Copy letter from Fr. Albert Bibby OFM Cap., St Francis Hospital, Santa Barbara, California, to Eamon de Valera, President of the Republic of Ireland, pledging his ‘unchanged and unchangeable, and uncompromising’ allegiance to the Republic and to you, its President’. He argues that ‘in the movement for the independence of Ireland I have always endeavoured to remember that I was a Capuchin Priest’.
Copy letter from Fr. Albert Bibby OFM Cap. The typescript copy notes that the original ‘belongs to L.T. Langley, 164 Iveragh Road, Gaeltacht Park, Whitehall, Dublin. The letter is incomplete, and no indication is given of the person to whom it is addressed’. The letter provides an account of the ‘closing scenes of Sean Heuston’s life’. Fr. Albert contends that ‘shortly after Easter Week, 1916, I gave a rather full account for publication in the Catholic Bulletin, but owing to the Censor’s restrictions it could not appear in print’. The letter reads: ‘At about 3.45 A.M. a British soldier knocked at the door of the cell and told us time was up. We both walked out together down to the end of the Jail yard; here his hands were tied behind his back, a cloth tied over his eyes and a small piece of white paper, about 4 or 5 inches square, pinned to his coat over his heart’. Reference is also made to Fr. Augustine’s Hayden’s ministry to Ėamonn Ceannt and Michael Mallin.
Copy extract from a letter by Harry O’Hanrahan to his mother and sisters. The letter is in the hand of Fr. Albert Bibby OFM Cap. He refers to his detainment in Richmond Barracks and to detectives selecting ‘out about 14 including the 2 Cosgraves, T. Mac Donagh, Kent, ourselves etc …’. He also refers to the fighting in Jacob’s Biscuit Factory.
Copy cable from Diarmuid Lynch (1878-1950), New York, to Terence MacSwiney, City Hall, Cork, confirming that ‘Fogarty got no commission whatever from and was not authorised to act or speak for myself or friends. Advise Dublin’. Annotation reads: ‘Received 16 July 1920’. Copy in the hand of Liam de Róiste; With [copy] letter from Liam de Róiste (1882-1959) to Diarmuid Lynch acknowledging Lynch’s cable referring to the aforementioned Fogarty. In Irish.
Typescript copy of Michael Mallin’s last letter to his wife. Copy signed: ‘Michael Mallin, Commandant, Stephen’s Green Command’; copy of Pearse’s last letter to his mother in which he refers to papers he has left with Fr. Aloysius Travers OFM Cap.
Photocopies of letters from Capt. Rev. Dominic O’Connor OFM Cap., 21 Stationary Hospital, Salonika Forces, M[acedonian] E[xpeditionary] F[orce], and the Capuchin Friary, Fr. Mathew Quay, Cork, to his sister, [Sister Constantine O’Connor?], explaining his reasons for becoming an army chaplain. He wrote: ‘Well someone had to do the work and when those who had done all the recruiting were too cowardly to go there was nothing left except to have us who were anti-recruiters go and help the souls of the soldiers the others had sent out’. He later referred to conditions for the troops he is ministering to: ‘We have had more than half the troops down with malaria, dysentery, sandfly fever etc. and it is fortunate that there was no fighting here’. [c. 1915]. In reference to the political situation he later wrote: ‘There is no use in saying anything about the political situation. England seems set upon forcing conscription on us. And the Irish Nation is equally or rather more determined to oppose it. God protect us!’.
A photographic postcard print with the printed title 'Commandant McKeown T.D.'. The portrait print shows Commandant Seán Mac Eoin (1893-1973), a senior IRA soldier during the War of Independence.
