Legal agreements in the form of deeds and indentures relating to the Derenzy family’s title and interest in lands in the vicinity of Tinnycross, County Offaly. The earliest deed dating from 1630, records Sir Mathew de Renzi purchasing the townlands of Ballynashragh, Ballycosny, Tyrenehinan, Kilmore and Derry, all in the barony of Ballycowen, on behalf of his son Mathew DeRenzy, then at the bar in London. The vendor was Robert Branthwaite of London, who had been granted the land by letters patent of King James I. Further adjoining townlands of Rossnagouloge or Cappanure were purchased by Sir Mathew from Allen Jones in 1630, and the following year the adjacent townlands of Derrykilliagh and Kilbeg were purchased from Art McOwen O’Molloy. All were settled on his son, Mathew DeRenzy.
The bulk of the collection consists of numerous leases and mortgages raised against the land by Mathew DeRenzy between 1699 and 1703, while he lived at Cloghbemon in County Wexford. Later items in the collection relate to the sale of the lands to Reverend James Cox, Archdeacon of Ferns.
Canvas-backed paper map of the former county town of Philipstown (Daingean) compiled by Arthur Richards Neville in June 1786 for Richard Nassau Molesworth, 4th Viscount Molesworth (1748-1793). The map covers 2887 statute acres and includes environs of the town. The plots are numbered 1-130 with an accompanying reference table describing the contents of each land-holding unit. The reference is tabular, listing tenants' name, description of the holdings (e.g. 'a very fine farm all good meadow', 'good high Meadow & Pasture', 'great red bog', 'poor ground' etc) a yearly value and a sum total of the east and south east side of Philipstown.
Scale 20 perch to the inch (1:5040)
Sans titreRental of the estate of the Earl of Charleville. Lists the denominations, tenants, acreage, yearly rent and other notes. Frequently amended with addition of new tenants and details of lease renewals
Sans titre13 volumes of photograph albums, known to Offaly Historical and Archaeological Society as the Magan-Biddulph Collection. complied by Lt. Col. Middleton Westenra Biddulph, landowner of the Rathrobin estate, near Mountbolus, County Offaly. Biddulph was born in Rathrobin in 1849, the eldest surviving son of Francis Marsh Biddulph and Lucy Bickerstaff. The Biddulph family's landholding was principally in the townlands of Rathrobin and those adjoining of Clonseer, Cormeen, Kilmore and Mullaghcrohy, all near Mountbolus, in the civil parish of Killoughy and the barony of Ballyboy. Middleton Biddulph enlisted with the Northumberland Fusiliers (Fifth Regiment) in 1867, rising to the ranks of Lieutenant Colonel before his retirement in 1896. Following his retirement, Biddulph and his wife, Vera Josephine Flower, returned to Rathrobin and rebuilt the old house over the period 1898 to 1900. Biddulph served as High Sheriff for King's County in 1901, and was appointed Deputy Lieutenant of the county in 1910.
As a keen amateur photographer, Biddulph used a quarter plate camera to document his various areas of interest including; his military career with the Northumberland Fusiliers; visits to country houses across Ireland, England and Scotland; members of the Biddulph and Magan family; visits around Ireland as part of the Royal Society of Antiquarians; interior and exterior photographs of Rathrobin House; agricultural work on the estate. There is also an extent of photographs of tenant families and employees of the Rathrobin estate, featured across the photograph albums.
Biddulph and his wife left for England in June 1921 as the military campaign of the IRA in the locality intensified, and Rathrobin House was destroyed by Republican IRA forces in April 1923. While he seemed to have planned to return to Ireland after this, an attack on his land agent and niece, Violet Magan, and his own declining health delayed plans to do so, and he died in Chelsea in May 1926. The albums were presented to Offaly Historical and Archaeological Society in 1997 by Brigadier William Magan, a nephew of the photographer.
