A collection of over 2,300 volumes from the rare book room of the library of St Andrew's College, Drygrange. The College was founded in 1953, in a country house near Melrose in the Scottish Borders, as a Roman Catholic seminary. The library in Drygrange was built up mainly from the collection of Bishop John Gillis (1802-1864), and also included books from St Margaret's Convent, Edinburgh, founded in 1835 by Gillis as the first Catholic religious house established in Scotland since the Reformation. Although the collection consists of mostly 18th- and 19th-century works, there are also three incunabula, 83 items printed before 1701, as well as some early continental imprints. The main subject areas are theology and religious controversy, church history and biography, devotional literature, Roman Catholicism in England and Scotland. There are also a number of early 19th-century tracts dealing with Catholic Emancipation, general European history, and works on travel and natural history.

Organisation

The books have been catalogued individually and have the shelfmark 'Dry.'.

Acquisition

The collection was deposited in the Library 1986 by St Andrew's College before it closed later that year.