding between himself and Kiddle. He immediately distanced himself: Margaret, thank you for your understanding and your kindness—in all of your letters—but just here I am thinking of that part of it in which you offer your help during my attempts at readjustment. I hope I won’t draw on your understanding too heavily because it really would be unfair to do so. Extreme tiredness and a background of worry made me do so once before, though I can’t altogether regret it and it has worried me. Dear Margaret, I am very, very fond of you, but I have realised, as I believe you did at once, that it was not the sort of fondness to justify emotional demands, and I am terribly anxious not to cause you unhappiness, not to alloy friendship with bitterness.173 * * *
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Amid the domestic drama, Crawford returned to work in the new year of 1957 to contend with routine University commitments. He was immediately greeted, however, with a most unusual controversy. This time Crawford was not publicly involved, though his advice was prophetic and if it had been more widely sought, then the man at the centre of one of Australia’s most infamous ‘causes celebres’ might never have obtained a senior position, and the whole affair might have been averted. The Orr case, as it became known, involved Sydney Sparkes Orr, who had taught at Melbourne University until 1952, when he was appointed Professor of Philosophy at the University of Tasmania. He was dismissed for misconduct in 1956 after allegations that he had seduced an eighteen-year-old student. Crawford had known Orr well. Both served on the Staff Association when Orr was a member of the Philosophy Department at Melbourne, and Crawford sympathised with his view that universities ‘should serve moral purposes’, although he found Orr’s advocacy of that cause irritating and disconcerting.174 Two years before obtaining the position in Tasmania, Orr had applied to the University of Witwatersrand in 1950 and cited Crawford as a referee. ‘I should not regard him as fit to occupy a Chair, and for reasons of personality’, Crawford warned a member of the selection committee. ‘I find him tedious, self-centred, and at times somewhat irrational, at least where his personal interest is involved’.175 In an appreciative letter, the Registrar responded to Crawford’s ‘judgment so clear and unreserved’, although he was somewhat mystified that the Carnegie Corporation had such a ‘wrong impression’.176 Oblivious to this damaging judgment, Orr again used Crawford four months later in his application to Victoria University College in New Zealand. On this occasion, Crawford was even more vehement, possibly motivated by his friendship with Wood and certainly influenced by his belief that the ‘first duty’ between universities was ‘truthfulness about applicants’. Crawford advised the Vice-Chancellor, Sir Thomas Hunter, that Orr was ‘not temperamentally fit for the responsibility of a head of a department’ and added that, with the exception of Boyce Gibson, his view was universally supported at Melbourne.177 Once again, Hunter found the ‘case of Orr’ odd because Crawford appeared a lone critical voice. He admitted, however, that Crawford’s opinion made them hesitate.178 By 1951, Orr no longer used Crawford as a referee.
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When Orr was dismissed from the University of Tasmania in 1957, the Melbourne University Staff Association was immediately drawn into the controversy. There was no agreement about the case. Some were convinced that Orr was punished for his political beliefs, and the charges against him were either a fantasy invented by a disturbed young woman or a fabricated ruse created by the University in a campaign to get rid of him. Others believed the allegations of impropriety. Crawford, among many, was asked to sign a letter from the Staff Association declaring itself ready to accept and pass on donations to the costs of Orr’s appeal to the High Court. He refused on the grounds that the method of approach to the Staff Association seemed ‘unnecessary and open to misconstruction’. Crawford confided to Macmahon Ball, the President at the time, that he would be more comfortable with a majority vote at a general meeting than a small number of signatures. Crawford claimed he had no objection to the Staff Association’s involvement as long as it ensured that it did not take a stance on the rights and wrongs of the dismissal. ‘I would be one of those prepared to contribute to these costs’, Crawford maintained in February 1957, ‘for the sake of helping a former university teacher to seek further judicial enquiry into his case’. 179 The reluctance of Crawford to sign the letter does not mean he was a traitor to academic freedom. His earlier misapprehension about Orr suggests that he clearly did not like or trust him. Pansy Wright was not particularly enamoured of Orr either, but believed the defence of academic freedom and civil liberties inherent to the case compelled him to become a powerful advocate for Orr for the next eight years. 180 As the case unfolded, Crawford returned to his Department. John La Nauze had proved an exemplary appointment. He comforted Crawford during Dorothy’s long illness and ensured that the administrative duties did not overwhelm him. It was now La Nauze who made the pleas for more staff and the annual recommendations for appointments. The teaching of Australian history was a priority, and enrolments had increased from 142 students in 1954 to 270 in 1959, by which time the subject eclipsed both modern and ancient history in popularity. It became
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necessary to divide the subject chronologically into two sections: from 1788 to 1900 (with an emphasis on the exploration of the Pacific, comparative imperial history and the Aborigines), and from 1900 to the late 1950s.181 Alison Patrick, June Philipp and Margaret Kiddle were permanent fixtures in the Department, despite not being rewarded with promotions. A new group of women had also emerged, with Jackie Templeton and Inga Clendinnen re-appointed from the previous year, but both were not encouraged to attend the Oxford finishing school.182 A new guard of men, led by Felix Raab, and soon after, Don Kennedy, Barry Smith, Greg Dening and Paul Bourke, came to the fore.183 By the late 1950s, Crawford was no longer the dominant force in the History School. His power and influence was waning. La Nauze, who was adept at appeasing Crawford, now had the greater authority, and Crawford was willing to relinquish it. The two were seen by most to operate as a partnership, one which marginalised Kathleen Fitzpatrick. When Hancock became ‘interested in the archival problem of Australian historians’, he approached both Crawford and La Nauze about a conference. Although he was convinced that archives themselves would be a ‘dull theme’, it occurred to him that a ‘general historical get together might be a good thing’. In effect, this ‘gathering’ heralded the emergence of an historical community that was no longer controlled by a central individual. Hancock had every intention of avoiding the onus of identifying the ‘chaps who would have fun and by implication, those who would miss it’, and proposed that each university select ‘the men’.184 The growing historical profession was more autonomous and less dependent on sole professors, although its opportunities were still not extended to women. Balliol College no longer played the part of the Camelot. It had become evident that the College had changed, and it was necessary to ‘cast about for advice from newer emigrants’.185 Crawford, unable to advise Ian Robertson, wondered if his choice of college mattered for the B.Phil degree. Stretton believed that Renaissance studies were ‘sadly neglected’ at Balliol, and recommended Magdalen, where the teaching came from All Souls.186 The older patterns and connections had partially broken down. Crawford’s Oxford contacts had diminished with the passage of time, and this had an impact on the new graduates. Felix Raab, described
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as a ‘big bear’, had found entry into Balliol problematic and could not get funding, despite his reputation and talent. ‘Would you do whatever you think best to get Felix into Balliol?’ La Nauze enquired of Crawford. ‘We don’t want to exhaust our goodwill, too quickly.’187 Crawford’s influence was sufficient to gain Felix Raab entry to Oxford, where he was informed by the College Head and repeated rather proudly, that ‘once a Balliol man, always a Balliol man’. The Australians had not completely abandoned Balliol, and Max Hartwell played a similar role as that of Stretton before him, assisting and promoting the colonials. When Raab signed his nationality as ‘British (Australian)’ on the application, a puzzled official enquired rather acidly if there was a distinction, which ‘evoked a fine flow’ from Hartwell.188 However, Raab was one of the last to look to Crawford for direction and advice. His letters, like those of his predecessors, recounted aspirations, desires, and resistance to and affection for Britain. Raab enjoyed the British traditions and culture, but missed Australia, convinced that he could never live in a country that clung to the pretensions of addressing people as ‘“sir” instead of “mate” or “sport” as nature intended’.189 Tragically, Raab did not return to Australia, for he died while mountain-climbing in Calabria. He had submitted his D.Phil. thesis, but its examination had not been completed. It was said that his was the first D.Phil awarded posthumously from Oxford. Although waning, Crawford’s public reputation in Australia was still significant. In 1957 Menzies appointed a Committee of Inquiry into the future of Universities, to be led by Sir Keith Murray, Chairman of the University Grants Committee of Great Britain. The Professorial Board began preparing the University’s submission, which was mainly drafted by Crawford, Pansy Wright and the Registrar.190 The Murray report defined three fundamental aims. The most urgent was to produce more graduates and the second to support research. The third was the more intangible and ambitious, and resonated Crawford’s brand of liberalism—universities should be the ‘guardians of intellectual standards and intellectual integrity in the community’, standing as ‘proof against the waves of emotion and prejudice which make the ordinary man, and public opinion, subject from time to time to illusion and deceit’.191 The report insisted that intellectual autonomy was an essential quality of the university. The
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Menzies’ government adopted its recommendations, although the third aim was difficult to implement, and the government had hardly been respectful of academic freedom in the past. Increased Commonwealth funding, which flowed from the report, would alter the fabric of the academy and lead to an unprecedented expansion.192 In 1937, the Commonwealth government had made available 30 000 pounds to be distributed to the six existing universities.193 In 1957, the University of Melbourne alone received 2 018 112 pounds.194 Despite Crawford’s statesmanlike role, his grip on the day-today running of the Department loosened, and he became a more distant figurehead. Now in his fifties, Crawford was of a different generation from most of his colleagues and expected, indeed demanded, respect and deference. Most called him ‘Professor’, with the exception of the ‘top dogs’. This title was applied to staff that had worked for him for over a decade.195 Manning Clark apparently never ‘knew where he stood’,196 which could possibly explain the variations in his letters from strict formality to enraptured intimacy. Kathleen Fitzpatrick was considered more ‘human’ and approachable than Crawford, although this impression was by no means universal and was contradicted by others who observed her preoccupation with social standing, which they perceived as artificiality and affectation. Geoff Sharp recalled overhearing Fitzpatrick once say without a hint of self-deprecation, ‘I think frozen peas are delightful if treated sympathetically in the kitchen’.197 Crawford’s diminished power might also be attributed to a loss in the standing of the Melbourne School. The field of Australian history specialists in Melbourne had become lean. The Department had lost its best and brightest to other states or, in Geoffrey Blainey’s case, to freelance work. The formation of the newly established Monash University was about to weaken the Melbourne School further. With Geoff Serle abroad in 1958, Crawford was forced to appeal to the ANU and arrange for Robin Gollan, then a Senior Research Fellow, to spend a term lecturing. This was the first time that power had been reversed; previously Melbourne assisted other beleaguered Departments. The ANU was increasingly reluctant to allow its staff to give ‘special lectures’, which it considered ‘at best “turns” and at
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worst a nuisance’.198 However, Hancock apparently had ‘come around to the view, and persuaded his University, that it may be a positive advantage to research men to take part from time to time in the ordinary work of a teaching department’.199 By the late 1950s, the Melbourne School had colonised most of the Australian History Departments, particularly Adelaide, Western Australia and Canberra. Exceptions included Ward in Sydney and Greenwood in Queensland, who were both resistant to Melbourne’s weakness for self-congratulation, and Hancock certainly did not accept its claims to superiority. Notes 1
Schrecker, No Ivory Tower, 339. Schrecker also insisted that ‘we need further study of the period’s main intellectual artefacts as well as serious research into what the nation’s Professors thought and taught during the McCarthy years.’ Applying this inquiry to an Australian context would be equally enlightening.
2
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 1 July 1954, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
3
Ibid. The letter from Crawford has not survived.
4
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 1 July 1954, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. ‘New Groans’ was an in-joke for Crawford and Fitzpatrick’s constant complaints about the eternal staffing difficulties.
5
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 9 November 1954, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
6
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 19 November 1954, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
7
Ibid.
8
Ibid.
9
Crawford had been insistent that he did not want to lose the control of the Department to any new incumbent. Crawford to La Nauze, 23 May 1952, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
10
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 19 November 1954, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
11
Crawford to Frank Johnston, 14 May 1954, 1954/493, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
12
Ibid.
13
In honour of Crawford’s predecessor, the position was to be called the Ernest Scott Chair of History. Crawford had visited Emily Scott and asked her permission. Emily Scott to Crawford, 23 January 1955, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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14
15
16
17
18 19
20 21 22 23
24 25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
University of Melbourne Ernest Scott Chair of History Conditions of Appointment, 1954/493, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA. John La Nauze to Crawford, date unknown, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Draft letter Crawford to Manning Clark, March 1955, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. John O’Brien to Manning Clark, undated. MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA. John La Nauze to Crawford, 1954, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 5 January 1954, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Ibid. Crawford to Manning Clark, undated. Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Conversation with Barbara Falk, 2000. McBriar’s comment was repeated by Allan Sachrin. See Allan Sachrin to Manning Clark, undated. MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA. Interview with June Philipp, 2001. Crawford to C. T. Bissell, 24 February 1955, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford to John La Nauze, 12 August 1953, Box 28, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA. Manning Clark to Crawford, 19 June 1953, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Manning Clark to Crawford, 1 March 1955, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Manning Clark to Crawford, 1 and 2 March 1954, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford to Manning Clark, March 1955, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, 3 March 1954, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 1 April 1955, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Crawford to C.T. Bissell, 24 February 1955, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. This aside was written when Crawford recommended historians to Bissell at the University of Toronto; Bissell was seeking a visiting scholar. Crawford, unable to accept the offer, gave unreserved support to Fitzpatrick. Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, undated. Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Manning Clark to Crawford, 17 April 1955, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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36
Ibid.
37
Interview with June Philipp, 2001.
38
Ibid.
39
Creighton Burns to Manning Clark, 1 April 1955, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
40
Manning Clark to Crawford, 3 March 1955, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
41
Creighton Burns to Manning Clark, 1 April 1955, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
42
Ibid.
43
Allan Sachin to Manning Clark, 22 July 1955, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
44
Manning Clark to John La Nauze, 1955, MS 5248, John La Nauze papers, NLA.
45
John La Nauze to Manning Clark, 6 April 1955, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
46
Crawford to Manning Clark, undated. Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. There were nine applicants, including an American (B. Aronstein), two Englishmen (C. Collyer and F. Spencer), Clark, Gollan, Harper, Hartwell, and Shaw.
47
Creighton Burns to Manning Clark, 1 April 1955, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
48
Stephen Holt, A Short History of Manning Clark ( Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1999), 104. Burton was the head of Canberra University College.
49
Herbert Burton to Crawford, 27 April 1955, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
50
Standing Committee for the Ernest Scott Chair of History, 24 May 1955, 1954/493, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
51
Crawford to Wilfred Prest, May 1955, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
52
Wilfred Prest to Crawford, 31 May 1955, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
53
John La Nauze to Crawford, 7 June 1955, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
54
Crawford to John La Nauze, 24 May 1955, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
55
John La Nauze to Crawford, 25 May 1955, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
56
The Pass Course: Numbers and the possibility of new subjects, 1959, History Department Papers, UMA.
57
University of Melbourne History School Research Work 1956, History Department Papers, UMA.
58
Crawford to Richard Tawney, date unknown, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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59
Crawford to John La Nauze, 23 May 1952, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
60
John La Nauze to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 26 May 1955, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
61
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to La Nauze, 25 May 1955, Box 1, Kathleen Fitzpatrick Papers, UMA
62
Margaret Kiddle to Crawford, 1 June 1955, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
63
Norman Harper to Crawford, 3 June 1955, Box 16,R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
64
Crawford to John La Nauze, 6 June 1955, NLA. Crawford wrote in a similar vein to Kiddle about Clark’s ‘face saving satisfaction’. Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, undated. Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
65
Conversation with Dymphna Clark, 1998.
66
Manning Clark to Crawford, 15 June 1955, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
67
Ibid.
68
Crawford to Manning Clark, 4 April 1955, MS7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA. When Crawford wrote to the Rockefeller Foundation on Clark’s behalf, he mentioned Clark’s ‘ideas and imagination’, and the plans for a two-volume history of Australia. See Crawford to R. Evans, 2 March 1955, Box 19, History Department Papers, UMA.
69
Crawford to John La Nauze, 6 June 1955, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
70
Holt, A Short History of Manning Clark, 111.
71
John Poynter, ‘Wot Larks to be Abroad: The History Department, 19371971’, draft for a history of the Melbourne School, 2004.
72
Ibid.
73
Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, 30 June 1954, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The research seminar program achieved great success. Travel between the universities had become an increasingly demanding part of the job, and Crawford was now expected to sit on various selection committees, in addition to visiting Canberra on a regular basis.
74
Crawford to Richard Tawney, 2 November 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
75
Ibid.
76
Crawford to Beaglehole, 14 November 1956, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
77
Richard Tawney to Crawford, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. See also Crawford to Zelman Cowen, September 1954, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
78
Richard Tawney to Crawford, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA
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79
Crawford to C. T. Bissell, 24 February 1955, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
80
Fred Alexander to Crawford, 5 September 1955, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
81
Crawford to Fred Alexander, 7 September 1955, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
82
Fred Alexander to Crawford, 9 September 1955, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
83
Crawford to Fred Alexander, 7 September 1955, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
84
Introduction of Richard Tawney by Crawford, 1955, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
85
Crawford to George Paton, 21 September 1953, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
86
Ibid.
87
Crawford to A. J. T. Ford, 22 January 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
88
Crawford to Richard Tawney, 23 December 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. There was another ulterior motive in the Melbourne scheme. Crawford had invited Tawney to be a member of the selection committee for the Second Chair.
89
The Tawneys had briefly stayed with the Crawfords in Kew, as Mrs Tawney had injured herself before leaving England and needed care. It became obvious that Dorothy Crawford was unable to cope with visitors, and they moved to the College. Margaret Cheshire to author, 6 December 2004.
90
Richard Tawney to Crawford, 6 April 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
91
Crawford to A. J. T. Ford, 28 July 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
92
Crawford to Richard Tawney, 23 July 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
93
Crawford to Max Hartwell, 29 September 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. A seminar in Melbourne was arranged for historians not included in the visit.
94
Crawford to Herbert Burton, 22 December 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
95
Crawford to Max Hartwell, 29 September 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
96
Crawford to Richard Tawney, 23 December 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
97
Richard Tawney to Crawford, 2 May 1954, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
98
John Ward to Crawford, 2 May 1955, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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99
Richard Tawney to Crawford, 5 June 1955, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
100
Crawford to C. T. Bissell, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. This was one of the reasons offered by Crawford when he rejected Bissell’s offer.
101
Crawford to Hans Baron, 13 September 1955, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
102
Hans Baron to Crawford, 9 July 1955, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. This inspired a lifetime of correspondence, exchange of ideas and a new mentor. Baron also felt adrift. He appreciated Crawford’s observations and mourned the lack of genuine interest in the Renaissance. In a lengthy letter, he gave Crawford advice as to where to publish and counselled him to send the publication to international campuses that did not have copies.
103
Introduction of Tawney by Crawford, 1955, Box 19, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
104
Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, undated. Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
105
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2004.
106
McQueen, Suspect History, 34.
107
John Rodgers to Crawford, 30 March 1955, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
108
‘Passport Ban Breaks Tradition’, The Age, 24 March 1955. Crawford’s letter, if written, would certainly have appeared in his ASIO file and has never emerged.
109
Fred Alexander to Crawford, 9 September 1955, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
110
Crawford to Fred Alexander, 13 September 1955, History Department papers, UMA.
111
ASIO report, 22 August 1955, A6126/16, R. M. Crawford ASIO File, NAA.
112
ASIO Memorandum for Regional Director, Victoria, 12 October 1955, A6126/16, R. M. Crawford ASIO File, NAA. The only other comment offered by the Regional Director was that the Professor R. M. Crawford named on the panel of foreign advisers was identical with their subject ,and his association with the journal had not been known to the office.
113
‘Publisher Named in ASIO Document’, The Age, 20 November 1999.
114
Margaret Kiddle to Crawford, 4 November 1954, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
115
Margaret Kiddle to Crawford, 4 November 1954, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
116
Jim Davidson to Brian Fitzpatrick, 21 May 1955, MS 4965 Brian Fitzpatrick Papers, NLA.
117
Margaret Kiddle to Crawford, 6 August 1955, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
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118
Margaret Kiddle to Crawford, 4 November 1954, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
119
Ibid.
120
Kiddle possibly hoped that Crawford would offer Ward a job, and her letters were dominated by the travails of Ward.
121
Margaret Kiddle to Crawford, 24 January 1956, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
122
Ibid. Kiddle could not fathom how she might comfort a devastated Ward, who also confessed to assaulting Clark with his ‘whinging tongue’. Russel Ward to Manning Clark, 18 January 1956, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
123
Margaret Kiddle to Crawford, 27 January 1956, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. Keith apparently had a ‘few dealings with MI5 during the war’.
124
Margaret Kiddle to Crawford, 27 January 1956, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
125
Manne, The Petrov Affair, 113.
126
Susan McKernan, ‘Literature in a Straitjacket’, Curthoys and Merritt, eds., Australia’s First Cold War. Vol. 1. Society, Communism and Culture, 151.
127
Ward first came to the attention of ASIO in the 1940s as a schoolteacher. See Russel Ward ASIO File, A6119/278, NAA.
128
File Note, 25 July 1956, Russel Ward ASIO File, A6119/278, NAA.
129
Charles Spry to unknown, 29 June 1961, ‘Spoiling Operations’, ASIO File, 6122/1901, NAA.
130
ASIO report, 3 April 1956, Russel Ward ASIO File, A6119/278, NAA.
131
‘Security in the Quad’, Nation, 3 December 1960.
132
Frank Crowley, ‘The Ward Fabrication’ in Quadrant, volume XLVIII, number 5, May 2004.
133
Ibid.
134
Russel Ward to Manning Clark, 14 February 1956, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
135
Ibid.
136
Russel Ward to Crawford, 8 February 1956, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
137
Ibid. Crawford wrote that he would be happy to act as referee and rather undiplomatically added that he looked forward to reading Ward’s thesis, instead of the ‘cringing of heart’ that he commonly felt at the prospect of examining. Crawford to Russel Ward, 13 February 1956, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
138
Russel Ward to Manning Clark, 29 March 1956, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA. JWD was Davidson.
139
Crawford to Russel Ward, 13 February 1956, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers,
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UMA. 140
Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, undated. Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
141
Ibid.
142
Ibid.
143
Russel Ward to Crawford, 26 February 1956, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
144
‘Sir Charles Lowe Seeks University Grants Committee’, The Age, 26 May 1956.
145
Capp, Writers Defiled, 120-4.
146
‘Sir Charles Lowe Seeks University Grants Committee’, The Age, 26 May 1956.
147
‘Freedom Urged for Universities’, The Age, 22 June 1956.
148
Ibid. See also, ‘Scientist’s Resignation, Sun, 22 June 1956.
