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Letters from Bishop Francis Henneman SAC (1882-1951), Vicar Apostolic of the Cape of Good Hope, Western District, later Vicar Apostolic of Cape Town, to Fr. Edwin Fitzgibbon OFM Cap. and Fr. Colman Griffin OFM Cap., Provincial Ministers. The letters refer to requests for the Irish Capuchins to take over missionary outstations including those at Matroosfontein and in the Welcome Estate.

Letter from Sr. Maria Angela, a Capuchin Poor Clare, to Fr. Colman Griffin OFM Cap., Provincial Minister, seeking copies of the 'Ordo' for the Divine Office. She wrote: ‘Now we are in need since the war began. We have no more connection with our Home Convent and received no more orders from there like we received all the years’. Reference is made in the letter to the kindness shown to the sisters by Fr. Oliver O’Hanlon OFM Cap.

File relating to the procedures for applications for temporary and permanent residency permits in South Africa. The file includes copy correspondence from the Most Rev. John T. Dunkin, Bishop of Louis Trichardt-Tzaneen, and circulars from the South African Catholic Bishops’ Conference to the Major Religious Superiors and Local Ordinaries. The documents refer to the difficulties encountered by Catholic religious in obtaining permits to work in Apartheid-era South Africa. One of the circulars affirms that ‘if asked, state that you are to minister to Whites … in such and such an area. It is recommended that you do NOT state that you are coming to minister to Blacks’.

Copy decree of Fr. Flavio Roberto Carraro OFM Cap., General Minister, for the establishment of the Capuchin Vice-Province of Southern Africa. The decree reads: ‘In response to the missionary call of Pope Pius XI and the invitation of the Apostolic Vicar of Cape Town, the Irish Capuchin Province of Saint Francis and Patrick extended its Capuchin Franciscan witness to South Africa, arriving in Cape Town on 20 October 1929. After overcoming many initial difficulties and having established a clear understanding of the commitment required of the Province in this missionary endeavour, the new plant began to take root and to grow’. The Vice-Provincial Minister was named as Fr. Sylvius McCarthy OFM Cap. (1931-2011).

Photostat copy of a report by Fr. James O’Mahony OFM Cap., Provincial Minister, on the Livingstone (Northern Rhodesia) and Cape Town (South Africa) missions ‘as was revealed to me in the course of the Canonical Visitation’. The report was published in 'Analecta Ordinis Fratrum Minorum Capuccinorum', 73, no. 12 (Dec. 1957), pp 274-84.