Heritage Council Grant Funds Digitisation of Cork Workhouse Registers
Cork City and County Archives is delighted to announce that it has received a Heritage Council 2026 Stewardship Grant to complete the digitisation and online publication of 29 no. Cork Poor Law Union workhouse Inmate (Indoor Relief) Registers to make them available for wider public access, heritage use, and genealogical and historical research.
The registers record the actual names and details of inmates of the workhouse. The registers form part of the Cork PLU Board of Guardians collection which is preserved at the Cork City and County Archives.
The registers are currently in original hard copy and microfilm format only, and scanning will make them greatly more accessible to a vast audience locally, nationally and internationally.
Cork Poor Law Union covered a large area, including Cork City plus several adjoining areas in the County.
The survival of Poor Law inmate registers is relatively rare nationally, so the Cork collection of these is of immense heritage, genealogical, and research importance.
The scanned registers will be made freely available online to all on our web site.
On 19 August, a day of in person talks for National Heritage Week 2026 will be held at the CCCA about archives, genealogical and local history research, including a talk about the Cork workhouse records.
