Michael Collins and the Women Who Spied For Ireland (14 page)

Hazel continued to be a guest in the home of Conservative MP Philip Sassoon, a lavish political host. There she often met his friend, Lloyd George. It was into Sassoon's room that the Irish delegation had been shown on their arrival in London.
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Mick wrote to Kitty on 12 December: ‘Am back but I'm so tired that I can scarcely remain awake. This is a line to tell you so, and to say I am thinking very very much of you today, also to say that, no matter how short my note is, I am writing it.'

The ‘short note' was to be the pattern of many of his letters, but he continued to write, no matter what demands were on him. He would enquire about her health, and she about his – if one of them had a cold this would be mentioned in the next letter. Both of them lit candles for each other.

Though extremely busy Mick tried to get down to Granard as often as possible, or failing that, to send Kitty a telegram to come to Dublin.

The Sunday after the turbulent cabinet meeting he was in Granard, but extremely tired. ‘I was sorry you felt so tired. I just got panicky before you left at how awful you were looking and all you had to face. So I pray you may have a rest and a sleep,' Kitty wrote. The love between them was growing stronger. ‘It was lovely to see you, only you were so tired and longed to sleep. It was I kept you up in a kind of way. I mean if I ran away to bed, you might have gone – and I was sorry. But that's always the way with you and I, we never want to separate. I hope it will always be that way. But it will, won't it?' Kitty pleaded.

His hurried note brought her great comfort. ‘You feel very sure now,' she responded. ‘Sure you might guess before you came on Sunday that I would think like you, and your worry be my worry.' His worries were great at this moment, and she understood, ‘I just want to tell you that I'll be praying for you that you do and say the thing that's best for Ireland.'
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He received this letter on the morning of 14 December, when the Dáil debate on the Treaty was about to begin. He wrote her a short note: ‘Am trying to show you that you are in my personal mind notwithstanding all cares and worries. I have so many. Do keep on praying for me.'

His hope was that the problems of the country would be sorted out shortly. ‘Then,' he wrote, ‘we can see how the future goes. It's all a dreadful strain and it's telling a good deal on me, but with God's help, things will be all right and some good will have been done.'
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Notes

On the morning of 14 December 1921 in the National University building, Earlsfort Terrace, Dublin, the Dáil debate on the Treaty began.

In many of the speeches Collins was the main target of the anti-Treaty group. The women were all anti-Treaty. In Mary MacSwiney's three hour speech which J. J. (Sceilg) O'Kelly felt was ‘in the highest ranks of the greatest orators of our race,' she pointed out ominously that the issue would be either rejection by all or civil war.

Collins' forecast was proving true: ‘Whatever we take back, it will be condemned'.

It was the oath which formed the greatest stumbling block and the issue of partition faded into insignificance. It was a sad, sorry spectacle – men who wanted the best for their country now spitting out venom because of it. Collins listened to the expressions of hatred and bitterness from Brugha. The bitterness was all there but it was open. Because it was honest Collins would never hold it against Brugha.

During the intervals Collins could be seen striding up and down the corridors of the National University, alone. He wore a moody and defiant look.

During these past five days Mick's letters to Kitty reflected his inner turmoil: ‘Am up early this morning, and am not feeling well at all unfortunately. The times are getting worse indeed and these coming days will be worse still'.
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And a few days later: ‘I do feel so neglectful – yet you understand now, don't you, dear Kit? ... – that I have you before my mind in spite of everything and you will be there always'.
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Then a few lines ‘very late' that Saturday night: ‘still at Dáil meeting and very worn out indeed. But am thinking of you,' he wrote. The next morning he wrote again during ‘a temporary cessation'. He noted: ‘All this business is very, very sad. Harry [Boland] has come out strongly against us. I'm sorry for that, but I suppose that like many another episode in this business must be borne also. I haven't an idea of how it will all end but, with God's help, all right. In any event I shall be satisfied'.
3

Harry Boland had been sent by de Valera to America ‘to prepare the American people for the acceptance of something short of a Republic'. When he heard the Agreement had been signed on 6 December, he made a public pronouncement welcoming it. But when he learned of de Valera's opposition he cabled to the Dáil his wish to have it on record that he would vote as de Valera would, against the Treaty. Now, Harry was Mick's opponent in politics just as he had been his rival for Kitty, the love of his life.

