Michael "Mick" Collins ( 16 October 1890 – 22 August 1922) was an Irish revolutionary leader. He was a Minister for Finance and Teachta Dála (TD member of parliament) for Cork South in the First Dáil of 1919. He was also the Director of Intelligence for the Southern IRA, and member of the Irish delegation during the Anglo-Irish Treaty negotiations. After that he was both Chairman of the Provisional Government and Commander-in-chief of the National Army. Throughout this time, at least as of 1919, he was also President of the Irish Republican Brotherhood. Under the rules of the Brotherhood this meant that he was President of the Irish Republic. Collins was shot and killed in August 1922, during the Irish Civil War.
Early years
He was born on his family farm named Woodfield in Sam's Cross near Clonakilty, West Cork. Michael Collins was the third son and youngest of eight children. Most biographies state his date of birth as 16 October 1890; however, his tombstone gives his date of birth as 12 October 1890. His father, also named Michael, was a member of the republican Fenian movement, but had left and settled down to farming. Collins was six years old when his father died.
After leaving school aged 15, Collins took the British Civil Service examination in Cork in February 1906,. In 1910, he moved to London where he became a messenger at a London firm of stock brokers, Horne and Company. While in London he lived with his elder sister, and studied at King's College London. He joined the London GAA and, through this, the Irish Republican Brotherhood, a secret, oath-bound society dedicated to achieving Irish independence. In 1915, he moved to the Guaranty Trust Company of New York where he remained until his return to Ireland the following year.
Easter Rising
Michael Collins first became known during the Easter Rising in 1916. A skilled organiser and very intelligent, he was highly respected in the IRB. When the Rising itself took place on Easter Monday, 1916, he fought alongside Patrick Pearse and others in the General Post Office in Dublin.
Collins, like many of the other participants, was arrested, almost executed. He was imprisoned at Frongoch internment camp. Collins became one of the leading figures in Sinn Féin after the Rising. This was a small nationalist party which the British government and the Irish media mistakenly accredited the Rising to. By October 1917, Collins had become a member of the executive of Sinn Féin and Director of Organisation of the Irish Volunteers. Éamon de Valera was president of both organisations.
The first Irish Parliament, the Dáil Éireann
Collins was nominated in the 1918 general election to elect Irish MPs to the British House of Commons in London. Collins won for Sinn Féin, becoming MP for Cork South. However, unlike their rivals in the Irish Parliamentary Party, Sinn Féin MPs had announced that they would not take their seats in Westminster, but instead would set up an Irish Parliament in Dublin.
That new parliament, called Dáil Éireann (meaning "Assembly of Ireland") met in the Mansion House, Dublin in January 1919, although De Valera and leading Sinn Féin MPs had been arrested.
In de Valera's absence, Cathal Brugha was elected Príomh Aire ('Main' or 'Prime', Minister', but often translated as 'President of Dáil Éireann'). He was replaced by de Valera, when Collins helped him escape from Lincoln Prison in April 1919.
The Irish War of Independence began on the same day that the First Dáil met on 21 January 1919. An ambush party of IRA volunteers acting without orders and led by Seán Treacy attacked a group of Royal Irish Constabulary men. They were escorting a shipment of gelignite to a quarry in Soloheadbeg, County Tipperary. Two policemen were shot dead during the fight. This incident is considered to be the first action taken in the Irish War of Independence.
1919 and the start of the War of Independence
In 1919, Collins had a number of roles. In the summer he was elected president of the IRB, Director of Intelligence of the Irish Republican Army. He also became the Minister for Finance. His ministry was able to organise a large bond issue in the form of a "National Loan" to fund the new Irish Republic. Collins and Richard Mulcahy were the two main organisers for the Irish Republican Army, in as far as it was possible to direct the actions of disorganised guerrilla units.
In 1920, the British offered a prize of £10,000 (equivalent to GB£474,000.00 / €535,026.83 in 2017) for information leading to the capture or death of Collins. His fame had so transcended the IRA movement that he was nicknamed "The Big Fellow".