The terrorism of Michael Collins is being airbrushed, as is that of the later IRA

Commentary on the 100th anniversary of Collins’ death have generally studiously ignored his role in the terrorism which gripped Ireland in the aftermath of World War One.

Rev Ivan Foster’s letter published in your paper is an honourable exception (‘Michael Collins was not opposed to sectarian killings, rather he unleashed them,’ August 30, see link below).

The BBC ran multiple articles on Collins yet failed to mention the 14 Protestants murdered in Bandon Valley in 1922, some of whom were ‘Disappeared’ in the fashion the IRA of the 1970s would with Jean McConville and others. No mention of the unionist MP and hero of the Great War Sir Henry Wilson, shot on the steps of his home on Collins’s orders — a fact supported by multiple sources cited in Ronan McGreevy’s recent book on the murder.

No acknowledgement of the fact that at the funeral of Sir Henry his widow reserved special places for some of the numerous Protestants who had been forced to flee the fledging Free State.

No mention of the Altnaveigh Massacre when Collins’s IRA crossed the border in order to attack an isolated Protestant community in South Armagh murdering six men, women and children and leaving homes in flames. Yes, the Sinn Fein government were keen to disown the attack – but as was to be the pattern decades later action against the culprits was sadly lacking.

No mention of the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) officers shot in the back.

No mention of the Pettigo attack — one of the few occasions when Collins’ IRA actually faced the security forces and consequently were soundly defeated.

Nationalist Ireland has no interest in any of that. Indeed, it was incapable of hosting even an academic discussion on the role of the RIC a few years ago. So much for their supposed ‘new Ireland’.

But this is much more than an historical point. The treatment of Collins in death is a reminder of how those who were linked to what any reasonable observer could only be described as terrorism in their lifetimes can have these unsavoury aspects of their careers airbushed.

Treatment of Collins 100 years after his death is a warning of how, with the passage of time, events like Kingsmill, La Mon, Enniskillen and Bloody Friday can be forgotten and those responsible lionised.

Michael Collins was not opposed to sectarian killings, rather he unleashed them