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This small collection provides valuable information about the founding of the establishment and its subscribing members, ethos, funding and finances primarily between 1835 and 1848. It also contains statistical information about the parish and the volume of patients treated, and provides insights into which leading local families contributed or did not contribute to the funding of the Dispensary. It should be noted that the documents are purely of administrative nature and contain no names of individual patients or the nature of ailments and illnesses treated at the Dispensary.

The collection items consist of seals, reproductions of portraits and transcripts of documents relating to the De Laval and Willis families, providing in snapshot detail the fate of a high-ranking Huguenot family forced into exile, their efforts to create a new life in a foreign country, and the lives of their descendants.

Glass plate negatives depicting images of Edward Donogh O’Brien, 14th Baron Inchiquin of Dromoland and Leamanegh, his children from his second marriage to Ellen Harriet née White, other family members and friends. Also depicted are views of Dromoland Castle and grounds, scenic beauty spots in County Clare and country houses and their occupants in England.

The collection contains a vast array of documentation relating to the activities of the East Limerick Brigade during the War of Independence, both day-to-day organisation and military engagements involving the brigade. The material documents the logistical problems of running an amateur guerrilla army with extremely limited resources. It also paints a picture of the efforts made to maintain morale during the Truce of 1921. The collection includes a weekly British intelligence report by Major General Strickland (P46/2/1) providing a comprehensive account of the state of Ireland in February 1921. The report was captured by the East Limerick Brigade in 1921 and was slightly damaged by the British forces in an effort to burn it before it fell into enemy hands. Other documents of interest in the collection include the announcement of the Truce in July 1921 signed by Ernie O’Malley (P46/1/3/1/3), and an order issued by O’Malley of the steps to be taken in the event of the collapse of the Treaty talks and the resumption of hostilities (P46/1/2/2/12).

The collection is based on a single theme, namely, the publishing background to James Joyce’s Dubliners. The book did, indeed, have a very strange history. Its journey began in 1904, when Joyce submitted a collection of short stories to the publisher, Grant Richards. It was not until February 1906 that Richards accepted them. Unfortunately, Richards had problems with his printer who refused to set up the print for the story Two Gallants, as he objected to certain passages therein. Richards and Joyce had many debates and arguments about the deletion and modification of this and other passages in the book. Finally in 1907, Richards backed away from publishing the work. In 1909, George Roberts of the Dublin firm Maunsel & Co. accepted Dubliners and signed a publication contract in August of that year. However, Roberts had second thoughts about its publication soon after and the entire first print run of the book was burned before it was launched. Dubliners was finally published in 1914 by the original publisher, Grant Richards, a full ten years after it was written. McGrath seems to have had a great interest in discovering what influenced two successive publishers to reject the manuscript. Other items in the collection include an original Seán O’Casey letter to McGrath in which he enclosed a large signed black and white photograph of himself (P8/4). There are also press cuttings which comprise of an obituary of Oliver St. John Gogarty (P8/20) and a review of a book about Joyce (P8/21).