Kitty wrote to him commenting on those who were for him and against him. ‘The papers to-day are interesting enough. It is nothing but Collins here, Collins all the time, and as far as I can gather from strangers coming here, it's the same all over Ireland.'
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She was concerned about his health, and wanted to be with him – to talk – writing was no substitute. ‘I am very lonely at the thought of not seeing you this week-end; in fact I am very lonely just now,' she wrote. ‘You must be having an anxious time, but don't worry, all will yet be well, and it won't be your fault if the country is brought into trouble again.'
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On 19 December the Dáil reassembled in public session. It was a day of speeches full of emotion and bitterness. Griffith rose to propose formally that the Treaty be approved. After de Valera spoke against the Treaty, Collins made a passionate speech in its favour: ‘In my opinion it gives us freedom, not the ultimate freedom that all nations desire and develop to, but the freedom to achieve it'.

Next morning as he had done every morning, he went to Mass. On 20 December he wrote to Kitty:

Yesterday was the worst day I ever spent in my life but thanks be to God it's over. The Treaty will almost certainly be beaten and then no one knows what will happen. The country is certainly quite clearly for it but that seems to be little good, as their voices are not heard ...
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As one day moved into the next, the debate continued with undiminished bitterness. ‘It is not hard to know how all my thoughts are fully occupied in this momentous hour,' he told Kitty.

On 22 December a debate on whether or not there should be adjournment for Christmas brought out some of the most venomous words. That evening Kathleen Clarke came to him. She had spoken against the agreement and wanted to explain that if her husband were alive he would not have voted for it. ‘I wouldn't want you to vote for it. All I ask is that, if it's passed, you give us the chance to work it,' was Collins' response.
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Later Barton and Mick spoke for the last time. Mick replied to a remark of Barton's that he was honouring his signature: ‘We all signed under the duress of our own conscience.'

The following morning he wrote a hurried note to Kitty saying that the previous day ‘came so strenuous' that he was unable to finish the note he started writing to her.

Finally, on 23 December the Dáil agreed that the house would recess and reassemble on 3 January 1922. Unfortunately attitudes, far from mellowing in the interim, became more entrenched. Mick was sad. A friend noted, ‘all the fun had gone out of him.' Over the festive period he would have to meet many a former friend, uncertain of their feelings towards him. But this was a price he was prepared to pay. He was going home to west Cork for Christmas. He would go to Kitty in Granard for the New Year.

Down in Woodfield and Sam's Cross he found the usual welcome. But there was much discussion, and many of the debates on Ireland's future were subdued. Most of the neighbours and his old friends would stand by him. But one great friend, Tom Hales, who had finally been released from Pentonville Prison, would not agree. He had suffered too much to give in now. If war was the alternative to total freedom and allegiance to Ireland, then war it would be. Mick said afterwards, ‘More than any man I would have valued his support'. However, Tom's brother, Seán, who had been in Frongoch with Mick, would in the end stand by him. That division in the family, repeated numerous times throughout the country, was a symbol of a divided people. But for the present, this Christmas of 1921, all would be friends. Mick would put aside his doubts, his worries, his anxieties and would enjoy Christmas at home – a Christmas not ‘on the run'.

A reinvigorated Mick returned to Dublin just after Christmas, but it was straight to work. On 28 December, he wrote to Kitty ‘a line before a meeting starts. Am looking forward to a very strenuous day as we are working hard for the resumption after Xmas'. There was a number of meetings to try and reach a consensus prior to the Dáil assembly. The Labour Party had proposed a way to avoid a division in the Dáil, but he had become apprehensive. He visited his sister Katie, who was in a Dublin hospital. ‘I've strained every nerve to get support for the Treaty,' he told her, ‘but I'm hoping now we'll be defeated at the division.'

Puzzled, she asked him why.

