Hugh Jackman has announced that his father, Christopher John Jackman, has passed away.

In a post shared to Instagram on Monday, the Australian actor, 56, revealed the news about his dad Christopher, a British-born, Cambridge-educated accountant, who was believed to have been around 84 years old.

Alongside a photo of his father, he wrote: ‘In the early hours of Father’s Day (AU), my Dad peacefully passed away. And whilst there is deep sadness, I am filled with such gratitude and love. My Dad was, in a word, extraordinary.  He devoted his life to his family, his work and his faith. I pray he is now at peace with God.’

Christopher and his ex-wife Grace are both Brits, and while Hugh was born in Australia, he is a British citizen, having previously said: ‘My parents are English and I have a British passport so I’m a British citizen.’

Tragic: Hugh Jackman has announced that his father, Christopher John Jackman, has died. In a post shared to Instagram on Monday, the Australian actor, 56, revealed the sad news. Pictured together last year

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Alongside a photo of his father, he wrote: ‘In the early hours of Father’s Day (AU), my Dad peacefully passed away. And whilst there is deep sadness, I am filled with such gratitude and love. My Dad was, in a word, extraordinary’

Christopher raised Hugh and his two brothers, Ian and Ralph, as a single father, in Sydney, Australia. The Broadway star was an eight-year-old schoolboy when his mother Grace left him and his family.

She left Australia and returned to her native England in the late ’70s, leaving her husband to raise their children alone.  After the couple divorced, Hugh’s sisters, Zoe and Sonya, went to live with Grace in the UK; Hugh and his brothers, Ian and Ralph, stayed in Sydney with their father.

Recalling his difficult childhood previously said: ”It was traumatic. ‘I thought she was probably going to come back. And then it sort of dragged on and on.’ He added that after his mother left, he saw her about ‘once a year’.

It wasn’t until he was ’12 or 13′ that it dawned on him his mother would never return. In 2012, Hugh broke down on 60 Minutes when discussing his mother leaving his father, himself and his siblings.  He said: ‘My father is my rock. It’s where I learned everything about loyalty, dependability, being there day in, day out, no matter what’. 

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Hard working: Christopher raised Hugh and his two brothers, Ian and Ralph, as a single father, in Sydney, Australia. Hugh is pictured as a young man with his father

Rock solid:  Hugh’s mother, Grace McNeil, left the family and returned to England when Hugh was just eight years old, and he has referred to his dad as his ‘rock’ from then on

‘It’s always about the family,’ he added of the values that his father has instilled in him. 

Hugh said he still vividly remembers the morning his mother left.

He said: ‘I remember her being in a towel around her head and saying goodbye. [It] must have been the way she said goodbye. As I went off to school, when I came back, there was no one there in the house…

‘The next day there was a telegram from England. Mum was there. And then that was it. Dad used to pray every night that mum would come back.’

Hugh once told an Australian magazine: ‘The thing I never felt – and I know this might sound strange – I never felt that my mum didn’t love me.’