Stephen H. Roberts

Stephen Henry Roberts (born February 16, 1901 in Maldon , Victoria , † March 19, 1971 ) was an Australian historian.

Life and activity

Roberts was born into modest circumstances in the Australian state of Victoria. His father, Christopher Roberts, was a Cornwall miner and his mother, Doris Elsie Whillelmina Wagener, was of German descent. He attended Castlemaine High School and Melbourne Teachers' College. He was then able to study history at the University of Melbourne with the help of a scholarship , where he earned a bachelor's degree in 1921 and a master's degree in 1923. Around 1927 he came to London to deepen his studies , where he was able to conduct research at the London School of Economics thanks to a research grant from London University . His teachers there included Harold Laski and Lillian Knowles . During this time he completed a dissertation on French colonial policy from the 1870s to the 1920s, with which he was awarded a D.Sc. PhD. The work, for the creation of which he had carried out extensive research in French archives, was published in two volumes. While through this project he deepened an already existing affinity for France , his long stay in Great Britain changed little in his detached attitude towards this country.

After Roberts took up a position as a researcher at the University of Melbourne in 1927 or 1928, he returned to Europe in 1928 to research a work on the French way of thinking ("The Mind of France"), which, however, remained an unfinished hull which he could not finish even decades later, in retirement.

In April 1929, Roberts was appointed as the holder of the Challis Chair in History at the University of Sydney after the previous owner, GA Wood, had committed suicide. His teaching activity there, which was achieved through a broad focus on the subjects under consideration as well as a pragmatic teaching philosophy (above all, he endeavored to train his students to be practitioners who he would prepare for an actual professional activity, thereby departing from the ideas of his predecessor Woods that the purpose of the study of history is to contribute to a moral ennoblement of man), which was averse to romantic and literary reflections of the past, was characterized, lasted until 1947. In parallel to his teaching duties, he published eight books from 1929 to 1936: in addition to his dissertation, he wrote two overview presentations on modern British and modern European history, conceived as school reading, as well as two works dealing with recent Australian history and Australia's international relations with the Far East states concerned.

In addition to his work at the university, he made a name for himself as an observer of international political developments, which was reflected in close relationships with the Australian Institute of International Affairs and the Institute of Pacific Relations: He gave numerous lectures on international relations and steered columns on them For the Sydney Morning Herald newspaper . He also reported on the radio with the Nots on the News section . In the 1930s, Roberts was a volunteer on the Board of Secondary School Studies, which helped shape the school curriculum.

In 1937 Roberts published his most highly regarded work, The House that Hitler Build , an analysis of the Nazi state, in which he based on his own trips to the German Reich in the 1930s - during which he a. a. attended a party rally of the Nazi regime in Nuremberg - outlined the history and, in his opinion, the future development line of the Nazi state resulting from this. Among the readers of the book was u. a. British Prime Minister Arthur Neville Chamberlain , who, however, according to his diary, rejected the conclusions drawn by Roberts. The work predicted that the structural constitution of the Nazi system would prompt it to instigate a new European war in the foreseeable future.

Robert's Hitler book became a bestseller (Roberts was able to build his own house with the proceeds) and was translated into several languages ​​and reprinted several times. In Germany, meanwhile, it brought him into the sights of the National Socialist surveillance organs, who classified him as an enemy of the state: in the spring of 1940, the Reich Security Main Office in Berlin - which suspected him to be in Great Britain - put Roberts on the special wanted list GB , a directory of people who were successful in the event of a successful Invasion and occupation of the British Isles by the Wehrmacht should be located and arrested by the occupying troops following SS special commandos with special priority.

In 1946, Roberts was named executive vice chancellor of the University of Sydney. In this capacity he was from 1952 to 1953 the Committee of Australian University Vice Chancellors. In 1955 he was promoted to principal, head of the University of Sydney, a position he held until his retirement in 1967. Under his aegis, it developed from a small elite university into a teaching and research facility with more than 16,000 students, which he expanded to include several faculties. Furthermore, under his supervision, Charles Perkins became the first Australian native to obtain a university degree. He supported the medical education of members of the population of Papua New Guinea and various Pacific island states at his university. Roberts also volunteered to chair the New South Wales State Cancer Council.

Roberts died in 1971 while on an overseas voyage to Europe on the ship Marconi near Port Melbourne .

His estate is kept in the archives of the University of Sydney.

Honors

Roberts has held honorary doctorates from the University of Bristol (1948), Durham University (1953), the University of British Columbia (1956), the University of New England (1957), McGill University (1958) and the University of Sydney ( 1968). He was also a member of the French Legion of Honor . He was also the holder of the Danish Order of Dannebrog (1960), the Lebanese Order of the Cedar (1961), the Greek Order of the Phoenix (1964) and the Italian Order of Merit .

family

On August 3, 1927, Roberts married Thelma Lilian Beatrice Asche in London, with whom he had three daughters.

Fonts

• History of Australian Land Settlement, 1788-1920
• Population Problems in the Pacific, 1927.
• History of French Colonial Policy (1870-1925) , 2 vols., 1929.
• Modern British history , 1932. (with C: H. Currey)
• History of Modern Europe , 1933.
• Australia and the Far East , 1935.
• The Squatting Age in Australia, 1835–1847 , Melbourne 1935.
• The House that Hitler Build , London 1937. (in German as: Das Haus that Hitler built , 1938)

literature

• Andrew Bonnell: "Stephen Roberts' The house that Hitler Built as a Source on Nazi Germany", in: Australian Journal of Politics and History Vol. 46, Issue 1, pp. 1-20.
• DR Wood: Stephen Henry Roberts, Historian and Vice-Chancellor , Sydney 1986.
• DM Schreuder: "A 'Second Foundation': SH Roberts as Challis Professor 1929-47", in: B. Caine (Ed.): History at Sydney, 1891-1991 , Sydney 1992.

Web links

• M. Schreuder :, 'Roberts, Sir Stephen Henry (1901–1971)', in: Australian Dictionary of Biography

Individual evidence

1. ^ Entry on Roberts on the special wanted list GB (reproduced on the website of the Imperial War Museum in London) .