149
Russel Ward to Manning Clark, 17 June 1956, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
150
Manning Clark to Margaret Kiddle, 25 June 1956 and 16 August 1956, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
151
R. M. Crawford’s examination report, 1956, History Department Papers, UMA. The report was duly sent to Clark, who ‘completely’ agreed with Crawford’s assessment. Despite their friendship, Clark was critical that Ward did not realise how marred his thesis was by the methodological approach he adopted. Clark considered that if Ward had examined the subjects thoroughly, he would have ‘modified his ideas’. The greatest criticism was attributed to Ward’s ‘lopsided’ sources. Manning Clark to Crawford, 16 August 1956, Box 15, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
152
Arthur Burns to Manning Clark, 16 April 1956, MS 7550, Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
153
Arthur Burns to Clark, 16 April 1956, MS 7550, Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
154
Russel Ward to Manning Clark, 25 May 1956, MS 7550, Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
155
Russel Ward to Manning Clark, 18 July 1956, MS 7550, Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
156
Russel Ward to Manning Clark, 15 October 1956, MS 7550, Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
157
Russel Ward to Manning Clark, 18 January 1956, MS 7550, Manning Clark Papers, NLA. Hartwell received considerable derision from Crawford, Prest and others when he applied for the second Chair of history.
158
ASIO report, Russel Ward ASIO File, A6119/278, NAA.
159
Hartwell’s comment quoted in ‘Security in the Quad’ in Nation, 3 December 1960.
160
Frank Crowley, ‘The Ward Fabrication’ in Quadrant, volume XLVIII,
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number 5, May 2004. 161
Crawford to Hans Baron, 1 March 1956, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. One of the main reasons was the opportunity to meet Hans Baron and discuss their ‘common interests’.
162
Margaret Cheshire to author, 6 December 2004.
163
Crawford to Hans Baron, 1 March 1956, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
164
Crawford to Paul Sharp, 16 October 1956, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
165
Crawford to John La Nauze, 15 November 1956, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
166
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to Crawford, 16 November 1956, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
167
Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, 16 November 1956, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
168
Margaret Kiddle to Crawford, 22 November 1956, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
169
Margaret Cheshire to author, 6 December 2004
170
Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, 27 November 1956, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
171
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2004.
172
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2004.
173
Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, 27 November 1956, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
174
Crawford to J. Y. T. Greig, 6 June 1950, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. The rumours of Orr’s unconventional domestic life did not appear to disturb Crawford. See Cassandra Pybus, Gross Moral Turpitude (Melbourne: William Heinemann, 1993).
175
Crawford to J. Y. T. Greig, 6 June 1950, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
176
J. Y. T. Greig to Crawford, 14 June 1950, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
177
Crawford to Sir Thomas Hunter, 7 September 1950, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
178
Sir Thomas Hunter to Crawford, 28 August 1950, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
179
Crawford to Macmahon Ball, 20 February 1957, Box 20, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
180
For an examination of Wright’s role in the Orr case, see McPhee, Pansy: A Life of Roy Douglas Wright. For an analysis of the Orr case in general, see Pybus, Gross Moral Turpitude.
181
Pass Course: Numbers and the Possibility of new subjects, 1959, History Department Papers, UMA.
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182
Margaret Kiddle had returned to Melbourne at the beginning of 1957.
183
John La Nauze to F. H. Johnston, 2 January 1957, History Department Papers, UMA. See also Vacancies 1957, History Department Papers, UMA and University of Melbourne Calendar 1957, 1958 and 1959.
184
Keith Hancock to Crawford and John La Nauze, 18 April 1957, Box 28, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
185
Hugh Stretton to Crawford, 7 March 1957. Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
186
Ibid.
187
John La Nauze to Crawford, 13 May 1959, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
188
Felix Raab to Crawford, 19 June 1960, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
189
Ibid.
190
Poynter and Rasmussen, A Place Apart, 180. The Staff Association did not contribute to the Submission.
191
Ibid., 183.
192
For a complete analysis of the Murray Report, see Poynter and Ramussen, A Place Apart, 171-220. The foundation of Monash University in May 1958 was one of the outcomes of the report.
193
University of Melbourne Calendar, 1936/7.
194
Poynter and Rasmussen, A Place Apart, 192. This figure did not include the Emergency Grants, which totalled 967,500 pounds for the triennium.
195
Interview with June Philipp, 2001.
196
Interview with June Philipp, 2001.
197
Interview with Geoff Sharp, 2001.
198
D. K. R. Hodgkin to George Paton, 26 May 1958, History Department Papers, UMA.
199
Ibid.
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Chapter 7
‘Into the Night’
By the decade’s end, there was a new engagement and accountability in the academy that marginalised Max Crawford. The promise he had exhibited years before had reached a plateau, and the elder statesman found he was overtaken by colleagues and former students determined to make an imprint on public life. Crawford was also distracted. By December 1957, Crawford made plans to remarry. In a letter written on Christmas Eve, he confided in Margaret Kiddle of his imminent marriage to Ruth Hoban.1 Ten days later, on the morning of the wedding, John La Nauze received the news. Whether Crawford was uncomfortable in discussing his emotional life or believed that romantic love was the province of the young, it was a somewhat distant letter to his ‘closest friend’.2 Crawford decided: Not wanting our friends to be involved in the junketing of two middle aged people I have kept silent…I have not found an empty house easy to come home to, and the comfort of a wife who is an old friend will make life a happier thing for me. I hope it will have its advantages for Ruth.3 Acknowledging Manning Clark’s subsequent congratulations, Crawford declared he could ‘tread the way more firmly and happily
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Ruth Hoban Photographer: Athol Shmith University of Melbourne Archives, R. M. Crawford Papers.
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now’.4 Six days after the event, he announced to Kiddle that the marriage ‘shows all the signs of being a happy one’. Kathleen Fitzpatrick’s response to Crawford’s marital bliss was neither gracious nor diplomatic. In a weak moment, Crawford had asked La Nauze to tell her.5 He feigned to La Nauze that he would have preferred to contact her directly, but she would not have been interested in his personal affairs while on holiday. Fitzpatrick was devastated: I heard last night about Max’s marriage. If you are in touch with him at all, would you do me the favour of letting him know that I have heard the news and send my congratulations and good wishes to Max and Ruth. Actually I think him a complete stinker, but you needn’t say that. I expect he knows already anyway. Naturally the marriage wasn’t a surprise to me but it is hard after twenty years (nearly) of dailyshared toils to hear such news only by accident. But probably the marriage itself is quite a good idea, don’t you think? Anyway I do hope that poor Max’s second venture will make up to some extent for all the unhappy years of the first.6 There are no surviving letters from Margaret Kiddle about the marriage. In January 1958 she had undergone a series of painful blood transfusions and struggled with the agonising after-effects. While Crawford wrote about his happiness and attempts to give up smoking, it was apparent that her health was rapidly failing.7 Kiddle was kept alive by a dialysis machine. Conscious of ‘time’s winged chariot’,8 she completed her manuscript of Men of Yesterday six weeks before her death. On 3 May, at the age of only forty-three, after saying goodbye to her friends, she refused the last transfusions, and, with her much loved sister by her side, told the doctor to ‘turn that thing off’ and died.9 When Crawford informed Clark of Kiddle’s ‘peaceful’ death, he immediately shifted the focus onto her manuscript.10 ‘She finished her book,’ he wrote, ‘and grew in stature with it, so the end is better than the beginning’.11 An Australian’s Perspective A year after the previous trip’s cancellation, the University of Wisconsin renewed its invitation to Crawford in December 1957, who now
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prepared for his sabbatical with a new wife and purpose, ‘to lecture for my sins on Australian history’.12 He admitted it was ‘unfortunate’ that he had to teach Australian history in Wisconsin, a subject he now left to ‘others during recent years’, and bemoaned the necessary preparation.13 ASIO revisited Crawford’s file before he left on the Fulbright Scholarship in August 1959. After reviewing his copious documents, and with a full summary and assessment, it was ‘proposed not to adopt any travel control procedure’.14 The security organisation’s interest had apparently subsided as Crawford’s involvement in political affairs had waned. If Crawford was not excited about teaching Australian history, he was ecstatic about the opportunity to pursue his Renaissance interests in the Newberry Library and to meet Hans Baron. Ruth Hoban, however, was more ambivalent about leaving her Department at that time. On the eve of their departure, Crawford’s close friend and the Vice-Chancellor, George Paton, appeared to share her concerns. In a letter ostensibly written to wish them farewell, Paton confessed that he regretted leaving the Law Faculty for higher office and expressed his appreciation to Crawford for all he had ‘done in the history school’ and the ‘reflected glory’ that he basked in.15 Departing in August 1959, Crawford and Hoban spent over five months in Wisconsin, with visits to Yale and Harvard Universities, New York, and briefly the United Kingdom. As a British Commonwealth Visiting Professor, Crawford presented a lecture course in the history of Australia and New Zealand and one graduate seminar, in addition to delivering the ‘Paul Knaplund Lectures’, a series of three public lectures on Australia. The latter, Crawford declared, represented a departure and a ‘marked development’ in his views of Australian history.16 American interest in Australia was marginal. The classes were small and did not attract the ‘best quality of students’, but Crawford considered them better than he expected. The trip was intensely productive. In his report to Paton, Crawford emphasised the contrasts. The University of Wisconsin’s History Department had twice the number of students, but half the class sizes. The importance of original research work was of prime importance and was not sacrificed to teaching. Instead, the staff adhered to a clear distinction between ‘office and study hours’. The facilities were flawless. Crawford revelled
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in the libraries and enthused about the holdings of the manuscripts and printed material. While Australian history was of ‘minor importance’ to the Americans, there was good coverage of it. Wisconsin also gave Crawford time to reflect. He was now convinced of the ‘wisdom’ in establishing a second university in Melbourne, an idea he had previously resisted. The legislation to create Monash University was prepared in 1957. Other observations made by Crawford exposed his biases. He endorsed the restricted amount of time the American academics gave to teaching, but was critical of their devotion to ‘mediocre students for negative results, at the expense of their own study and of their better students’.17 Apparently unaware of the social and professional hierarchy in his own Department, Crawford objected to the ‘strong cleavage’ between the administrative staff and academics at the lunch table in the Faculty Club. Yet morning tea in Melbourne’s History School appeared to define and accentuate the hierarchal divide. Conversation was controlled and governed by the senior members of staff and, occasionally, the young tutor would be encouraged to contribute. The development in his interpretation of Australian history that Crawford referred to was not elaborated. However, one expectation of the trip was that he would produce a book from his three Knaplund lectures. Unlike his aborted attempts to publish something about Russia and his procrastination and eventual failure to write about Camden Harbour, the University of Wisconsin Press received Crawford’s manuscript and published it as The Australian Perspective. Crawford did not make many extensive changes to the lectures, and the book examined the stereotype view of Australia, which deplored the intellectual mediocrity of Australian life and oversimplified Australian history and culture. The themes included the aristocratic pastoral society of the nineteenth century and the rise and decline of its influence, the urbanisation of Australia, the democratic triumphs, the growth of an aggressive Australian literature and the genuine cultivation of the more conservative sections of society, the legacy of war and the unrecovered loss in liberal progress, expansion and the beginning of great material development. There is no mention of race relations or immigration. Nor did Crawford refer to communism or McCarthyism, in stark contrast to his book Australia, written seven years before.
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The radical interpretation of Australian history adopted by colleagues and students, notably Brian Fitzpatrick and Russel Ward, was alluded to. The Australian Perspective was elegantly written and hinted at the Australian historian that Crawford could still have become, but it was by no means superior to his book, Australia. It is, however, more personal and evocative, alluding to the sheer and impenetrable loss wrought by the First World War, the rise of totalitarian regimes that ‘kept ideological debate alive and bitter’, the experimental reform initiated by Raymond Priestley that gave rise to a more active intervention of academics and the intellectual lessons Crawford learnt: Of course, astringent satire is not the daily fare of the tougher Australian thinkers; but it merely exaggerates a quality that is common among the best of our younger scholars. It is true that the lessons one generation has learned, the next may forget; but one knows, looking in at one’s own experience and out at that of others, that we have shared a passage from generous but relatively naïve beliefs through the disillusioning experience of our middle years to a more sober understanding.18 Instead of continuing to write about Australia, under the spell of Hans Baron and Merle Curti, Crawford devoted his research to Renaissance studies with rejuvenated enthusiasm. ‘Melbourne Communists at Work’ During his sabbatical in Wisconsin in 1959, Crawford had observed that the ‘waning of the McCarthy horror had not only freed but stimulated a good deal of critical analysis, and if the new liberalism was somewhat naïve, it was at least something that generous enquiry had so widely succeeded, the earlier fear of thought.’19 These remarks were revealing. Here was an overt, if private, condemnation of McCarthyism that was not matched by public protest against its Australian manifestation. There was also a marked departure from Crawford’s earlier attitude, with the sole emphasis on free thought, rather than the disapproval of the treatment of left-wing intellectuals. At the completion of the sabbatical, Crawford and Hoban returned to Melbourne and
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resumed teaching. They juggled the usual demands of heading their respective Departments until the calm was punctuated by a crisis of enormous magnitude. On the morning of 12 April 1961, Crawford’s friends and colleagues arrived on campus to discover that Crawford’s liberal opposition to McCarthyism had altered. In its place was a decision that astounded them. An editorial in the Bulletin, a stridently anti-communist publication, trumpeted that ‘anyone interested in the welfare of Australian Universities’ should read Max Crawford’s letter.20 Prompted by an article, ‘The New Scare Campaign’, written by Frank Knopfelmacher for the Observer, Crawford wrote to the Bulletin and declared that he was ‘unable to reject’ Knopfelmacher’s allegations of a communist conspiracy in academic politics. Crawford went further. He drew attention to a University staffing matter under the pretence of exposing a communist plot. In four controversial points, he described the situation prevailing at the University: 1.
2.
3. 4.
I have in recent years seen a dissident group, which I believe to be Communist led and to have used the known tactics of factional policies, attempting to drive the heads of two small departments and those loyal to them either into acquiescing…or even into resigning. Behaviour of this type referred to would once have earned dismissal for those engaging in it, and might still do so if there were clearly no question of political belief involved. But Australian university administrations in general fall over backwards to avoid any possible appearance of attempting to punish or control dissident political beliefs. Universities must be allowed to solve these problems for themselves. Any attempt at outside intervention is dangerous. If factional politics are played in Universities, we need to become aware of them. And it is just as proper for academic selection committees to take into consideration any evidence leading them to fear that an applicant may indulge in factional politics as it undoubtedly is to take account of defects of personality. 21
Crawford referred in his letter to his previous involvement with left-wing groups, to suggest that he understood their methods; he
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emphasised his own victimisation by ‘Redbaiters’. It was an astounding reassessment. He was now critical of academics who were politically active, he advocated dismissal on the basis of factional conduct and urged greater interference in the selection of applicants on the basis of their political sympathies. Crawford claimed to be concerned with the very academic freedom he had fought for in the past. If his previous persecution was alluded to, the abandonment of his earlier public stance for quiescence was not. These were not the sympathies of a liberal and he seemed to suspend his earlier principles. Although the Social Studies Department was not mentioned in the letter, nobody had any doubt of what Crawford meant by ‘two small departments’. He had a manifest interest in one of them, the Department of Social Studies. The Department of Criminology was the other ‘small department’. In 1961 Social Studies was small, with a full-time staff of only eight. The Director was Ruth Hoban, considered by some as difficult and ambitious, by others as generous and supportive. Though Hoban’s private life had attained great happiness after her marriage to Max Crawford, it appeared from the hints and gossip that all had not been well in her Department for years, although the reasons are still contested today. In correspondence with John La Nauze in 1958, three years before the publication of the Bulletin letter, Crawford had referred to the effects of Ruth’s ‘staff troubles’ on her health.22 The difficulties had apparently emerged from the divergent views between Hoban and her colleague, Geoff Sharp, over the conduct of the Department and its policy in the field of training and research. The Department had effectively divided into two factions, with Hoban having the support of Alice Hyde. For the most part, Sharp had the support of Cynthia Turner, Laurie O’Brien and the remainder of the staff. There was considerable contention in the Department over the conduct of research and over the value of a critical approach to social work, theory and practice.23 Sharp insisted that the resentment Hoban generated was less about academic matters than about administrative style. He had deep and ‘ethical misgivings’ about Hoban’s attitude to a staff member who had suffered depression and sought professional help.24 During Hoban’s sabbatical in the United States, Sharp had been made Head of Social Studies and introduced a more ‘democratic’ way
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of running the Department. Previously, meetings were held infrequently and with considerable formality. In Hoban’s absence, they were called frequently, at times without a formal agenda, but always with minutes taken. Decisions were reached by consensus. Hyde had kept Hoban informed of the developments, and Sharp requested she cease private communication with Hoban and instead participate in the open letters written by the staff to Hoban.25 Hyde interpreted this as constraint, and Sharp admitted with hindsight that his request, while decided toward openness, was perhaps naïve. After her return, Hoban believed she had lost authority because of the changes made by Sharp. The regular staff meetings were immediately discontinued. What appeared to be a departmental domestic dispute escalated as the conflict between the factions in the Department reached an impasse. It had become ‘personal and deep seated’, and Hoban became convinced her influence was being deliberately undermined because of Sharp’s political affiliation with the Communist Party. The accusation of a Communist plot thus emerged.26 It was a fear possibly perpetuated by Fred Emery, the Secretary of the Staff Association and a lecturer in the Psychology Department, who, in 1957 left the Communist Party, of which he had been a conspicuous member and Chairman of the University Branch. He subsequently suggested that Sharp had joined the Social Studies Department with the sanction of the Party.27 It was a claim that Sharp insists was totally unfounded.28 In the hope that the tensions would ease, the Vice-Chancellor, George Paton, initiated an informal enquiry and appointed a group, benignly called the ‘Good Offices Committee’ in November 1959. It proved ineffective.29 A further ‘crisis’ erupted after Paton attempted to mediate and called a staff meeting to establish each staff member’s duties. In the late afternoon, after the meeting, Sharp approached Hoban outside the Women’s College in an attempt to discuss the untenable situation and to reach an improvement—and possibly, a compromise. Sharp recalled that Hoban became very upset.30 Crawford’s version of events, as told to him by Hoban, was very different. ‘Ruth was waylaid by Sharp’, Crawford wrote dramatically to La Nauze on 9 November 1959, ‘and treated to an angry and menacing display…She arrived home in a state of considerable—I think, severe shock.’31 Crawford contacted Paton immediately and, on the Saturday morning, Paton visited the Crawford home. Crawford suspected that
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although sympathetic, Paton would prove to be ‘quite hopeless of any support of value’.32 La Nauze was in an unenviable position and sent him messages of sympathy during the crisis, hoping that the constant meetings with Paton would have a positive outcome for him and Hoban, whom he referred to as a ‘poor girl’. As events unfolded, La Nauze offered to write to Paton on Crawford’s behalf.33 ‘I am distressed to hear about the outcome of George’s intervention’, La Nauze wrote. ‘One aspect of the Orr case has been to frighten Uni Chancellors off any intervention with staff except the gospel of sweetness and light.’34 The allusion to the Orr case was important. Donald Horne claims that it was Australia’s own Dreyfus case, ‘instantly and seductively definable; it was an assault on academic freedom’.35 Cassandra Pybus, on the other hand, alleges that Orr was not an innocent victim of repression and political intrigue, but a classic case of hubris. Pybus argues that the dismissal was not flawed, but rather Orr’s original appointment was derelict.36 In the immediate aftermath of that notorious case, the Registrar of the University of Melbourne said it had revised an earlier precedent. Staff could not be given notice ‘without extremely good reason, probably after a Council enquiry but, once he had such notice, the staff member would have no ground for a court action’.37 The other matter concerned the rule that professors were barred from membership of political associations, which was now deemed ‘contrary to the practice in most universities today’.38 The rule was later altered. On the following Tuesday, Hoban met Paton again, this time with Professors Richard Downing and Charles Moorhouse in attendance. Although Crawford was not present, he reported the meeting to La Nauze. ‘It could be a decision for good’, Crawford wrote on 13 November 1959, ‘if George knew how to combine firmness and dignity, but I am afraid he will be unfirm and undignified’.39 Crawford was hinting at dismissal, and rumours abounded that Hoban wanted one or more of her staff sacked from the Department, if not from the University.40 Matters in the Social Studies Department did not improve. Arthur Turner, a Reader in Jurisprudence, was so disturbed by the reports reaching him that by 21 February 1960, he too communicated with Paton. Turner enquired whether the Board of Social Studies, a
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University committee that supervised the work of the Department, was ‘doing anything’.41 Like Crawford, Turner’s concern was also personal, as he was married to Cynthia Turner, a member of the Department. It might be observed that the episode was also a case of powerful men attempting to fight the battles of their less influential academic wives in an institution and public culture that perpetuated patriarchy. This is partially the case, but to define it so strongly in these terms overlooks the autonomy and control that Ruth Hoban had enjoyed as Director of the Department for several decades. Enter Frank Knopfelmacher, ‘a complex and Dostoevskian character’.42 Knopfelmacher was a member of the Psychology Department, but was more notorious for stirring up public furores with his obsession about communist conspiracies. He had, in Donald Horne’s words, a ‘hunting dog’s knack for starting off a chase’.43 Knopfelmacher ran an obsessional campaign about ‘porno politics’, by which he meant that the left exploited sex for political gain. So adept was he in fomenting witch-hunts that it was alleged the Australian Association for Cultural Freedom subsidised his telephone calls.44 Susan McKernan has claimed that the organisation appeared more preoccupied with academics and journalists who were communist sympathisers than with the dangers of socialist realism.45 Horne dismissed this assertion as simply ‘not true’.46 Brandishing a ‘large dossier full of letters, dispositions and other alleged records’ pertaining to the Social Studies Department’, Knopfelmacher claimed he had in his possession damaging ‘evidence’ and alluded to a burglary and other conspiratorial activities.47 Knopfelmacher allowed the poet Vincent Buckley to read the contents. Although Buckley feigned a lack of interest, he maintained he was disturbed by the dossier, which did not originate with Knopfelmacher, but had been ‘put in Franta’s hands for safekeeping’. Buckley insisted that Knopfelmacher was not making anything up nor compiling such dossiers.48 If true, the source remains a mystery. What is not disputed is that Knopfelmacher then sent the files to James McAuley and Richard Krygier. Both men were leading lights of the Australian Association for Cultural Freedom in Sydney. Krygier, who was the founding secretary, approached McAuley (renowned for the Ern Malley hoax) who, at the time, was the first editor of Krygier’s brainchild, Quadrant.49
