Catalogue description Irish Distress Committee and Irish Grants Committee: Files and Minutes

In 1922 the Irish Distress Committee, later reconstituted as the Irish Grants Committee (March 1923), was set up in London to provide assistance to refugees from Ireland, but later extended its activities to granting loans to persons having valid claims against either Government. Its work was suspended in charged with the responsibility of discovering whether any further action with regard to persons who had suffered injury to person or property in Ireland since 11 July 1921 was necessary.

The recommendations of this Committee (Cmd.2748) led to the appointment of a second Irish Grants Committee in October 1926 with wider terms of reference which laid special emphasis on the plight of loyalists in Southern Ireland who had suffered hardship or loss between 11 July 1921 and 12 May 1923. This latter Committee sat until 11 February 1930 when its report, signed by its chairman, Wood-Renton, was sent to the Secretary of State for the Dominions. Certain claims were still being dealt with as late as 1933 but attempts to get the Committee re-constituted proved abortive.