‘Either way there's going to be trouble,' was his response. Despite the disadvantages of now being known, he would choose to face the British military machine rather than to face a fight against his own countrymen. ‘I would rather see it thrown out than passed by a very narrow majority,' he told a friend.
8

Mick went down to Granard for New Year's Day. It was a happy time. He and Kitty seriously discussed their future and plans for marriage as soon as the political turmoil settled.

In a short note on the morning of 3 January prior to the reassembly of the Dáil he told Kitty, ‘I am so happy about it all, much much more happy as I think more and more of it all'. At least something was going right for him; their relationship was on an even keel; he had found true love.
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Notes

When the Dáil reassembled on 3 January 1922 Collins began the day with a suggestion that they should accept the Treaty without a division and authorise the foundation of a Provisional Government. ‘If necessary,' he said to the anti-Treaty group, ‘you can fight the Provisional Government on the Republican question afterwards.'

‘We will do that if you carry ratification, perhaps,' responded de Valera scornfully.

‘Believe me,' said Collins, ‘the Treaty gives us the one opportunity we may ever get in our history for going forward to our idea of a free and independent Ireland. This cannot be gained without very much work yet – very hard work and perhaps more hard work ... It is not by denial of liberty that we can reach liberty.'

Countess Markievicz at one point stung Collins by repeating the rumour in circulation that as ‘Princess Mary's wedding is to be broken off ... the Princess Mary is to be married to Michael Collins who will be appointed First Governor'. This hit a nerve. Collins rose and said:

... it is an insult to my name and to the name of a lady belonging to a foreign nation that I cannot allow to pass. Some time in our history as a nation a girl went through Ireland and was not insulted by the people of Ireland [this is a reference to an earlier comment on the activities of Constance Markievicz]. I do not come from the class that the deputy for the Dublin division comes from; I come from the plain people of Ireland. The lady whose name was mentioned is, I understand, betrothed to some man. I know nothing of her personally, but the statement may cause her pain, and may cause pain to the lady who is betrothed to me. I just stand in that plain way, and I will not allow without challenge any deputy in the assembly of my nation to insult any lady either of this nation or of any other nation.

Mick wanted Kitty to have the right version of the story before she heard it or perhaps read it in the paper, so he sent her a telegram that evening: ‘My dear, dear Kitty, see the reference to yourself and princess Mary of England. My Betrothed, My fondest love.'
1

There were meetings at night to try to find a compromise, but no compromise could be found; the long-drawn-out debate continued. Collins had pointed out that the Articles of Agreement were not a Treaty as such, that the Dáil had to ratify them and the signatories were only recommending the document for acceptance.

What with wrangling over procedures and amendments and policy differences and some bitter invective, 5 January was a gruelling day. That night, very very late, Mick sat down to write ‘just one or two lines' to Kitty. ‘This is the worst day I have had yet – far far the worst. May God help us all ... In awful haste.' Here was his deep inner feeling – a cry for an exit!

Earlier that night he had met Harry Boland, who was back from America. He tried to persuade him to change his mind, but failed. ‘He was friendly, of course, and very nice,' Mick told Kitty. However, next day, Mick recorded, ‘I'm afraid though he was not so nice today but not about you – I mean not on the subject of you [Kitty]. I'm afraid he wasn't fair in his homecoming in what he said about our [Treaty] side today. He's working like the very devil against us, but God is good'.
2

It was 8.30 on the evening of 7 January when Arthur Griffith finished speaking. Then de Valera with a few brief words asked the house to reject the Treaty in favour of Document No. 2. Collins concluded: ‘Let the Irish nation judge us now and for future years'.

The time to vote had arrived. The Treaty was approved by a majority of seven.

There was no exultation. Collins was on his feet to seize the moment. ‘It is no victory,' he said as he called for unity. ‘I make the promise publicly to the Irish nation that I will do my best, and, though some people here have said hard things of me, I would not stand things like that said about the other side. I have just as high a regard for some of them, and am prepared to do as much for them now, as always. The President knows how I tried to do my best for him.'

‘Hear, hear!' de Valera interrupted.

Collins stretched out his hand towards him, stating, ‘Well, he has exactly the same position in my heart now as he always had'. De Valera seemed pleased but before he could respond, Mary MacSwiney rose, said she rejected any proposals and called the vote ‘the grossest act of betrayal that Ireland has ever endured'.

