Catalogue description Compensation (Ireland) Commission (Shaw and Wood-Renton Commission) and Related Bodies: Registers, Indexes and Papers

Following the Truce of 11 July 1921 and the advent of an uneasy peace in Ireland, a working agreement was reached between British and Irish Ministers on the implementation of Articles of Agreement subsequently embodied in the Act of the Imperial Parliament setting up the Irish Free State Constitution (13 Geo. V sess.2 c.1). Part of the Agreement admitted the principle of compensation for those who had suffered loss or injury of the kind governed by the enactments relating to Criminal Injuries, including those sustained during action taken by the military operating under martial law.

As a consequence the Compensation (Ireland) Commission was established jointly by the two Governments in 1922. It sat in Ireland under the presidency of, initially, Lord Shaw of Dunfermline, and subsequently, Sir Alexander Wood-Renton. The Commission's terms of reference were confined to the consideration of claims in respect of damage or injury incurred between 21 January 1919 and 11 July 1921.

Registers of claimants were prepared in the conduct of the Commission's business, which came to an end in 1925, when on 3 December the Government of the Irish Free State assumed all liability in respect of malicious damage done to property after 21 January 1919.