Copies of British war diaries and other records, 1914-18 War ("Heyes papers")

Copies of British war diaries and other records, 1914-18 War ("Heyes papers"):


Tasmin Heyes served as an agent of the Australian War Records Section (AWRS) abroad, and secured for the Australian Official Histories many valuable military and naval records that provided the contextual understanding behind Australia’s role in the War of 1914-1918.

The origins of this series can be traced to 1917 when the Commandant of AIF Administrative Headquarters wrote to the Secretary of the British War Office, requesting that AIF war diaries be transferred to the newly created Australian War Records Section (AWRS). Diaries of British formations which included Australian units, or of British units flanking Australian units, were also requested.

British delays and difficulties arranging for the production of their own histories impacted the Australian effort, and supply of British records to the AWRS was subsequently suspended. Efforts were nonetheless renewed and lists of required war diary and non-war diary material drawn up and dispatched over 1920-3. These requirements were presented to the British the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence (CID).

In May 1922 the flow of records resumed and the British suggested that an Australian officer be attached to the Historical Section to act as liaison between it and the Australian official historian. The British also urged that the copies of relevant files be typed as the project would take six to eight years using the Photostat method – an early form of photocopying, which created a photographic negative plate, from which copies could be made.

The Australian War Museum (as the Australian War Memorial was known until October, 1923) and C E W Bean, the Australian official historian, agreed to this and sent a liaison officer. The appointee would ensure that:
1.Unwanted material would be discarded;
2.Valuable non-diary records would be made available; and
3.Summaries and extracts would not have to be made in Australia as they would be copied in Britain.

On Bean's recommendation Mr Tasman H E Heyes, chief clerk at the Australian War Museum, was appointed by the War Museum Committee. A war veteran himself, being posted to the Australian War Records Section and promoted sergeant, Heyes' mission was to make extracts from, or precis of, war diaries and "other records" of such formations and units of the British and Canadian armies as were intimately associated with the AIF in France, Palestine and Gallipoli.

The records for Palestine, Egypt and Gallipoli were generally to be left to last (except urgently needed medical records) and Heyes was to concentrate on the records for France for the years 1917 and 1918, most of those covering 1916 being already in hand. The extracts were to be prepared in duplicate to correspond with the division of battles into periods and sub periods "for filing purposes".
1.Detailed instructions regarding what records he was to collect and in what depth were as follows (AWM93, 12/5/128, (part 2), "Notes and Instructions..."):
2.
3."Full precis" of GHQ General Staff [GS] diaries for periods of heavy fighting, but "very little" for quiet times, looking particularly for references to strategy and the background to operations;
4.
5.“Everything concerning Australian operations and a full statement of the rest" from the GS, Royal Artillery [RA] and Director of Medical Services [DMS] of armies and corps in which Australians fought;
6.
7.“Fairly full statements" in times of heavy fighting from the diaries of flanking armies and corps;
8.
9.“Full statements" of headquarters, brigades and battalions on the Australians' immediate flanks and of flanking divisions;
10.
11.Specified records of formations to which the Australian Flying Corps [AFC], artillery and tunneling companies were attached.
12.

In addition, Heyes was requested to obtain records for the naval historian, A D Jose. He was cautioned not to be conservative; all records needed "clearly to understand the work of the Australian forces" were wanted (AWM93, 12/5/128 Part 3, Treloar to Heyes, 14 April 1926).

Having arrived in London in July 1924 Heyes began extracting, copying and despatching, firstly, "special records" needed by the medical historian, A G Butler, and extracts from war diaries for 1916 not already obtained.

Most of the diary and naval material would apparently be procured and copied without difficulty, but from the start Heyes encountered problems with non-diary records, and this disrupted the entire documentation program. He reported it was "no easy matter" to obtain Gallipoli medical records as custody of them was shared by a number of agencies, including four branches of the Admiralty (AWM93, 12/5/128 Part 3, Heyes to Acting Director of the War Museum, 3 August 1924).

Resistance within the Historical Section in late 1924 over the copying of non-diary records prompted the British to try and circumvent the agreed process and force the Australians to submit a list of questions which its experts would answer rather than allowing the records to be copied. Bean did supply questions that were answered, though he observed later that this method "has...proved entirely inadequate" (AWM93, 12/5/128 Part 3, memorandum of Bean, 18 April 1926).

Heyes' position had improved by the following August when he reported that he now had permission "to walk into any room where records are filed and to examine any records in those rooms" and continue with the project as originally intended. Apart from war diaries these included correspondence, operations files and messages of GHQ, armies, corps and divisions, and a collection of "special files" (AWM93, 12/5/128 Part 3, Heyes to Treloar, 18 August 1926).

Heyes completed the British copying project in August 1927. After leaving Britain he spent short periods in Ottawa, Washington and Wellington gathering copies of other records needed for the official history.


Content

AWM45 is an artificial series comprising typescript copies of British - and some Canadian, American and New Zealand - war records. It consists almost entirely of carbon duplicate copies of copies Heyes' staff of three typists made from the original records, and can thus be regarded as "copies of copies". Some, at least, of the "original copies" were eventually absorbed into other AWM-held record series.

Some of those relating to France were inter-sorted with British and AIF original records in AWM26 (operations files). Others found their way into AWM36 (naval records used by Jose) and AWM41 (Butler's papers). The whereabouts of the originals of other material in the series - such as the Gallipoli and Palestine material, "special files", and subject-based records and so on - has not been determined.

The greater part of the series comprises copies of extracts from British formation and unit war diaries. They include the diary itself (a day-by-day or hour-by-hour record of activities) and attached appendices (signals, minutes, operations orders, reports, returns, records of conferences, etc.). Heyes sorted the extracts according to the period/sub period system, marking these on the item covers.


System of arrangement and control

The series has been arranged, as accumulated, in "bundles". Bundles and items of non-diary material are generally arranged by provenance (unit or formation) or subject (e.g. battles, medical records, naval records, etc.). Heyes compiled other large subject-classified items, labelling them "special" or "miscellaneous" files. These document battles, individual units' activities, strategic questions, operations and so on. Sometimes such material was labelled "duplicates" and left unarranged in large bundles (now titled "Operations, 1916-7" or something similar). Other types of non-diary material include narrative accounts of the war (e.g. "Yilderin"), the material collected in response to Bean's questions and American operational records.

A two-number system has been imposed on the series ([1/1] - [49/1]), the primary number indicating the provenance of each bundle – i.e. the 1 series includes Naval Records – and the second number indicating an order in sequence depends on one or more of a number of arrangement schemes appropriated from the British, devised by Heyes or imposed later:
1.As chronological;
2.
3.By formation/unit and their components;
1.By type of record;
2.
3.By subject;
4.
5.By theatre;
6.
7.By sovereign provenance of records
8.

In accordance with archival principles Heyes' organization scheme has been retained, despite a certain awkwardness whereby diary material, correspondence, "special files" and so on are interspersed out of logical order.


Using the series

AWM45 is not presently digitised for access on the Australian War Memorial’s website. Researchers may use the National Archives of Australia database, RecordSearch to examine the items in this series. Items may be retrieved and viewed in the Memorial’s Reading Room.

• AWM45 1 - [Naval Records, 1914-1918:]
• AWM45 12 - [Extracts from British Unit War Diaries - Palestine, 1916-1919:]
• AWM45 32