Letter from Fr. Peter Bowe OSFC, Provincial Minister, to Fr. Camillus Killian OSFC, guardian, regarding arrangements for the impending Provincial Chapter and the canonical visitation by Fr. Anselm, definitor general. Fr. Bowe also reminds Fr. Camillus that the recently established houses in America are ‘attached … to the Irish Province so that the religious sent to them shall have the same rights and privileges as in the houses of the Irish Province’.
Letter from Fr. Matthew O’Connor OFM Cap., Capuchin Friary, Kilkenny, to Fr. Sylvester Mulligan OFM Cap., Provincial Minister, regarding the conditions of a lease of property adjoining the Friary offered at an annual rent of £20.
A letter from Fr. C. O’Neill, St. Peter’s Presbytery, Milford Street, to Fr. Canice Bourke OFM Cap., a Capuchin friar, referring to the effects of bombing raids during the Belfast Blitz in April 1941. He writes ‘A great disaster has befallen this city and I have lost a few very saintly tertiaries. Many people have left, for the houses are not habitable; others have fled in fear. But no-one on the Falls Road area was injured. The Catholic Church in the city was damaged save for a few panes of glass. The disaster will affect our Triduum somewhat, but I think it is better to have it, all the same. It would never do to give up on prayer and the people are saying the Rosary in the streets every night in this parish. The horror of an air-raid is inconceivable until one has seen it’.
Letter from Fr. Gilbert Bermingham OFM Cap., Capuchin Friary, Kilkenny, to Fr. Colman Griffin OFM Cap., reporting on the religious exercises and triduums held in the Friary in Kilkenny to mark Marian Year. With cover.
This series contains property documents including title deeds, legal correspondence and memoranda relating to the acquisition of properties in Kilkenny by the Capuchin friars. For the most part, the documents relate to the present-day Friary building situated on Friary Street (formerly known as Walkin Street). The modern Friary consists of two portions, one running parallel to Friary Street, built about 1873-4; the other is a wing built in 1897, situated at a right angle and extending to the adjoining Pennyfeather Lane. The series also contains documents relating to the novitiate building constructed on the site of the Capuchin Friary in Kilkenny in 1959-60.
Although the association of the Capuchin friars with the Walkin Street (now Friary Street) area of Kilkenny dates to the late seventeenth century, the documents in this section relate primarily to the present-day Church of St. Francis, built by Fr. Peter Joseph Mulligan OSFC (1793-1853) in 1848. The section also contains documents relating to the subsequent extensions to the Friary, most notably in 1897 when a large three-storey building between Walkin Street and Pennyfeather Lane was constructed to provide, among other things, accommodation for novices. The relatively large number of documents relating to the Walkin Street properties has necessitated the creation of a further three sub-sub-series relating to a particular plot of ground, purchase or sale.
This sub-series contains the correspondence of solicitors. Most of the letters relate to work connected with property-related transactions and associated fees and bills of cost.
Letter from James Poe & F.M.J. Lyons, solicitors, Kilkenny, to Fr. Ignatius Collins OFM Cap., guardian, enclosing a list of deeds connected with the purchase of property (on Pudding Lane) from Patrick Francis Doran. With searches from the registry of deeds.
Letters from Lanigan & Nolan, solicitors, 81 High Street, Kilkenny, regarding the proposed sale by the Capuchin Order of premises situated on Pennyfeather Lane to James J. Farrell. The letters refer to the need to inform the Charity Commissioners of the proposals for the sale in order to obtain a vesting order. Reference is also made to negotiations with the Harty estate which holds the freehold interest in the property being sold to Farrell. With solicitors’ bill of costs.
Letter from Lanigan & Nolan, solicitors, 81 High Street, Kilkenny, regarding a claim against Kilkenny Corporation for a malicious damage to a shrine in the Church.