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Immediately after the appearance of Crawford’s published letter, a hushed and incredulous staff encountered him in the History Department.50 The tension was palpable and was strained further by the presence of John O’Brien, who was married to Laurie O’Brien. Crawford, who had in the past offered wisdom, guidance and courage when academic independence had been threatened, had in their eyes committed a reprehensible act. Many referred to the irony of a victim turning prosecutor. Crawford had also chosen two strange bedfellows, Donald Horne and Frank Knopfelmacher. Under Horne’s stewardship, the Bulletin consolidated its reputation as a bastion of political conservatism, although Horne was regarded differently from his predecessors and was considered a product of the ‘intellectual and international Australian professional class’ that entered the communist debate.51 The Bulletin had slavishly documented the Orr case and the trials of Russel Ward. Many of Crawford’s circle despised its methods and political motivations. Despite the passing of time, nobody has ever provided any conclusive reason for Crawford’s decision to write about these events to the Bulletin, a publication that had damned intellectuals like him for years. Clem and Nina Christensen retrospectively attributed it to misguided gallantry.52 Geoff Sharp agreed, believed that Crawford was ‘trapped’, and felt pity for him. He observed Crawford’s ‘tense vulnerability’.53 Crawford was ‘extremely protective of Ruth and there were topics’, according to Ian Crawford, ‘which it was simply impossible to raise with him…his defensive attitude towards Ruth was like a wall around the two of them.’54 The crisis in the Social Studies Department had also prompted Crawford to vow that the University must have ‘no fanatics or dry line’ members of staff. This suggests a departure for him, for he had been previously unconcerned about the political affiliations of University members. By the late 1950s, he had become quite critical of the left and his letter exposes this antagonism. As academics became increasingly sensitive to the limits of academic freedom, it would appear that Crawford was also desperate. His wife of barely four years had become obsessed about a communist conspiracy and possibly he could bear it no longer. The University was incapable or unwilling to deal with a conflict that was malicious and had become intolerable. Apart from his series of unsuccessful
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meetings, Paton was simply not able to cope with the clash of personalities and the ramifications of a mounting crisis that, in important ways, went beyond personalities. Although Crawford was highly critical of Paton, Sharp believed that he was not ineffectual, but was privy to confidential details from both sides and was deliberately inactive in the hope that the crisis would not explode.55 It seems implausible that Crawford could not foresee the damaging consequences of his actions, but Hoban’s influence was also significant. In retrospect, Horne believed that Hoban’s political bias should have made him more ‘cautious’ about her claims.56 Geoff Sharp, however, disagreed and believed that Hoban did not harbour any right-wing sympathies and can only recall her tolerance. Indeed in 1952, Hoban had been one of the 63 suspect staff members cited in the ASIO list.57 Her political prejudice is as contentious as Horne’s motivation who was prepared to exploit the story. In his defence, Horne contended that because of his ‘Andersonian past’, he always considered the notion of academic freedom as important: As I saw it at the time (which for me was an 18-month or so period of excess), yes I believe there were issues of academic freedom – a line strongly supported, of course, by Knopfelmacher. Looking back, as I suggested…I can now see it as the recurrent feature of that intermittent feature of university life – a school dispute.58 Laurie O’Brien recalled that a friend, a ‘long-time Horne watcher’, insisted that Horne’s actions were not so much motivated by issues of academic freedom or anti-communism, but rather by his bitterness towards universities.59 Matters deteriorated further on 19 April, when an article written in support of Crawford’s letter appeared in the Bulletin. The article, entitled, ‘Melbourne University Communists at Work’, was apparently written before Crawford’s letter, and Horne maintained afterwards that it was based on the dossier that Knopfelmacher had presented to him ‘like poisoned chocolates’.60 Horne said that the files came from McAuley and Krygier, and there was ‘no direct Crawford connection’.61 Again, there is some contention over the order of events, and Geoff Sharp believed that Horne had Crawford’s letter in hand and awaited
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the appearance of the key article before producing the letter as confirmation.62 Whatever the order of events, Crawford’s letter was deemed to corroborate the material in the dossier. Horne’s determination to pursue the issue was apparently strengthened by Crawford’s reputation. ‘I had imagined him to be a person of great integrity’, Horne recalled. ‘His entry into the affair seemed, at the time, a clincher as to its authenticity.’63 He described Crawford as ‘a history professor of Cromwellian seriousness and rectitude, and a victim of the 1940’s Red-baiting’.64 If Crawford’s letter caused a great stir, the response to the later article, ‘Melbourne University Communists at Work’, had a completely different dimension. The poster announcing the scandal was outside many newsagents, and Sharp could not believe the portrayal of his character that was so disparate from the image he had of himself. It was, he recalled, ‘bizarre and surreal’.65 The article reduced the names of the staff to letters, which rather poorly concealed the identities of the protagonists, and gave a detailed account of the problems and politics of the Department. Ruth Hoban was ‘Miss A’, Sharp was ‘Mr B’, and Miss Hyde was ‘Miss C’. To provide ‘evidence’ for Crawford’s accusations, the two-page commentary documented every detail of the problems besetting the Department since 1952. It was an ingenious mix of fact, innuendo and fabrication. The allegations were mainly levelled at ‘Mr B’ (Geoff Sharp), ‘a well known Communist’. The litany of Sharp’s offences included a visit to Prague (apparently evidence of his allegiance to Russia), intimidation of Hyde, the sympathisers he cultivated within the Department, his sabotage of Hoban and suspect ‘organisational activities’. The article asserted that Sharp’s ‘type of politics’ constituted a direct attack on ‘academic freedom and integrity’. The author reserved condemnation for the academics that helped to ‘consolidate a dangerously unreal image of Communism’, rather than the Melbourne administrators who were reluctant to act in the wake of the Orr and Ward cases 66 The argument offered in the Observer and the Bulletin (into which the former merged) was that the Communist Party demanded its members violate the integrity of Western institutions. Hence Geoff Sharp’s position in the University was maligned, and it was alleged
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that his objective was to sabotage Hoban’s Department. This thesis was advanced by the American Sidney Hook in his book, Heresy – Yes, Conspiracy – No, and supported by Knopfelmacher. Several prominent intellectuals, including Ian Turner and Robin Gollan, stated that they would accept the argument if it was supported by credible evidence, but that Crawford’s letter did not provide it.67 Tensions in the History Department became intolerable, and La Nauze was called back urgently from leave. By the end of April, Crawford was too ill to attend the Department. With the exception of Harper, who supported Crawford, and John O’Brien, who was personally involved, staff confronted Crawford with a protest of ‘no confidence’ in his leadership. Crawford was devastated about the staff’s reaction and more specifically the ensuing publicity, which exposed the case completely.68 Laurie O’Brien believed that Crawford was in a sense an innocent and unable to cope with the ruthlessness of the Sydney connection. In defence of the remainder of the Social Studies staff and in response to all the charges laid by Crawford and the Bulletin, Arthur Turner wrote a damning and confidential memorandum on 27 April that called for the University to ‘take action’.69 Turner was particularly critical of Horne and Crawford, whom he hinted, exercised far too much influence. The staff had never resented Crawford’s presence as Chairman of the Social Studies Board during his long courtship and marriage, although in retrospect it was deemed inappropriate. Kathleen Fitzpatrick certainly had misgivings about his role. On the eve of his wedding, Crawford mentioned he had offered to resign, but that Hoban insisted he remain. ‘If there were any controversial matter coming before it and involved the Director or her policy’, Crawford assured La Nauze in 1958, ‘I should stay away’.70 In hindsight, it was an ominously empty promise. Turner found it astonishing that Crawford had accepted the ‘facile explanation’ that Sharp had engineered any Communist plot. Citing the endemic nature of personal differences in any academic department, Turner recollected that it was actually Hoban who had promoted Sharp as Acting Director, and the only explanation for the subsequent attacks on his credibility was to make him a ‘scapegoat’.71 Turner concluded that ‘some members of staff have been grievously defamed and have suffered serious loss in consequences’.72 He
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described Crawford’s letter and Horne’s article as defamatory and advised the staff cited to sue. The authorship of the unsigned articles preoccupied Turner and others. Donald Horne maintained that a summary accompanied the documents Krygier and McAuley had given to him. Horne subsequently handed them over to Peter Coleman, who ‘cooled it down’ and then he ‘cooled it down further’.73 Horne insisted that Crawford, Hoban and Knopfelmacher were not the authors. The consensus at the University was that Horne could not know the intricacies and subtleties of the controversy, and an insider had to have inspired it. At the time, both Sharp and Turner doubted Horne’s version of events, the latter describing the article as a ‘dirty and malicious lie, the more deadly because no one without knowledge can discriminate between fact and fiction’.74 Turner insisted that if an investigation ensued and the document was shown to be a ‘lie’, the Bulletin must apologise. Horne responded that if he were ‘personally satisfied’ of its untruth, he might offer a retraction.75 Vincent Buckley assumed that Horne had seen the same dossier that Knopfelmacher had on campus.76 ‘It was bloody Knopfelmacher. He was seen regularly at the Bulletin office with Donald Horne, then very politically conservative.’ Clem Christensen later insisted. ‘Every time there was an outburst in the Bulletin about the University, it was always Knopfelmacher.’77 Geoff Sharp was also convinced of Knopfelmacher’s role.78 It was also suggested that ASIO agents regularly visited the Bulletin, and the exchange of information possibly occurred on such an occasion.79 This, however, is mere conjecture and, when asked, Donald Horne wrote: McAuley arranged an ASIO “contact” for me. I was not connected with their “operational side”, but in gaining background, mainly on the Communist split. It was not unusual at the time for editors to receive ASIO briefings. We ran only one story from them. I don’t know that anyone on my staff was in contact with them, although I doubt it. But on internal evidence after I had gone it looks as if there were some stories that probably came from an ASIO source.80
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As to the inquiry itself, Horne simply responded, ‘I don’t know anything about that’.81 At the time of Crawford’s letter, the role of ASIO was mere speculation, but rumours of its involvement turned out to be close to the truth. Since 1957, ASIO had been running what it termed ‘Spoiling Operations’ in the media, and one of the most serious of these operations was directed at some of the Social Studies staff. ASIO manipulated the Australian media and ‘assisted or inspired the writing’ of the Bulletin article, ‘Melbourne Communists at Work’.82 It was Arthur Turner’s memorandum, warning that the article was defamatory, that managed to fall into the hands of ASIO and cause panic. An agent or informant had given ASIO a copy and it was filed.83 ASIO was concerned that if legal action were taken, the trail would lead back to them. The correspondence that was still ‘raging’ in the Bulletin also preoccupied ASIO.84 In June 1961, Spry wrote of ASIO’s attempts to ‘encourage’ an unidentified source and ‘welcome ally’ to write for the Bulletin to attack the left at the University of Melbourne. In the same letter, Spry mentioned an idea to ‘arouse interest in this dispute’ in London. He also suggested another unidentified source who would have an: interesting contribution to make which could play a vital part in having the question of communist activity at the Melbourne University brought into the open. In putting the question to [name deleted] you should, of course point out that we have no interest in the affair other than assisting those on their own who have made strenuous efforts to bring about the exposure.85 Over five months later in November 1961, a long letter by Fred Emery, who was living in London and was a former Communist and member of staff at Melbourne University, was published. Emery supported Crawford’s decision to take the issue into the public arena and the importance of vetting university appointments.86 ASIO had much to be defensive about. In 1960 Max Hartwell, now working at Oxford, had written a letter to Vestes, the quarterly magazine of the Federation of Australian University Staff Associations, alleging that a ‘security check’ was part of the procedure to appoint
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professors and lecturers at the University of New South Wales. He exposed the blocked appointment of Ward on the basis of his past political allegiance. The press responded and reported on the controversy for weeks. ASIO predicted in December 1960 this would ‘inevitably touch off attacks on this organization in Parliament, as it was designed to do’.87 One officer reported that ‘the timing—four years after the event is curious, and may indicate an aftermath of the “Gluckman Affair”. This is a reference to the Professor from Manchester University whose visa was denied.’88 ASIO agents reacted by hoarding the articles, compiling a long file on Hartwell and revisiting Ward’s file. Spry sent Menzies two letters about the episode.89 The Orr and Ward cases forced universities to exercise some discretion. By implication ASIO was facing a public relations disaster. The universities were embroiled in other controversies, including the Brenner episode, that challenged the notion of academic freedom. Echoing the Ward case, Y. S Brenner’s appointment at the University of New South Wales was blocked by the Vice-Chancellor, despite the Selection Committee’s recommendation. The University denied it had applied security tests, but refused to elaborate why Brenner, a lecturer at the University of London, had not been appointed. Brenner also applied successfully to the University of Adelaide, but was denied entry into Australia. Knopfelmacher was outraged that Ken Buckley, the Secretary of the Federal Council of the University Staff Association, approached the Immigration Minister on Brenner’s behalf.90 During the publicity about Orr and Ward, FAUSA had contacted the Vice-Chancellors to enquire whether they practised ‘political discrimination against applicants for University positions’. They responded with a ‘categorical no’, but conceded there were two exceptions. The first involved the ANU, a case that was apparently resolved, and the second was Ward’s case against the University of New South Wales, which was ‘not satisfactorily clear’.91 * * * When Clem Christensen suggested ‘gallantry’ as Crawford’s motive, he implicitly exonerated his friend of conscious political motives. If Crawford was acting out of chivalry, he was misguided. He had forsaken his principles and sacrificed the respect many had for him, in a sense, to loyally defend his new wife. He was in an untenable
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position. As for his politics, it came down to a contest between principles and power. Crawford might also have been seduced by the memory of his past power and possibly threatened everything in order to recapture or reassert it. It would also appear that Knopfelmacher was not the only person on familiar terms with ASIO agents. On 22 August 1960, nine months before Crawford’s published letter, ASIO officers had a ‘personal chat’ with him.92 The interview was ostensibly arranged to discuss Charles Littlewood, an applicant for a position in the Department of Defence who had cited Crawford as a referee. Crawford met the agents and assured them that as far as he was aware, ‘Littlewood did not take part in any of the political activity associated with the University’.93 ASIO reported that ‘the opportunity was taken to discuss “other circumstances”’. Crawford accommodated this request and assured them that he and his brother, Sir John Crawford, ‘were appreciative of the Security Services’.94 Crawford, a victim of ASIO informants, was flirting with becoming one himself. In the light of his co-operative attitude, ASIO interviewed an informant who appeared to be remarkably knowledgeable about Crawford’s new position: [concealed name] was asked whether Professor R. M. Crawford’s reactions to the manner in which Sharp was treating his wife, were known... Source said that Crawford had stated from information obtained from his wife relating to SHARP, that he, CRAWFORD, was convinced that SHARP would be a Communist, because Crawford said – SHARP is adopting the same tactics that were used in the Australian Soviet Friendship Society when he, CRAWFORD, was a member of that organization. Although not asked directly, source inferred that CRAWFORD no longer had any interest for the Australian Soviet Friendship Society. Source understood that Professor CRAWFORD and his wife (Miss HOBAN) had discussed the question of Communist influence in the Department of Social Studies with Sir John CRAWFORD, who was going to communicate with the Governor General of Security on the matter.95
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Whether as a dupe or as a willing participant, Crawford was implicated with ASIO. The damning and confidential interview was sent to the Commonwealth office on 22 August 1960, a year before the Bulletin’s exposé. Years later, Horne would maintain that ‘unknown to us, ASIO had some hidden hand in this affair, and that it might have been Crawford who first brought them into it’.96 At the time, Horne had no intention of letting the issue rest, and a series of articles and letters followed. He revisited the alleged plot in editorials, sometimes by the most tenuous of connections. In an article entitled, ‘The Smearing of Professor Crawford’, published two weeks after Crawford’s sensational letter, Horne came to his defence. Condemning the ‘trail of irrelevancies and smears’ laid to distort the substance of what Crawford wrote, Horne mentioned the rumours that Crawford had been ‘misled’ by Hoban.97 If anybody had any doubt as to the identity of ‘Miss A’, Horne had ‘outed’ her. A week later, Horne mentioned the Social Studies Department by name and reported on Sharp’s alleged disruption of the Criminology Department.98 On 10 May 1961, Horne wrote another article entitled, ‘Melbourne University: The Central Issue’, which accused the University of culpable negligence. In Vincent Buckley’s opinion, the Social Studies case had brought the matter of a communist conspiracy ‘out of the area of private fantasy and into that of public power’.99 The knowledge that Buckley had seen the dreaded dossier spread when he wrote an editorial in Prospect calling for an enquiry. ‘I was never allowed to forget my tiny part in this matter’, Buckley recalled: Between the drafting and the publication of the editorial, which made no charges at all, I was approached by two people to talk me off the ball, intimidated by one, “cut” in a dramatic Oxbridge way by another, and subject to a campaign of character denigration and innuendo.100 If Buckley, who was a minor player, experienced harassment, Crawford became a recluse. Letters to the editor either defended him for his ‘courage’ or pilloried him for his betrayal of academic freedom.101 A voluminous number of commentaries, articles and letters appeared in the Bulletin, Prospect, Dissent, Farrago, Nation and the mainstream press between April and June 1961. It was further
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evidence of the intense interest in the case. ASIO did its job effectively, and the letters to the Bulletin in support of Crawford increased after June. The editors of Farrago called for a Committee of Enquiry and insisted that without an investigation, Sharp would be ‘hopelessly compromised’ and the public would be left with the ‘impression that a Communist conspiracy’ was gravely damaging the University’s reputation.102 Ken Gott decried Crawford’s action, which betrayed his ‘usual political acumen’. He claimed the onus was on Crawford and Knopfelmacher to substantiate their charges of malpractice.103 Gott later elaborated and dismissed the allegations with claims that the argument in Social Studies was more a staff dispute over research and training than ‘an example of Communist tactics’.104 On 5 May a Liberal backbencher, William Wentworth, whom Horne described as a ‘real can-kicker, doing harm to our side’, also called for an investigation. Wentworth, who had set his sights on Brian Fitzpatrick in 1954, insisted that if the allegations were true, they ‘represented a serious Communist threat to academic freedom’ and the University was ‘gravely menaced by a Communist conspiracy’.105 In private, La Nauze was critical of Crawford and in June wrote to Fitzpatrick, articulating his intense ‘feelings of rage’.106 Fitzpatrick, who was in Italy at the time, had to wait before seeing Crawford’s public letter. After she received a copy, she responded immediately: Why on earth I wonder, didn’t he seek the advice of friends? Perhaps because there really aren’t any except you, and you weren’t there or he didn’t ask you because of its all being mixed up with Social Studies affairs.107 John O’Brien observed to Manning Clark that the Melbourne History Department, ‘from being an example’, had become a ‘warning’. By June he was happy for Clark to offer his name for a position in Canberra. O’Brien admitted that he knew Clark’s negative view of the Crawford ‘diehards’, but attributed Crawford’s decision to write to the Bulletin to the state of his health.108 Obsessed about his image and reputation, desperate for the approval of others, Crawford wavered between distress about the irreparable damage to his beloved History Department and denial—
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and weary, fragile defeat. ‘I thank you – indeed more than words can convey for stopping in and taking over when I cracked up’, Crawford confided in a letter to La Nauze in July. The staff was summoned and Crawford managed to discuss the matter with all, including ‘friendly talks’ with John O’Brien that gave him a ‘positive sense of relief even in dealing with seemingly insoluble staffing problems’.109 Yet he was condemned by nearly all who meant most to him. At the time, Fitzpatrick was attempting to determine whether the ‘troubles’ had bred serious factions and speculated that O’Brien’s influence over his younger colleagues had diminished. ‘I ask only in order to know what to reckon on, the only side I’m on is that of our vulnerable but valuable craft’, Fitzpatrick wrote.110 Her words suggest a lack of support for Crawford. Despite her private outrage and the ‘definite cooling, no-one dared to discuss Social Studies with Katy’, June Philipp has recalled.111 Laurie O’Brien concurred and observed that Fitzpatrick clearly disapproved of Crawford’s action, but wanted to remain detached from the commotion it generated.112 There were a few messages of compassion for Crawford. The Registrar, Frank Johnston, hoped he would make a speedy recovery from his ‘sickness’ and said he had the ‘understanding sympathy’ of his friends.113 Don Mackay, the President of the Staff Association, wrote a measured letter that acknowledged Crawford’s contribution to teaching history in Australia. ‘However justified your letter may have been, it would have been better not to send it to the public press, and especially the Bulletin,’ Mackay wrote: Even if you were goaded beyond endurance, even if your patience with other methods ran out, and even if your letter should turn out to have been primarily responsible for a satisfactory solution through precipitating the first real attempt by the authorities to deal with the problem, I think most of these people would agree with me in regretting that you chose this method…I’m pretty sure that most of them also feel, as I do, that one shouldn’t hang a man for one mistake – or none should “scape hanging”.114 The Vice-Chancellor and Council had been content to put their collective heads in the sand as events escalated, but once the press
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and public knew about the controversy, the University had to be seen to be doing something. On 1 May 1961, Council appointed an Advisory Committee chaired by Mr Justice Adam to establish the causes of the dispute in the Department and whether the differences could be resolved. The Advisory Committee was not intended as a disciplinary tribunal. Paton insisted it would be greatly assisted if staff allowed it to ‘function within the University framework with freedom from outside pressures’.115 The Committee held several meetings and interviewed Crawford, Moorhouse, Downing and the staff of the Social Studies Department. Donald Horne was offered the opportunity to meet the Committee and ‘substantiate from personal knowledge the allegations’, but he declined.116 He also appeared on television and was asked to ‘name names’.117 The Committee’s report noted that the ‘disharmony’ under the helm of Hoban had been acute on her return from leave, although it had been evident earlier and before Sharp came ‘actively in the picture’. The Committee described Hoban’s fears of a Communist plot as ‘understandable’, yet did not accept her accusations and conceded that it seriously ‘coloured her approach’. However, the group accused by Crawford to be communists was deemed to have no justification for complaint and their ‘personal integrity and academic reputations’ were not impugned. Crawford’s letter was considered to ‘aggravate’ the ill-feeling, yet with the exception of Sharp, neither Crawford nor Hoban could offer the names of any member of staff on the ‘extreme left’. ‘The assumption of a communist plot, with presumably Mr Sharp as the disruptive force’, the Committee noted, ‘compliments his leadership much too highly and does scant justice to the intelligence, personalities and integrity of his colleagues’.118 At the same time, the staff of Social Studies were criticised for the ‘unduly democratic view of the running of the Department’ and lack of ‘deference’ to Hoban. Sharp was described as ‘the ringleader’ and when emotionally stirred, tended to adopt a ‘somewhat domineering manner’. The Committee dismissed the communist plot theory. In the report’s lengthy and confidential summary of findings, the Committee concluded with a series of understatements. The differences between the staff were ‘in essence personal and deep seated’ and domestic; the differences had not originated in ideological
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issues; although Hoban ‘strongly and genuinely’ believed she was a victim of a Communist plot’, there was no evidence of conspiracy; the differences between members of staff were untenable and would continue while Hoban and Sharp both remained in the Department; there was no evidence ‘to justify dismissal from the University of any person in the Department’; and the situation was deemed ‘too complex’ to apportion the culpability to any individual. ‘We find that the blame for this’, Adam concluded vaguely, ‘cannot be laid exclusively on one side or the other’.119 Justice Adam read the report of the Advisory Committee to Council on 6 November. Paton contacted the Age and assured the newspaper that there was no communist plot, although there was an individual ‘somewhere on the left’—an interpretation on which he did not elaborate and to which Horne took great offence.120 The findings were duly reported. The Age described the controversy as a ‘protracted and damaging debate’ that neither served the University nor ‘several of its honourable’ staff. The editor congratulated Paton, and the enquiry was deemed to have ‘cleared the air and revealed an imagined plot to be a very real mare’s nest’.121 The editorial supported Sharp and his colleagues, and derided the ‘overzealous heresy hunters’ with the neat moral that allegations of subversion should never have been made by individuals not fully acquainted with the ‘facts’.122 After reading it, Manning Clark wrote a letter of support to Geoff Sharp: It is, I think encouraging that in the end the truth was permitted, but it was inspiring to find somebody in Australia who could behave with dignity while subjected to abuse and defamation by those in society who have walked into the night.123
‘The Little Flicker Has Gone Out’ With the exception of the Orr case, most controversies involving universities were quickly forgotten. The story would run its inevitable course. The Orr case was seductive because it was a ‘running story, with new evidence that maintained a narrative push’.124 This was atypical. In the case of a public attack of an academic (usually made by a
