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29 NATION BUILDERS: COLLINS AND GRIFFITHA fine pair of coloured photographic portraits (possibly hand-tinted in detail), showing Collins alert in his military uniform, Griffith impassive in a brown tweed suit,
images 11 x 7 ins [28 x 18 cms], each signed and inscribed in pencil on mounts by the photographers, C. & L. Walsh of Dublin, dated 1922, in original oak frames.
It is likely that this striking pair of portraits was published as a memorial to the two men, who died in 1922 within ten days of each other. The two had done much
of the heavy lifting to make Ireland’s declared independence a reality, Griffith as writer and statesman, Collins as organiser and soldier. Griffith died suddenly on 12
August 1922, of a cerebral haemorrhage following years of overwork, aggravated by the distress of the civil war. Collins attended his funeral; barely a week later, he
also was dead, shot in a pointless skirmish in his home county of Cork.
The Collins portrait is known also from a monochrome version; we have not seen the Griffith portrait in monochrome. The pair are extremely rare.
€ 1,000 - 1,500