Three incomplete volumes recording details of residents admitted to the Parsonstown (Birr) Workhouse, the first of which dating from the opening of the workhouse in April 1842.

Provides details of names of inmates, previous residence, date when admitted or born in workhouse, whether male/female, age, marital status, employment, religion, disability type, and date when discharged or died in workhouse. Volumes from 1842-1843 and 1849-1850 contain index of names.

Minute books, accounts ledgers, reports, workhouse registers, and ancillary material relating to the creation, administration, and eventual dissolution of Parsonstown Union from its establishment in May 1839 to its dissolution in 1925. The union’s Board of Guardians were responsible for overseeing several functions of local government; primarily the care of the poor, including the setting up, financing and running of the workhouse, the creation of dispensary districts, assisted migration and outdoor relief.

The main set of records are the minute books of the Boards of Guardians, comprising 97 volumes. Other material is financial in nature, such as the financial minute books and repayment of relief account book. Three registers of the Parsonstown (Birr) workhouse survive; 1842-1843, 1849-1850 and loose pages from a 1912 registers. As the Board of Guardians also oversaw the dispensary districts in the union, there is a ledger relating to their activities, as well as a copy of the lease for the Kinnitty dispensary residences.

Parsonstown Union’s area of operation covered 234 square miles from two counties: from Offaly (King’s County) – Banagher, Drumcullen, Eglish, Ferbane, Frankfort, Kilcoleman, Kinnety, Lemanagan, Letter, Lusmagh, Seirkyrans, Parsonstown, Shannon Bridge, Shannon Harbour and Tissarin. From County Tipperary – Aglishcloghane, Ballingarry, Dorha, Lockeen, Lorha and Uskeane.

Copies of outgoing letters from John V. Brown, clerk of Parsonstown Union to various recipients, particularly the Poor Law Commissioners, detailing reliefs and works. Also includes copy outgoing correspondence relating to assisted emigration schemes for inmates of the Parsonstown workhouse during the course of the Great Famine.

Loose pages of notes copied by 'H.D.' on 14 December 1891 'from particulars made out from old Minute Books for Mr. John Wright for his Directory and history of King's County in November 1889".
Lists holders of the following positions in the workhouse for the 50 years between the opening of the workhouse in 1842 and when the notes were compiled in 1889: chairmen; clerks of the union; masters of the workhouse; Protestant chaplains of the workhouse; Roman Catholic chaplains of the workhouse; the first inmate admitted; financial arrangements; furniture suppliers; meeting houses; and medical officers of the workhouse.