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Letters of Fr. Alban Cullen OFM Cap. (1902-1957). The main correspondent is Fr. Edwin Fitzgibbon OFM Cap., Provincial Minister. Other correspondents include Fr. Kieran O’Callaghan OFM Cap. and Fr. Colman Griffin OFM Cap. Provincial Minister. The subjects include: the progress of the Irish Capuchin mission in South Africa, particularly the ‘coloured localities of Athlone, Parrow and Claremont’; arrangements for the opening of the mission in Barotseland, Northern Rhodesia; the language difficulties. Fr. Alban wrote ‘The big drawback of the Church in South Africa has been the dearth of English-speaking priests. Cape Town has them. Port Elizabeth has some. Johannesburg has a few. But almost everywhere else, French, German, Dutch have possession’. (21 Mar. 1931); requests for mass stipends (18 Sept. 1931); information concerning the forty square miles of the Capuchin mission in South Africa including ‘Athlone, Crawford, Jamestown, Belgravia Estate, the Welcome Estate and Langa’. (6 Nov. 1931); the construction of churches, mission schools and orphanages; the establishment of a canonical foundation by the Irish Capuchins in Athlone, Cape Town. (14 Jan. 1932); the deprivations faced by the ‘native population’ in Cape Town. (26 Feb. 1932); the education of the coloured population of Cape Province, South Africa. (18 Mar. 1932); Fr. Alban’s attempts to hire John McCormack, the renowned Irish tenor, to perform in aid of the poor of Athlone Parish, Cape Town. (5 Aug. 1932); on the necessity of holding property in the Athlone Vicariate. Fr. Alban affirms that ‘the Athlone Catholics are poor, miserable coloured native people on the verge of starvation’. (25 Nov. 1932); the building of the Church of St. Mary of the Angels in Athlone, Cape Town. (9 June 1933); Fr. Alban’s work as a missionary since his ordination in 1925. He wrote ‘I have devoted my time exclusively to the missionary life – almost four years with the Californian Indians, and almost five with the coloured and native people of Athlone’. (27 July 1934); the visitation of Fr. James O’Mahony OFM Cap. to South Africa. (6 Sept. 1935); his desire to return to Ireland. He reminds Fr. Colman Griffin OFM Cap., Provincial Minister, that he is ‘the last of the first three [priests] who came here in 1929’. (6 June 1951). The file also includes a letter from Fr. Aloysius Travers OFM Cap. to Fr. Edwin Fitzgibbon OFM Cap., Provincial Minister, transmitting news from Fr. Alban re the number of communicants in Athlone parish. (19 Nov. 1931).

File of clippings relating to temperance demonstrations, parades and meetings in Dublin, Cork, Wexford, Drogheda, Galway and elsewhere (particularly involving workingmen’s’ associations and trade unions). Some of the articles also refer to the sermons preached by various Capuchin friars and to societal problems associated with intemperance. The file includes the following cuttings:
• Report on a meeting of the Sodality of the Sacred Thirst, St. Mary of the Angels, Church Street, Dublin ('Irish Catholic', 30 May 1899).
• Report on a large demonstration of trade associations in Cork in support of temperance ('Cork Examiner', 15 Oct. 1906).
• Report on a meeting of the Workmen’s Temperance Committee, Father Mathew Hall, Church Street, Dublin ('The Anglo-Celt', 3 November 1906).
• Opening of Aonach na Bealtaine in Father Mathew Hall, Church Street, Dublin, in 1907.
• 'The Peasant and Irish Ireland' (14 Sept. 1907).
• Report of a lecture by Fr. Lawrence Dowling OSFC during a temperance mission in Father Mathew Hall, Queen Street, Cork. ('Cork Examiner', 21 Oct. 1912).
• ‘Public opinion and the housing problem’. A report of a talk on this subject by Fr. Aloysius Travers OFM Cap. ('The Catholic Times', 24 Oct. 1913).
• 'The Alliance News and Temperance Reformer / the Organ of the United Kingdom Alliance' (30 Oct. 1913).
• Reports of meetings of the Father Mathew Total Abstinence Association.

• Letter from Patrick Forrestal to Fr. Aloysius Travers OFM Cap. giving his father’s recollections of Fr. Mathew. He writes ‘My father was born in 1832 in the Parish of Ramsgrange, Wexford. … . He took the pledge from Father Mathew and kept it about 16 years. … It was very remarkable the multitude that gathered around him, the platform was enormous, something like ten thousand. He [Fr. Mathew] walked off the platform to where my father stood and told him you are very young may God bless you and placed his two hands around his head …’. [c.1902]. Manuscript, 6 pp.
• Copy article from the 'Cork Examiner' on Fr. Mathew’s birthplace. 27 Oct. 1931. Typescript, 1 p.
• Note by Fr. Francis Hayes OFM Cap. re two contemporary engravings of Fr. Mathew in the possession of Charlie McCarthy. Fr. Francis notes that they were engraved and designed by John Brown, Patrick Street, Cork, heraldic artist for Fr. Theobald Mathew OSFC, 1845. Typescript, 1 p.
• Note on the inscription on the Daniel O’Connell memorial window in Holy Trinity (Father Mathew Memorial) Church in Cork. It reads: ‘Sacred in gratitude and affection to the memory of Daniel O’Connell, liberator of his fellow Catholics from the inflictions of the Penal Code and assertion of equal rights of all communities to civil and religious freedom, RIP’. Manuscript, 1 p.
• Cuttings referring to the visit of Fr. Mathew to Kilkenny where he had ‘17,000 adherents to the total abstinence principles’ and a similar visit to Limerick. 'Morning Register', 23 Jan. 1840; 'Saunder’s News-Letter', 23 Mar. 1840. Pasted onto card, 2 pp.
• Copy excerpts from the 'Quarterly Review', December 1840-Mar. 1841, referring (negatively) to the relationship between the Fr. Mathew’s temperance movement and ‘Romanism in Ireland’. Typescript, 1 p.
• Notes by Fr. Paul Neary OSFC re Fr. Mathew taken from 'The Nation'. Manuscript, 10 pp.
• Letter from Deborah Webb to Fr. Silvester Mulligan OSFC enclosing her recollections of a meeting with Fr. Theobald Mathew OSFC in Rathfarnham, Dublin. 25 Oct. 1913. Manuscript, 5 pp.
• Extracts relating to Fr. Theobald Mathew OSFC in the Life of Catherine MacAuley. Typescript, 1 p.
• Extracts from 'Tuckey’s Cork Remembrances' (Cork, 1838), John D’Alton, 'History of the County of Dublin' (Dublin, 1838), 'The Irish Magazine', and 'Dublin University Magazine' re the Capuchins in Cork and Fr. Theobald Mathew OSFC. One of the extract reads ‘10 Oct. 1810: The corporation determined to improve this city, by pulling down the houses on the right of Blackamoor Lane, and continuing Sullivan’s Quay to the South Bridge’. Manuscript, 8 pp.
• Extract from An Irishman’s diary by Quidnunc in the 'Irish Times', 9 Aug. 1943, referring to visit to London by Fr. Mathew in Aug. 1843. ‘Led off by prayer and a speech, the temperance pioneer received pledges from 3,000 abstainers during one day, of which number about one-half were Irish’. Typescript, 1 p.

