Letter of Fr. Hilary McDonagh OFM Cap., Via Boncompagni, 71, Rome, to Fr. Paul Neary OFM Cap., informing him that he has located a letter from the late Fr. Albert Bibby OFM Cap, in the archives of the General Capuchin Curia. Fr. Hilary writes: ‘I am informed that it is not usual nor advisable to allow such documents into any hands outside the Curia, so I fear it will not be possible to allow it to be used by any historian of the sad period about which it centres – at least for the present’. With cover.
Letter to Fr. Albert Bibby OFM Cap. from [signature indecipherable], St. Brigid’s Clara, giving family news and referring to Fr. Albert’s exile in America. With cover annotated on reverse: ‘Fr. Albert died on Feb. 14th [1925]. Return this letter unread, Joseph’
Letter to Tim Healy from various republican internees asking him intercede in a dispute with prison authorities. The manuscript provides background to the dispute. The letter is in two distinctive hands and is (copy) signed by ‘Michael Staines, Head Leader; James Murphy, leader, no. 1 room; Edward A. Morkan, leader, no. 2 room; R.J. Mulcahy, leader, no. 3 room; Thomas D. Sinnott, Leader no. 4 Room’. The letter reads: ‘Recently the military authorities in charge of the Camp here have adopted such an attitude of consistently vindictive injustice towards us that we are reluctantly compelled to believe that there must be some ulterior motive behind it. … We can do very little to help ourselves, cut off as we are from all the world, and strictly prohibited – officially – from sending out a single complaint’. In September 1917 Healy acted as counsel for the family of the dead Sinn Féin hunger striker Thomas Ashe. He was one of the few King’s Counsel to provide legal services to members of Sinn Féin in various legal proceedings in both Ireland and England after the 1916 Rising. This included acting for those illegally interned in 1916 in Frongoch in North Wales.
List of demands made by Thomas MacDonagh whilst jailed in Richmond Barracks. The list reads:
Visits to prisoners
Treatment of officers
Dependents and relations
Blankets
Books
The wearing [of] red cross badge who were not combatants
Washing arrangements Faint signature of ‘Thomas Mac Donough, Jacobs Factory’ is visible in centre of page. Addition in different hand at bottom of page reads: ‘No 7 will be allowed. Other complaints cannot be dealt with here. Louis [Ramsey?], 1/C. Richmond B[arrac]ks, 1/5/16’.
List of names and addresses of people resident in the United States. Includes a business card from Joseph Smith, Director, Boston Commercial and Industrial Bureau.
Memorial card for Captain Richard Coleman ‘who fought for the Freedom of Ireland, Easter, 1916, and died in Usk Prison, England, on December 9th, 1918’.
Memorial card for Liam Mellows, Rory O’Connor, Joseph (‘Joe’) McKelvey and Richard (‘Dick’) Barrett who were executed by firing squad in Mountjoy Jail in Dublin on 8 December 1922.
