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Massacre of Drogheda under Oliver Cromwell (Lessons for Victory in Iraq?)
Christian History Institute ^ | Christian History Institute

Posted on 11/14/2006 8:32:32 AM PST by xzins

Massacre of Drogheda under Oliver Cromwell.

the Staff or associates of Christian History Institute.

After the massacre, Oliver Cromwell declared to the English Parliament, "I am persuaded that this is a righteous judgment of God upon these barbarous wretches, who have imbued their hands in so much innocent blood and that it will tend to prevent the effusion [shedding] of blood for the future, which are satisfactory grounds for such actions, which otherwise cannot but work remorse and regret."

Oliver Cromwell, responsible for a massacre. Just what happened at Drogheda, Ireland on this day, September 11, 1649 is hard to pin down with certainty. Two groups stood to gain by issuing propaganda against Cromwell. The Irish hoped to inflame patriotic fervor by magnifying the event and certain Englishmen hoped to discredit Cromwell because they feared his growing power.

Parliament had sent the Protestant Cromwell into Catholic Ireland to subdue it and prevent Prince Charles from landing and preparing an invasion from the nearby Island (he used Scotland as his launch pad instead). Aware that previous armies had bogged down in Ireland, usually because of insufficient financing, Cromwell insisted on having the necessary money in hand before he sailed. That way he could pay for supplies as he needed them and not make enemies by robbing the common folk. Once in Ireland, he moved quickly, knowing that a drawn-out war favored the inhabitants, not the invaders.

The situation in Ireland was complex. The Irish were badly divided and several betrayed their own towns. They offered little effective resistance to Cromwell. In fact, he reduced opposition across most of the island within eight months, although subordinates required another decade to complete the work he had begun.

Drogheda was one of the first cities Cromwell faced. He offered fair terms and gave his men strict instructions against excessive violence. However, the situation fluctuated a good deal. As Drogheda's fortunes waned or waxed, the garrison alternately negotiated or stalled. Cromwell's troops broke through the wall before negotiations were complete (possibly with inside help) and rushed through the town, killing virtually everyone in the city. They set fire to St. Mary's church, burning alive those who had taken refuge in it and then butchered women hiding in the vaults below. Some accounts say they used Irish children as human shields and killed every priest, treating them like combatants, because they had encouraged the defenders. According to those tales, only thirty defenders survived and they were sold as slaves to Barbados. At least one of the English soldiers claimed that Cromwell himself ordered the slaughter.

Defenders of Cromwell say that not only did he not order the slaughter but that the massacre of the women never happened. Cromwell himself insisted (even before he left Ireland) that no one in arms was massacred, destroyed or banished. His statement fell short of denying that civilians were slaughtered. Tales of civilian massacres increased at the time of the restoration of the English throne when it was both politically correct and safe to say the worst things one could about the man who cut off the head of King Charles I.

Whatever the truth, Cromwell surely is to blame for not attempting to stop the massacre. By the brutal standards of the time, killing a defiant garrison was acceptable, but butchering civilians was not. By his own statement, it is clear Cromwell hoped that the events at Drogheda (and at Wexford a few days later) would shorten the war. At Wexford, his troops committed another massacre, although apparently without his approval. A priest writing over a century later claimed 300 women were slaughtered beside a cross at which they had taken refuge and seven friars were killed in the performance of their duty. Whether this is true or not, Cromwell considered the victory an unexpected providence and said he prayed that God would have all the glory.

The present religious troubles in Ireland were aggravated by the events at Drogheda and Wexford. British soldiers, for example, are called "Cromwell's lads." However, it would be unjust to leave the impression that Cromwell's campaign was the beginning of the Irish religious troubles. Eight years before Cromwell's invasion, for instance, Catholics slaughtered hundreds of Protestant civilians in Ulster.

Resources:

Allen, John. One Hundred Great Lives. New York: Journal of Living, 1944.

Coonan, Thomas L. The Irish Catholic Confederacy and the Puritan Revolution. New York: Columbia University, 1954.

Copeland, Lewis. World's Greatest Speeches. New York: Book League of America, p. 147ff.

"Cromwell." A History of the Irish Race.

(www.ireland.org/irl_hist/hist31.htm) "Cromwell, Oliver." Dictionary of National Biography. Edited by Leslie Stephen and Sidney Lee. London: Oxford University Press, 1921 - 1996.

