These two developments led to the Provisional Government's 27 June 1922 order serving notice on the Four Courts garrison to surrender the building, their arms and release O'Connell, that night or face military action "at once". According to historian Charles Townsend, 'Collins must have consented to this though the actual decision seems to have been taken by Griffith'. Peter Hart similarly writes, 'it was Griffith rather than Collins who took the lead in this decision'. However cabinet member Ernest Blythe recalled that, 'the decision to attack the Four Courts was almost automatic once Collins had agreed to it.