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Letters from John Earley, stained glass artist and church decorator, Upper Camden Street, Dublin, regarding the design and installation of windows and door panels at the Capuchin Church and Friary, Walkin Street, Kilkenny. The file includes letters to Fr. Jarlath Hynes OSFC, Fr. Berchmans Cantillon OSFC and Messrs Ashlin & Coleman, architects. Other works referred to include the erection of a tabernacle and canopy over the altar and a pulpit ‘made of the best selected Sicilian marble …’.

Letters from Kathleen Clarke (wife of Tom Clarke), 15 Barrington Street, Limerick, to Fr. Albert Bibby OFM Cap., mostly concerning family news. She also wrote: ‘Limerick does not agree with me. I am tired all the time here. I have an unsettled feel here too … . I find it hard to realise that my home and everything is gone, the only thing left is hope, and if our hopes for Ireland’s future are fulfilled the sacrifices will have been worth the making’. She also refers to Ernest Blythe: ‘We had hoped for better for him. I suppose he is left Arbour Hill by this and there would be no use in writing to him

Letters from Mary MacSwiney (Máire Nic Shuibhne, 1872-1942) to Fr. Henry Rope. Two of the letters are copies (Rope notes that the copies were made in 1947 and that he deposited the originals in the archives of the Pontifical Irish College in Rome). One of the copy letters (dated 21 Nov. 1922) refers to Mary MacSwiney’s treatment by the Free State authorities. It reads ‘The hardest part of my trial here is being deprived of the Sacraments as I have not succeeded in finding a priest who will be satisfied to hear the confession of my sins and let my political convictions alone’. The original letter (26 Oct. 1930) refers to the ‘terrible airship disaster’ involving R 101, a British rigid airship. The disaster claimed the lives of forty-eight of the fifty-four people on board including Fr. Henry Rope’s younger brother, Squadron Leader Frederick Michael Rope.

Letters from Michael Knightly (1888-1965), the government’s Chief Press Censor, to Fr. Senan Moynihan OFM Cap. Knightly’s letter refers to the prohibition on the publication of images of coastal locations (such as Cobh, Mizen Head, and Portstewart Strand) and to restrictions on information received from foreign ‘wireless’ (telegraph or radio) sources.

Letters from Sinéad de Valera to Fr. Albert Bibby OFM Cap., asking for a ‘national novena to the Sacred Heart’. She declares that she has ‘had a letter from Dev this morning. They have had no Sunday mass since they left Ireland. He served Mass on Corpus Christi but that was the only day they had Mass’. She relays De Valera’ request that luxury items such as sweets should not be sent to republican prisoners and suggests that ‘some little committee could be formed to collect the money which would otherwise be expended on postage …’. She adds ‘Please don’t let Eamonn’s name be associated with it as I know he would not like his remark about the luxuries to go around. He has a dislike to being considered a vaitin and his remark might be misunderstood’. In the letter of 24 May 1918 she refers to her anxiety over ‘the midnight raid and Saturday’s paper’. She added: ‘Dev is in Gloucester prison. I had a message from the Governor saying to send on some clothes’.

Letters mainly from patrons forwarding subscriptions in favour of the Brigade. The file includes letters from Richard O’Shaughnessy, barrister, 3 Wilton Place, Dublin, to Fr. Mark McDonnell OSFC, Church Street, passing on his good wishes to the Boys’ Brigade. He claims that ‘the richer Catholics, and a large, a very large number of Protestants would be among its subscribers … if they only know the work it is effecting’.

Letters from William Partridge to Fr. Albert Bibby OFM Cap. giving an outline of his career mostly in the labour and union movement under James Larkin. Partridge was among those rebels who surrendered at St Stephen’s Green in 1916. He was subsequently sentenced to ten years’ penal servitude and sent to Dartmoor and afterwards to Lewes Prison. He was released due to ill-health and returned to Ballaghadreen in County Mayo, but died on 26 July 1917. He refers to his physical condition in some of the correspondence. He writes ‘Please excuse scribbling as my sight got bad in prison and I have not yet got glasses’. With his memorial card and a newspaper cutting of his obituary notice. The file also includes a letter (probably from his brother, Felix Partridge) referring to his last days and thanking Fr. Albert for his words of sympathy.

A file containing ‘Criterion Plates Ltd., Stechford, Birmingham’ box. The box holds four plates. The annotation on the box reads ‘Negatives of letters of Fr. Robert O’Connell OSFC in the Fr. Luke Wadding OFM [1588-1657] collection'. The annotation was made by Fr. Stanislaus Kavanagh OFM Cap. in May 1922. The plates are labelled a-d.

Letters of Fr. Timothy Phelim O’Shea OFM Cap. (1902-1979). The correspondents include Fr. Kieran O’Callaghan OFM Cap., Provincial Secretary; Fr. Edwin Fitzgibbon OFM Cap., Provincial Minister; Fr. James O’Mahony OFM Cap., Provincial Minister; Fr. Colman Griffin OFM Cap., Provincial Minister; Fr. Conrad O’Donovan OFM Cap., Provincial Minister., and Fr. Clement Neubauer OFM Cap., General Minister. The subjects include: the progress of the Irish Capuchin mission in Barotseland and Livingstone, Northern Rhodesia; the Silozi catechism; the Loanja station; requests for financial assistance and loans for the Northern Rhodesian mission; missionary activities in Cape Town, South Africa; the recognition of five parishes in the Cape as coming under Irish Capuchin jurisdiction (1946); the Katima Mulilo mission station in the Caprivi Strip (1949); Fr. Phelim’s appointment as Regular Superior of the Victoria Falls Mission; the completion of the church at Langa (1949); the deaths of Fr. Eustace Burke OFM Cap. and Fr. Donatus Aherne OFM Cap. (1949); Educational matters in the missionary territories; the appointment of Fr. Killian Flynn OFM Cap. as Education Secretary General (1949); the need for more missionary sisters (Holy Faith Sisters, Sisters of Mercy, the Irish Sisters of Charity and the Franciscan Missionary Sisters of Africa); the opening of the church at the Holy Family Mission, Katima Mulilo. (Mar. 1954); the building of a new convent and girls’ boarding school at Maramba. (July 1953); his proposal to resign as Bishop of Livingstone ‘in line with the gradual Zambianization of the Hierarchy’. (10 Aug. 1969). Reference is also made to the activities of the following Capuchin friars: Fr. Casimir Butler OFM Cap.; Fr. Oliver O’Hanlon OFM Cap.; Fr. Timothy Connery OFM Cap.; Fr. Agathangelus Herlihy OFM Cap.; Fr. Seraphin Nesdale OFM Cap.; Fr. Eltin Daly OFM Cap. The file also includes a manuscript copy of an ‘Approved Prayer for the Conversion of Africa’ and a typescript copy of a ‘Spiritual portrait of Bishop Timothy Phelim O’Shea OFM Cap.’ by Fr. Salvator Quinn OFM Cap. (Livingstone, 1992). 19 pp.

Two letters to Germaine Stockley re the treatment of female republican prisoners. One of the letters is from Mary MacSwiney (Máire Nic Shuibhne). The letter refers to the release of her sister Annie MacSwiney from prison. She writes ‘I know how glad and happy you are about Annie’s release. She is getting on well but more slowly than I should like. The doctor says she must take great care for some time. Of course, she is not long out yet’. She also refers to a raid on her house and the imprisonment of other republican women.