The Limerick Papers

Identity area

Reference code

IE 2135 P51

Title

The Limerick Papers

Date(s)

1531-c. 2019 (predominantly 1832-1913) (Creation)

Level of description

Fonds

Extent and medium

9 standard boxes and 3 outsize boxes

Context area

Name of creator

Pery family, Earls of Limerick

(Title created 1803)

Biographical history

The Earls of Limerick are descended on their maternal side from Edmond Sexten (1486-1555), who held the office of Mayor of Limerick in 1535 and was the first mayor of native Irish extraction. Originally closely associated with the Earl of Kildare, Sexten… Read more

The Earls of Limerick are descended on their maternal side from Edmond Sexten (1486-1555), who held the office of Mayor of Limerick in 1535 and was the first mayor of native Irish extraction. Originally closely associated with the Earl of Kildare, Sexten changed allegiances and ingratiated himself to King Henry VIII. He was given custody of Derriknockane Castle and remained active on the Crown’s behalf, carrying out much of this work at his own expense and at times pleading financial hardship to the Crown. By way of compensation, Sexten was granted the dissolved priory of St. Mary’s in 1537. St Francis’s Abbey came into his possession in the same year. Bartholomew Striche, who succeeded Sexten as Mayor, made an attempt to overturn the grant of St Mary’s by alleging that the expenses which Sexten claimed had not been paid out of his own purse but at the expense of the city of Limerick, and that by implication the grant should therefore have fallen to the corporation. In 1538, Sexten was committed to Dublin Castle for high treason on grounds dating back to his time as Mayor but was later released and continued to enjoy the favour of the Crown. His grandson and namesake Edmond Sexten (1595-1636) was four times Mayor and five times High Sheriff of Limerick city. He, too, was engaged in a series of disputes with Limerick Corporation, primarily concerning the immunity of the lands of the two dissolved abbeys mentioned above, and whether Sexten alone, or the parish generally, was responsible for the upkeep of the church of St John the Baptist, Limerick, whose tithes were appropriate to St Mary’s. His only sister Susan Sexten married Edmond Pery of Limerick (1599-1655) and succeeded as sole heiress to the Sexten property. Her son, Colonel Edmond Pery married Dymphna Stackpole, a wealthy heiress, and when Colonel Perry died in 1721, his son the Reverend Stackpole Pery succeeded to the Sexten, Pery, and Stackpole fortunes. His second son, the Reverend William Cecil Pery (1721-1794) became Bishop of Limerick in 1784, and six years later was created Baron Glentworth. The peerage title was derived from his maternal great-grandfather Sir Drury Wray of Glentworth, Lincolnshire. Three of William Pery’s sisters married in to Limerick families of note: Dymphna to William Monsell of Tervoe, County Limerick; Lucy to Sir Henry Hartstonge of Bruff, County Limerick, Baronet and MP for that county; and Jane to Launcelot Hill of Limerick city. William Pery’s only surviving son, Edmund Henry Pery (1758-1844) was created Viscount Limerick in December 1800 and the Earl of Limerick in February 1803. He fell out with his eldest son and heir apparent because of the latter’s recklessness with money. In order to protect the family’s future, the 1st Earl made a will in which he vested the estate in a trust and made his heirs tenants for life. He was succeeded in the title by his grandson, William Henry Tennison, who did not mix much in society and who died from a sudden attack of bronchitis at the relatively early age of 56. He was twice married, and was succeeded by his son William Hale John Charles Pery from his first marriage to Susanna Sheaffe. In 1868, the 3rd Earl commissioned Edward William Godwin to design Dromore Castle in the Gothic Revival style near Pallaskenry, County Limerick as a country retreat. The building was completed in 1874. In the event, it was rarely used as a residence and eventually sold in 1939. Like his father, the 3rd Earl was twice married. With his first wife, Caroline Maria Gray, he had one son, William Henry Edmund de Vere Sheaffe, who succeeded him as the 4th Earl. He married May Imelda Josephine Irwin but the marriage ended in a separation in 1897. The couple’s only son Gerard, Viscount Glentworth was an RAF pilot and was killed in action near the end of the First World War in May 1918. The title then passed to the 4th Earl’s half-brother, Colonel Edmond Pery from his father’s second marriage to Isabella Colquhoun. His eldest son Patrick succeeded to the title as the 6th Earl in 1967. The current holder of the title is his son, Edmund Christopher, 7th Earl of Limerick. For a more detailed pedigree of the Earls of Limerick and associated families, please refer to P51/9/5-7.