"Cromwell and the Drogheda Massacre." (www.bbc.co.uk/education/beyond/factsheets/makhist/ makhist7_prog5c.shtml)

"Cromwell Devastates Ireland." www.doyle.com.au/cromwell.htm).

( Drinkwater, John. Oliver Cromwell. New York: George H. Doran, 1927.

Hill, Christopher. God's Englishman; Oliver Cromwell and the English revolution. Harper and Row, 1970. Russell, Bertrand. Wisdom of the West. New York: Fawcett, 1964; p. 252.

Smellie, Alexander. Men of the Covenant. Revell, 1903. Source of the image.


TOPICS: Editorial; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: cromwell; godsgravesglyphs; insurgency; iraq; ireland; propaganda
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To: xzins

Yes, mass murder is required to be an occupying force. Unfortunately, we have decided that we need to win the hearts and minds of Arabs so they will be agreeable to adopting democracy and so they won't cut off our oil supplies. All of this was totally predictable. I have no idea why the White House thought that history's lessons don't apply to them.


61 posted on 11/14/2006 10:57:20 AM PST by GraniteStateConservative (...He had committed no crime against America so I did not bring him here...-- Worst.President.Ever.)
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To: justshutupandtakeit

Yes there are. History is filled with the problems of occupying a nation who doesn't want to be occupied.


62 posted on 11/14/2006 11:02:10 AM PST by GraniteStateConservative (...He had committed no crime against America so I did not bring him here...-- Worst.President.Ever.)
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To: xzins
See #51 (And I promise never to non-theologize Cromwell again.:>)

Okay. But I'll be casting a baleful Calvinist glance in your direction from time to time.

As to the substance of your posts, I think that as bitter as the English/Irish conflict has been, that Islamists vs. America in the present Mideast is a far more dire situation. You can draw some parallels (like the old Puritan cries against Charles conspiring to recruit the "papish hordes" (to use the contemporary terms) of Ireland to subdue his English subjects and allow him to ignore Parliament. But the level of fundamental conflict was between rival Anglo-Saxon peoples and their respective Christian religious factions.

In the conflict with the Mideast, Islam under secularized dictators like Saddam or Wahabbists like the Saudis are in conflict with America militarily, economically and religiously. Add to that that Islam has a fundamental hostility to human rights, any other religion and democracy.

So Cromwell doesn't help us that much. Iraq is what Don Rumsfeld called an 'unfamiliar war'. He was right. Very different than any of the wars fought by Western nations before. Classic Orientalism under a conquering Islamic barracks religion vs. the civil values and human rights of the free West.
63 posted on 11/14/2006 11:02:43 AM PST by George W. Bush
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To: 3niner

I have been corrected. However, I call them Americans, today! ;)


64 posted on 11/14/2006 11:04:18 AM PST by TNdandelion
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To: xzins
Here's why we would never (and should never) use this as an example for Iraq:

Cromwell's troops broke through the wall before negotiations were complete (possibly with inside help) and rushed through the town, killing virtually everyone in the city. They set fire to St. Mary's church, burning alive those who had taken refuge in it and then butchered women hiding in the vaults below. Some accounts say they used Irish children as human shields and killed every priest, treating them like combatants, because they had encouraged the defenders. According to those tales, only thirty defenders survived and they were sold as slaves to Barbados. At least one of the English soldiers claimed that Cromwell himself ordered the slaughter.

The highlighted portions are hauntingly familiar to the tactics used by salamikazes worldwide. They might ride them to victory, but we would certainly (and deservedly) lose if we tried the same thing.

65 posted on 11/14/2006 11:07:43 AM PST by r9etb
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To: r9etb

That is one of the parallels I saw...not that the US was using such tactics, but that apparently they were in use, and they were part of the propaganda campaign.


66 posted on 11/14/2006 11:09:46 AM PST by xzins (Retired Army Chaplain and proud of it! Supporting our troops means praying for them to WIN!)
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To: xzins

That's a good point.


67 posted on 11/14/2006 11:16:32 AM PST by r9etb
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To: r9etb

And even though we're not using such tactics, we get blamed for doing so anyway.


68 posted on 11/14/2006 11:19:29 AM PST by xzins (Retired Army Chaplain and proud of it! Supporting our troops means praying for them to WIN!)
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To: capitalist229

MSM???


69 posted on 11/14/2006 11:28:35 AM PST by ZULU (Non nobis, non nobis, Domine, sed nomini tuo da gloriam. God, guts, and guns made America great.)
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To: Oberon

No, the Stuarts didn't invent the divine right of kings. There's some support for it in the Bible, depending on how you read the stories of Saul and David, and kings have always had a sense of divine annointing.