The dream of unity was shattered. Many wept in despair at this moment. Enduring friendships were now truly split.

Outside the Dáil, crowds cheered when news of the decision on the vote filtered through.

On 9 January 1922 the Dáil reassembled. Amid scenes of chaos, de Valera resigned as president of the Dáil.

After a weary day Mick wrote ‘in awful haste' to Kitty: ‘I'm absolutely fagged out and worn out and everything ... If you knew how the other side is “killing” me – God help me. We had to beat them again today'.
3

Next day, he wrote to Kitty he was ‘running back to the University for more talk – talk – talk. How I wish I could see you for a few minutes and if you only realised how I have missed hearing from you ... please do write. You can scarcely realise how I wish for you ... Your very own all right now!'
4

On the following day de Valera and his supporters left the Dáil in protest, Arthur Griffith was then elected president of Dáil Éireann (Second Dáil). He appointed his cabinet, among them Michael Collins as minister of finance.

Later that night Mick reflected: ‘The whole business was awful and I feel exactly like you about it,' responding to Kitty's ‘wish it was over' sigh. He knew she would see it in the papers. Right now ‘I am wishing to God I could be with you and had left it all. The tactics of the opposition were not very creditable at times ... '
5

Only pro-Treaty deputies attended a meeting on 14 January 1922 to formally ratify the Treaty and to select a Provisional Government to run until 6 December 1922, unless the people should reject it at the polls. Michael Collins was elected chairman; Griffith had no post in this Provisional Government.

(At this time there were – in coexistence – Dáil Éireann with Griffith as president with a cabinet, and the Provisional Government with Collins as chairman. Some ministers held posts both in the Dáil cabinet and in the Provisional Government.)

One of the proudest moments for Mick Collins was on the morning of 16 January 1922, when he took over Dublin Castle from the British, the seat of British administration and its military headquarters in Ireland for over seven centuries. Mick had been down in Granard with Kitty for the weekend and due to a train strike he was twenty minutes late for the historic ceremony. As he awaited the start of a Provisional Government meeting, he penned a few lines to Kitty wanting to share the moment with her:

I am as happy a man as there is in Ireland today ... Have just taken over Dublin Castle ... Otherwise I see all sorts of difficulties ahead, but never mind ... There is nobody like you, I find, and I wish I'd been nicer to you.
6

With no other social outlet, and few whom he could trust, he began to rely on Kitty. He took full responsibility for any misunderstanding there had been between them –' 'Twas my fault,' he wrote.

He disliked getting the better of his friend Harry Boland in love – politics was another matter. He told Kitty that he ‘just said to him [Harry] that he had little chance in that quarter now'.
7
Harry accepted it with good grace and wrote to Kitty: ‘I want to congratulate you. M [Mick] told me of your engagement, and I wish you long life and happiness. – Ever yours, H. Boland'
.
8

So the love triangle was now sorted out.

Mick felt that at present there was much to be done for the country and he was in a hurry. He set up temporary headquarters of the Provisional Government in City Hall, then moved to a building in Merrion Street beside where Griffith had established Dáil Éireann headquarters. Collins was an important link between the two governments, which functioned in parallel. (Cosgrave, Duggan and Kevin O'Higgins were members of both ministries.)

The division in the cabinet was repeated in the Army Council. At the February Cumann na mBan Convention, Mary MacSwiney spoke against the Treaty. She said the ‘women were the backbone of the nation,' and she urged her peers to reaffirm their allegiance to the Republic. Jennie Wyse-Power, however, agreed with Michael Collins that ‘it seemed easier to get the Republic from a government working in Ireland by Irishmen than from an Ireland under British rule'.
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Cumann na mBan rejected the Treaty, so a woman's organisation in support of the Treaty took the name of Cumann na Saoirse (Society of Freedom).

Collins, in a difficult situation as president of the militant IRB and its most dominant figure, sought to maintain unity in the hope that the constitution which was in preparation would help to satisfy the more extreme elements.