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politician and consisting of vague, unfounded accusations), an enquiry would follow and matters would be dispensed with. Episodes involving staff members were usually resolved after a series of meetings, and disputes rarely reached the public domain. University councils and the protagonists were usually content to keep such matters confidential. Critics of the Social Studies Department believed that the University had managed to guard its secrets. Paton instructed the Council and Advisory Committee to return the report at the completion of the meeting. The report’s complete findings were locked in a safe. While Paton emphasised again that there was no evidence of a ‘Communist plot’ or misconduct, the controversy did not wane. ‘A University does not exist to stifle freedom of expression’, Paton wrote in May 1962. ‘But the University must feel concern at the repetition of unfounded allegations against members of staff…the verdict of the umpire should be respected.’125 Farrago alleged that staff members were instructed not to make public statements or talk to the press.126 In the following year, Farrago demanded the University publish the Social Studies Department Report in full and remove Council’s ban on ‘public controversy and discussion’. Both Arthur Turner and Sharp believed that Paton’s behaviour was beyond reproach and the camp that denigrated the Vice-Chancellor wanted to trivialise the episode.127 Turner recalled that Paton was very humane and considerate.128 In Vincent Buckley’s opinion, the move to expose the crisis had been a ‘resounding failure’. Morale was damaged. There were continuing effects on all the principals involved. According to Buckley, Crawford was ridiculed in ‘a thousand conversations’, while Knopfelmacher became a pariah, ‘for a while at least’.129 Contrary to rumours, Sharp and Hoban were not dismissed. Later, in the 1970s, it was suggested in a moment of folly that Sharp should work in the Psychology Department, thereby becoming a colleague of none other than Knopfelmacher. Crawford never exchanged a word with either the Turners or Sharps again. When Arthur Turner attempted to speak to Knopfelmacher about the case, he threatened to call the police.130 Three years later, Knopfelmacher would be embroiled in his own academic freedom controversy when his appointment as a Senior Lecturer in the Political Philosophy Department at the University of
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Sydney was withdrawn.131 Donald Horne would vehemently condemn the ‘academic lynching’ of a somewhat avuncular soothsayer. Horne regretted pursuing the Social Studies ‘Communist Plot’.132 ‘Communism aside, there wasn’t proper confirmation of the overall story.’ Horne wrote as he considered the Bulletin’s errors. ‘But —even more important—even if there had been, there wasn’t proof that this was Communism at work.’133 This had not prevented Horne from referring to the plot throughout the 1960s whenever the University of Melbourne, the Orr case and even the Murray report were mentioned. Did Crawford betray academic freedom? The answer lies in interpretation of the concept of intellectual autonomy. Sidney Hook, the renowned conservative American intellectual, corresponded with Crawford over the matter and upheld his actions. Others viewed it as a betrayal of his principles. He was undoubtedly motivated by loyalty for his wife. ‘Ruth has been coping with a difficult situation with dignity and restraint.’ Crawford claimed in December 1961. ‘We are coping and there are no repercussions for History. It’s up to others to show the same restraint. I know that cryptic allusions may be worse than silence.’134 His prior dealings with ASIO cannot be ignored. The stoic optimism that Crawford feigned in July was soon abandoned. He had lost authority and credibility. From 1961, John La Nauze assumed the primary role in the Department and was expected to keep an ‘eye out for promising possible lecturers’ and to establish a sense of stability.135 Kathleen Fitzpatrick did not share Crawford’s belief that the History Department had emerged unscathed. Nor did she encourage La Nauze’s willingness to play peacemaker: No I don’t want you to speak to Max about apologising to people he has (probably) misjudged. You are quite right—it would be a painful job and which would have serious consequences and which would certainly be a complete waste of time. My raising the issue represents my last little flicker of hope that the breach opened in the History Department by the Social Studies imbroglio might in a season of fair weather be healed. At the time I only knew only half of the terms of the ‘settlement’ i.e. that Ruth and
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Sharp were to be ‘transferred’. Since then I have learnt the rest and the little flicker has gone out and I sit in darkness and greatly stricken.136 Fitzpatrick’s only public intervention was a letter signed by nine staff members in May 1962 and addressed to the Staff Association. The letter protested at the ‘obviously malicious and defamatory’ tone of a series of articles published in Farrago.137 The matter was raised at the Staff Association Executive, and Don Mackay repeated the same ‘concern’. Appropriate action was taken by the SRC.138 By August, a disheartened Fitzpatrick would resign from her beloved Department, attributing the decision to ‘a collapse of confidence’.139 Crawford was circumspect about why she left and, when asked, cited ‘private studies and writing’ as her reasons, even though she considered applying for the Chair of History at Monash University.140 Geoff Serle had resigned from the Melbourne Department in 1961 and accepted a Senior Lecturership at Monash. The exodus continued in 1965 when La Nauze succeeded Keith Hancock as Head of the Research School of Social Sciences at the ANU. In the same year John O’Brien died.141 In 1966, Alan McBriar took up his Chair at Monash University. By 1966, Crawford had lost five of his senior colleagues and two of his closest friends, Fitzpatrick and La Nauze. The Melbourne School was greatly depleted. The Social Studies affair did not end with the University Enquiry. In 1967 Sharp sued Australian Consolidated Press and Donald Horne for libel, claiming that the Bulletin had failed to accept the Adam Enquiry’s findings and continued to perpetuate the false and malicious version of events it had originally published.142 In 1969, just before the case between the litigants came to court, the Bulletin printed a retraction and apology. It stated that any ‘misconduct, dishonesty, impropriety or criminality, or any innuendoes to that effect were not intended’.143 And the bitterness prevailed. In the same year, a solicitor contacted Crawford. ‘I received Farrago’, he wrote and ‘I am interested to see that Sharp is depicted as a cross between the New Messiah and the Delphic Oracle. More important, he appears to have friends on the Editorial Board’.144 Six years later, lawyers asked Crawford to ‘revisit the dispute and discuss the case once again.’145
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A former staffer in the Social Studies Department who wished to remain anonymous, recalled Knopfelmacher pursuing them in the University Bookroom several years before his death. ‘The trouble with you’, he uttered, ‘is you never had a sense of humour.’ Knopfelmacher spoke for several hours and continued to justify his role and discuss the ‘strong’ Sydney connection.146 The Social Studies affair remains tantalising because of the absence of primary evidence. Paton circulated a partial report, and it is contended that the full report was destroyed. It was never publicly released. Donald Horne and Vincent Buckley have both published biographical accounts that are seriously deficient, especially with regard to their own roles in the affair. Horne was not a naïve editor who made an error of judgement; nor is his memory convincing that, ‘as often happens with a story, the story pursued the Bulletin’.147 Horne reported on events because he believed Crawford’s story was true, and it made good copy. He would later admit that he was ‘overenthusiastic about attacking domestic communism for about eighteen months’.148 Vincent Buckley, too, was hardly an innocent, peripheral bit-player who was later unfairly hounded; he was privy to a malicious body of information and helped to circulate it. We do not hear Crawford or Knopfelmacher’s retrospective voices—both remained resolutely and publicly silent until they died. According to Ian Crawford, his father did not at any time discuss the case. Crawford’s voluminous archival collection is open, and all papers relating to the Social Studies Enquiry are present, but so also is his stipulation that these particular papers are closed to researchers for thirty years after his death. The Social Studies Communist ‘plot’ was easy to trivialise, because it contained all the stereotypical ingredients of a University domestic dispute: personal politics, unsubstantiated rumours, a protective husband, a personality clash, an indecisive Vice-Chancellor, a Council afraid of dissent. It was far more than a schoolyard conflict and was striking for a number of reasons. First, academics were more sensitive to the limits of academic freedom. There was comparatively little protest in 1956 about Ward, but a few years later, the claims for intellectual autonomy were far more resonant. It occurred at a time when other cases impinging on academic freedom, such as Orr, Brenner and Gluckman erupted, and the press demanded truth or at
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least the appearance of accountability and propriety. Hence the Social Studies Affair makes sense as a later episode. Second, ASIO was deeply implicated, and it was evident that someone close to the Social Studies Department had alerted them. Finally, the circumstances and the case itself have rarely been examined. There were deliberate attempts to conceal it. When Laurie O’Brien attempted to make sense of the entire episode years later, she confessed that, after so many years, the allegations seemed even more bizarre than they had at the time. But the 1950s created the kind of political climate that sustained a ‘debate’ of that nature.149 Crawford was undoubtedly motivated by loyalty for his wife, though his prior dealings with ASIO cannot be dismissed. On a national level, it cannot be ignored because of the machinations of the press and ASIO and the attempts to stifle and manipulate debate and investigation. The legacy of the Social Studies debacle and subsequent enquiry was enduring. It scarred the lives of those who lived through it. The damage to careers and reputations was considerable. When asked about Crawford’s letter to the Bulletin, Lloyd Churchward shook his head and responded, ‘I have never seen someone of such eminence destroy their standing overnight’.150
Epilogue The Social Studies Enquiry and the bitterness it caused greatly damaged Max Crawford’s reputation and came at a tremendous personal cost. Although he remained a Professor of History for the duration of the 1960s—a decade as tumultuous in political activism as the 1930s— Crawford took no part in any debate or protest. Partially because of failing health, staff changes and the ramifications of the Enquiry, he withdrew to become a virtual ghost in his beloved Department. Crawford at the time was in considerable pain with a twisted bowel, which was eventually operated and deteriorating eyesight due to cataracts.151 John Poynter recalled that even when he was a student, Crawford was ‘a major professional presence’ but ‘frequently very absent’.152 Almost immediately after Poynter’s appointment as Ernest Scott Chair in 1966, Crawford fell ill, and Poynter assumed the role as Head of the Department. They were, as Poynter conceded, not Crawford’s ‘greatest
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years’; his sense of direction, once so confident, had gone.153 Yet even in those years when Crawford seemed so ‘out of touch’, he could display his once characteristic ‘decisive and formidable action’ and provide ‘exceptionally thoughtful and helpful advice’.154 Though Crawford earned early acclaim and was one of the most celebrated historians of his generation, in retirement he was never quite regarded as a venerated elder statesman. Despite his attachment to the Department he had built and despite his devotion to his discipline, it was, in many ways, a self-imposed exile. In 1973 he confided to John La Nauze that while retirement had many benefits, he lamented the isolation that resulted from determination not to breathe down his ‘successor’s neck or assume privilege in the Department’.155 This is not to suggest that Crawford completely distanced himself from the University, where he had been such a strong presence for over thirty years, but he never actively initiated involvement and only participated when he received an invitation.156 Crawford was by no means unusual in his response to retirement, and many academics find it difficult to adapt. The sudden transition from business to an excess of spare time, from company to solitude and from importance to neglect is a difficult one. Crawford’s insistence not to pull rank was genuine. His correspondence of this period is characterised by a shyness and emerging modesty. He seemed to have lost confidence. Possibly he felt it uncomfortable as a visitor in the Department he built and which had inevitably changed. With the passage of time, there were more staff whom he had not mentored; the undergraduates were anonymous and of a generation that were possibly less accommodating of his patrician manner. He also had a different base for his time at the University: immediately after taking early retirement as Professor of History in 1970, Crawford joined Ruth Hoban at the Institute of Applied and Economics Social Research, where he was appointed a Senior Research Fellow. The reticence in Crawford’s letters is marked, despite the honours that were accorded him and the congratulations that followed. On 4 June 1971, he was awarded an OBE. He received congratulations from a collection of friends in diverse fields. They included Ursula Hoff, Robert Menzies, Laurie Gardiner, Ken Inglis, Norman Harper, Joe Burton, Ian Robertson, Tom Truman, Jack Gregory, Ken Myer and Clem Christesen. It appeared that only a few members of the
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Department sent letters of congratulations. In 1988, Crawford accepted the conferral of Doctor of Letters, an honorary degree that recognised his achievement. Although he seemed less certain about himself, many of his friends and former colleagues once again offered warm praise. Retirement permitted time to revisit old research, complete unfinished commitments and embark on new work. A revised edition of his short history of Australia was completed by 1970, various articles were written and autobiographical reminiscences were considered. The latter appeared in a chapter he contributed to a book of essays on his brother Jack, along with a selection of highly personal poems, of which he was immensely proud.157 It seemed that Crawford never quite resolved his early inclination to write—‘drama or poetry or novels’.158 He himself was honoured by a special issue of Historical Studies in October 1971. Crawford’s new research was conducted in collaboration with Ruth Hoban; their projected study of Victorian philanthropy was never completed, and this activity probably marginalised him further from his former colleagues. He did finally finish the biography of George Wood that he had embarked upon a quarter-century earlier. Published in 1975, A Bit of a Rebel received mixed reviews. An educational historian described it as a ‘masterpiece’, ‘discursive and informative on all kinds of things Oxonian’, ‘put together with urbanity and style’, ‘fascinating’ and ‘absorbing’.159 An academic writing in the new Journal of Australian Studies, a harbinger of new intellectual fashions, deemed that Wood emerged as ‘a duller personality than Crawford intended’.160 Frederic Howard in the Age considered Crawford’s book ‘a size too big for his subject but effectively revealed the prevalence of hidebound conventions and war hysteria in Australia at the turn of the century’.161 Maurice Denlevy in the Canberra Times noted that Crawford’s account of the conflict between communal hysteria and the liberal values that Wood affirmed constituted an acute analysis of the important trait in the Australian character, ‘the prevalence of passive intolerance and the rarity of an active attachment to liberty of opinion’.162 When Crawford originally conceived the biography in 1946, he was interested in Wood as a university teacher and as a type of liberal.163 Both themes emerge strongly, but it is Wood’s role in the
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anti-Boer War movement that sustains the book. Wood joined with the Labor politician, William Holman, in forming the Anti-War league, which advocated peace on liberal terms. As the war approached, Wood became the League’s President and the main target of attack. Under pressure from the newspapers and various politicians, the University passed a note of censure, claiming that Wood encouraged ‘the enemies of the country’ and impaired ‘the value of his teaching in the university’. The ensuing debate led to hysterical demands that Wood should be dismissed and charged with treason. As Derek Whitelock commented, Wood’s experiences allowed Crawford to examine a case history of jingoism.164 A number of reviewers observed the autobiographical tone of the book. Crawford figures as the prodigal son who identified too closely with the paternal subject. Indeed, it is difficult to mistake Crawford’s empathy for his beloved teacher, who advocated an unpopular stance, suffered unforgiving criticism and eventually took his own life. In a thoughtful review, Don Baker (who was himself a former student of Crawford) claimed that there was little evidence that Wood had been a ‘bit of a rebel’. Indeed, he was a supporter of a White Australia, expected Australia to be ‘the everlasting home for an untainted European and dominantly English community’ and venerated an empire in which justice never failed. Baker observed acutely that Crawford shared many of Wood’s ‘liberal views’, but not his ‘optimism’; Crawford’s rebelliousness was far more ‘prolonged’. Baker also included in his review the few passages of the book where Crawford offered personal reminiscence. ‘He (Wood) equally welcomed independence of mind in his students.’ Baker quoted, ‘of course we caught the infection, but it was the infection of lively humanity…And it was this which transformed the study of history from an aridity into an exhilarating exploration of life.’ Baker concluded perceptively that ‘there will be hundreds of us who say just that about Max Crawford himself’.165 The most unforgiving review was written by Humphrey McQueen, then the enfant terrible of the New Left. He took up the autobiographical theme in a brutal twist, maintaining that the book was a ‘scarifying’ autobiographical confession and Crawford’s ‘literary mask’. The very choice of Wood for his ‘persona’, McQueen contended,
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was an admission of how sharply Crawford felt his own disappointments. ‘What crueller way’, McQueen enquired ‘could there be for an historian to confess to the insubstantiality of his own writing, than to devote his own lengthy study to another historian who published little?’ 166 A more significant parallel is discussed by McQueen. Both men were liberals and ‘bits of rebels’, who took unpopular stands before being driven back to quieter anchorages.167 Under the guise of writing about his teacher’s tribulations in Sydney, McQueen insisted, Crawford was reflecting on his own experiences at Melbourne University in the 1930s and 1940s, when his Miltonic principles led him to be a ‘bit of a rebel’, while the middle classes suspected him of something more heinous. As evidence of the public’s gullibility, McQueen interjected that they mistook Martin Boyd for a communist because he supported the divine right of kings.168 Though McQueen’s assertion about the form of both men’s liberalism is valid, in Crawford’s case and as the Social Studies Enquiry attests, Crawford did not remain very quiet. McQueen is also too dismissive in his assessment of Crawford’s importance and failed to recognise his legacy, which was emphasised by Stephen Murray Smith in an eloquent letter written in 1971 to Geoff Serle. ‘Anyone who was ever in touch with Max Crawford as a student has much to thank him for’, Murray Smith declared, ‘and perhaps what resides longest is a shy kindness and humanity which made us hope that the study of history made people nicer people.’169 Almost twenty years later, Greg Dening contacted Crawford and also alluded to his predecessor’s compassion. ‘How proud I am to possess the title Max Crawford Professor of History,’ Dening declared, ‘you marked it and the University with a very special scholarship and humanism. As generations of staff and students have come and gone after you, independent and ever ready, as they should be, to show their difference, they have nevertheless been marked by the style of learning you left on the academy.’170 The disappointments observed by McQueen are echoed in Crawford’s correspondence. He speculated to La Nauze in 1982 on the ‘opportunities missed and the false paths followed’, but as he admitted, ‘they must be acknowledged’.171 As Crawford in his retirement revisited his early Melbourne years and wrestled with a feeling of
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regret about ‘ideas for work not carried through’, he would take comfort in his inheritance. ‘I console myself’, he wrote to Clark, ‘by reflecting on how superbly our common exploration has been carried out by some of those whom I had the good luck to have as pupils’.172 The compassion that Baker and others admired continued to buoy him. Certain relationships were strengthened, others renewed and some others simply fell away. The marriage to Ruth Hoban was happy, but appeared to isolate him professionally and personally. Ian Crawford admitted that from his perspective, his father ‘was a very changed man after his marriage to Ruth.’173 Crawford remained in close contact with old friends: Christopher Hill, John Mulvaney, Stephen Murray Smith (his friendship with this former student and indefatigable correspondent intensified in the 1980s), Douglas Pike, Keith Hancock, Gwen Williams, Geoff Serle, Jackie Templeton, Fred Wood, George and Valerie Yule and Inga Clendinnen. Crawford was not reclusive, he and Ruth ‘mixed in different set of circles, especially her family and neighbours.’ Ian Crawford recalled. ‘Overseas they mentioned dinner with Robert Helpmann, and I suppose there were others.’174 The relationship between Manning Clark and Crawford had altered, and their roles had almost reversed. When he learnt of Clark’s dedication in his second volume of A History of Australia,175 to his former mentor, Crawford wrote a lengthy letter recalling his ‘inexperienced’ conviction in Clark’s potential. ‘I could see it then. Some of your critics would underline the “imaginative” and deny the History.’ Crawford observed, ‘They fail in understanding you have asked questions that are fundamental to any true understanding of human history…it is great and profound work.’176 There is no surviving correspondence from Kathleen Fitzpatrick after 1961. That gulf was absolute. As Crawford reminisced, his letters were tinged with melancholy. He remembered William Muir, his companion at Balliol who had died prematurely and who, in his estimation, had only ever been replaced in his affections by the ‘other great man’, John La Nauze.177 The latter was Crawford’s closest ally and friend, and they often reconsidered past glories and tribulations. ‘We had some trials to bear together’, La Nauze recalled, ‘and you had some trials which I could not share except by relieving you, as far as I could, of worry about the condition and the morale of the Department which you had built up’.178
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There were, perhaps unsurprisingly, only a few oblique references to politics and the issues that had once exercised him. La Nauze observed in the immediate wake of the Coalition’s refusal of Liberal Party supply, which led to the dismissal of the Whitlam government, ‘Well the Liberals are wrong, and as wrong as can be’.179 Gwen Williams, who had worked as Crawford’s assistant for years, speculated on Whitlam’s proposal that ASIO should be directly responsible to the Prime Minister.180 Later still in 1976, Williams reported on Manning Clark’s Boyer lectures, which were presented in the ‘inimitable Manning Clark style’ and were ‘not entirely to the liking of the Liberal Party which tried to have them censored’.181 All of these reflections came from Crawford’s correspondents, and he seldom offered his own thoughts on current affairs. Unfortunately, there are no surviving letters between Max and Jack Crawford over the latter’s defiance of the Federal government at the height of the conscription debate during the Vietnam War. Determined to stamp out student opposition to the war, the government decided in the late 1960s to require information on possible draft resisters from university records. Jack Crawford, then the Chancellor of the ANU, ‘firmly refused’.182 Perhaps the most telling clue to Crawford’s political thoughts is the existence of a file in his papers pertaining to the only political controversy that drew his attention after the Social Studies Enquiry. Labelled ‘Geoffrey Blainey’, Crawford had assiduously collected all the newspaper articles relating to the maelstrom that erupted after Geoffrey Blainey expressed his concerns about the level of Asian immigration in 1984. He had done so in an address to a gathering of 1,000 people at a Rotary International event in a picture theatre in the Victorian town of Warrnambool. The resulting hysteria dominated the media; one article speculated how Blainey had become the ‘patron professor of racists’ and another enquired whether he deserved being ‘demonised’ by fellow historians. An editorial asserted that Blainey’s claims had ‘provoked personal abuse and intellectual arrogance’ that was ‘no less disturbing than racial abuse in a free and open society’.183 Another article contended that ‘in the process of alerting Australia to the change as he saw it’, Blainey, who was ‘no racist’, ‘unwittingly’ encouraged others with a more ‘impatient’ agenda.184 There is no record of any exchange of letters between Blainey and his former teacher regarding the furore, but there are distinct
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parallels between Crawford’s experience in 1961 and Blainey’s fall from grace—a momentous statement, public controversy, reciprocal accusations of betrayal, fission amongst staff that led to a public statement of no-confidence and a permanent break. While the immigration debate was more vicious, Blainey was made of tougher stuff and pursued the dispute in the media rather than retreat into silence.185 ‘Ned Kelly, Malcolm Fraser and the Drover’s Dog must be envious of my moment of glory’, Blainey wrote defiantly in one of his regular columns for the Herald.186 Blainey also might not have had as much invested in the History Department and managed to survive the controversy, continuing to enjoy public (if selective) acclaim. Crawford uncharacteristically entered into the fray when he discovered that his name was erroneously included in a letter published on the front page of the Age in May 1984, and signed by 23 members of the academic staff of the History Department, disassociating themselves from Blainey’s views on Asian immigration. Crawford’s letter to the Age, which resulted in a retraction,187 allows a rare glimpse of his later political stance and prevailing conviction about intellectual freedom, whatever the costs. Crawford’s name had been cited because Greg Dening, as the Max Crawford Professor of history, was a signatory. While Crawford had not seen the letter, he nevertheless offered three reasons why he would not have signed it. First, Blainey had been ‘careful’ to speak as an individual, not as a representative of a group. Second, Crawford could not ‘accept’ the implication of the History Department’s signed letter that ‘sensitive wishes which may be used by extreme and irrational groups for their own purposes should be avoided’. Finally, he empathised with Blainey and asserted that he would not write against him because he regarded Blainey as a ‘man of complete integrity and quite remarkably free of racial intolerance even if I thought he was mistaken’. Crawford vaguely suggested that he might ‘in certain circumstances be prepared to put a different view in a positive fashion’.188 This was Crawford’s last political statement. Despite his constant allusions to failing health—and everyone else’s perception of his frailty—he outlived many of his contemporaries, family and friends, and died in 1991. Crawford always had a firm conviction that he would out-last Ruth Hoban. His later years were extremely difficult. ‘Hoban’s Alzheimer was very advanced: she was very demanding, and
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he kept the house locked up to prevent her escape. He could not leave her’ Ian Crawford recalled: He was distraught with worry, and unable to make the decision to have Ruth institutionalised. And when he did finally make that difficult decision, she escaped and was eventually escorted home by the police.189 Max Crawford’s beloved brother Jack had died in 1984 (Crawford and other members of the family were not permitted to attend his funeral at the instigation of Jack’s widow, which caused ‘great distress’190), and John La Nauze and Kathleen Fitzpatrick both died in 1990. The country lost its most influential historian in the same year of Crawford’s death when Manning Clark died in 1991. Clark had become an iconic Australian presence, ‘the great man of history’, complete with the brown Stetson hat and goatee beard. His death was followed by a condolence debate in the Commonwealth parliament. Kathleen Fitzpatrick, too, had attained minor celebrity status after the publication of her elegant memoir, Solid Bluestone Foundations and Other Memories of a Melbourne Childhood. Yet Max Crawford, who had nurtured both and had undoubtedly played such a decisive role in their careers, and others, was the least recognised.
