5 Pounds

The Brennan–McElligott signature combination dates this note to a very specific administrative window. Joseph Brennan served as Currency Commissioner and then first Governor of the Central Bank, while J.J. McElligott held the position of Secretary of the Department of Finance — an unusual pairing that reflects the transitional governance arrangements following the Central Bank Act of 1942, which transformed the Currency Commission into the Central Bank of Ireland.

Waterlow & Sons had held the Irish currency printing contract since the Free State's first notes in 1928. The relationship was long and exclusive enough that the 1944 Waterlow forgery scandal in South America caused no disruption to Irish contracts — Dublin's business continued unaffected.