It's not true, however, that the middle ages invented the divine right of kings in its fullest sense. It was a delusion that rose to its heights during the seventeenth century, most notably with Louis XIV, le roi soleil. But James I and Charles I were more than a little delusional, too. Charles II had more sense.


70 posted on 11/14/2006 11:30:35 AM PST by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
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To: AngloSaxonChristian

My dear old Ma was shocked, I mean shocked, when she discovered that her fathers family, were converted Protestants and Scots, rather than the oppressed Irish Catholics that they portrayed them selves to be. The Horror.


71 posted on 11/14/2006 11:50:46 AM PST by Little Bill (A 37%'r, a Red Spot on a Blue State, rats are evil.)
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To: GraniteStateConservative

That is not the problem in Iraq. If anything it is the terrorists who are "occupying" Iraq not Americans.

Ireland was part of the British Empire before Cromwell, Iraq is not and is not intended to be part of the United States. Ireland had a long relationship to England predating Cromwell by over two centuries. Ireland was colonized by England Iraq is not going to become a colony. Ireland did not have suicide bombers flowing in from across the globe to attack its citizens and the English. Any lessons to be learned from Irish history to be applied to Iraq are just incidental.


72 posted on 11/14/2006 12:11:03 PM PST by justshutupandtakeit (If you believe ANYTHING in the Treason Media you are a fool.)
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To: xzins

Someone needed to.


73 posted on 11/14/2006 12:12:03 PM PST by justshutupandtakeit (If you believe ANYTHING in the Treason Media you are a fool.)
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To: Cicero
It was a delusion that rose to its heights during the seventeenth century, most notably with Louis XIV, le roi soleil.

That's quite plausible. Also, I think it would be difficult to talk about this particular brand of hubris without mentioning Henry VIII.

74 posted on 11/14/2006 12:27:19 PM PST by Oberon (What does it take to make government shrink?)
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To: Oberon

Henry VIII may have had syphillis, which in its late stages can drive the victim insane. In any case, I'd say he would have been certifiable, although he would have cut off the head of any psychiatrist who got near him and ventured to say so. If there had been any psychiatrists, of course.

One little known fact about Henry VIII is that he left a large sum of money in his will so the chantry monks would pray for his soul in Purgatory. The only problem was that he had closed down all the religious orders and chantries, confiscated the funds, and paved the way for the Anglican rejection of Purgatory.

As far as I know, after he died there was no one left to pray for his soul, and probably no one inclined to, either.


75 posted on 11/14/2006 12:51:35 PM PST by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
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To: Cicero
Henry VIII may have had syphillis, which in its late stages can drive the victim insane.

Hmmm...so are you saying that the Anglican church may have been founded due to a bad case of The Pox?

76 posted on 11/14/2006 12:59:51 PM PST by Oberon (What does it take to make government shrink?)
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To: AngloSaxonChristian

thank you.


77 posted on 11/14/2006 1:08:07 PM PST by HANG THE EXPENSE (Defeat liberalism, its the right thing to do for America.)
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To: AngloSaxonChristian

thank you.


78 posted on 11/14/2006 1:08:19 PM PST by HANG THE EXPENSE (Defeat liberalism, its the right thing to do for America.)
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To: Oberon

Most Anglicans either credit Henry VIII with founding the Church of England or they say it goes back to much earlier days, and then reformed after the Protestant Reformation. Traditionally Anglicans considered themselves Protestant but also believed in the Apostolic Succession, which is somewhat paradoxical. If asked, they would say they were the one, true "catholic and apostolic" Church and that it was Rome that went astray.

But it's not clear that Henry VIII didn't still think of himself as a Catholic. He was really more interested in grabbing the money than reforming the Church.

I'd say that the Church of England wasn't really put on a firm footing until Queen Elizabeth ascended the throne. Edward VI was a minor, supervised by a council of Protestants, but I think things were pretty much up for grabs until Elizabeth.


79 posted on 11/14/2006 2:03:55 PM PST by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
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To: Cicero
He was really more interested in grabbing the money than reforming the Church.

Yeah...but it wasn't entirely about the money. It was about outside influence undermining his authority as well, and getting in the way of him getting his way.

Which is, of course, mostly what he wanted...his way.

80 posted on 11/14/2006 2:09:46 PM PST by Oberon (What does it take to make government shrink?)
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