'What if Michael Collins had lived?' - a century on, historians ponder the impact the military leader's killing had on Ireland's future
The civil war left a bitter legacy in Irish society, particularly the execution of dozens of anti-treaty fighters by the new provisional government.But Prof Marie Coleman, professor of 20th Century Irish history at Queen's University, Belfast, does not believe this would have been any different had Collins not been killed.
"He showed nothing between June and August 1922 to suggest that he would have been any softer on the republican side than Richard Mulcahy was after him." "Collins was replaced by Richard Mulcahy, who had been the chief of staff of the IRA during the War of Independence.There is still no agreement on who fired the fatal shot that killed Collins, which has left space for a range of theories and conspiracies.