Problems were mounting, with the IRA splintered and evacuated army barracks throughout the country being taken over, in some places, by pro-Treaty and in others by anti-Treaty military personnel. At first there was sporadic unrest, intimidation and coercion but gradually and with increasing militancy the floodgates opened.

The country had begun to split and Mick Collins hated this. Mick knew that men like Brugha and Stack were motivated partly by old jealousy and resentment but now in a surprise move, Rory O'Connor, a friend of Mick's and member of GHQ, began to organise opposition to the Treaty.

Mick could see conflict looming when the IRA demanded that a convention should be held. He was torn between political demands and military claims. On 20 January he had to go to London to meet Sir James Craig, the northern prime minister. Already trouble had flared up in the north – talk of a Boundary Commission and the release of internees had caused Unionists to react violently. They attacked Catholic areas in Belfast; thirty people were killed in one night, and a stream of refugees was driven across the border.

Kitty came to ‘Dunleary' (Mick's spelling) on 20 January to see him off on the mailboat. As he journeyed on the rough sea to his destination he wrote her a few lines on how ‘very vividly' she was in his thoughts – ‘May it be always like this and any time we leave each other ... I'll say a small prayer for you'. He had only two hours' sleep in the Jermyn Court Hotel, then at 8.30 he went to the Laverys' to speak to Sir John about the Sir Hugh Lane pictures. (Lady Gregory had written to Collins on 14 January 1922 about this collection coming to Ireland rather than staying in England – ‘Sir John Lavery says you are the man whose request will carry most weight with the London Government,' she wrote.) Despite his heavy schedule and his many problems he broached the subject with advisers of the British government. He got a mixed reaction, but he promised Lady Gregory that he would pursue the matter.
10

There was a four-hour meeting of the Irish group with Craig concerning the boycott of Belfast goods. They reached ‘an agreement' of which Mick told Kitty in his few brief lines on 21 January, with his ‘fondest love'.
11
Mick's dislike for politicians comes through in a letter to his friend John O'Kane that night: ‘They will have me for what I am not. The more the rigmarole of my life continues to encompass politics the more uneasy I feel. I am a soldier ... '
12

That night Hazel and John Lavery entertained both the British group and the Irish delegation which included Collins, Duggan and Kevin O'Higgins. Lady Juliet Duff who was there commented that: ‘three nicer men she'd never met,' and found Collins ‘quite irresistible ... with a tremendous twinkle and sudden quick impulsive gestures'.
13

Collins was back in Dublin on 22 January and on 23 January he had a note delivered to Kitty, who was in town. He asked if he could meet her at 2 o'clock: ‘Will you come to the Dolphin [Hotel] and I'll wait for you at the door, or will you say any better place where I can pick you up and bring you there?'

A week later he again met Craig in Dublin. Feelings ran high when Craig made it clear that the north-east would not be part of the ‘new state'. Furthermore, a threat that some Volunteers who had been captured in the north could be hanged had Collins mentioning the subject of reprisals. He ignored the activities of MacEoin, Aiken and others who had carried out a series of raids in the north in retaliation for the killings of Catholics which had become a nightly occurrence in the north.

According to the Craig-Collins agreement the Dáil cabinet on 24 January agreed to lift the boycott on Belfast goods. Immediately trade was resumed and some Catholic workers who had been dismissed from the shipyards were reinstated. However, conflict continued. A further meeting between the two men broke up in February. Up to March, Collins and Craig met a few times, but promises had little effect and violence in the north-east against nationalists continued unabated. Craig did not help the situation when he publicly reinforced the north's separate identity under the Government of Ireland Act.

As well as the northern problem, Mick was trying to administer law and order in the rest of the country, and handling the transition from the British administration. More than anything he was personally distressed by the thought of the disloyalty of former comrades.

A friend wrote from America and appealed to him not to break with de Valera and Harry Boland. Collins in his reply regretted that both men were ‘on the other side' because, he wrote: ‘We are going forward ... surely no one will claim that we can possibly be worse off ...' Speaking of Harry Boland he said: ‘... there is no need for me to tell you what I have thought of him in the past, and I need only to say that my feelings towards both the President and himself are still as cordial as they were'.
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