Madam, - When home in Kildare recently I read the article "The Women in Collins's Life" (Weekend Review, May 5th). I rush to defend Kitty Kiernan. My source is Mrs Paul Dawson Cusack, née Violet Davies, the daughter of the bank manager in Granard.
Vi, as we knew her, was a firm friend of my mother. Both ladies are now dead, having lived into their nineties, but I spent days and weeks listening to Vi (who had total recall) reminiscing about Kitty, her husband's cousin and her own best friend, and Michael Collins. I have a letter Michael wrote her in 1921 when her husband had been imprisoned.
I also met Lt Gen Seán MacEoin when I was in Dublin many years ago. He had fond memories of Kitty's spirit.
I expect you know that Kitty was first engaged to Harry Boland, a close friend of Collins. She lived at the Greville Arms, owned by her brother Larry. One day Harry Boland and Michael Collins met there, and Harry was carrying a glass bowl which, on being asked, he told Michael was a present for Kitty. "I'll back my personality against your glass bowl any day" said Collins.
Kitty was well aware of the affairs Michael had with various ladies. "It does not bother me, Vi, and I know that if I went to bed with him myself he'd be up and away. I love him, and I know that in his way he loves me, that is what matters." They were due to be married on August 31st, 1922, but Collins was killed a few days earlier.
I well understand why genteel ladies in Granard disliked Kitty. She was her own person, wilful and wayward, and judging from the newspaper photographs (I have one, in addition to the one you showed) I suspect they were jealous of her good looks. What they termed "vulgar" could also be termed "sparkling".
She mixed freely with the British officers who were billeted in the Greville Arms, but she was aware of the risk of carelessly "informing"." I might be a bloody eejit but I'm not a fool" she said.
Kitty Kiernan and Michael Collins were very well suited. She deserves a better epitaph. - Yours, etc,
ANNE POWYS-LYBBE, Horsted Keynes, West Sussex, England.