Insurance policies from the Sun Insurance Office, 63 Threadneadle Street, London, the Patriotic Assurance Company Ltd., 9 College Green, Dublin, and the Irish Catholic Church Property Insurance Company Ltd., 19-20 Fleet Street, Dublin, for Father Mathew Hall. The polices cover fire insurance, third party indemnity insurance, heating plant insurance and personal accident insurance ‘for each of [the] 100 voluntary helpers in connection with Father Mathew Hall’. The file includes receipts, correspondence and memorandums stating conditions.
Costs of Little, Ó hUadhaigh & Proud, solicitors, 12 Dawson Street, Dublin, to the trustees of Father Mathew Hall, for legal costs incurred in obtaining a valuation of the Hall property and in applying for a renewal of the dance hall licence for the St. Brigid’s Hall extension. Totals costs: £9 15s 6d.
Correspondence of Fr. Celsus O’Shea OFM Cap., President, Father Mathew Hall, with Sean Ó hUadaigh, solicitor, 51 Dawson Street, Dublin, mainly concerning the renting of six cottages held by the trustees of Father Mathew Hall. The six cottages were 29-30 Bow Street and 11-15 Nicholas Avenue. The letters relate to efforts to secure the possession of 14 Nicholas Avenue from the relatives of Miss Effie Murphy, a former tenant of the said property (a notice of trespass was issued to George Murphy and his family), and the issuing of general notices to the occupiers in relation to an increase in rents. Other legal issues referred to in the correspondence include counsels’ opinion on title, insurance matters, the accounts of Father Mathew Hall and the title deeds of the Hall. The file includes costs from Ó hUadaigh in relation to leases and other matters pertaining to the title of the above-noted cottages.
Correspondence relating to the progress of work on the stairs in the St. Brigid’s Hall extension. Correspondents include Edward Murphy, builder and contractor, E.G. O’Neill, architect, 82 Taney Road, Dundrum, Thomas Garland, consulting engineer, 40 Upper Fitzwilliam Street, and Fr. Virgilus Murtagh OFM Cap. With a specification for the said works.
Correspondence relating to the financing, construction, fitting-out of Father Mathew Hall. Most of the letters refer to estimates for interior furnishing and the fitting out of the Hall. Correspondents include: The National Bank Ltd.; John L. Smallman, sanitary and gas engineer; Henry Kerrill & Sons, engineers, coppersmiths and electricians; Edmundson’s Furnishing & Engineering Co.; Walter Glynn Doolin, 20 Ely Place, Dublin, secretary of the Father Mathew Hall building committee; the Patriotic Assurance Company, 2 College Green, Dublin.
Letters to Walter Glynn Doolin, engineer, from John Kennedy, 11 & 12 Merrion Row, Henry Kerrill & Sons, 80 Drumcondra Road, C. McNamara, 10 Christchurch Place, and others regarding estimates for the installation of gas and lighting fittings in the Father Mathew League of the Cross Hall, Church Street.
Specifications from E.J. Creed, 26 New Ireland Road, Rialto, J. Treacy & Co., 17 Stoneybatter, Dublin, and J. Seward, 26 New Ireland Road, Rialto, Dublin, for internal and external painting works of the president’s room, billiard room, toilet, return room, staircases and other parts of Father Mathew Hall, Church Street. With a manuscript draft of the said specification and contract.
Specification for the reconstruction of seating arrangements at the rear of the auditorium in Father Mathew Hall, Church Street, by J. Seward, 26 New Ireland Road, Rialto, Dublin. Includes a schedule of work to be done, materials to be used and form of tender.
Flier seeking funds (£800) to complete the building of the Father Mathew Hall, Church Street. The opening paragraph affirms that ‘this Total Abstinence Hall, for one of the poorest and most crowded districts of Dublin, will cost £3,000. It will seat 1,200 people, and the building will also contain a gymnasium, reading rooms, a room for bagatelle and other games, a library, a coffee bar and a caretaker’s apartment’.
Newspaper cuttings referring to Father Mathew Hall, Church Street. The cuttings are mainly from 'The Irish Catholic' and include references to the opening of 'Aonach na Bealtaine', temperance work, membership of the Hall, notices of annual meetings, details of excursions and lectures, and statements of accounts of the Hall Committee. One of the cuttings refers to the work of Fr. Albert Mitchell OSFC in founding the temperance sodality. It reads ‘in 1881 the association was installed in modest apartments in Halston Street … in 1891, the centenary year of Father Mathew, the new fine hall now standing on Church Street was opened during the presidency of Father Columbus Maher OSFC’. Includes two sketches of Fathers Mitchell and Maher. The report of the 23rd annual meeting of Father Mathew Hall contained a short excerpt of a speech by Pádraig Pearse in which he stated that the ‘Irish Ireland movement would be successful only so far and so long as it went hand in hand with temperance and its off-shoot of total abstinence’.
