Before Australia had a Foreign Service most of its background information on international issues was received from London. Following World War 1, and especially after the appointment of an External Affairs Liaison Officer in London in 1924, classified Foreign Office material on a multiplicity of subjects was passed to the Prime Minister. Foreign Office prints are registeredc as CRS A6782.
During World War 2, papers containing information of relevance to the war and the post war world were prepared for the Foreign Office by the Foreign Research and Press Service, based at Balliol College, Oxford, and by the Foreign Office Research Division.
These papers were originally controlled by a complex classified alphanumerical system (eg - RR/XV/19/i). External Affairs received them from London in irregular batches, not necessarily in chronological order. For the purpose of ciculating them around the Department, the Library listed them by title as they arrived, imposed a handwritten serial number on each paper. Each separate typescript list also received a serial number. Lists numbered 1 to 40 are extant, covering papers numbered 1 to 947 and dated from 1940 to 1946.
The paper have been bundled into runs and numbered by Foreign Affairs and Trade. The lists have been amalgamated and given a number in this run.