Irish sporting legends to unveil new statue of Michael Collins in Cork city centre

And the members of the Michael Collins 100 Committee, who have spearheaded the project, have issued an open invitation for people to attend. Committee chairman, Tim Crowley, said they were delighted that three Cork sporting legends have agreed to unveil a statue of another Cork icon.

“The ethos of our group from the start has been non-political so we chose these three legends — people who have shown their mettle on the field of play and in coaching, all extraordinary people in their own right, all in the mold of Collins in their own respective fields,” he said.

Fine Gael city councillor, Shane O’Callaghan, whose motion asking the council to facilitate the placing of a statue of Collins in the city centre was agreed unanimously last September, encouraged people to attend.

“All are welcome. We are expecting a large turn-out, so I would advise anyone who wishes to attend to get there before 12 midday. It should be a great day and a fitting tribute to Cork’s and Ireland’s greatest hero,” he said.

Sculptor Kevin Holland, who created the landmark statue of Collins in Clonakilty, unveiled by Oscar-winning actor Liam Neeson in 2002, has been working on the new statue for several months.

It will depict Collins standing alongside a bicycle, based on the iconic photograph of him taken with a Pierce bicycle in Wexford in 1922, at a time when he would cycle around Dublin despite a bounty on his head.

Cast in Germany, the new bronze statue is being assembled in Macroom while the stainless steel bike element is being coated in bronze in Midleton.

The pieces will be re-united on Grand Parade and set at ground level inside a small stone surround, standing upon carved limestone paving providing basic details about Collins’ life.

Mr Crowley said Collins ran the War of Independence “among the people” and that’s why the decision was taken to set the statue at ground level.

“People will be able to stand right next to it and have their photograph taken with it. It should become a great landmark in the city,” he said. 

He also praised the response to a crowd-funding campaign launched last December to help pay for it. Mr Holland said at the launch: “This statue will be funded by public donations — the public are directly involved in this commission. So this is a commission from the roots up, this is a monument for the people, funded by the people”.

The location on the Grand Parade was chosen given its historic connection to Collins, who addressed a massive pro-Treaty rally on the wide thoroughfare on March 12, 1922, with estimates putting the size of the crowd at close to 50,000.

Collins used the platform to launch an attack on the leader of the anti Treaty side, Éamon de Valera, whom he accused of deserting the ship of the Irish state while absent in America during the War of Independence and leaving it to men like him to steer it into calmer waters.

He also highlighted what he saw as the obvious benefits of the Treaty to the ordinary people of Cork — the exit of British forces who had burned the city about a year earlier.

Collins’ convoy would have also passed the spot early on the morning of August 22, 1922, on his journey from the Imperial Hotel, where he spent his last night, on route to Béal na Bláth where he was shot dead later.