Naval and War Pensions Committee
The Naval and War Pensions Committee was set up in 1917 to administer national provisions for war pensions for the thousands of Irishmen who fought in the First World War. At local level there was for instance the Banagher Local War Pensions Committee.
The Presbyterian Church in Birr grew in numbers in the 1840s following the Crotty Schism. Fr William Crotty (with his cousin Fr Michael Crotty) led this breakaway Catholic congregation to join the Presbyterian Church. Crotty's Church built to emulate a Presbyterian Hall was erected in Castle Street in 1839. A new church building for the Presbyterian congregation was erected in 1885 in John's Mall, not now in use.