Notes 1
Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, 24 December 1957, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
2
Crawford to John La Nauze, 6 January 1958, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
3
Ibid.
4
Crawford to Manning Clark, 11 February 1958, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
5
Crawford later wrote a letter to her that was posted to her home, awaiting her return from Italy several months later.
6
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to John La Nauze, 23 January 1958, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
7
Crawford to Margaret Kiddle, 12 January 1958, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
8
Margaret Kiddle to Hope Black, 25 March 1958, Margaret Kiddle Papers, UMA.
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9
This is an amalgamation of R. M. Crawford, ‘Margaret Loch Kiddle’, Obituary, Margaret Kiddle Papers, UMA, and Russel Ward, A Radical Life, The Autobiography of Russel Ward, 230.
10
Crawford to Manning Clark, 3 May 1958, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
11
Ibid. Crawford anticipated that a great deal of revision would be necessary, and he and La Nauze agreed to undertake it. It was claimed that the task of revision was beyond Kiddle. Crawford’s letters to Clark and others are punctuated by references to the manuscript that La Nauze was revising. Jane Carey and Patricia Grimshaw, however, maintain that this was male propaganda perpetuated by La Nauze, and the original manuscript was, with the exception of a few grammatical changes, virtually the same as the published edition. Jane Carey and Patricia Grimshaw, Women Historians and Women’s History, 32. Men of Yesterday was finally published in 1961 and sold over 15,000 copies. All of Kiddle’s royalties were bequeathed to the University of Melbourne History Department, where a staff meeting room is named in her honour. Lyndsay Gardiner, ‘Margaret Kiddle’, October 1982.
12
Crawford to Brian Fitzpatrick, 17 December 1957, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
13
Crawford to Hans Baron, 21 April 1958, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
14
ASIO report, 2 June 1958, A6126/16, R. M. Crawford ASIO File, NAA.
15
George Paton to Crawford, 29 June 1958, Box 17, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
16
Crawford to George Paton, 1 September 1959, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
17
Ibid.
18
R. M. Crawford, An Australian Perspective (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1960), 75.
19
Crawford to George Paton, 1 September 1959, Box 18, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
20
‘The Crawford Letter’, Bulletin, 12 April 1961.
21
R. M. Crawford, ‘Communism in Universities’, Bulletin, 12 April 1961.
22
Crawford to John La Nauze, 10 August 1958, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
23
University of Melbourne Advisory Committee on Social Studies, 31 October 1961. See Farrago, 28 April 1961.
24
Interview with Geoff Sharp, 2001.
25
Council minutes, 6 November 1961, University of Melbourne Council Papers, UMA.
26
Ibid.
27
‘Where Is That Social Studies Department Report?’ Farrago, 30 March 1962.
28
Interview with Geoff Sharp, 2001.
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29
Council minutes, University of Melbourne Council Papers, UMA, 6 November 1961.
30
Interview with Geoff Sharp, 2001.
31
Crawford to John La Nauze, 9 November 1959, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
32
Ibid.
33
John La Nauze to Crawford, 11 November 1959, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
34
John La Nauze to Crawford, 23 November 1959, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA. ‘NDH’ referred to Norman Harper.
35
Horne, Into the Open, 28-9.
36
Cassandra Pybus, Gross Moral Turpitude: The Orr Case Revisited (Sydney: William Heinemann Australia, 1993), 203-209.
37
F. H. Johnston to I. Owen, 14 April 1958, 1959/1076, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
38
P. L. Henderson to George Paton, 12 September 1957, 1959/1076, 1958/1123, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
39
Crawford to John La Nauze, 13 November 1959, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
40
Memorandum by Arthur Turner, 27 April 1961, provided to the author by Geoff Sharp.
41
Turner to George Paton, 21 February 1960, Registrar’s Correspondence, UMA.
42
Donald Horne to author, 9 May 2002. Frank Knopfelmacher, was a Czech Jew whose entire family was killed in the Holocaust.
43
Donald Horne, Into the Open (Sydney: Harper Collins, 2000), 110.
44
Ibid.
45
Susan McKernan, ‘Literature in a Straitjacket’, Curthoys and Merritt, eds., Australia’s First Cold War. Vol. 1. Society, Communism and Culture (Sydney: George Allen & Unwin, 1984), 146.
46
Horne to author, 5 December 2002.
47
Vincent Buckley, Cutting Green Hay (London: Penguin Books, 1983), 216.
48
Ibid.
49
Cassandra Pybus, The Devil and James McAuley (Queensland: University of Queensland Press, 1999), 143.
50
Interview with Geoffrey Serle, 1995. Laurie O’Brien also described the atmosphere in the Department. Interview with Laurie O’Brien, 2002.
51
McKernan, ‘Literature in a Straitjacket’, 145. For an examination of the Bulletin and Observer, see also Rowse, Australian Liberalism and National Character.
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52
Interview with Clem and Nina Christensen, 1998.
53
Interview with Geoff Sharp, 2001.
54
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2004.
55
Interview with Geoff Sharp, 2002.
56
Horne, Into the Open, 110.
57
Report, CPA Activity and interest in Melbourne University, A6122/2, NAA. See Appendix 2: ASIO’s Interest in Melbourne University.
58
Donald Horne to author, 9 May 2002.
59
Interview with Laurie O’Brien, 2002.
60
Horne, Into the Open, 110. The dossier that Buckley read had apparently expanded two files by the time Horne consulted it.
61
Donald Horne to author, 9 May 2002.
62
Interview with Geoff Sharp, 27 May 2002.
63
Horne to author, 9 May 2002.
64
Horne, 110.
65
Interview with Geoff Sharp, 27 May 2002.
66
‘Melbourne University Communists at Work’, Bulletin, 19 April 1961.
67
‘Where Is That Social Studies Department Report?’, Farrago, 30 March 1962.
68
Conversation with Laurie O’Brien, December 2004. Although Laurie O’Brien was not a member of the History Department, she apparently spoke to Crawford about the protest after the event. The tensions in the Department are mainly drawn from the letters between Kathleen Fitzpatrick and John La Nauze, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA. Surviving members of the History Department continue to be reticent about the conflict. Geoffrey Serle briefly reviewed the events, but was reluctant to provide a decisive reason for Crawford’s decision. Interview with Geoffrey Serle, 1995. John Poynter was relieved that he was overseas at the time. Interview with John Poynter, 2001.
69
Memorandum by Arthur Turner, 27 April 1961, provided to the author by Geoff Sharp. The confidential memorandum was circulated to members of Council, the Professorial Board, Board of Criminology, Registrar and the permanent academic staff of the Social Studies Department.
70
Crawford to John La Nauze, 6 January 1958, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
71
Memorandum by Arthur Turner, 27 April 1961, provided to the author by Geoff Sharp.
72
Ibid.
73
Horne to author, 5 December 2002.
74
Memorandum by Arthur Turner, 27 April 1961.
75
Buckley, Cutting Green Hay, 218.
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76
Ibid.
77
Interview with Clem Christensen, 1998.
78
Interview with Geoff Sharp, 2001.
79
Interview with Clem Christensen, 1998.
80
Donald Horne to author, 9 May 2002.
81
Donald Horne to author, 19 November 2001.
82
David McKnight, ‘News Spies Spoiled for a Fight’, Australian, 28 July 1998.
83
ASIO report, ‘Spoiling Operations’, ASIO File, 6122/1901, NAA. The memorandum was obviously circulated and obviously fell into the hands of students. Jeffries Dallinger cites the memorandum in a letter to the Bulletin. See letter to editor from Jeffries Dallinger, Bulletin, 10 May 1961.
84
Charles Spry to unknown, 29 June 1961, ‘Spoiling Operations’, ASIO File, 6122/1901, NAA.
85
Ibid.
86
Fred Emery, ‘Communism in the Universities’, Bulletin, 11 November 1961.
87
ASIO report, December 1960, Russel Ward ASIO File, A6119/278, NAA. Newspapers covered the story. See ‘Lecturer Alleges Security Check’, Adelaide Advertiser, 3 December 1960; ‘Security in the Quad’, Nation, 3 December; ‘The Case of Russel Ward’, Sydney Morning Herald, 3 December 1960.
88
ASIO report, December 1960, Russel Ward ASIO File, A6119/278, NAA. See also McKnight, Australia’s Spies and Their Secrets, 154.
89
Charles Spry to Robert Menzies, 5 December 1960, Russel Ward ASIO File, A6119/278, NAA.
90
See ‘Brenner case: NSW Uni. Ignored Committee’, Daily Telegraph, 27 October 1960. For correspondence regarding the Brenner case, see: Frank Knopfelmacher to Ken Buckley, 29 October 1961 and Ken Buckley to Frank Knopfelmacher, 2 November 1961, MUSA Collection, UMA.
91
Minutes of Melbourne University Staff Association meeting, 4 August 1959, Box 8, MUSA Collection, UMA.
92
ASIO, 16 December 1959, A6126/16, R. M. Crawford ASIO File, NAA.
93
Ibid.
94
Ibid.
95
Ibid.
96
Horne, Into the Open, 111. ‘The Smearing of Professor Crawford, Bulletin, 26 April 1961.
97 98
Melbourne University Communists Again at Work’, Bulletin, 3 May 1961.
99
Buckley, Cutting Green Hay, 218.
100
Ibid, 219.
101
Letters to the editor, Bulletin, 26 April 1961.
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102
‘Allegations of Red Intrigue at Uni. Demand Enquiry’ Farrago, 28 April 1961.
103
Ken Gott, ‘Prof. Crawford’s Charge’, Nation, 22 April 1961.
104
Ken Gott, Nation, 6 May 1961.
105
‘Inquiry Urged on Communism at University, Age, 5 May 1961, and ‘University Refuses an Inquiry’, in News Weekly, 10 May 1961. See also House of Representatives Adjournment, p. 1583, Hansard Reports, 4 May 1961.
106
John La Nauze to Kathleen Fitzpatrick, June 1961, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
107
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to John La Nauze, 15 June 1961, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
108
John O’Brien to Manning Clark, 25 May 1961, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
109
Crawford to John La Nauze, 6 July 1961, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
110
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to John La Nauze, 8 July 1961, M5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
111
Interview with June Philipp, 2001.
112
Interview with Laurie O’Brien, 2002.
113
F. H. Johnston to Crawford, 28 April 1961, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
114
Don Mackay to Crawford, 14 May 1961, Box 21, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
115
G. W. Paton Circular, 5 May 1961. Given to author by Laurie O’Brien.
116
The University of Melbourne Advisory Committee on Social Studies, 31 October 1961, George Paton Papers, UMA.
117
Horne, Into the Open, 110.
118
The University of Melbourne Advisory Committee on Social Studies, 31 October 1961, George Paton Papers, UMA.
119
Ibid.
120
‘University Tribunal Clears the Air’, The Age, 6 December 1961.
121
Ibid.
122
Ibid.
123
Manning Clark to Geoff Sharp, 6 December 1961, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
124
Horne, Into the Open, 29.
125
G. W. Paton circular, 1 May 1962. Given to author by Laurie O’Brien.
126
‘Where Is That Social Studies Department Report?’ in Farrago, 30 March 1962.
127
Interview with Geoff Sharp, 27 May 2002; conversation with Arthur Turner,
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20 May 2002. 128
Interview with Arthur Turner, 2002.
129
Buckley, Cutting Green Hay, 220.
130
Interview with Arthur Turner, 2002.
131
See Martin, Intellectual Suppression, Australian Case Histories, Analysis and Responses, 166. The press at the time examined the case avidly.
132
Horne, Donald, Into the Open, p. 111.
133
Ibid.
134
Crawford to La Nauze, 14 December 1961, Box 16, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
135
Ibid.
136
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to La Nauze, 1 February 1962, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
137
Signatories to the Don Mackay President, MUSA, 1 May 1962, MUSA Collection, UMA. The letter was signed by Kathleen Fitzpatrick, David Derham, A. C. Jackson, C. B. Mohr, Cherry, Max Charlesworth, Ian Maxwell and John O’Brien. Farrago’s offending articles were: ‘Where Is the Social Studies Report?; and ‘Opinion’, 30 March 1962; ‘Lawyers to be Trained outside University’ and ‘Security Police and Psychology Department’, 6 April 1962 and ‘Why Don’t We have a Sociology School?’ 13 April 1962.
138
Don Mackay to John O’Brien, 22 May 1962. Letter provided to the author by Laurie O’Brien.
139
Kathleen Fitzpatrick to John La Nauze, 29 August 1962, MS 5248 John La Nauze Papers, NLA. For the letter of resignation, see Kathleen Fitzpatrick to George Paton, 29 August 1962, History Department Papers, UMA.
140
R. M. Crawford, ‘Associate Professor Kathleen Fitzpatrick’, former staff file, History Department Papers, UMA.
141
R. M. Crawford, ‘Jack Lockyer O’Brien Obituary’, former staff file, History Department Papers, UMA.
142
The alleged libels occurred in twelve issues of the Bulletin from 10 May 1961 to 17 April 1965. Consolidated Press published the Bulletin, the Sydney Daily Telegraph and the Observer. See also ‘University Man Sues’, Farrago, 21 April 1967.
143
‘Geoffrey Sharp – Retraction and Apology’ in the Bulletin, 28 April 1969. Donald Horne was no longer the editor, but joined in making the statement.
144
Donald Cooper to Crawford, 7 August 1969, Box 62, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
145
Solicitors to Crawford, 7 August 1969, Box 63, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
146
Interview, 2002.
147
Horne to author, 9 May 2002.
148
Horne to author, 18 December 2002.
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149
Interview with O’Brien, 2002.
150
Interview with Lloyd Churchward, 1996. Ron Ridley recalled a similar comment, Ron Ridley to author, 30 November 2001.
151
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2004.
152
John Poynter, ‘Max Crawford as Head of Department’ in Macintyre and McPhee, Max Crawford’s School of History, 123.
153
Ibid, 127.
154
Ibid.
155
Crawford to John La Nauze, 14 October 1973, MS 5248, John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
156
By the end of the decade, the requests for references and recommendations for applicants were no longer so frequent. He did continue to conduct occasional seminars, most notably on Theory and Method to the Honours cohort, well into the 1980s.
157
Crawford to Manning Clark, 1 January 1988, Box 64, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
158
Essay, ‘Before the Dawn’, 1923, Box 1, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
159
Derek Whitelock, ‘Pioneer of Australian History’, The Australian, 13 December 1975.
160
Tony Hannan, Journal of Australian Studies, No 1 June 1978.
161
Frederic Howard, ‘Dissent Was Rare’, The Age, 10 November 1975.
162
Maurice Denlevy, ‘A Fascinating Look at an Academic Rebel’, The Canberra Times, 14 November 1975.
163
George Arnold Wood, 1 May 1946, School of History Research Seminar Book, Department of History Papers, UMA.
164
Derek Whitelock, ‘Pioneer of Australian History’, The Australian, 13 December 1975.
165
Don Baker, ‘A Bit of a Rebel’, Nation Review, 14 November 1975.
166
Humphrey McQueen, The Critic, April 1976.
167
Ibid.
168
Ibid.
169
Stephen Murray Smith to Geoff Serle, 29 May 1971, Box 65, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
170
Greg Dening to Crawford, 29 January 1989, Box 65, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
171
Crawford to John La Nauze, 3 February 1982, MS 5248, John La Nauze Papers, NLA
172
Crawford to Manning Clark, 25 October 1971, MS 7550 Manning Clark Papers, NLA.
173
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2003.
174
Ibid.
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175
C. M. H. Clark, A History of Australia: Volume 2 (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1968).
176
Crawford was also immensely gratified that Clark had included him alongside Brian Fitzpatrick, Geoffrey Blainey, John Anderson and Keith Hancock as great historians for the list of ‘88 prominent Australians’ to commemorate the Bicentennial. Crawford to Manning Clark, 1 January 1988, Box 64, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
177
Crawford to John La Nauze, 7 June 1971, MS 5248, John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
178
John La Nauze to Crawford, 31 October 1973, Box 62, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
179
John La Nauze to Crawford, 19 October 1975, Box 62, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA
180
Gwen Williams to Crawford, 8 October 1975, Box 63, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA
181
Gwen Williams to Crawford, 23 November 1976, Box 63, R. M. Crawford Papers, UMA.
182
‘Crawford in the Eye of an Industrial Storm, The Australian, 10 March 1979.
183
‘Blainey and the Right to Debate’, The Age, 27 June 1984.
184
‘Melbourne University Debate Is Off Course’, The Australian, 22 May 1984.
185
Stuart Macintyre and Anna Clark, The History Wars (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2003), 73.
186
Geoffrey Blainey, ‘Have They Come to Bury Me?’ the Herald, 28 March 1985. This article was written in response to the book, Surrender Australia.
187
‘We Were Wrong’, The Age, 22 May 1984.
188
Drafted letter, Crawford to the editor of The Age, 19 May 1984.
189
Ian Crawford to author, 26 November 2004.
190
Crawford to John La Nauze, 4 November 1984, MS 5248, John La Nauze Papers, NLA.
