ABSTRACT
The Ouzel Galley Society was the most important commercial arbitration body in Dublin between 1705 and 1888. Far from an arbitration body, the societys records indicate it was active primarily as a convivial drinking club until the late eighteenth century. Harking back to the early eighteenth century the Chamber of Commerce claimed it as their forerunner Dubliners claimed it as a symbol of their fairness while merchants used it to show they were capable of arbitrating for themselves. Walsh and Whitelaw mentioned the origins of the society as an arbitration body but it was the philanthropic actions of the society which made the Ouzel Galley noteworthy and not the adventure story. The society transaction book makes it clear that the body had fallen into disuse in the first half of the eighteenth century. Dame Street became the commercial centre for the city in the closing years of the eighteenth century and the first decade of the nineteenth century.
