Alexandra Hasluck

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AD
Hasluck in 1960
Viceregal consort of Australia
In office
30 April 1969 – 11 July 1974
MonarchElizabeth II
Governor GeneralSir Paul Hasluck
Preceded byMaie, Lady Casey
Succeeded byAlison, Lady Kerr
Personal details
Born
Alexandra Margaret Martin Darker

(1908-08-26)26 August 1908
North Perth, Western Australia, Australia
Died18 June 1993(1993-06-18) (aged 84)
Claremont, Western Australia, Australia
Resting placeMelbourne General Cemetery
Spouse
​
​
(m. 1932; died 1993)​
ChildrenNicholas Hasluck (son)
Alma materUniversity of Western Australia
OccupationWriter and vice-regal wife

Dame Alexandra Margaret Martin Hasluck, Lady Hasluck,

wife of Sir Paul Hasluck, Governor-General of Australia
.

Early life

Hasluck was born on 26 August 1908 in North Perth, Western Australia. She was the only child of Evelyn Margaret (née Hill) and John William Darker. Her father was an engineer and her mother was one of the first female graduates of the University of Sydney.[1]

Hasluck attended

Arthurian legend for financial reasons. She subsequently taught English and French at a small private school and later at St Hilda's Anglican School for Girls.[1]

Marriage and public life

In 1932, she married Paul Hasluck, who (as Sir Paul) was Governor-General of Australia 1969–1974. In 1974 he was offered an extension of his term by the Prime Minister, Gough Whitlam, and he was willing to serve an extra two years, but Lady Hasluck (as she then was) refused to remain at Yarralumla longer than the originally agreed five years.[2] Whitlam then appointed Sir John Kerr. Historians of the period are certain that if Hasluck had still been Governor-General in 1975, as he would have been had his wife not intervened, the constitutional crisis of that year would have ended differently. Hasluck himself implied this in his book, The Office of Governor-General and also in the Queale Lecture.[citation needed]

In the 1978 Queen's Birthday Honours, Lady Hasluck was appointed the first Dame of the Order of Australia for "pre-eminent achievement in the fields of literature and history and for extraordinary and meritorious public service to Australia".[3]

Writing

Hasluck wrote poetry and prose from a young age. Her early interests included medieval England, and in the 1930s she wrote a historical novel titled Tudor Blood which was rejected for publication. She developed an interest in the

Western Australian Historical Society.[1]

Hasluck published eleven books on history as well as a collection of short stories and an autobiography.

Edmund Du Cane (1973), as well as shorter works on James Stirling and C. Y. O'Connor. Her 1959 book Unwilling Emigrants examined the convict era of Western Australia through a study of convict William Sykes. Her writing was targeted at general readers and "brought the history of Western Australia to a popular audience at a time when the State's historiography was in its infancy".[1]

Death

She died in 1993. Dame Alexandra and Sir Paul Hasluck are joint eponyms of the Western Australian Federal House of Representatives Division of Hasluck.

Publications

  • Georgiana Molloy: Portrait with Background (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1955)
  • Unwilling Emigrants (London: Oxford University Press, 1959)
  • Remembered With Affection (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1963; book design by Alison Forbes)[5]
  • Thomas Peel of Swan River (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1965)
  • Audrey Tennyson's Vice-Regal Days (Canberra: National Library of Australia, 1978)[6]
  • Portrait in a Mirror (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1981)

See also

  • Spouse of the Governor-General of Australia

References

  1. ^ a b c d Hunter, Ann P. (2017). "Hasluck, Dame Alexandra Margaret (Alix) (1908–1993)". Australian Dictionary of Biography.
  2. ^ 'How one strong woman changed the course of Australian history, The Age, 2 January 2010
  3. ^ "Australian Government Gazette – Special" (PDF). Government House of The Commonwealth of Australia. Archived from the original (PDF) on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 12 June 2016.
  4. ^ "Author Hasluck dies, 84". The Canberra Times. 19 June 1993. p. 3. Retrieved 9 January 2014 – via National Library of Australia.
  5. ^ Recollection | Alison Forbes, recollection.com.au. Retrieved 18 June 2023.
  6. ISBN 978-0-642-99115-7
    .

Further reading

External links
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