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Repository

Special Collections and Archives Department

Content and structure area

Scope and content

The main portion of this collection consists of wills, accounts, correspondence and statements from the mid- to late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries relating to the family’s financial affairs, mostly arising from the will of the 1st Earl of… Read more

The main portion of this collection consists of wills, accounts, correspondence and statements from the mid- to late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries relating to the family’s financial affairs, mostly arising from the will of the 1st Earl of Limerick and the dramatic reduction in rents at the turn of the century, which necessitated the sale of holdings through the Land Commission Court in the early 1900s. There is a small but interesting series of leases of property in Limerick City (P51/3/1/1-3 and P51/4/1-2) and a comprehensive set of documents (P51/3/2/1-28) relating to a dispute over title to St George’s Church at No. 1 Mallow Street, Limerick, which was demolished to make way to the Provincial Bank of Ireland, designed by James and George Richard Pain (for a ground plan of the bank by the Pain brothers, see P51/3/2/11).

While much of the early material relating to the Earls of Limerick and their antecedents is deposited in the National Library of Ireland, some interesting early documents can also be found in this collection. Of particular note is a compilation of manuscript transcripts of letters and petitions (P51/1/1) by Edmond Sexten the elder (1486-1555) and his grandson Edmond Sexten the younger (1595-1636) concerning among other things their disputes with Limerick Corporation. The document is written in secretary hand, but a more easily legible version can be found in P51/1/2. Also worth noting is a compilation of abstracts and copies of early deeds relating to the Sexton, Casey and Stackpole families (P51/1/3). A wonderful example of the emergence of the Age of Enlightenment can be found in P51/2/1 in the shape of a commonplace book, in which Colonel Edmund Pery kept notes between 1671 and 1681 on weights and measures, foreign coins, chronology, geography, astronomy, orthography, pronunciation and usage of English, significance of colours, instructions concerning the keep of horses, recipes for ink, boot polish etc., gardening activities and meteorological predictions.

A shortcoming of this collection is its limited scope. There are no rent rolls, no estate correspondence and no personal correspondence of family members. The building of Dromore Castle remains unrecorded, except for a scrap book (P51/5/4/1) compiled in 1868-1869 to contain sketches by the architect Edward William Godwin and rare photographs of Dromore Castle taken at various stages of its construction and a sketch of fireplace tiles by Godwin (P51/5/4/2). The only item of personal nature in the collection is an album of photographs, sketches, and signatures collected by May, Countess of Limerick during house parties (P51/6/3/2/2).

It should be noted here that the material deposited in the National Library of Ireland dates primarily from 1371 to 1806. A significant gap of the nineteenth-century material therefore exists, both in terms of estate and personal documentation.

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Appraisal, destruction and scheduling

All records have been retained.

Accruals

Accruals are possible.

System of arrangement

The material has been arranged into nine series. Series 1 contains material pertaining to the Sexten family, maternal ancestors of the Earls of Limerick. Series 2 contains material pertaining to Colonel Edmund Pery, direct ancestor in the male line of… Read more

Conditions of access and use area

Conditions governing access

Unrestricted access to all items.

Conditions governing reproduction

Standard copyright regulations apply to all items. For photocopying or reproducing material, please consult with the staff.

Language of material

Béarla
Laidin

Physical characteristics and technical requirements

Paper documents mostly in good condition.

Allied materials area

Existence and location of originals

The originals of the photocopied items in the collection are held by the Limerick family.

Existence and location of copies

Available digitally on the University of Limerick Digital Library at https://doi.org/10.34966/uldl.4x0x-5048.

Related units of description

The main body of papers relating to the Earls of Limerick are held in the National Library of Ireland, Dublin (https://www.nli.ie/sites/default/files/2022-12/121_limerick.pdf). Material relating to Edward William Godwin and the building of Dromore Castle… Read more

Related descriptions

The Monsell of Tervoe Collection

Access points

Subject access points

Place access points

Name access points

Pain, James (1783-1877), architect (Subject)
Pain, George Richard (1792-1838), architect (Subject)
Godwin, Edward William (1833-1886), English architect and designer (Subject)

Description control area

Rules and/or conventions used

This description follows guidelines based on ISAD(G) 2nd edition (2000), Irish Guidelines for Archival Description (2009), National Council on Archives: Rules for the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names (1997) and EAP Guidance on Data… Read more

Archivist's note

Papers arranged and described by Anna-Maria Hajba in May 2019.

Fonds P51 - The Limerick Papers

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