Queen Elizabeth’s letters to Governor-General are missing – again

In another archival debacle, letters between the Queen and Governor-General Michael Jeffery cannot be found.

Prince Philip, Marlena Jeffery, Queen Elizabeth II and Governor-General Michael Jeffery at Government House Canberra in March 2006. Picture: AAP

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12:00AMMarch 08, 2025

Queen Elizabeth II’s letters to governor-general Michael Jeffery are missing, with Government House and the National Archives of Australia acknowledging they don’t know where they are, even though they are Commonwealth records open for public access after 20 years.

No routine vice-regal correspondence from the queen and her staff to the former governor-general and his staff from 2003 or 2004 have been transferred to the National Archives.

This was discovered after a request by The Australian to view the records.

In June 2023, it was revealed that Peter Hollingworth’s correspondence with the queen had also disappeared.

After an extensive search it was discovered they had been taken by the former governor-general and were subsequently deposited with the National Archives.

The royal family, including Queen Elizabeth II and then-prince Charles, rallied around Peter Hollingworth (centre) in 2003.

Those letters, when disclosed, revealed that Dr Hollingworth felt he was a victim of a witch hunt over his past handling of child sexual abuse while archbishop of Brisbane, which led to his resignation as governor-general. The queen subsequently wrote a letter of “sympathy” following his resignation from the vice-regal role.

Mr Jeffery, who died in December 2020, served as governor-general from August 2003 to September 2008.

He was known for having deeply conservative views on a range of social issues. It is likely he corresponded about policy and political matters during the Howard and Rudd governments, deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, and the aftermath of the Dr Hollingworth scandals.

The vice-regal correspondence is classified as official Commonwealth records and are required to be deposited with the National Archives under the Archives Act 1983. They are not personal records.

All correspondence either to or from the monarch and their staff has been transferred to the archives for later public release.

Dr Hollingworth and Mr Jeffery are the only governors-general not to do this in the past 60 years.

Michael Jeffery, who died in December 2020, was a senior Australian Army officer and governor-general between 2003 and 2008.

Hundreds of letters between governors-general Richard Casey (1965-69), Paul Hasluck (1969-74), John Kerr (1974-77), Zelman Cowen (1977-82), Ninian Stephen (1982-89), Bill Hayden (1989-96), William Deane (1996-2001) and Dr Hollingworth with the queen, her family and her staff have been exclusively reported by The Australian since 2020.

Only one letter from Jeffery to the queen has been located. It is not a routine dispatch reporting his activities and observations as her representative in Australia, as all his predecessors frequently wrote, but rather a one-page letter to thank her for lunch at Buckingham Palace in early 2004.

The failure to locate and transfer the correspondence, following the debacle over Dr Hollingworth’s letters, is an embarrassment to both the National Archives and Government House.

Former governors-general Sir William Deane and Michael Jeffery in 2014 before General Sir Peter Cosgrove was sworn in as Australia’s 26th Governor-General.

In a statement, the National Archives confirmed it had not identified any records in its custody that contain correspondence from the queen or her staff from 2003 and 2004.

“National Archives is working actively (with Government House) to identify potential gaps in content and address these through future transfers,” a spokesman said.

A spokesman for the Office of the Official Secretary to the Governor-General said they only became aware last week that some records from Mr Jeffery’s term may not have been transferred, but it was not known if the office still held records from that period.

“For the avoidance of doubt, the office is actively undertaking an internal review that may include consulting with third parties,” the spokesman said.

“Should any records be discovered through this review, the office will arrange for them to be transferred to the National Archives.”