Enquiries to: Archivist
Access: By advance appointment only.

Description:

Officially opened on 1 June 2000, the Archive Centre of the Western Mercy Province was situated at 47 Forster Street, Galway. It is the repository of a collection of artefacts, items of religious and artistic interest as well as many paper collections from the dioceses of Achonry, Ardagh & Clonmacnoise, Clonfert, Elphin, Galway, Killala and Tuam. These collections are not exhaustive and as some convents close we are the recipients of quite a lot of material. Some of this is not relevant or valuable but we accept it all in hope that we may discover some little items of value or some useful information.

The sisters who work in the centre enjoy the multidiscipline work which is involved in the organisation of the centre as collection, classification and preservation are on-going tasks. Our Administrative Team avail of our research quite often and we also receive many other queries, most of which in recent times relate to family history. Record keeping in the nineteenth century was not very good, so often we are the beneficiaries of interesting information which can be helpful.

Marianne Cosgrave, our congregational archivist has been our mentor over the years and under her guidance we have updated the registers, published and bound the annals which have been submitted by the various communities, produced obituaries of the many sisters who have died in recent years and have organised Open Days and Information days. A number of sisters have done an Oral Archive, and we consider these as a very valuable resource for the future, as many describe an Ireland which is quickly disappearing.

Address: 47 Forster Street, Galway.
Telephone: +00353 (091) 568290
E-Mail: wparchives@yahoo.co.uk