'Into the Night'
365
Conclusion
This biographical study has endeavoured to reassess Max Crawford as an historian and intellectual. It does not claim to be a comprehensive study of liberal intellectuals in Australia, but rather examines one man’s journey in academic and public life as he negotiated the challenges and particular controversies of his era. The central argument is that Crawford’s genuine and vigorous liberalism encouraged him to assume a political stance that was, for the 1930s and 1940s, conspicuous, courageous, and radical. Crawford had abandoned his earlier position of a detached intellectual to become a more committed political figure when events that seemed to threaten that liberal order became impossible to ignore. His involvement in public affairs attracted public attack and academic scrutiny, so that he retreated from direct engagement until he wrote to the Bulletin in 1961. Crawford found then he could not evade the consequences of his writing about an alleged Communist plot, an act that was ill-conceived and misdirected. The dual (and subordinate) narrative in this study is the creation and role of the Melbourne School of History, with Crawford its directing force. Here too there is a high point of confidence and influence, followed by decline after Crawford strained loyalties and friendships. Crawford is remembered in a number of interesting ways. Manning Clark observed that he had ‘the good fortune to come under
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the influence of a great teacher – i.e. a man interested in the great intellectual questions of the day’ - although Clark’s relationship with Crawford was far more complex than his observation suggests.1 Geoffrey Blainey emphasised the ‘influence’ of the Melbourne School.2 Hugh Stretton paid tribute to Crawford’s ‘personal exhibition of the correct relations of science, art and conscience’.3 John Poynter described Crawford’s ‘major significance’ in Australia’s intellectual development.4 At the time of Crawford’s retirement, Geoffrey Serle proclaimed that Crawford ‘raised the quality of intellectual life in this country’ and also referred to the ‘profound intellectual influence’ of the Melbourne School.5 Keith Hancock described Crawford’s writing as ‘scholarly, reflective and delightful’6 Inga Clendinnen referred to Crawford as ‘quite an extraordinary man’ and John Mulvaney and Weston Bate were equally enthusiastic.7 We have seen that others were not as complimentary or hagiographic. The challenge of the book has been to reconcile these contradictory assessments of Crawford’s legacy. Indeed Crawford himself might have perpetuated certain inconsistencies. He was a careful and self-conscious autobiographer and the narrative that he created was selective and almost prophetic. Crawford was at pains to insist that he was not political, that while he became embroiled in the debates of the day, his involvement was almost accidental. This claim is dubious. Crawford’s working-class origins, his family’s significant political connections and liberalism, the creed of his mentors at the University of Sydney, were all formative influences. Balliol College introduced a more patrician tone as Crawford grappled with the inflexible British class system, family difficulties, his own uncertain identity and desire for acceptance. Crawford’s education and subsequent struggle to establish a career transformed him from a self-conscious, even shy boy with a profound faith in Empire and Australia to a confident, urbane man who imagined the world could be improved by freedom, intellect and honesty. Despite Crawford’s later recollections, his metamorphis from an immature and naïve youngster to a refined and somewhat precious scholar was not effortless. After a brief ‘exile’ at Sydney Grammar, Crawford returned to England. During his experiences as a schoolmaster there, he began slowly to formulate his synoptic historical approach and the belief
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that the past should illuminate the present. The early chapters argued that although Crawford was not radicalised by his early difficulties, which were compounded by the Great Depression, he began to shed his political quietism under the influence of the intense ideological conflicts of the 1930s. A subsequent brief engagement at Sydney University was vital. Crawford returned to his native land as ‘a contented Australian’ and struggled with the demands of teaching, the burden of producing original research and the new conviction that he might provide some guidance to the Australian public on the issues of the day. Motivated by the Spanish Civil War – and possibly the example of Stephen Roberts as a celebrated public intellectual – Crawford completed a series of articles on contemporary events. His appointment as Professor of History at the University of Melbourne proved a turning point in his career. Crawford’s didacticism, his synoptic view of history, pedagogical innovations and vision for a fully professionalised discipline could all be realised. The creation of the ‘Melbourne School of History’ and Crawford’s own intellectual development paralleled his political discovery, of the limits of liberalism in university circles and the media’s scrutiny of intellectuals. There is a clear inconsistency between Crawford’s active role in the Australian Council for Civil Liberties and the retrospective insistence that he was somehow ‘pushed’ by the circumstances to declare his views. Despite condemnation, Crawford demonstrated a marked conviction as he challenged the non-interventionist policies of Britain and Australia in Spain, opposed appeasement and National Service and defended intellectual freedom. The idea of a distinctive Melbourne tradition and influence has been contested. Crawford himself denied that he encouraged an ideology: ‘The Melbourne School of History did not teach an ideology, but I hope it sowed a seed of hope’.8 Geoffrey Serle maintained that Crawford was never an ideologue, that he did not attract disciples. The tradition he sowed was a tangible one. It consisted of an optimism that history was important and although it did not espouse a definitive political ideology, the School advocated an intellectual and liberal one. As this book has suggested, the two were not necessarily incompatible. History for Crawford was both an academic discipline and a
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moral imperative; it had to illuminate a drama of necessity and freedom, and the historian had to explore its implication and accept responsibility to abide by it. Crawford was at his most prolific as he fashioned his synoptic view of history and put it into practice through such creations as Ourselves and the Pacific. His liberal faith and public commitment shone through. Crawford’s experiences during World War Two also reveal a political consciousness inextricably linked to this historical vision and liberal convictions. The History School had significant implications for Crawford as he became concerned with the individual’s moral response to the challenge of contemporary events and espoused intellectual freedom. Crawford’s political commitment found expression during the conflict over the National Security Act, censorship and the ban on the Communist Party. Whilst Crawford’s activism was considered radical for the time, it rarely went beyond the limits of this intellectual role. He was not combative and always embraced the philosophical liberalism imbued in his formative years – the belief in civilised example and enlightened morality. Crawford was willing to exercise his belief in public commitment and he embarked on what promised to be his most exciting appointment, as Secretary to the first Australian Legation in the USSR. The appointment galvanised Crawford’s political beliefs, exposed his vanity and intensified his complex relationship with Kathleen Fitzpatrick. It is my contention that Crawford was never a communist but had an abiding sympathy and affection for the Russian people and an idealistic inclination to avoid criticism of the Soviet political system. The book has followed the shift from the West’s wartime alliance with the Soviet Union to the onset of Cold War; from the celebration of Crawford as a public figure and ‘unofficial expert’ on Russia to an object of heated condemnation. The political landscape changed dramatically by 1946 and Crawford found his life in turmoil as he struggled against accusations of subversion, improper influence and disloyalty. Such public scrutiny caused Crawford to resign from the organisations that fostered a closer relationship with the USSR. Politics, the improvement of the human condition and the enlargement of freedom were no longer actively pursued. In response to the drift against communism and liberalism, ASIO’s predecessor, the
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Commonwealth Investigation Branch, began to monitor Crawford and other intellectuals. This surveillance of Crawford’s activities, writing and opinions heralded an intense suspicion of academics like him. The extent of the political interest in the ‘suspect’ historian’s work is deserving of greater attention. It is apparent that the historians who were investigated were considered suspect because of their political activities and allegiances, and also because of their writing, which moved away from Britain’s orbit and emphasised a national destiny separate from British identity. The extent of political interference with the historians who pursued this divergent narrative has yet to be explored fully. The post-war years certainly heralded the beginning of a significant interest in the study of Australian history that served this increased nationalism. The interest also affirmed a growing independence and a dismantling of the imperial framework.9 Manning Clark was the first of Crawford’s favoured sons to benefit from his system of patronage and was selected as the lecturer in charge of the Australasian history course. Crawford’s growing enthusiasm for Australian history led to research on Camden Harbour. The research was not sustained and Camden Harbour followed the familiar pattern of his aborted projects on Spain and Russia. After a series of devastating controversies culminating in the refusal of an entry visa to the United States, Crawford succumbed to the pressures of the Cold War, fell silent and withdrew from public engagement. The trajectory of his political life suggests the changing nature of Australian liberalism and the precariousness of academic freedom. The progressive liberalism Crawford had espoused proved fragile. It was always threatened by intolerance and assailed by the constant threats to academic autonomy. By the early 1950s Crawford was unable or more aptly, unwilling to profess it. Politicians, public agencies (most notably ASIO) and the various sections of the press hounded ‘suspect intellectuals’ and advanced the notion of manipulative academics. Despite the High Court decision against the Communist Party Dissolution Act and the subsequent failure of the Referendum, ASIO intensified its gaze. Dossiers were created and revised. The vetting of ‘suspect’ staff and the collusion between ASIO and universities inhibited open criticism of the government. Self-censorship became more common.
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Despite Crawford’s political reticence and his failure to follow his research projects to completion, the History School enjoyed unparalleled success in the 1950s. These were considered the ‘greatest years’ and, as Geoffrey Serle claims, the time of the ‘first full flowering’ when Honours graduates numbered almost ten a year and Crawford’s dominance was at its peak.10 The myth of the ‘golden years’ is reflected in the autobiographical writing of the men who graduated and does a disservice to other departments and other historians. The legend emerges from the almost evangelical belief in Crawford; the fruits of his patronage and pastoral guidance; the colonisation of other History departments, and the emergence of the freelance, independent scholar. The political Crawford is rarely, if ever, alluded to in the retrospective accounts of this achievement. There is little is any evidence that the staff or students ever openly challenged Crawford or questioned his authority. As this book examined Max Crawford’s life as the most influential historian of his day, it also attempted to challenge the self-congratulatory image of the History School and introduce greater balance. Crawford’s flaws included his exercise of the prerogatives of a ‘God Professor’, the patronage he bestowed on favourites, the lack of accountability, and the personal tensions and disappointments such methods caused. The absence of women in the mythical narrative is striking and it is argued that they were disadvantaged by the prejudices of the time and possibly by Crawford’s own inclination to tolerate a system that discouraged women from applying for scholarships and pursuing overseas postgraduate research. Crawford’s role in the teaching and writing of Australian history is also open to debate. He recognised the importance of the Australian past and was an instigator of its transformation from a mere sequel to British history to an autonomous, national narrative. Crawford is portrayed as ‘a very rare, exceptional case’ of the ‘God Professor’ because of his ‘sheer ability and charismatic quality to make the system work at its best’.11 However, unchecked authority invites abuse and manipulation, this book has found evidence of both. Crawford’s selection of John La Nauze for the Chair of Australian History could be interpreted as a betrayal of his relationship with Kathleen Fitzpatrick (though this is open to debate). It also exposed Crawford problematic relationship with Manning Clark.
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Even during the 1950s the dominance of Crawford had begun to erode. The older patterns and connections had broken down and universities in Australia ceased to be ivory towers for a privileged elite. The influx of returned soldiers had begun the process. They were a more vocal student body with confidence that Australia could make an independent contribution. Then came the Commonwealth Scholarship scheme that allowed a broader cross-section of students to pursue University study. The University of Melbourne grew rapidly both in enrolments and the range of activities. Research and postgraduate study took a new significance. Universities were becoming more relevant, accountable and accessible to the broader public. The alteration of the University’s status is reflected in the academic controversies of the time. Although Crawford was keen to avoid all political causes by the 1950s, he often found himself caught in the web of politics. The debates involving intellectual autonomy became more frequent and public. The significance and effect of inquisitions into the work of historians and their extra-curricular activities went beyond surveillance. ‘Security risks’ were denied academic appointments. It is my contention also that such surveillance was not confined to the government and its security agencies. Universities themselves did not always uphold the concept of academic autonomy or independence and on occasions imposed restraints on speech as well as discouragement of academics who did adhere to the institution’s code. This book has argued that university administrators monitored communists and liberals on campus long before ASIO began its official campaign of surveillance of ‘suspect’ intellectuals. As early as the 1930s, selection committees considered the political affiliations of candidates for academics posts, including Herbert Burton, Brian Fitzpatrick and Esmonde Higgins. During the height of the Cold War, there was a preoccupation with protecting impressionable students from political indoctrination. Controversies erupted when it became known that universities blocked or vetted staff appointments. The legacy of these abuses of academic freedom was an inhibiting fear of speaking out. The extent to which historians censored their own work and universities lost their critical edge has not been fully explored here, and is worthy of further enquiry. The study of Crawford culminated in the Social Studies Affair in 1961, which emerged from this fear of a communist plot. The
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accusations and rumours now seem anomalous, even bizarre. Yet at the time it was a deeply disturbing affair, which embroiled some of the leading literary and academic figures of the day. I have shown how ASIO had an intense interest in the Social Studies Department and engaged in a program aptly named ‘Spoiling Operations’. In the past, the Social Studies Enquiry has been portrayed as a trivial university spat. Crawford’s role in it is never mentioned in the autobiographies and memoirs of his students. The Enquiry raised important issues of academic freedom, anti-communism and intellectual repression. Perhaps Crawford’s retrospective determination to deny his political roots and his very public causes might stem from this final crisis; the outraged suggestion that he was simply motivated by gallantry is not convincing. Crawford never repaired the damage the Social Studies Enquiry did to his reputation. He desired the approval of others and, deeply hurt, withdrew publicly and intellectually. This robbed him of the role most would have accorded him in his later years, that of the distinguished spokesman for history. Despite Crawford’s flaws and decline, it is my contention that he was one of the most influential figures in the development of the discipline, both as a practitioner and presence. The retreat from direct engagement in public intellectual life has dramatically affected the way Crawford is remembered. The extent of his significance and impact is not easy to measure because of this silence, and his reputation is beset by contradictions. I have endeavoured to reassess Max Crawford’s status. The impressive list of graduates who emerged from the Melbourne School is testament to its achievement – Clark, Stretton, Inglis, McBriar, Clendinnen, Poynter, Mulvaney, Shaw, Serle, Dening, Blainey to name a few, came to dominate the history profession. By the end of the 1960s over a third of history professors in Australian universities were products of the Melbourne School.12 Even the subsequent generations of students who had little contact with Crawford after 1961, when he became a ghost in the Department, were shaped by the school he created. For all the personal failings and disappointments he felt not to have brought his own scholarly projects to completion, he had shaped the intellectual culture.
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Notes 1
Clark is quoted by Geoffrey Serle, ‘R.M. Crawford and his School’, Melbourne Historical Journal No. 9, (1970), 3.
2
Macintyre, Making History, 69.
3
R.M. Crawford Special Issue Historical Studies, 1971, 12.
4
John Poynter, ‘Preface’, R.M. Crawford Special Issue Historical Studies, 1971, 3.
5
Serle, Melbourne Historical Journal, 1970, 4.
6
R.M. Crawford Special Issue Historical Studies, 1971, 12.
7
Macintyre and McPhee, eds., Max Crawford’s School of History, 45.
8
Macintyre, ed. Making History, p. 47.
9
Macintyre and Thomas, ed. The Discovery of Australian History, 7.
10
Serle, Melbourne Historical Journal, 1970, 4.
11
Ibid.
12
Geoffrey Serle, ‘A Survey of Honours Graduates of the University of Melbourne School of History 1937-1966’, Historical Studies, (1971), 44-58.
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Bibliography
Interviews Clem Christesen Nina Christesen Dymphna Clark Lloyd Churchward Ian Crawford Ken Crawford Lloyd Evans Barbara Falk Sheila Fitzpatrick Frank Ford Betty Hayes Donald Horne Laurie O’Brien June Philipp John Poynter Geoffrey Serle Geoffrey Sharp Nonie Sharp Barry Smith Valerie Tarrant
Melbourne, 1998 Melbourne, 1998 Canberra, 1998 Melbourne, 1996 Perth, 2000 Canberra, 2001 Melbourne, 2001 Melbourne, 2000 Melbourne, 2001 Melbourne, 1998 Melbourne, 1996 Sydney, 2001 Melbourne, 2002 Melbourne, 2001 Melbourne, 2001 Melbourne, 1995 Melbourne, 2002 Melbourne, 2002 Canberra, 2001 Melbourne, 2001
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Arthur Turner Cynthia Turner
Melbourne, 2002 Melbourne, 2002
* Please note that some of these interviews were formally conducted, using a tape recorder; others were conducted less formally, when I took notes.
University of Melbourne Archives Personal Papers Leonhard Adam Papers James Barrett Papers Communist Party of Australia Papers Lloyd Churchward Papers R. M. Crawford Papers Kathleen Fitzpatrick Papers Norman Harper Papers Gwyn James Papers Margaret Kiddle Papers George Paton Papers Raymond Priestley Papers Official Papers Council Minutes History Department Papers Melbourne University Staff Association Newspaper Clippings Collection Professorial Board Minutes Registrar’s Correspondence
University of Melbourne Special Collections Meanjin Papers
University of Sydney Archives Sir Stephen Henry Roberts Papers George Arnold Wood Papers
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National Library of Australia Manning Clark Papers Sir John Crawford Papers Brian Fitzpatrick Papers Dorothy Fitzpatrick Papers John La Nauze Papers Keith Officer Papers
National Archives of Australia Manning Clark ASIO files Lloyd Churchward ASIO files R. M. Crawford ASIO files Brian Fitzpatrick ASIO files Murray Groves ASIO files Esmonde Higgins ASIO file Ian Milner ASIO files Russel Ward ASIO files CPA Activity and interest in Melbourne University ‘Spoiling Operations’ files
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The Observer, 1957 Smith’s Weekly, 1940-1945 * In addition, clippings from an extensive range of newspapers from abroad, collected by Max Crawford, were used. Periodicals Civil Liberty, 1936-1945 Sane Democracy, 1938 University Calendar, 1937-1970 University Gazette, 1940-1961 Books Aaron, Raymond. The Opium of the Intellectuals. New York: Doubleday, 1957. Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections of the Origins and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso, 1983. Andrews, E.M. Isolationism and Appeasement in Australia: Reactions to the European Crisis, 1935-1930. Canberra: ANU Press, 1970. Aughterson, W. V. Taking Stock: Aspects of Mid Century life in Australia. Melbourne: F. W. Cheshire, 1953. Barber, Joan and Mark Harrison. A Social and Economic History of the USSR in World War Two. London: Longman, 1991. Barthes, Roland. The Rustle of Language. New York: Hill and Wang, 1986. Bayley, Edwin R. Joe McCarthy and the Press. New York: Pantheon Books, 1981. Beasley, Jack. Red Letter Days. Sydney: Australasian Book Society, 1979. Blainey, Geoffrey. A Centenary History of Melbourne University. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1957. —— The Tyranny of Distance: How Distance Shaped Australia’s History. Melbourne: Sun Books, 1971. —— Across A Red World. Melbourne: Macmillan of Australia, 1968. Bolton, Geoffrey. The Oxford History of Australia, Vol. 5. 1942-1988, The Middle Way. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1986. Brenan, Gerald. The Spanish Labyrinth. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1960.
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Brett, Judith. Robert Menzies’ The Forgotten People. Melbourne: Macmillan, 1992. Bridge, Carl (ed). Manning Clark: Essays on His Place in History. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1994. Bryn, R. J. Intellectuals and Politics. London: Allen & Unwin, 1980. Buckley, Vincent. Cutting Green Hay. London: Penguin Books, 1983. Buckley, W. M. F. and L. B. Bozell. McCarthy and his Enemies. Chicago: Henry Regeny, 1954. Cain, F. M. The Origins of Political Surveillance in Australia. Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1983. —— The Australian Security Intelligence Organization: An Unofficial History. London: Frank Cass, 1994. Calwell, A. Danger for Australia. Melbourne: The Industrial Printing and Publicity Co, 1949. Canary, Robert. H. The Writing of History, Literary Form and Historical Understanding. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1978. Capp, Fiona. Writers Defiled. Melbourne: McPhee Gribble, 1993. Carey, Jane and Patricia Grimshaw. Women Historians and Women’s History: Kathleen Fitzpatrick (1905-1990), Margaret Kiddle (19141958) and the Melbourne History School. Working Paper No.5. Melbourne: The History of the University Unit, 2001. Carr, Raymond. Modern Spain. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980. Caute, David. The Fellow Travellers: A Postscript to the Enlightenment. London: Wiedenfeld and Nicholson, 1973. Chomsky, Noah. The Cold War and the University: Toward an Intellectual History of the Postwar Years. New York: New Press, 1997. Clark, C. M. H. Meeting Soviet Man. Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1960. —— The Puzzles of Childhood. Melbourne: Penguin Books, 1989. —— The Quest for Grace. Melbourne: Penguin Books, 1990. Coady, Tony (ed). Why Universities Matter. Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2000. Cockburn, Claud. In Time of Trouble. London: Hart, 1956. —— I Claud: The Autobiography. London: Penguin Books, 1967. Coleman, Peter. Obscenity, Blasphemy, Sedition: Censorship in Australia. Brisbane: The Jacaranda Press, 1967.
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Davies, A. and G. Serle. Policies for Progress: Essays in Australian Politics. Melbourne: F. W. Cheshire, 1954. Davies, Susan (ed). Dear Kathleen, Dear Manning: The Letters of Manning Clark and Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 1949-1990. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1996. Davison, Graeme, John Hirst and Stuart Macintyre (eds). The Oxford Companion to Australian History. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1998. Dewey, John. Democracy and Education. New York: Macmillan, 1916. Docker, John. Australian Cultural Elites. Sydney: Angus & Robertson, 1974. Dow, Hume (ed). More Memories of Melbourne University: Undergraduate Life in the Years Since 1919. Melbourne: Hutchinson, 1985. Dunn, M. Australia and the Empire. Sydney: Fontana, 1984. Eggleston, F. W. Reflections of an Australian Liberal. Melbourne: F.W. Cheshire, 1953. Evans, L. T. and J. D. B. Miller (eds). Policy and Practice: Essays in Honour of Sir John Crawford. Canberra: ANU Press, 1987. Farrell, Frank. Themes in Australian History. Sydney: New South Wales University Press Ltd., 1990. Fitzpatrick, Brian. The Australian People. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1951. —— A Short History of the Australian Labour Movement. South Melbourne: Macmillan of Australia, 1968. Fitzpatrick, Kathleen. Solid Bluestone Foundations and Other Memories of a Melbourne Childhood. 1908-1928. Melbourne: Macmillan, 1983. Foster, S. G. and Margaret Varghese. The Making of the Australian National University. Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1996. Fryer, Jonathon. Eye of the Camera: A life of Christopher Isherwood. London: Allison and Busby, 1993. Gella, A. (ed). The Intellegentsia and the Intellectuals. New York: Sage, 1976. Giddens, Anthony. Beyond Left and Right: The Future of Radical Politics. London: Blackwell Publishers Ltd., 1998. Greenwood, Gordon (ed). Australia, A Social and Political History. Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1974.
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Griffith, Rob. The Politics of Fear. Lexington: University Press Kentucky, 1970. Gollan, Robin. Revolutionaries and Reformists. Canberra: Australian National University Press, 1975. Hall, Robert. The Rhodes Scholar Spy. Sydney: Random House Australia, 1991. Hancock, W. K. Country and Calling. London: Faber and Faber Ltd., 1955. —— Professing History. Sydney: Sydney University Press, 1976. Heseltine, Harry. Vance Palmer. St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1970. Hetherington, John. Australians, Nine Profiles. Melbourne: F. W. Cheshire, 1960. Higham, Charles. and Michael Wilding (eds). Australians Abroad: An Anthology. Melbourne: F. W. Cheshire, 1967. Hofstadter, Richard. Anti-Intellectualism in American Life. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1974. Hollander, Paul. The Paranoid Style in American Politics and Other Essays. London: Jonathon Cape, 1966. Hollis, Christopher. Oxford in the Twenties: Recollections of Five Friends. London, Heinemann, 1976. Holmes, Richard. Footsteps: Adventures of a Romantic Biographer. London: Flamingo, 1995. Holt, Stephen. Manning Clark and Australian History 1915-1963. St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1982. —— A Short History of Manning Clark. Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1999. Hook, Sidney. In Defence of Academic Freedom. New York: Pegas, 1971 Horne, Donald. The Lucky Country: Australia in the Sixties. Melbourne: Penguin Books, 1964. —— Into the Open. Sydney: Harper Collins Publishers, 2000. Hynes, Samuel. The Auden Generation: Literature and Politics in England in the 1930s. London: The Bodley Head Ltd., 1976. Inglis, Imirah. The Hammer & Sickle and Washing Up. Melbourne: Hyland House, 1995. Inglis, K. S. This Is the A.B.C. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1983. —— Observing Australia. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2000.
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Brian Kennedy. A Passion to Oppose: John Anderson, Philosopher. Carlton South: Melbourne University Press, 1995. Knight, David. Australia’s Spies and their Secrets. Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1994 Knopfelmacher, Frank. Intellectuals and Politics. Sydney: Thomas Nelson, 1968. Lasch, Christopher. The New Radicalism in America. 1889-1963: The Intellectual as a Social Type. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1966. Mabro, Judy. I Ban Everything: Free Speech and Censorship in Oxford between the Wars. Oxford: Ruskin College Library, 1985. Macintyre, Stuart. The Oxford History of Australia. Vol. 4. 1901-1942. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1986. —— Ernest Scott. A History for a Nation. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1994. —— The Reds: The Communist Party of Australia From Origins to Illegality. Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1998. Macintyre, Stuart (ed). Making History: R. M. Crawford, Manning Clark, Geoffrey Blainey. Melbourne: McPhee Gribble/Penguin Books, 1985. Stuart Macintyre and Anna Clark. The History Wars. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2003. Macintyre, Stuart. & Julian Thomas (eds). The Discovery of Australian History 1890-1939. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1995. Macintyre, Stuart. & Peter McPhee (eds). Max Crawford’s School of History. Melbourne: The History Department, University of Melbourne, 2000. David McKnight. Australia’s Spies and Their Secrets. Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1994. Mackinolty, Judy (ed). The Wasted Years? Sydney: George Allen & Unwin, 1981. McPhee, Peter. The Politics of Knowledge: Towards a Biography of R. D. (‘Pansy’) Wright. Working Paper No.1, Melbourne: The History of the University Unit, 1995. —— Pansy: A Life of Roy Douglas Wright: Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1999. McQueen, Humphrey. A New Britannia: An Argument Concerning the Social Origins of Australian Radicalism and Nationalism . Melbourne: Penguin, 1970.
