Research Collections: Archives
Copy letter from Seán Lester to Nora Barnacle on the death of James Joyce, 13 January 1941
[IE DCUA C1/9/c1_9_0041]
Our archive collections contain holdings of national and international standing, including papers of noted literary, political, and professional figures, photographic and audiovisual collections, historic manuscripts and records of corporate bodies and associations.
The collections are intended to support research by a wide range of scholars and researchers whose work relies on primary resource materials. See below a list of collections currently available for consultation and others that will be made available in due course.
Collections
Collection Dates: 1995-2021
Extent: 2 digital audio files
Dr. David O'Donoghue is an Irish journalist and historian who has written two books on Irish-German relations during the Second World War. David has worked as a journalist for Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTÉ) and for Agence France-Presse (AFP) in Paris, France. David was awarded a PhD from Dublin City University in 1995.
This collection includes an audio documentary Hitler's Irish Voices about the Irland-Redaktion radio service, 1939-1945, and an audio interview with creator Dr. David O'Donoghue about the documentary and his PhD thesis 'Hitler's Irish voices: the story of German radio's propaganda service, 1939-1945', (1995), Dublin City University.
This collection can be accessed in digitised form here. A finding aid is provided below.
Collection Dates: 1782-1950
Extent: 1 album
Provenance: Bound Volume acquired by St. Patrick's College in the 1990s.
Henry Morris (1874-1945) was a writer and Irish scholar, born on 14 January 1874 in Lisdoonan, Donaghmoyne, Co. Monaghan, Ireland. Morris was a teacher and school inspector for the Department of Education, collector of 18th and 19th century Irish manuscripts, and involved in the revival of Irish language and antiquarian studies.
Album of correspondence, press-cuttings, autographs, warrants, postcards, invitations, and receipts, collected by Henry Morris.
This collection can be accessed in digitised form here. A finding aid is provided below.
Collection Dates: 1905-2011
Extent: 4 boxes
Provenance: Colum Kenny donated this collection to DCU Library on behalf of the Kenny family on 23 November 2011.
This collection consists of material relating to the lives and careers of Kevin J Kenny (1881-1954), Michael B Kenny (1919-1992) and Colum J Kenny (born 1951).
The majority of the material relates to Kevin J Kenny who founded Kenny’s Advertising Agency in 1902, one of the first full-service advertising agencies in Ireland. The agency provided placement opportunities in publications for clients, as well as other services, which brought Kenny into contact with many notable historical figures of the day, such as Roger Casement, Patrick Pearse, Arthur Griffith, Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington and James Creed Meredith. The collection includes letters from these figures as well as other papers providing important insights into major historical events such as the Easter Rising, the Gallipoli Landings, the recruitment controversy of 1915-1918, the War of Independence and Civil War.
This collection can be accessed in digitised form here. A finding aid is provided below.
Collection Dates: 1935-2003
Extent: 2 boxes and metal case
Provenance: The Seán Lester Diaries were donated to Dublin City University by Patricia Kilroy and Ann Gorski, daughters of Seán Lester, on behalf of the Lester family in 2008.
This collection consists of the diaries of Irish diplomat Seán Lester (1888-1959), covering his time as High Commissioner of the League of Nations in Danzig [Gdańsk, Poland] from 1935 to 1939, and part of his time as Deputy, and subsequently as Acting Secretary General, of the League in Geneva, Switzerland, from 1940 to 1941.
Lester’s diaries offer a fascinating insight into the rise of the Nazis and the lead-up to and outbreak of the Second World War, while Lester and his colleagues struggled to maintain the existence of the League with, as he noted, “the world falling about our ears”. Fearing the discovery of his diaries by the Nazis, Lester buried them in a metal case beside a bench in the Palais des Nations [the headquarters of the League] in Geneva. This metal case is also included as part of the collection at DCU.
This collection can be accessed in digitised form here. A finding aid is provided below.