Collins, Michael

b. 1890; d. 1922

Irish revolutionary general, born at Woodfield, Clonakilty, County Cork. He was educated at a national school and was employed in London in the Post Office and afterwards in an accountant's office. In Easter week, 1916, he took part in the seizure of the Dublin GPO; after the failure of the 'rising' he was imprisoned in Stafford jail and in Frongoch camp, Merioneth, from which he was released before Christmas 1916. In 1918 he was imprisoned in Sligo jail for sedition; in the same year he was elected parliamentary representative for County Cork, and took his seat in the republican Dáil Éireann. He was chiefly responsible for Eamon de Valera's escape from Lincoln jail in 1919. Collins was minister for finance in the government set up by the republicans, and also head of the intelligence department of the revolutionary army. By 1920 a reward of £10,000 was offered for his arrest, but he managed to evade capture.

Collins and Arthur Griffith were the principal Irish agents at the negotiations with the British government in 1921 and it was chiefly through the influence of Collins that the British treaty terms, which led to the setting up of the Irish Free State, were accepted by Dáil Éireann.

On the death of Griffith in 1922 Collins became head of the Irish government. He entered into discussions with the Northern Irish Unionists while at the same time fighting the republican irreconcilables in the Free State. He was ambushed by republicans and shot dead while motoring from Skibbereen to Cork.

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