Letters 1916-1923 is Ireland’s first participatory digital humanities project. Begun in September 2013 as Letters 1916, in 2017 it expanded its collection period to the end of the Civil War through a generous grant from the Irish Research Council.
This digital collection includes letters held at institutions in Ireland and abroad alongside those in private collections. There are thousands of letters connecting hundreds of lives commenting a wide range of topics, from wars and violence at home and abroad including the Easter Rising, The Great War, The Anglo-Irish and Civil Wars literature and art, love, politics, business, and ordinary life. Letters 1916-1923 adds a new perspective to the events of the period, a confidential and intimate glimpse into early 20th Century life in Ireland, as well as how Ireland was viewed abroad.
In September 2018 the project launched its new integrated database, combining the previously-separate ‘Contribute’ database (which provided for community involvement in uploading and transcribing letters) and the Explore database which gathered images, metadata and transcriptions so that users could read and research the collection.
Explore the collection through the Browse tab above. Our new database allows you to limit your search to the name of the letter writer(s), the date (or date range) the letter or letters were written, the family or repository that holds the letter(s), and keywords.
This new database is launching with some 3000 letters transcribed by over 2000 volunteers.
The Letters 1916-1923 team thanks everybody in the community that makes this collection possible: the archivists and curators, the directors of cultural heritage institutions, and the hundreds of volunteers who have transcribed, encoded and edited letters, decoding difficult to read handwriting, figuring out almost illegible signatures, and correcting mistakes when they slip through our proofing process.
Continue to join us on this journey as we create this important collection by registering to be a transcriber or adding a letter from your family allowing their story to become part of a national narrative. To learn how to get involved, see the Get Involved tab above.
And be part of the research process!