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—— Gallipoli to Petrov. Sydney: George Allen & Unwin, 1984. —— Suspect History. South Australia: Wakefield Press, 1997. Malcolm, Janet. The Silent Woman. London: Pan Macmillan General Books, 1994. Manne, Robert. The Petrov Affair. Sydney: Pergamon, 1987. Martin, Brian. Intellectual Suppression: Australian Case Histories, Analysis and Responses. Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1986. Mayer, Henry. The Press in Australia. Melbourne: Lansdowne, 1964. Mill, John Stuart. Three Essays. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1975. Motion, Andrew. Philip Larkin: A Writer’s Life. London: Faber and Faber, 1993. Munro, Craig. Inky Stephensen: Wildman of Letters. St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1992. Osborne, Charles. W. H. Auden: The Life of a Poet. London: Eyre Methuen, 1979. O’Sullivan, Vincent (ed). Intersecting Lines: The Memoir of Ian Milner. Wellington: Victoria University Press, 1993. Palmer, Nettie. Fourteen Years. St Lucia: University of Queensland, 1988. Parini, Jay. John Steinbeck: A Biography. London: Minerva, 1994. Pike, Douglas. Australia, The Quiet Continent. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970. Poynter, John and Carolyn Rasmussen. A Place Apart: The University Of Melbourne, Decades of Challenge. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1996. Price, A. Grenfell (ed). The Humanities in Australia, a Survey with Special Reference to the Universities. Canberra: Australian Humanities Research Council, 1959. Pullan, Robert. Guilty Secrets: Free Speech in Australia. North Ryde, New South Wales: Methuen, 1984. Pybus, Cassandra. Gross Moral Turpitude. Melbourne: William Heinemann, 1993. —— The Devil and James McAuley. Queensland: University of Queensland Press, 1999. Ridley, Ronald T. Jessie Webb: A Memoir. Melbourne: History Department, University of Melbourne. 1994. Roberts, Stephen. The House that Hitler Built. London: Methuen Publishers, 1937.
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Rowse, Tim. Australian Liberalism and National Character. Melbourne: Kibble Books, 1978. Russell, Conrad. Academic Freedom. London: Routledge, 1993. Schedvin, C. B. Australia and the Great Depression. Sydney: Sydney University Press, 1970. Schrecker, Ellen. No Ivory Tower: McCarthyism and the Universities. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986. —— Many are the Crimes: McCarthyism in America. Boston: Little Brown and Company, 1998. Serle, Geoffrey. From Deserts the Prophets Come: The Creative Spirit in Australia 1788-1972. Melbourne: Heinemann, 1973. —— Sir John Medley: A Memoir. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1993. Sinclair, Keith. Halfway around the Harbour. London: Penguin Books, 1993. Slater, Helen and David Widdowson (eds). The War Diaries of William Slater. Melbourne: Astrovisuals, 2000. Strahan, Lynne. Just City and the Mirrors: Meanjin Quarterly and the Intellectual Front 1940-1965. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1984. Street, Jessie. Truth or Repose. Sydney: Australian Book Society, 1966. Steinberg, Peter L. The Great Red Menace: United States Prosecution of American Communists 1947-1952. Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1984. Theoharis, Athan. Seeds of Repression: Harry S. Truman and the Origins of McCarthyism. Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1971. Toynbee, Phillip (ed). The Distant Drum: Reflections on the Spanish War. London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1976. Vander, P. A. M. Prelude to War. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1951. Walker, James and Brian Head (eds). Intellectual Movements and Australian Society. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1988. Ward, Russel. The Australian Legend. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1962. —— A Radical Life: The Autobiography of Russel Ward. Melbourne: Macmillan, 1988. Waten, Judah. Scenes of Revolutionary Life. Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1982.
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Watson, Don. Brian Fitzpatrick: A Radical Life. Sydney: Hale and Iremonger, 1979. Weintraub, Stanley. The Last Great Cause. New York: W. H. Allen, 1968. White, Richard. Inventing Australia: Images and Identity 1688-1980. Sydney: George Allen & Unwin, 1981. Whitlam, Nicholas. and John Stubbs. Nest of Traitors. Queensland: University of Queensland Press, 1985. Wilkes, John. Liberty in Australia. Sydney: AIPS, 1955. Winke, Robin. Cloak & Gown. New York:William Morrow and Company, Inc, 1987. Woodhouse, Fay. Anti Communism and Civil Liberties: The 1951 Communist Party Dissolution Referendum Debate at the University of Melbourne, Working Paper No.3, Melbourne: The History of the University Unit, 1998. Articles and Reviews Austin, A. G. ‘Anti-Intellectualism in Australian Life’, The Australian Rationalist. Vol. 1, No.1, 1969, pp.5-8. Ball, W. Macmahon. ‘The Australian Censorship’, Australian Quarterly. Vol. 7, No. 26, June 1935, pp.9-14. Cairns, Jim. ‘The Economic and Intellectual Position of the Academy’ in Melbourne University Magazine. 1949, pp. 80-82. Clark, C.M.H. ‘Melbourne: An Intellectual Tradition’, Melbourne Historical Journal. No. 2, 1962. Clunies Ross, A. ‘Student Life in the 1950’s’, Melbourne University Magazine. 1961, pp. 28-32. Crawford, R. M. ‘The Abyssinian Situation’, The Union Recorder. July 1935, pp.40-1. —— ‘Revolution in Spain?’, Australian Highway. 10 July 1936, pp. 114-6. —— R. M. Crawford Reviews An Autobiography by R. G. Collingwood, Historical Studies. Vol. 2, No. 3, April 1941, p 212. —— ‘History as a Science’, Historical Studies. Vol. 3, No. 11, November, 1947, pp. 153-75. —— ‘The Antipodean Pilgrimage of Arnold Wood’, Royal Australian Historical Society Journal and Proceedings. Vol. 48, Part 6, March 1963, pp. 405-16.
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—— ‘Obituary, Brian Fitzpatrick 1905-1965’, Historical Studies. No. 2, 1965, pp 327-9. —— ‘The School of Prudence or Inaccuracy and Incoherence in Describing Chaos?’, R. M. Crawford Special Issue Historical Studies. Vol. 15, No. 57, October 1971, pp 27-42. Deery, Phillip. ‘Cold War Victim or Rhodes Scholar Spy: Revisiting the Case of Ian Milner’, Overland. 147, 1997, pp. 9-12. Gott, Ken. ‘Student Life in the 1940’s’, Melbourne University Magazine. 1961, pp. 28-32. Roe, Michael. ‘E. M. Higgins: A Marxist in Tasmania 1936-1938’, Labour History. No.32, May 1977, pp. 11-26. Serle, Geoffrey. ‘R. M. Crawford and His School’, Melbourne Historical Journal. Vol. 9, 1970, pp. 3-6. Theses Pomeroy, John. ‘Morale on the Homefront in Australia During the Second World War’. Ph.D. thesis, University of Sydney, 1996. Scalmer, Sean. ‘The Career of Class: Intellectuals and the Labour Movement in Australia 1942-56’. Ph.D. thesis, University of Sydney, July 1996. Woodhouse, Fay. ‘The 1951 Communist Party Dissolution Referendum Debate at the University of Melbourne’, B.A. (Hons) thesis, Victoria University of Technology, 1996.
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Index Aborigines, 23, 35, 194 Abyssinia, 40 Abyssinian War, 41 Academic freedom, 4, 11, 23, 78, 108, 112–3, 164, 181–4, 196–7, 201, 218, 220, 224, 233–8, 251–9, 291, 294, 296, 299, 300, 302, 306–7, 328–3, 338–41, 346, 348, 370, 372; see also intellectual freedom activism, 3, 30, 42, 237, 260, 349 Acton, Harold, 26 Adam, Justice, 343–4 Adam, Leonhard, 167, 177, 232 Adelaide University, 238 Adelaide University, 34, 39, 249–50, 282, 292 Adelaide, 34 Africa, 30, 130 Alexander, D.A., 171 Alexander, Fred, 62, 193, 291, 294 All Souls, 55, 185, 222, 308; see also Oxford University American Consulate, 223, 254–5 American Federation of Labor, 128 Anderson, A.C.V., 57 Anderson, John, 2, 39, 40, 71, 79, 106 anthropology, 177 anti-semitism, 130 ANZAAS, 81, 83–4, 175, 253 Apthorpe, Doreen, 171 Atkinson, J.M., 79, 110 Auden, Wystan, 26, 28 Australia, 23 Australia-China Association, 295 Australia-China Cooperative Association, 171 Australia-Soviet House, 158–60, 173, 182, 184, 223
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Australian Association for Cultural Freedom, 331 Australian Broadcasting Commission, 31, 135, 138, 157 Australian Consolidated Press, 347 Australian Council for Civil Liberties (ACCL), 8, 65, 77–80, 87–91, 101–4, 107, 109–12, 118, 140, 171, 183, 202, 223, 257, 262, 294, 368 Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), 88–90, 129 Australian Historical Studies, 84–5 Australian history, 5, 20, 57, 59, 70, 114, 117, 154–5, 162, 166, 177, 189–91, 195, 199, 220, 244, 246–50, 252–3, 279–82, 286, 289–90, 296, 303–4, 307, 324–6, 370 Australian identity, 4, 22 Australian Imperial Forces, 101, 130 Australian Institute of International Affairs, 113, 120, 157 Australian Labor Party, 118, 124, 159, 259, 260 Australian Legation to the USSR, 8, 118– 19, 124, 136–9, 142, 158–9, 168, 369 Australian National University (ANU), 164, 187, 198–9, 228, 236, 238, 250, 253–7, 280, 292, 296, 299, 300–3, 310, 338, 347, 355 Australian Red Cross, 120 Australian Russian Society, 185 Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), 1, 4, 7, 11, 170–1, 222–5, 236–9, 241, 255, 259–60, 295–9, 302–3, 324, 333, 336–41, 346, 349, 355, 369–70, 372–73; see also Commonwealth Investigation Branch Australian Tramways & Motor Omnibus
Employees Association, 111 Australia-Soviet Friendship League, 8, 120, 126, 158, 160, 168, 170–5, 178–85, 202, 223, 339 Australia-Soviet House, 295 Azana, 33, 44 Badger, Colin, 89 Bailey, Kenneth, 2, 55, 62, 77–8, 85, 91, 105–6, 109, 120, 262 Baker, Don, 284, 352, 354 Ball, Macmahon, 2, 120, 155–6, 163, 218, 232, 235, 307 Balliol College, 12, 20, 26–7, 30–2, 39, 55, 57, 62, 71, 75, 82, 112, 179, 242–3, 279, 286, 295, 302, 308, 367; see also Oxford University Baragwanath, Laurie, 163, 226, 249 Baron, Hans, 2, 293, 324, 326 Barrett, Alamada, 224–5 Barrett, James, 77–9, 108–9 Barry, J.V., 102, 110, 158 Barry, Keith, 116 Barunga, Albert, 193–4 Bassett, Walter, 243 Bate, Weston, 367 Baxter, Phillip, 299 Baynes, Mollie, 79, 114 Beaglehole, J.C., 57 Bean, Charles, 116 Belgium, 105, 106 Bell, Kenneth, 2, 26–7, 30–4, 57–9, 62–5, 77, 79, 106 Bergin, Jim, 111 Bexley, 18, 25, 124 BHP, 193 biography, 2, 7–9 Birmingham University, 55–6 Bissell, Claude, 283, 290–1 Blackburn, Maurice, 103, 107, 110–11 Blainey, Geoffrey, 2, 10, 242–3, 310, 355–6, 367, 373 Bloch, Marc, 293 Blue Mountains, 25 Blunder, Geoffrey, 133, 136 Boer War, 20 Book Censorship Abolition League, 65 Boston, 127; see also United States Bourke, Paul, 308 Bradfield College, 8, 36–7, 69 Brenan, Gerald, 41 Brennan, Frank, 103 Brennan, Niall, 103 Brenner, Y.S., 338, 348 Britain, 26, 27, 29
British Broadcasting Commission, 131 British Colonial Service, 30 British Embassy, 133 Brittany, 30 Brown, Maurice, 202 Browne, G.S., 57, 62, 170 Bruce, J.E., 19 Buckley, Ken, 338 Buckley, Vincent, 3, 331, 336, 340, 345, 348 Bulletin, the, 3, 7, 8, 40, 67–8, 78, 327–8, 332, 334–7, 341–2, 346–9, 366 Burns, Arthur, 201, 229, 249, 302 Burns, Creighton, 226, 284, 285 Burton, Herbert (Joe), 26, 66, 75–9, 88–91, 102–3, 110, 180, 236, 253, 285, 287, 350, 372 Butterfield, Herbert, 57 Cain, John, 234 Cairns, Jim, 2, 201–2, 218, 302 Cairo, 131, 141 Calwell, Arthur, 201 Cambridge spies, 259 Cambridge University Press, 189, 253 Cambridge University, 66, 76, 165–6, 186, 254 Camden Harbour, 193–5, 325 Campbell, David, 300 Canberra University College, 165, 187–8, 197, 230, 238–9, 246, 285, 292 Canberra, 81, 163–5, 287 Carnegie Corporation, 220, 222, 226–7, 245, 253–4, 306 Carrington, C.E., 189–90 censorship, 4, 8, 28, 81, 104–5, 112, 219, 240, 369–70 Cerutty, Percy Mills, 169 China, 116 Christ’s Hospital, 33, 36 Christesen, Clem, 2, 262, 332, 336, 338, 350 Christesen, Nina, 2, 229, 239, 332 Christianity, 23, 25 church, 23; see also Christianity Churchill, Winston, 141 Churchward, Lloyd, 254, 349 civil liberties, 4, 90, 102, 106, 224 civilian morale, 116 Clark, C.M.H. (Manning), 2, 9–11, 29, 64, 66, 77, 155–6, 163–4, 177, 184, 186, 190–1, 195–9, 220, 226, 230, 237, 239–40, 245–9, 253, 256–62, 280–5, 287–91, 296, 299, 300–3, 310, 321, 323, 341, 344, 354–7, 366–7, 370–3 Clark, Dymphna, 256
Index
389
Class, 12, 18, 24, 29, 129 Clayton, Wally, 263 Clendinnen, Inga, 228–30, 308, 354, 367, 373 Clermont floods, 17 Cockatoo Island, 193 Cockburn, Claud, 26 Cold War, 1–7, 167–8, 200, 217–18, 237, 255, 259, 262–3, 278, 294, 301, 369–70 Coleman, Peter, 336 collective security, 67 Columbia University, 186, 199 Columbo, 23 Committee of Industrial Organization, 128 Committee of Inquiry into the future of Universities, 309; see also Murray, Keith, Murray Report Commonwealth Department of Defence, 339 Commonwealth Department of External Affairs, 119, 124, 135, 153, 163–4, 239, 260, 262 Commonwealth Department of Information, 120 Commonwealth Department of Post-War Reconstruction, 165 Commonwealth Department of War Organisation of Industry, 115 Commonwealth Fund Fellowship, 72 Commonwealth Investigation Branch 76, 170–2, 184, 370; see also ASIO Commonwealth Literary Fund, 302 Commonwealth Reconstruction Training Scheme, 162–3 Commonwealth Research Grant, 190 communication to the press, 106, 108, 173, 182; see also press communism, 6–8, 18, 24, 36, 45, 74–7, 104–8, 111–12, 140, 170–1, 173–4, 179– 82, 184, 197, 200–3, 218–19, 222, 235, 237–8, 241, 254, 258–63, 278, 298–9, 327, 329, 333–7, 340–8, 366, 372 Communist Dissolution Bill, 217–21, 232, 370; see also communism, Communist Party of Australia Communist Party of Australia (CPA), 65, 76–7, 80, 105–11, 170, 179, 181, 192, 200, 202, 221–4, 236–8, 254, 258, 299, 329; see also Royal Commission to inquire into communist activities in Victoria, referendum on the Banning of the Communist Party of Australia Communist Party of Great Britain, 75–6, 295
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compulsory service, 8, 85; see also national service Conlon, Alf, 116 conservatism, 3, 6, 7, 325 Cook, Christopher, 62, 65 Copland, Douglas, 85–6, 113, 120, 198, 236, 302 Country Part, 232 Coupland, Reginald, 189 Cowen, Zelman, 232–3 Crawford children; Crawford, Michael, 34, 36; Cheshire, Margaret nee Crawford (daughter), 9, 10, 17, 24, 34, 63, 303–5; Crawford, Ian (son), 9, 10, 21, 63, 121, 123, 139, 224, 294, 305, 332, 348, 354, 357 Crawford, Dorothy nee Cheetham (first wife), 24, 31–6, 62, 121, 131, 135, 141, 232, 243, 294, 303–5, 307 Crawford, Gladys (sister), 24 Crawford, Grace (sister), 24 Crawford, Harriet (mother), 2, 16, 24, 27, 29, 31–5, 39, 72, 101, 121 Crawford, Harry (father), 2, 16, 17, 20, 27, 34–5, 157 Crawford, James (uncle), 17 Crawford, John (brother), 17, 21, 33–6, 39, 72, 263, 339, 355, 357 Crawford, Ken (brother), 9, 17, 21, 24, 225 Crawford, Lillian (sister), 24 Crawford, Marjorie (sister), 24 Crawford, Michael (son), 34, 36 Crawford, R.M. and academic freedom, 4, 67, 181, 183–4, 196–7, 219–20, 235, 239–40, 258, 260, 291, 294–5, 299, 301–9, 326–8, 332–4, 344–9, 368–73 as a lecturer, 58, 64–5, 71, 167–8, 177, 250 as a liberalism, 19–20, 25, 28, 67, 70, 76, 80, 179, 278, 309 as a political commentator, 40–1, 43, 61, 67, 87–8 as a public intellectual, 101 as a school teacher, 31, 33, 35–7 as an historian, 72 ASIO, 170–1, 184, 222–5, 237, 295, 299, 337, 339–40, 346, 349, 369–70 attitude to diplomacy, 126, 128 attitude to Russia, 128, 132–6, 139, 157–8, 169, 179 Australian Council for Civil Liberties, 79–81, 86, 101–4, 109–12, 368 Australia-Soviet House, 158–60, 182–84, 223
career ambition, 22, 30, 32–9, 63 and Cold War, 3, 129, 219, 255, 369 conservatism, 19, 23–4 death, 357 Edmunds, Frederick, 172–5, 178–84, 222–3 education – undergraduate, 18–19, 24–31; trip to Oxford, 20–5; Balliol, Oxford, 26–31, 367; friendship, 29–30 evaluations, 2, 366–7, 373 faith, 23, 25 family background, 3, 20–1, 27, 35–6, 59, 63, 71–2; relationship with Harriet and Henry Crawford (parents), 24, 27, 31, 34–5, 101, 121 friendships, 350, 354 as First Secretary to the Australian Legation to the USSR, 131–42; appointment, 117–21; travel to Russia, 124–31 health, 131–2, 153–4, 245–6, 250, 256–7 historical approach, 69, 175 Historical Studies, establishment of, 84–5 ideologue, 2 insecurity, 21, 28 intellectual style, 4 legacy, 2, 163, 353 Melbourne School of History – Crawford’s application, 57–61 Melbourne School of History – Crawford’s appointment, 61 Melbourne School of History – innovations and re-shaping, 5, 59, 62–3, 68–70, 117, 154, 162, 177, 226–7, 280, 290–1, 308, 310–11, 350, 354, 366, 368–73; postgraduates, 166, 199, 226–30, 242–3, 308–9, 371 Melbourne School of History – staffing, 53–61, 74–5, 85, 117, 123, 139, 154–6, 160–4, 167, 176–7, 195–9, 226–30, 245–50, 279–90, 307–311, 335, 342, 346–9, 371; Second Chair of History, 246–50, 278–90, 371 mentors, 19, 26–7, 79, 102, 106, 352 National Registration Bill, 87 National Security Act, 101, 103–7 National Service Committee, 85–7 penchant for compromise, 90 political controversies, 67–8, 85–91, 102, 104–14, 159–60, 168–75, 178–85, 234, 295, 326–8, 332–5,
339–44, 369; Social Studies case, 326–49, 372–3 political denial, 2, 12, 17–18, 42, 90–1, 366–7, 373 political engagement, 3, 12, 30, 36, 40, 45, 65–8, 78–80, 103–8, 110–12, 128, 139–40, 158–60, 168–70, 176, 179–82, 185, 201, 326–8, 332–4, 337–9, 346–9, 353–6, 366–7; political ideology, 3, 78 political withdrawal, 235, 260, 278, 293–4, 299–301, 349, 355, 370 Prime Minister’s Committee on National Morale, 116–17 publications, Australia, 189, 220–2, 290, 335–6; An Australian Perspective, 35, 325–6; Bit of a Rebel, 65, 290, 351–3; History as Science, 175–6; Ourselves and the Pacific, 114–15, 369; Past and Present, 295; Paths to Peace, 290; Study of History, 81–4; The Renaissance Mirror, 290; Wilson Hall, 241 relationship with Brian Fitzpatrick, 79, 102, 110, 256–9 relationship with Dorothy Crawford (first wife), 31, 34, 36, 62–3, 121, 124, 135, 232, 243, 294, 303–5 relationship with John Anderson, 39–40 relationship with John La Nauze, 247–50, 279–90, 307, 329–30, 341, 350, 354 relationship with Kathleen Fitzpatrick, 74, 121–4, 135, 186–8, 231–2, 244–50, 278–87, 323, 335, 341–2, 346–7, 354, 371 relationship with Keith Officer, 124–5, 137 relationship with Manning Clark, 155–6, 163–4, 230, 246–7, 249–50, 278–90, 299–300, 310, 344, 354, 371 relationship with Margaret Kiddle, 162, 256, 283, 294, 298, 305, 321, 323 relationship with Stephen Roberts, 40, 58–9 relationship with Richard Tawney, 291–3 relationship with Ruth Hoban (second wife), 244, 321, 323 , 326, 328–34, 338, 349, 354, 356–7 relationship with women, 24–5, 74, 191, 228–30
