Robert Barton

Robert Childers Barton (Irish Riobárd Bartún, * 1881 in County Wicklow; † August 10, 1975 ) was an Irish lawyer, politician and landowner. He was one of the negotiators of the Anglo -Irish Treaty of 1921.

Barton was born into a wealthy Protestant landowners family. His father was Charles William Barton and his mother Agnes Childers. He was the first cousin of Robert Erskine Childers. Barton was married to Rachel Warren, daughter of Fiske Warren.

After training at Rugby and Oxford, he became an officer of the Royal Dublin Fusiliers at the outbreak of the First World War. During the Easter Rising in April 1916, he was stationed in Dublin. As a sign of protest against the violent British backlash against the insurrection, he renounced his officer position and joined the Republican movement.

In 1918 he was elected for Sinn Féin in the constituency of West Wicklow to the British Parliament. Like other Sinn Féin representative he did not accept his position and instead went in the first Dáil Éireann, the Irish Parliament. In February 1919 he was arrested for sedition, but was on St. Patrick's Day from the Mountjoy Prison in Dublin escape. He was arrested again in January 1920 and sentenced to three years in prison. As part of a general amnesty in July 1921 he was released early.

Barton was appointed following the Minister of Agriculture of the Republic of Ireland, then to the Secretary of State. In 1921 he was elected to the second Dáil. He participated in the negotiations for the Anglo - Irish Treaty. Reluctantly signed this treaty of the same year. During the Irish Civil War, he was on the side of Eamon de Valera.

In June 1922 he was elected to the Dáil third, his mandate is accepted and left politics. He became a judge; 1934 to 1954 he was chairman of the Agricultural Credit Corporation.