Gort Archives available on Microfilm -

Galway County Council is pleased to announce that the Gort Poor Law Union archive collection is now available on microfilm. Access is available at the Archives Section in the County Library Headquarters, Island House, Cathedral Square, Galway.

The collection contains the minute books of the Board of Guardians of Gort Poor Law Union throughout the famine period, and subsequent minutes which chart the history of the Union right up to 1921. It contains, for instance, weekly statistics on the number of persons accommodated in the workhouse, together with the numbers of births and deaths, and the number receiving outdoor relief. The highest recorded number of deaths occurred in January 1848, with 26 dying in one week, 63 the following week, 79 deaths are recorded for week-ending 15 January (1848), and 65 died during week-ending 22 January 1848.
At that point the Board’s Medical Officer reported that the medical department of the Workhouse was in a ‘most deplorable condition’ and that ‘whole [work]House is one mass of disease and infection without accommodation classification, clothing, bedding or proper attendants...’ (February 1848, G01/12/5, pp538-539).

The Minutes also reveal that the Board was involved in a programme of assisted emigration in the early 1850s. The minutes record for example that the Board ‘Resolved that the Commissioners be requested to get Aid from the Treasury to Emigrate some of the unmarried females now in this workhouse to Van Dieman’s land’’ (G01/12/11, p13).

The minutes also record that ‘The Medical Officer of the Kinvarra District reported that the town of Kinvarra is at present in a filthy state, owing to heaps of manure being allowed to remain in several parts of the town which polute (sic) the air and are highly dangerous to the health of the inhabitants’ (1888 , G01/12/81, p157), and also that Lady Gregory often invited the workhouse children to spend afternoons at Coole Park (for instances, G01/12/79, p449, 1887).
There is a whole wealth of interesting and important historical and human interest information to be gleaned from this wonderful archive collection. It is a valuable record charting local administration, and social and public infrastructural development in the south Galway region during a very important and poignant era in Irish history. It should be of interest to administrative, economic, political and social historians. In particular, it should be a major source of information for local historians.

The Poor Law Union collection was microfilmed as part of the ongoing program to preserve our County’s documentary heritage, to ensure the protection of original records, and to facilitate access for interested readers. Access to the records is by prior appointment with the Archivist at Island House (Tel. 091 562471).