The ruins of Rosserk Friary, near the mouth of Killala Bay, founded around 350 years before the United Irishmen rebellion.
On this day in 1922, Michael Collins – commander in chief of the nascent Irish army – was killed in an ambush in west Cork. He had been shot by fellow republicans – some of the members of the Irish Republican Army that did not accept the Anglo-Irish treaty that ended the Irish rebellion against Britain, but which had left 6 Irish counties remaining under British rule. Collins had ordered a move against the anti-Treaty republicans at the end of June when he ordered an attack on the Four Courts in Dublin (which had been occupied as a protest by anti-treaty IRA members) – he would be dead eight weeks later. His death marks a distinct fork in the road of modern Irish history – had he survived, what would have he achieved ? Given that De Valera (his one-time chief who then sided with the anti-Treaty forces) and the party he subsequently founded (Fianna Fáil) dominated much of modern Ireland’s development in Collin’s absence, an alternative timeline where Collins lived would suggest a very different path for the make-up of post-war Irish political leadership.
There is another anniversary today which might serve to tantalize those interested in the counterfactual. In an alternative universe, today would be the equivalent of Ireland’s D-Day, when a maritime landing signalled the beginning of liberation. On this day in 1798, a French force of 1,000 soldiers, led by General Humbert, landed near Killala in Co. Mayo to assist local Irish rebels in an uprising against the British. Alas, rather than arrive to herald the birth of liberation, the French had arrived to witness it’s burial. The landing had arrived too late to be of any use.. The uprising of 1798 had already happened around the country, led by the United Irishmen, and had been crushed, with brutal consequences for anyone even suspected of taking part. The very rebels who should have been inspired to revolt by the French invasion were already dead or defeated. The French-led revolutionaries was soon defeated – while the French were treated as prisoners-of-war, the Irish participants were slaughtered. In fact, the attempts by Theobald Wolfe Tone, leader of the United Irishmen, to involve the French in the liberation of Ireland is a series of what-ifs. A much bigger invasion had been previously planned. Despatched from France at the end of 1796, the 14,000 troops under the command of General Hoche set sail from France, but could not be landed in Cork as planned, due to poor weather and communications. Even after the rout of Humbert’s force, the French sent a further naval force with 3,000 troops to Ireland in October of the same year – Wolfe Tone was onboard one of the French ships. Attempting to land in Donegal, they were intercepted and captured by British ships – Wolfe Tone died in prison a month later.
Every subsequent uprising between 1798 and 1921 was a failure, succeeding only in adding to the list of Irish political martyrs and exiles. Collins had been involved in 1916 in a minor role, but the lessons he learned from the failure of the Easter Rising helped him wage a successful rebellion against the British, leading to the Irish Republic that exists today. It also led to the creation of Norther Ireland, and 94 years of fighting over the border in between. Thousands of people have been killed in that dispute, and all those deaths haven’t moved the border by an inch. However, in 1998, the path of Irish history took a turn for the better when the Good Friday Agreement was signed, and the island has become a progressively more peaceful and united place every year since. But one still can’t help thinking about the ‘what-ifs’ that might have occurred along the way.