Series number

AWM78

Series title

Reports of Proceedings, HMA Ships and Establishments

Contents date range

1939-1993

Extent

32 metres

Access conditions

Subject to the Archives Act, 1983

Agency controlling

Department of Defence

Custodial agency

Australian War Memorial

Function and provenance

Reports of Proceedings (ROPs) are the official record of activities of the Royal Australian Navy’s commands, vessels, shore establishments, administrative authorities and installations.

Instructions on reporting were ordinarily laid out in detail in The King’s Regulations and Admiralty Instructions, however reports of proceedings do not appear to have been named as such until after the Second World War.  For example, The Queen’s Regulations and Admiralty Instructions of 1953 mention ‘reporting proceedings’ under item 2708 (for Commanders-in-Chief and Senior Officers), and item 2904 (for Captains).

Reports of Proceedings were normally submitted by a commanding officer to his superior, and then on to Navy Office.  Although the 1953 instructions do not specify the frequency of the reports (‘The Captain is to report his proceedings from time to time...’), it was common practice to submit them either monthly, in the case of ships, or quarterly, in the case of shore establishments. Reporting was required in both wartime and peacetime. In some cases, especially in the early years of the Second World War, reports were in the form of ‘war diaries’, or in earlier decades they were sometimes referred to as ‘Letters of Proceedings’.

Between 1979-1981 many of the ROPs were temporarily transferred from Navy custody to the Australian Archives, where they were registered as Series A4621.  In 1981 they were returned from Australian Archives to the Department of Defence.  Later that year the series began to be transferred to the Australian War Memorial, and this continued between late 1981 and 1984.  A few extra items were also transferred in the early 1990s.

Content

The series comprises almost 1,600 individual files, each being a Report of Proceedings. About one third of the series covers the years of the Second World War (1939-1945), with the remaining two-thirds covering subsequent decades.

There are Reports of Proceedings from five general navy groups:

·          Commands

·          Vessels and groups of vessels (e.g. squadrons, flotillas)

·          Administrative authorities (e.g. Naval Officer in Charge, Flag Officer Commanding)

·          Shore establishments

·          Miscellaneous

The types of information found in ROPs typically include:

·          Events of `historical significance'

·          Dates of arrival at, and departure from places visited

·          Details of ships in company

·          Visits and official calls

·          Outstanding incidents

·          Details of operations

·          The state of the ship and its company

Some ROPs may also include photographs.

System of arrangement and control

The ROPs of individual ships, establishments, etc, are generally arranged alphabetically and in chronological order, covering periods of one or more years. A two number control system has been imposed on each item.  Each ship or establishment forms a separate subseries and is represented by a different first number, with the second number representing the sequential file number in that subseries.  The Control symbols for this series range from [1/1] to [457/1]

Some ROPs comprise several items. For most ships operating in the Second World War and the immediate post war years there are, additionally, items containing duplicate copies of ROPs. These duplicates are often incomplete.

Using the series

Each item is recorded on the RecordSearch database which researchers can access via the internet. Further assistance in finding relevant information may be gained from related series of records (click on Series Links at the bottom of this page).

Digitisation

This series is being progressively digitised, with access to the images via the Australian War Memorial’s website at, http://www.awm.gov.au/collection/records/awm78/

As of July 2015 items numbers [1/1] through [245/2] had been digitised.

Sources

AWM78 series dossier

The Queen’s Regulations and Admiralty Instructions for the Government of Her Majesty’s Naval Service, HMSO (1953).

AWM files:

AWM315 208/001/005

AWM315 416/020/001

Related digitised records

Admiralty Fleet Orders (AFO) from 1910 to 1945 are available at the Royal Australian Navy website at:

www.navy.gov.au/media-room/publications/admiralty-fleet-orders