Unfortunately, the political differences also extended to the IRA, which broke into two separate factions. Those that opposed the treaty retained the IRA name (although the government referred to them as the irregulars) and those that supported the treaty and remained with the government became known as the Irish Free State Army. During the next few months, there were isolated incidents of violence between the two factions and on April 14, the IRA seized the Four Courts, which was the Irish judicial center in Dublin.

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The Irish Civil War started on June 28, 1922, when the Free State Army attacked the Four Courts and swiftly seized control of Dublin. The IRA, however, controlled much of southern and western Ireland. Once the Civil War started, Collins became commander-in-chief of the Irish Free State Army (technically, it was the National Army, since the Irish Free State did not come into existence until December 1922.) Over the next few weeks, the Free State Army drove the IRA from its strongholds. The biggest victory occurred when the Free State Army made an amphibious landing outside of Cork city, taking the IRA completely by surprise and driving it into the surrounding countryside over the next few days. On August 20, Collins left Dublin for an inspection of Cork. He arrived in Cork later that evening and spent the next day meeting with commanders. On August 22, he departed the city to tour western County Cork. Around 7:30 p.m., his small convoy entered a little valley called Beal na mBlath, which was only about 15 miles from where he had been born. A small group of IRA men had heard that Collins was in the area and had set an ambush for him. Shots rang out from the hillside and in the short gun duel that ensued, Collins fell dead. It was the supreme irony that the man who had perfected guerrilla warfare and who had escaped death numerous times at the hands of the British would be killed in a guerrilla ambush by his former comrades in his home county. The civil war continued until May 1923, when the IRA declared a cease-fire. Even though the Free State Army had clearly won, the IRA never officially surrendered. Instead, it took the fight into the political arena and in 1932, Eamon de Valera, who had been the leader of the losing side in the conflict, was elected prime minister. De Valera, or his party, would remain in power for most of the next 50 years. As a result, much of the history books written during that period portrayed Collins in an unfavorable light. Since de Valera’s death in 1975, however, there has been a renewed interest in Michael Collins by people have only recently begun to appreciate what he did for their country. In fact, in a poll conducted by the Irish Times as part of the millennium celebration, Collins was voted the republic’s man of the century. Even today, Collins remains the most controversial and polarizing figure in Irish history. To his supporters, he is a combination George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses Grant, and John Kennedy, having led the Irish both politically and militarily in their revolution and in their Civil War, only to be martyred at an assassin’s hands. Those who oppose Collins view him as a Benedict Arnold who betrayed the goal of an Irish Republic. While it is true that Collins settled for less during negotiations, however, he viewed the settlement establishing an Irish Free State as a stepping stone toward complete independence. Collins stated during the treaty debates that the treaty ‘gives us the freedom, not the ultimate freedom that all nations desire and develop to, but the freedom to achieve it.’ Future events proved him correct, for in 1937, under de Valera’s leadership, Ireland adopted a new constitution that abolished the Irish Free State. The country became known as Éire and declared itself a’sovereign independent democratic state.’ Finally, on April 18, 1949, the Republic of Ireland was established and formally severed all ties to the British crown and the Commonwealth. One is only left to speculate what Michael Collins would have been able to accomplish had he lived and been able to govern Ireland during peacetime. It is safe to say that the course of Anglo-Irish relations would have been much different had he lived and that, perhaps, the problems of Northern Ireland would have been solved long ago.

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