Wednesday, March 17, 2010 Previous editions
Saturday, November 07, 2009
THE owner of Blarney Castle has donated his entire family archive, some of which dates from the 17th century, to the Cork City and County Archives.
The Colthurst collection, which includes 4,000 items, provides a remarkable insight into the lives of three of Cork’s great merchant families over three centuries.
The Colthursts are prominent Anglo-Irish landowners best known for their links to Blarney Castle. The Colthurst Baronetcy in Co Cork was created in 1744 for John Colthurst, who represented Doneraile, Youghal and Castlemartyr in the Irish House of Commons.
Today, the family still owns tens of thousands of acres of land around Blarney, Ballyvourney and Millstreet.
Sir Charles St John Colthurst, the 10th Baronet, now aged 55, inherited the lands including Blarney Castle from his father, Sir Richard. Their family is connected through marriage to two other historically important Cork families – the Morrises of Dunkettle and Olivers of Little Island.
Ellen Oliver married Jonas Morris. Her husband died young and she inherited the Morris family archive. She left the Oliver and Morris archives to her daughter Edith, who married Sir George St John Colthurst in 1881, bringing those papers with her.
Up until recently, all the material associated with the three families was stored in boxes in various rooms in Blarney House.
Sir Charles asked freelance librarian and historian Margaret Lantry to catalogue the material.
She said Sir Charles had considered selling the material until she told him of a previous donation to the city and county archives.
She said Sir Charles then decided it would be better to have the entire collection professionally catalogued, stored and made available to the public.
"It is a fascinating collection which provides a sequential record of everything to do with the Colthurst estates since the 1600s. It is a very important resource for historians," Ms Lantry said.
The documents include legal records, letters and maps relating to the main Blarney estate, the Rathcoole estate near Millstreet, Ballyvourney and Coolymurraghoe estates.
There are continuous records on rental and mortgage payments, wills and marriages. The collection also includes several family photo albums, with some photographs dating from the 1840s, just a few years after the first camera was invented.
City archivist Brian McGee described the donation as one of the single biggest the city and country archives has ever accepted.
"It has been catalogued and will be preserved and stored professionally, in the appropriate temperature and conditions, and will be a very valuable source of information for historians," he said. Sir Charles and the Lord Mayor of Cork Dara Murphy are due to attend a ceremony at the city archives in Blackpool next Thursday to mark the official hand-over of the collection, which will soon be available to researchers.
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