File relating to cures associated with visits to the grave of Fr. Theobald Mathew OSFC in St. Joseph’s Cemetery in Cork. The file was compiled by Fr. Stanislaus Kavanagh OFM Cap. The file includes:
• Statements from Hannah Keohane regarding her son who was cured through the intercession of prayers at the grave of Fr. Theobald. (18 Mar. 1943).
• Letters to Fr. Stanislaus from Fr. Mel Farrell OFM Cap. and Fr. T.J. Walsh re Annie Nolan, 21 Abbey Street, Cork, who reputedly recovered her sight through the intercession of Fr. Theobald.
• Statements and correspondence re Madge Twomey whose throat condition was cured through visits to the grave.
• Letters relating to Mrs Kathleen Skillington (née Walsh) whose leg was cured following a visit to Fr. Theobald’s grave. The file includes the testimony of Dr D. F. Hegarty, surgeon. 5 Jan 1938.
• Letter from Fr. Paul Neary OFM Cap. to Fr. Stanislaus Kavanagh OFM Cap. referring to the cause of Fr. Mathew. He wrote ‘It is to be regretted that there is no one of ourselves free and willing to take an interest in the cause – as according to rumours a great many things occur at the grave. The people come from a distance. No one has any knowledge of themselves, the favours they have received or where they come from’. 28 Jan. 1932. Manuscript, 2 pp.
• ‘Father Mathew / Leader and Priest / Cures wrought at his tomb’. The text of a speech given by Fr. Aloysius Travers OSFC on the occasion of the 123rd anniversary of the birth of Fr. Mathew. Oct. 1913. Typescript, 8 pp.
• Prayer for the beatification of Fr. Theobald Mathew OSFC. It is noted that this prayer was submitted to the Most Rev. Daniel Coholan, Bishop of Cork, for ecclesiastical approval in May 1928. Typescript, 1 p.

Correspondence of Fr. Paul Neary OSFC, and Fr. Peter Bowe OSFC, with the Catholic Bishops of Derry, Ferns, Waterford and Lismore, Down and Connor, Dromore, Clogher, Kilmore, the Archbishop of Tuam, the Archbishop of Dublin, and Cardinal Michael Logue, Archbishop of Armagh, re the publication of the Capuchin Franciscan 'Temperance Manual', the establishment of temperance sodalities in the various dioceses, and the general progress of the temperance crusade conducted by the friars. The draft letter from Fr. Paul Neary OSFC to Archbishop William Walsh (1841-1921) refers to the good work Fr. Aloysius Travers OSFC is doing among the trades’ societies and artisan classes in Dublin (10 Apr. 1906).

Ledger of income derived from mass intentions at the Church of St. Francis, Kilkenny. The title is given on the first page: ‘House Intentions Book’. Entries are listed under the number of masses said and the amount of money received. Monthly totals are also given. A list of bequests with the amount of masses to be said and stipends received is extant on the final pages of the volume. The entries include the Walsh bequest of January 1914 (29 masses said at 2s 6d) and ‘Mrs Fleming’s bequest’ of 8 May 1915 (40 masses at 5s in stipends). A manuscript annotation at the end of this section reads: ‘All above masses have been said, Fr. Aloysius Travers of Cork, Provincial Minister, 7 April 1915’. Entries throughout the volume are periodically signed by the Provincial Minister at visitations.

Costs of Thomas J. Furlong, 11 Eustace Street, solicitor, to Fr. Peter (Edward) Bowe OSFC and others for preparing a deed of conveyance to vest Church property in nine members of the community as joint tenants and for a power of attorney from Fr. Anthony (John) Travers OSFC (resident in Tasmania) to Fr. Aloysius (William) Travers OSFC. Total cost: £33 5s 4d. 2 copies. With letters from Thomas J. Furlong to Fr. Angelus Healy OSFC and Fr. Paul Neary OSFC referring to a deed executed by Miss Maher on 19 Aug. 1897 conveying the property bequeathed to her following the death of her brother (Fr. Patrick Joseph Columbus Maher OSFC, died 10 Sept. 1894) to the Capuchin community on Church Street.