it with 3000. Horse and Foote; which with those that were in it before
will make about 4500. And for provisions they have no want &c.
But Cromwell relies not altogether upon strength, something on policy; and
therefore hath hee sent abroad Proclamations and Papers, that promise
Liberty of Conscience, Propriety, Ease and Freedome to all the English
(not any Irish) in Armes, that will come in and submit to him. But wee
heare not of any but some of their owne run-awaies, and wee hope this will
bee a meanes rather to cement then Separate the Royallists &c.
Dublin September
24. 1649.
By another Letter from the same hand of 2 Oct. it is further certified:
That Sir Arthur Aston, Sir Edmund Varney, and thethe rest of the
prime Officers, who after the Enemy had gained the Towne, retreated
into, and maintained the Mount, had all of them Quarter promised
them for their lives, and upon that condition went all into the WindMill
on the top of the Mount, whilest the Enemie tooke Possession
thereof; which no sooner they had done, but they disarmed, and afterwards
most perfidiously Murthered them one by one, in the most cruell
manner they could invent, cuting off their Members, and peeces of their
flesh, which they wore in their Hats triumphantly two daies after &c.
That their Barbarousnesse was no lesse exercised upon the rest of the
Souldiers and Inhabitants, especially Religious men, amongst the rest
the Lord Taaff's Brother an Augustine Fryer, and one Parsons (of
the same Order)Whom they kept two daies alive, torturing them
by all the cruell waies and meanes they could devise, to make
them confesse what they knew of the Royallists Designes,and then ended
them. That above 1200. were Murthered in St. Peters Church.
That about two hundred Officers and Souldiers maintained the Tower
at the West Gate till the next day, in which time they killed above two
hundred of the Enemy, refusing to submit to mercy; but the Enemy
at length considering the strength of the place, and how their severall
attempts of firing them out had failed, and what losse they had already
received, offered them conditions of quarter for their lives, upon which
they surrendered, yet neverthelesse Cromwell afterwards commanded
the Officers to bee all Murthered and every tenth man of the Souldiers,
which they were accordingly, and the survivers sold and Shipped
away for Barbadoes, there to bee made slaves of all the daies of their
lives &c.
Something else concludes this Letter, which I hope by this hath
made some part of amends for this losse; but I am (as yet) commanded