100 years after his murder, Cork remembers Michael Collins in a new exhibition
The extended Collins family, local and national politicians and the public gathered for the opening of a new exhibition focusing on the Civil War in Cork now showing at Cork Public Museum.
In a small exhibition room upstairs in the Cork Public Museum in Fitzgerald’s Park, Margaret O’Donovan pointed to a photo her late father had taken of an IRA battalion marching along the South Mall in early August 1922.
“It’s quite possible one of those men shot Michael Collins,” she said pointing to the photo that her father, a professor of pathology at UCC, had taken on August 10, 1922.
Standing in front of the photo taken over 100 years ago, O’Donovan said that a soldier from the battalion spotted her father, who was on the roof of 47 South Mall taking photos of the soldiers. The soldier trained his gun on her father, who immediately ducked down, but luckily the battalion went around the corner and disbanded O’Donovan said.
Photos loaned from Margaret O’Donovan, as well as Suzanne Buckley, form a major part of the small but landmark exhibition which was opened by Lord Mayor Cllr Deirdre Forde on Saturday, August 20, at the museum in Fitzgerald’s Park.
“By a Treaty Divided – The Civil War in Cork” opens to the public this week and as Daniel Breen, curator of the museum explained, it contains “physical objects and documents, as well as privately owned photographs and images never displayed in public before, to tell Cork's story.”
Suzanne Buckley told T+D that photos she loaned the exhibition came about from a call out issued by historian and author Donal Ó Drisceoil of UCC looking for old photos of Cork City.
“Up I went to the bedroom and under the bed I found some things which I thought looked useful,” Buckley said.
Buckley said that Ó Drisceoil nearly “fell down” when she showed him what she had found, adding that she’s very happy the photos belonging to her grand uncle are being used in the exhibition “as they form part of our shared history.”
Also on display are uniforms that Collins wore, one of his guns, an admission pass to a Dáil session a year before his death and a few of the 300 letters, postcards and telegrams between Kitty Kiernan and Michael Collins, as well as letters between Kiernan and Harry Boland, the first president of the Irish Republican Brotherhood.
While the life and death of Michael Collins features strongly in the new exhibition, which includes an unfinished portrait of Collins by the artist Leo Whelan, likely painted in the early 1940s, “By a Treaty Divided” aims to tell the story of how the Civil War played out in Cork as guns poured into the county, tensions increased and families and communities divided into factions.
Eleanor Moore, a great-grand niece of Michael Collins, told Tripe+Drisheen that it was wonderful that people across Cork donated to the new exhibition to make it such an inclusive exhibition.
Moore, standing aside the unfinished painting of her ancestor, described the new exhibition as “very poignant”.
“It wasn’t always about the political figure for us as a family,” Moore said.
“He [Collins] was someone’s brother, uncle, or in my case my Granny’s uncle. So it’s very poignant seeing the exhibition today,” she said, promising to come back to take it all in again, when it’s less busy.
On Saturday evening, Moore along with 226 others from the extended Collins’ family, many of whom had flown in from all over the world, gathered for a dinner at Rochestown Park Hotel, ahead of the centenary commemorations at Béal na Bláth on Sunday, August 21.
Speaking at the opening of the exhibition, which was attended by a wide cross-section of local politicians, city council officials, members of the defence forces as well as Simon Coveney, the Fine Gael Minister for Foreign Affairs and Defence, Fidelma Collins, a grand-niece of Collins said “this week, this month, this year” had been a great honour for the Collins family.
“The people of Cork have really embraced the tradition of Michael Collins, his values, what he has done for the country, and in some ways they have embraced all of us as well.”
“They’ve been so generous to us, so welcoming, wanting to hear us, wanting to hear our stories and being really truly interested in what Collins had to offer, and in some ways what we are continuing to keep as his legacy.”
Lord Mayor Deirdre Forde said Collins “fought tirelessly to bring peace to the island of Ireland, and he deserves to be recognised for the man and political figure that he was”.
“By a Treaty Divided – The Civil War in Cork” runs until the summer of 2023 in the Public Museum in Fitzgerald’s Park.
The museum is free to enter and is open Tuesday to Friday from 10 am-4pm and on Saturday from 11 am-4pm. Closed Sunday and Monday.
Cork City Council also have an a database of material about Michael Collins which you can view here.
