William Shaw Mason (c. 1774–1853) played an important role in records management in Ireland in the early nineteenth century. In 1810 he was appointed secretary of the Irish Record Commission. Mason was also in charge of the earliest censuses undertaken in Ireland – in 1813–15 and 1821. Possibly as an accompaniment to the censuses, Mason published three volumes of statistical accounts of parishes across Ireland in 1814, 1816, and 1819. Typically, each parish account was the work of the local Church of Ireland clergyman.