Volume 1 and loose signatures, 1800

The first of two volumes of Irish manuscripts is a collection of historical, literary, or linguistic texts in a rustic wrap-around binding of tanned hide, with pages numbered on the recto. Additional writing, similar to the contents of the manuscript, can be seen under the hide binding on leaves making up the boards of the covers. It begins with a work of prose and verse titled "Uisneach" in Irish script on 11 of 12 leaves, with the first leaf missing. The volume is almost entirely written in Irish script, with occasional words and phrases in English and Latin. It is accompanied by a typed note headed "GAELIC MANUSCRIPT", asserting (incorrectly) that the volume "probably belonged to John Gilmary Shea" and suggesting a provenance from Ireland by way of Shea's father and grandfather. The note also points out an apparent date of 1777 in the text and an inserted slip of paper with a note in ink regarding the genealogies of the two wives of James II, and compares the writing on the slip to another example of Shea's handwriting.

Accompanying the volume in its box are two gatherings of manuscripts, one sewn and the other loose, with accompanying card by Francis Barnum, SJ indexing them under "Irish" and describing them as having "no special interest". Both gatherings are written in Irish, the sewn one being in cursive Roman letters and the loose one in Gaelic, with occasional English words and mythological references in Roman cursive. Also with these gatherings is a photocopy of a clipped newspaper entry related to the discovery of an Irish manuscript in Sandusky (alternatively Detroit) and the identification of its language at Georgetown during the presidency of Benedict Fenwick around 1822-1825.