Sans titreEstate and legal papers comprising of deeds, indentures, tenancy agreements, land titles, correspondence and personal papers relating to the Mulock and Homan-Mulock family of Bellair House, Ballycumber.
Sans titreThis collection is comprised of the records of Patrick Moore & Sons, Victuallers of Edenderry and Rathangan. They were a family business who sold meat to the surrounding towns including Edenderry, Rathangan, Allenwood, Clonbulloge, Enfield, Kinnegad and Rhode. The collection includes ledgers, cash books, stock books, daily order books and van sales books. There are also documents regarding financial accounts such as bank account books, customer account books, bills of account with local traders, Dublin traders and a trader from Manchester. Also includes documents of their accounts with other businesses and legal costs as well as personal family photographs. A note in ledger P1/C/17 from 1923 recounts that Judge Wakely's house, Ballyburly, near Rhode, was 'burned by irregulars' in 1923.
Individuals and businesses that had an account with Patrick Moore & Sons include:
Coopers & Bailey, Central Market London.
H.M. Hawkins, Seifond, Dorchester.
Doctor Hamilton, Edenderry.
E.J.B. Nesbitt, Rutland Gate, London.
E.J.B. Nesbitt, Penton Lodge, Andover.
D. Alesbury.
Civic Guards, Edenderry.
J. Joly, Clonbologue.
Patrick Moore & Sons had accounts with:
William Bros, Edenderry (Grocery Account)
M.J. O'Brien, Edenderry.
William Bros. (Petrol Account)
Offaly County Board of Health and Public Assistance.
Ledgers and minute book of Offaly Farming and Industrial Society, organisers of the Tullamore Agricultural and Industrial Show.
Sans titreRoll books; daily report books; a district inspectors observation book; roll of cookery and laundry work; a religious instruction certificates book and other registers of Killyon National School.
Sans titreThis is a large set of records which broadly reflects the evolution of local authority health and welfare provision in Offaly. It contains minutes of committees established to oversee public health and public assistance, as well as administrative records detailing the admission and discharge of individuals into the County Home or the County Hospital. While the bulk of the records derived from the County Board of Health, there are a few outlying records from 1912-21 relating to transitional periods in the health service, or where registers were taken over from the preceding health system and incorporated into the new Board of Health. Likewise some county home and county hospital administrative records, particularly admission and discharge registers and financial ledgers which were kept by record-creators in an unbroken series, post-date the County Board of Health's executive function which ceased in 1942.
RECORDS RELATING TO MOTHER AND BABY HOMES AND BOARDED-OUT CHILDREN:
The main series of records which record unmarried mothers and/or decisions relating to the boarding-out of children are to be found in the Public Assistance Minute Books (Series 3) and the Admissions and Discharge registers for the County Home (Series 5).
While Offaly did not have a designated ‘Mother and Baby Home,’ the records show that unmarried mothers were regularly admitted to the County Home to give birth until the late 1940s, many staying for a significant period of time in the home with their children. In some instances, both mother and child were transferred from the home after the birth to other institutions such as Sean Ross Abbey, Roscrea, Co Tipperary, or Manor Home, Castlepollard, Co Westmeath.
From the late 1940s, it appears that unmarried mothers were either admitted directly to institutions in other counties (these records are held by other bodies) or transferred from the County Home to mother and baby homes outside Offaly before or after giving birth (these instances, which are infrequent from the late 1940s are recorded in the county home registers in this collection). Children entered in the registers of the county home are recorded as having been born there, or have been transferred into the county home from another institution before being 'placed' or 'boarded-out' in Offaly. It is possible to trace children by surname, noting the limitations of the records in terms of completeness and the date span.
In general terms and from an overview of the records, the incidence of names of unmarried mothers and their children decreases significantly over time. This is most likely due to unmarried mothers from Offaly entering institutions outside the county before the birth of their children. By the 1950s, there are only sporadic instances of births to unmarried mothers and of 'boarded-out' children recorded in the county home registers. This particular record series ends in 1957.
Sans titre