Michael Collins was a lot more than a military leader, McCullagh tells Béal na Bláth commemoration

Michael Collins was a pragmatist who came to believe that only through compromise could Ireland achieve “the freedom to achieve freedom”, the annual Michael Collins Commemoration in Béal na Bláth heard on Sunday.

This year’s oration was delivered by RTÉ broadcaster and historian David McCullagh, who has written biographies of Éamon de Valera and John A Costello.

Mr McCullagh said the focus on Michael Collins as a man of action, and a military leader, can take away from other aspects of his complex career.

“Leading a military campaign may seem more important than acting as the revolution’s fund-raiser and accountant; but without money, there would have been no military campaign to lead,” he said.

“Taking to the barricades might seem more inspiring than reaching a peace agreement; but without the peace agreement, the time on the barricades would have been a waste of time.

“The idealist is more celebrated in song, story and cinema than the pragmatist; but idealism without pragmatism can lead to a dead end.

“Making peace is less dramatic than waging war; but all wars end, and unless they end with complete victory or complete defeat, they require compromise. And while compromise may be seen as a dirty word by some, the truth is that compromise often requires courage – and can serve a cause better than intransigence.” 

Describing Collins as a pragmatist, the RTÉ presenter said circumstances had “turned Collins the military organiser, the intelligence chief and the financial mastermind, into Collins the diplomat, the negotiator and the constitution maker”.

Recognising in the Treaty the opportunity for the freedom to achieve freedom “Collins was focusing on practicalities – he was prepared to give way on symbolism to achieve greater independence in practice,” Mr McCullagh said.

More than 400 people attended the commemoration of Collins’s death in an anti-treaty IRA ambush on August 22, 1922, among them the Lord Mayor of Cork, councillor Damian Boylan, and deputy county mayor councillor Marie O’Sullivan.

Lieutenant Colonel Michael Parsons represented the Defence Forces, Inspector Kevin Long represented An Garda Síochána, while Angus Collins O’Malley and former justice minister Nora Owen represented the Collins family.

Fine Gael senator Garret Kelleher said Mr McCullagh’s extensive work writing on Ireland’s revolutionary period had shone through his “superb” oration.