Index
391
research, 188–92, 231, 253–4 research on Australian history, 59, 70, 155, 162, 190–1, 248, 290, 307, 324–6, 351, 370 research on Camden Harbour, 192–5, 370 research on Russia, 8, 140–1, 155–6, 185, 370 research on Spain, 15, 32–4, 37, 40–6, 61, 71–5, 368, 370 research on the Renaissance, 290, 293, 326 synoptic approach, 69, 70, 81–4, 367, 369 University of Sydney, 39 University Voluntary Defence Corp, 115–16 visa refusal, 222–5, 231, 370 young life, 16–20 Crawford, Rene (sister), 24, 35 Crawford, Stanley (brother), 63 Crawford, Thomas (uncle), 17 Crean, Frank, 172 Cremor, Brigadier, 162 Crowley, Frank, 226–7, 299, 303 Crozier, Dorothy, 190, 195–9, 230 Cryan, Amy, 113 Currey, C.H., 59, 71 Curti, Merle, 255, 326 Curtin, John, 116, 159 Czechoslavakia, 262–3 Dane, Paul, 103 Davidson, Jim, 253, 257, 296 Davies, Joseph E., 127 Davis, Dorothy, 79 Day Lewis, Cecil, 42 De R. Foenander, Orwell, 62 democracy, 33, 104, 221 Dening, Greg, 308, 353, 356, 373 Denlevy, Maurice, 351 depression, 1, 35, 77, 368 Dexter, David, 163 Dibley, Frederick, 189 diplomacy, 118 Diplomatic Corp, 30, 126, 169, 240 Dixon, Owen, 127 Downing, Richard, 120, 330, 343 Dreamer, Sid, 116 Duncan, Bill, 124, 127–31, 136, 139–40 Dunk, W.K., 165 Dunn, Joyce, 228 Dunstan, Albert, 172
392
An Historian’s Life
Ebbels, Noel, 237 Edmunds, Frederick, 172–3, 178–84, 191–2, 222–3 Edwards, Austin, 89, 90 Eggleston, Frederic, 113–14 Emery, Fred, 329, 337 empire, 22, 25–8, 36, 67, 105 England, 41, 91 Enthwistle, William, 30, 32 Ericksen, Ray, 162 Evatt, H.V., 117–19, 137, 153–4, 159, 170, 172, 258, 260 Falk, Barbara, 187, 281 Farnell, Lewis, 28 Farrago, 66, 68, 180, 341, 345, 347 fascism, 41, 45, 65–8, 111, 114 Federal Council of the University Staff Association, 338 Federation of Australian University Staff Associations, 337–8 fellow travelling, 6 Ferguson, Bell, 153 Field, Francis, 174, 180 Fintona Girls’ School, 114 Firth, Raymond, 199 Fisher, John, 136–8 Fitzhardinge, Laurence, 81, 256–7, 296 Fitzpatrick, Brian, 2, 4, 8, 36, 74–6, 79, 88–91, 102–7, 109–14, 181, 190, 202, 225, 238, 256–9, 263, 296, 326, 341 Fitzpatrick, Kathleen, 2, 7, 10, 74, 84, 114, 117–25, 128–9, 132, 135–41, 153–5, 185–6, 188, 192–6, 202, 218, 224–5, 228, 231–2, 244–55, 260, 278–87, 291, 304, 308–11, 323, 335, 341–2, 346–7, 354, 357, 369, 371 Fitzpatrick, Sheila, 225, 256–7 Florey, Howard, 302 Florida, 12 Foote, C.H., 116 Ford, Frank, 65 Fort Street High School, 18 Foster, J.E., 173, 175 France, 41, 105 Franco, 44 freedom, 43, 80, 106, 135, 174, 202, 234, 326 Friedmann, William, 188, 196–7, 201–2, 218–19, 232 Friendship with Russia League, 156, 158 Fullbright Scholarship, 324 Gandhi, 26 Gardiner, Laurie, 350
Gasset, Ortego y, 44 Germany, 26, 30, 42, 45, 91, 105, 111 Giblin, 120 Gibson, A.B., 102 Gibson, Boyce, 79, 89, 164, 196, 306 Gibson, Nonie, 228 Glenbrook, 21 Gluckman affair, 338, 348 Gollan, Robin, 43, 253, 310, 335 Gorman, Eugene, 79, 89 Gott, Beth, 180 Gott, Ken, 180, 341 Gray, Pat, 199 Greenwood, Gordon, 62, 253–4, 258, 281, 311 Greenwood, Ivor, 181 Greenwood, J.N., 170 Gregory, Jack, 359 Grenfell, 20, 35, 62 Groves, Murray, 178, 242 Gunnamurryamoi, Edward, 193 Hall, Marshall, 178 Hamilton, E., 172 Hancock, Keith, 2, 26, 29, 39, 55–7, 84, 155, 187, 190, 198–9, 279–80, 302–3, 308–11, 347, 354, 367 Harper & Brothers, 189 Harper, Norman, 84, 114, 124, 222–5, 285, 287, 350 Harriman, Averill, 141 Harrison, J., 57, 59 Hartwell, Max, 253, 258, 281, 285–6, 299, 301–3, 309, 337–8 Harvard University, 127, 227 Hawaii, 126; see also Pearl Harbour Hayes, Betty, 228 Hearst, Randolph, 126 Heinze, Bernard, 170 Henderson, George, 20, 57, 62 Henderson, Kingsley, 77–8 Helpmann, Robert, 354 Heydon, Peter, 124, 129–31, 137–9, 153 Higgins, Esmonde, 26, 75–6, 236, 372 Hill, Christopher, 2, 30, 45, 243, 295, 354 historical determinism, 33 historical records, 167, 177 Historical Studies, 9, 10, 351 Hitler, Adolph, 36, 41, 45, 67–8, 78–9, 103–4 Hoban, Ruth (second wife), 7, 244, 304, 321–6, 328–35, 338–40, 343–6, 350–1, 354, 356–7 Hodgson, W.R., 153, 158 Hoff, Ursula, 350
Hogbin, Ian, 62, 116, 165 Holland, 105–6 Hollis, Christopher, 41 Holman, W.A., 2, 17, 352 Holt, Harold, 294 Hong Kong, 32 Honours School, 68 Hook, Sidney, 3, 335, 346 Hooper Research Foundation, 126 Horne, Donald, 2, 9, 71, 330–6, 340, 343–8 Howard, Frederic, 351 Hughes, W.M., 109, 110 Huizinga, Jan, 293 humanity, 26 Hume, David, 175 Hunter, Thomas, 306 Hutchinson’s University Library, 189 Hyde, Alice, 328–9, 334 immigration, 237, 325, 355–6 India, 30 informers, 238, 262 Ingham, Pat, 190 Ingham, Syd, 226 Inglis, Amirah nee Gust, 180 Inglis, Ken, 226, 350, 373 Institute of Applied and Economics Social Research, 350 intellectual freedom, 1–4, 11, 113–14, 183, 309, 368, 372; see also academic freedom intellectual lead, 280, 326 intellectual tradition, 3, 7, 64 intellectuals, 1–6, 19, 26, 35, 44, 64–5, 73, 76–80, 101, 126, 129, 180, 182, 218, 225, 235, 259, 278, 300–1, 325–6, 332, 366, 370, 372 interference, 5 International Movement against War and Fascism, 65 internship, 112 Italy, 30, 40–1, 45, 186, 231 James, Evelyn, 195 James, Gwyn, 84–5, 195, 281 Johnston, Frank, 342 Joint Committee for Peace, 40 Journal of Australian Studies, 351 Jowett, Benjamin, 26 Junta de Ampliacon de Estudios, 32 Kemenov, 158 Kennedy, Don, 308 Kent, 25 Kew (Melbourne), 62
Index
393
Kew Gardens (London), 25 Kiddle, Keith, 298 Kiddle, Margaret, 162, 256, 283–7, 294–9, 300–5, 308, 321–2 Kingston Oliphant Prize, 31 Knapland, Paul, 255 Knopfelmacher, Frank, 3, 327, 331–6, 338–9, 345, 348 Krygier, Richard, 3, 331, 333, 336 Kuibyshev, 131, 133–4, 138, 157; see also USSR La Nauze, John, 123, 188, 230, 244–50, 258, 279–90, 292, 300–3, 307–8, 321–2, 328–30, 341–2, 346–7, 350, 353–7, 371 Latham, John, 120, 238, 335 Lazarus, Mary, 79, 114 Le Gay Brereton, John, 19 League of Nations, 40, 67 Leeper, Geoffrey, 79 Leeson, Ida, 164 Left Book Club, 65, 79 Legge, John, 226, 262, 291, 294 Lewis, Essington, 193 Lewis, Wyndham, 41 Liberal Party of Australia, 258, 260–1, 355 liberalism, 3, 7, 11, 12, 19, 20, 23–5, 28–9, 66, 76, 80–3, 102–6, 142, 170, 179, 200, 221–5, 235, 293, 301, 309, 326–7, 352–3, 366 liberty, 102 Lifanov, N.M., 127, 158, 168, 170, 172 Lindsay, A.D., 2, 27, 32, 57, 59, 62, 79 Littlewood, Charles, 339 London School of Economics, 199 London University, 58, 254, 291 London, 25, 225 Love, J.R.B., 193 Lowe, Charles, 2, 159–60, 174–5, 183, 201–3, 233–5, 302 loyalty, 108, 109, 112, 178–9 Lucas, Theo, 79 Machiavelli, 18 Mackay, Don, 342, 347 Mackinolty, John, 234 MacRobertson Girls’ High School, 114 Main, Jim, 222, 226–7 Maloney, J.J., 153, 168–71, 173 Manchuria, 26 Martin, Leslie, 252 Masterman, J.C., 28 Maxwell, Ian, 232, 233 McAuley, James, 3, 331, 333, 336 McBriar, Alan, 195, 226, 281, 347, 373
394
An Historian’s Life
McBride, Pat, 166 McCarthyism, 129, 183, 217–18, 236, 240, 255, 260, 298, 325–7 McDonald, A., 156 McQueen, Humphrey, 352, 353 Medley, John, 71, 78, 85, 87, 105–9, 113, 115, 118–9, 139, 154–6, 159, 162–7, 178, 182, 192, 196, 201–3, 218–19, 225, 229, 232 Melbourne Club, 298 Melbourne Cricket Ground, 66 Melbourne Grammar School, 55 Melbourne School of History – Crawford’s application, 57–61 Melbourne School of History – Crawford’s appointment, 61 Melbourne School of History – innovations and re-shaping, 5, 59, 62–3, 68–70, 117, 154, 162, 177, 226–7, 280, 290–1, 308–11, 350, 354, 366–9, 371, 373; postgraduates, 166, 199, 226–30, 242–3, 308–9, 371 Melbourne School of History – staffing, 53–61, 74–5, 85, 117, 123, 139, 154–6, 160–4, 167, 176–7, 195–9, 226–30, 245– 50, 279–90, 307–11, 335, 342, 346–9, 371; Second Chair of History, 246–50, 278–90, 371 Melbourne University Labor Club, 103, 108, 180, 200, 202, 239 Melbourne University Liberal Club, 91 Melbourne University Press, 84 Melbourne University Staff Association, 5, 69, 80, 82, 192, 201–2, 218–9, 251–2, 293, 307, 329, 342, 347 Melbourne, 72 Meldrum, Max, 79 Menzies, Robert, 1, 2, 88, 91, 101–4, 159, 200, 217, 221–2, 236, 240, 258–9, 260, 296, 302, 309, 350 Meyer, Karl, 126, 128 Mills, R.C., 83, 165, 198 Milner, Ian, 2, 11, 119, 163–4, 184–5, 197, 236, 262–3 Molotov, V.M., 135 Monash University, 310, 325, 347 Moorhouse, Charles, 330, 343 Morosova, Ludmilla, 133 Morrison, Sylvia, 228 Moscow, 119, 131, 134, 138–41, 153; see also USSR Mosley, Oswald, 36 Moss Vale, 71 Moyseyena, Mina, 133 Mt Lyell Company, 243
Muir, William, 28, 30, 32, 34, 65, 231, 354 Mulvaney, John, 177, 194, 354, 367, 373 Murdoch, Keith, 105 Murdoch, Walter, 105, 106 Murray Report, 309, 310, 346; see also Committee of Inquiry into the future of Universities; Murray, Keith Murray, Canon, 158 Murray, J.K., 165 Murray, Keith, 309; see also Committee of Inquiry into the future of Universities, Murray Report Murray-Smith, Nita, 180 Murray-Smith, Stephen, 163, 239, 353, 354 Mussolini, Benito, 30, 41, 45, 67, 68 Myer, Ken, 350 Nadel, George, 226–7, 242 National Registration Bill, 87–90 National Security Act, 103–4, 110–11, 369 National Service Committee, 85–6 national service, 86–9, 91, 368; see also compulsory service nationalism, 22, 45, 79, 129, 237, 370 Nazi Soviet Pact, 91, 102 Nettleford, Thomas, 159 New Guinea, 23 New York, 127; see also United States New Zealand, 32, 39, 57 O’Brien, John, 167, 280, 332, 335, 341–2, 347 O’Brien, Laurie, 9, 112, 230, 328, 332, 342, 349 Observer, 327, 334 Oeser, Oscar, 218 Officer, Keith, 2, 124–6, 129–30, 134–9, 142 Olympic Games, Berlin, 45 Oriel College, 227; see also Oxford University Orr case, 306, 330, 334, 344–8 Orr, Sydney, 2, 11, 306, 338 Ortego d, Jose, 82 Oxford University, 8, 11, 19, 20, 24–31, 33, 59, 65–6, 69, 76, 130, 141, 165–6, 187, 196–9, 222, 226–7, 231–2, 242–3, 254, 308; see also All Souls, Balliol College, Oriel College, Somerville College Palmer, Nettie, 2, 41–2, 44, 75, 83 Palmer, Vance, 41, 89, 103, 106–7, 110, 118–19 Paris, Peter, 130 Parnaby, Owen, 226 Parsons, Givon, 255
Partridge, P.H., 184, 300 Paton, George, 115, 196, 219, 224, 229, 233–5, 245, 249, 251–2, 257, 262, 278, 324, 329–30, 333, 342–5, 348 Patrick, Alison, 228–9, 308 Paul, George, 79, 175 Pearl Harbour, 125; see also Hawaii Penguin Books, 244 Petersham Girls’ High School, 31 Petrov affair, 259, 263 Petrov, Evdokia, 259 Petrov, Vladimir, 259 PhD regulation, 166 Philipp, Franz, 227 Philipp, June, 228–9, 282, 284, 308, 310, 342 Philosophical Association, 80 Pike, Douglas, 354 Pirenne, Henry, 293 Pitt, Lorna, 281 Poland, 91, Polgaze, Jean, 120 Polish refugees, 139–40, 158 political denial, 2, 7, 11, 12 politics, 28 Pollardo, Oriollo, 42 Pope, Arthur Upham, 127–8 Portus, Garnet, 20, 75–6, 219 Postan, M.M., 187 postgraduate research, 165–6, 190, 227, 242–3, 255 Power, Eileen, 293 Poynter, John, 349, 367, 373 press, 4, 8, 106–7, 123, 136, 138, 173, 182, 259–60, 356; see also communication to the press, spoiling operations Prest, Wilfred, 113, 285 Priestley, Raymond, 56–9, 61–2, 66–8, 70–1, 74–5, 326 Prime Minister’s Committee on National Morale, 116–17 Princeton University, 199 Prospect, 340 Protest, 67, 106, 191, 200, 203 Public Service Board, 298–9 Puzzo, Dante A., 42 Quadrant, 331 Queensland University, 253–4 Raab, Felix, 308–9 race relations, 325 Radford, J.G., 102 radicalism, 3, 6, 12, 66, 200 radicals, 1, 4
Index
395
Railwaymen’s Union, 17 Ralegh, 28 Ratcliffe, Horace, 111–13, 171 Rawson, Roy, 79, 102 referendum on the banning of the Communist Party of Australia, 232–6, 370; see also Communist Party of Australia Retired Rail and Tramwayman, The, 157 Rhodes Scholarship, 23–4, 27 Rivett, David, 79, 120 Roberts, Stephen, 2, 37–42, 45, 58–9, 61–4, 78, 81, 85, 220, 368 Roberts, Thelma, 45 Robertson, Ian, 308, 350 Rockefeller Fellowship, 32, 34, 37, 72, 222, 289, 291, 294 Rodgers, John, 159–60, 170, 175, 184, 294 Roosevelt, F.D., 129, 141 Roper, E.D., 116 Roper, Myra, 292 Rosenberg, Ethel, 259 Rosenberg, Julius, 259 Royal Commission into Espionage, 259–63; see also Communist Party of Australia, Communists Royal Commission to inquire into communist activities in Victoria, 201, 202–3, 217, 223; see also Communism, Communist Party of Australia Rural Bank of New South Wales, 72 Russia’s National Day Committee, 158 Russian history, 155, 167 Rutherford, J., 57 Ryan, Peter, 295–6 Ryder, Francis, 28–9 S.S. Ormonde, 21 Sachin, Allan, 284 San Francisco, 127; see also United States Sane Democracy, 77–8 Santamaria, B.A., 66 Sawyer, Geoffrey, 202 Saxby, M., 138 Schoeppel, Andrew, 224 Scotch College, 75 Scott Polar Institute, 186 Scott, Emily, 253 Scott, Ernest, 46, 55–8, 61–2, 74, 114, 117, 135, 253 Scutt, C.A., 66 Serle, Geoff, 200, 226, 228, 247, 250, 310, 347, 353–4, 367–8, 371, 373 Shann, Edward, 55, 57, 155, 250 Sharp, Geoffrey, 9, 254, 310, 328–9, 332–6,
396
An Historian’s Life
339, 343–7 Sharp, Paul, 304 Sharpley, Cecil, 202 Shaw, Alan, 221, 226–7, 373 Sheepskins for Russia Movement, 159 Shepardson, Whitney, 220, 227, 245 Shepparton, 123 Sinclair, Keith, 168 Skerry, J.H., 158 Slater, Mary, 159 Slater, William, 106, 118–21, 124–5, 129– 30, 133–9, 153, 159, 168–9 Smith, Barry, 308 Smith, Homer, 134 Smiths Weekly, 140, 171 Social Sciences Committee, 113 Social Studies Enquiry, 8; see also Crawford, R.M., political controversies Social Studies Research Council, 258 Society for Cultural Relations, 158 Solatov, 158 Somerset, 29 Somerville College, 75; see also Oxford University, Spain, 15–16, 26, 32–3, 36–7, 40, 42–6, 61, 72–3, 116 Spanish Civil War, 8, 33, 41–5, 65–6, 72–3, 79, 368 Spanish Relief Committee, 42, 65 spoiling operations, 337, 373; see also press Spry, Charles, 1, 2, 225, 236–7, 298, 337–8 St Andrews College, 84 Stalin, Joseph, 141 Stanner, W., 116 Starkie, Walter, 41 starvation, 131–2 Stead, Christina, 18 Steinbeck, John, 126 Stephenson, P.R. (Inky), 11, 23–4, 76 Stephenson, William, 225 Stone, C.G., 26 Stone, Julius, 116 Stopes, Marie, 28 Stout, A.K., 116 Street, G.A., 87 Street, Jessie, 168–9 Stretton, Althea, 190 Stretton, Hugh, 2, 167–8, 199, 222, 226–7, 242, 248–50, 282, 308–9, 367 Student Representatives Council, 87, 178, 181, 233–4, 347 Sumner, Humphrey, 185–6, 199, 222, 231 Sumner, Lindsay, 26, 32, 83 suppression, 5
surveillance, 4, 11, 76, 182, 236–7, 239–40, 370, 372 Sutherland, Sydney, 105 Sydney Girls’ Grammar School, 31–4, 367 Sydney Technological University, 253 Sydney, 31, 35, 62–3, 65 Synoptic Club, 28 synoptic history, 69, 70, 83, 369 Tarrant, Valerie, 228 Tasmania, 177 Tatura, 112 Tawney, Richard H., 2, 76, 79, 195, 243, 260, 290–3, 296 Tehran Conference, 141, 157, 159 Tehran, 131, 141 Tel Aviv, 141 Templeton, Jacqui, 308, 354 Theory and Method, 70–1, 82, 186, 189 Thomas, Max, 110–13, 171 Thomson, Donald, 120 Toscana, 231 Townsley, W.A., 83 treason, 111 Trikojus, Victor, 112 Trinity College, University of Melbourne, 55, 70 Truman, Tom, 199, 237, 295, 350 Turkey, 141 Turnbull, Clive, 118, 121 Turner, Arthur, 9, 330–1, 335–7, 345 Turner, Cynthia, 9, 328, 331 Turner, Ian, 202, 335 Turner, John, 166 United Nations, 185, 262 United States Consulate, 225 United States of America, 1, 127–9, 183, 186, 218, 222–3, 255; see also Boston, Florida, Hawaii, New York, San Francisco, Virginia, Washington University Democratic Rights Commission, 219 University Gazette, 194 University of Melbourne, 11, 15, 37, 53, 57, 71, 75, 77, 87, 106, 113, 116–17, 139, 160–4, 167, 172–4, 178, 183–4, 187–8, 195, 226, 234–8, 241, 248–52, 258, 262, 285, 292, 296, 302, 310, 332, 337, 353, 372 University of Melbourne, Department of Criminology, 328 University of Melbourne, Department of Psychology, 329, 331, 45 University of Melbourne, Department
of Social Studies, 244, 328–32, 335–9, 341–5, 348–9, 372–3 University of Melbourne, History Department, 5, 9, 11, 46, 53, 56, 59, 61–3, 68–70, 80, 85, 115, 119–20, 123, 125, 139, 154, 162–7, 176, 182, 186–90, 195, 199, 200, 220, 226–30, 241–52, 257, 278–83, 286, 289–92, 301, 307–11, 324–5, 332, 334–5, 341–2, 346, 349–51, 355, 366–8, 371–3; see also Melbourne School of History University of Melbourne, Political Science Department, 119, 155–6, 163–4, 196–7 University of Moscow, 135 University of New England, 303 University of New South Wales, 299, 338; see also University of Technology University of Sydney, 8, 18–21, 26, 37, 39, 43, 55, 58, 66, 69, 72, 78, 84–5, 179, 238, 253, 262, 292, 296, 346, 367–8 University of Tasmania, 238, 306, 307 University of Technology, 298–9, 302; see also University of New South Wales University of Washington, 219 University of Western Australia, 104, 238 University of Wisconsin, 303–4, 323–6 University of Witwatersrand, 306 University Voluntary Defence Corps, 115–16 USSR, 1, 41, 102, 105, 111, 116–23, 125, 128, 132–6, 139, 141, 171, 176, 185, 263; see also Kuibyshev, Moscow Vedette, 17, 18 Victoria University College, 306 Vienna, 30 Vietnam War, 355 Virginia, 129 visa application, 8, 222–5, 231, 278, 301, 370 VOKS – All Union Association for Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries, 133–4, 158 Wagga Wagga Teachers College, 299 Walkrom, A.K., 81 Ward, Eddie, 124 Ward, John, 253, 258, 281, 311 Ward, Russel, 2, 4, 11, 162, 237, 247, 256, 296, 298–9, 300–3, 326, 332, 334, 338, 348 Warrnambool, 355 Washington, 127, 129; see also United States Waugh, Evelyn, 26
Index
397
Webb, Jessie, 10, 72, 74, 84, 114, 139, 154 Webb, Leicester, 257 Wentworth, William, 258, 341 Western Australia, 192, 195 White Australia Policy, 221, 237 Whitelock, Derek, 352 Wilcher, Lewis, 70 Williams, Althea, 222 Williams, Gwyneth, 289, 354, 355 Williams, Mick, 222, 227, 242–3 Wilmot, Frank, 84 Wilson Hall, University of Melbourne, 53, 106, 240, 241 Wilson, Roland, 113 Wolff, Erica, 166 Wollongong, 109 women historians, 5, 228–9, 246, 308 women students, 74, 228–9
398
An Historian’s Life
women, 24–5, 116, 123, 228–9, 246 Wood, Fred, 39, 57–8, 62, 165, 249, 250, 287, 354 Wood, G.L., 112–3 Wood, George Arnold, 19, 20, 39, 57, 65, 69, 79, 82–3, 106, 155, 167, 192–3, 351–3 Woodruff, H.A., 89 Workers Educational Association, 75 World War I, 16, 66 World War II, 1, 7, 41, 105, 369 Wright, R.D. (Pansy), 11, 116, 120, 126, 153, 170, 218, 232, 234, 307, 309 Wurth, Wallace, 298 Yule, George, 226, 354 Yule, Valerie, 115, 354
