Ireland in Key Stage 3 History (Year 8)

Reputations
Sources: Cromwell at Drogheda
By
Richard Bailey
Ansford Community School, Castle Carey
&
Chris Culpin
SHP

Cromwell’s campaign in Ireland

The Race to Rule. Ireland and Europe 1570-1700
by A. Hodge, Colourpoint Books, 1-89839-249-8, p. 62

‘Ireland in Schools’ Bath & Somerset Pilot Scheme Bath Spa University College
Introduction

This collection of sources on Cromwell at Drogheda is used in Year 8, towards the end of a series of lessons
on the English Civil war.

The sources are discussed and questions are asked relating to the sources.
Tasks 3
The plantation of Ulster 4
Division 5
Cromwell on Drogheda 6
Interpretations 7
Appendix
‘Young Ned of the Hill’, The Pogues 8

The unit addresses two broad skills - the reputation of historical and interpretations of history.

Listening to ‘Young Ned of the Hill’ by The Pogues sets the mood.

Bailey, Cromwell at Drogheda, 2

Tasks

1. Listen to ‘Young Ned of the Hill’ by the Pogues (without the lyrics). Discuss the tone of the song. What
sort of music is it? What are they saying?

2. Read through the following two pages of booklet, discussing plantations and studying the maps
(Protestant English had the ‘nice’ houses; poor Catholic Irish lived in tumbledown cottages. Large church
would have been Protestant etc.)

3. Study ‘A vicious circle’ diagram and answer the following questions (adding own knowledge from
previous discussion):
a. Why did the Irish hate the English?
b. Why did the English hate the Irish?

4. Study the English view of the Irish Rebellion (linking in with previous lesson on Trigger 2 of English
Civil War):
a. Describe what the picture shows.
b. Decipher the ‘olde’ English at the top.

5. Read Cromwell’s own report to Parliament after the events at Drogheda, and examine the map:
a. According to Cromwell, what happened at Drogheda (bullet points).
b. How does Cromwell justify his actions?

6. Listen to ‘Young Ned of the Hill’ again, this time with the lyrics:
a. What do the Pogues think of Cromwell?
b. Why do you think they think this?

7. Read Antonia Fraser’s piece on the events at Drogheda. Explain who she is, discuss how she would have
obtained information, evidence etc.
a. What does she say about Cromwell?
b. Does she attempt to justify his actions? How? What does she say?

8. Sentiments and accuracy in interpretation:

a. Which of the two views of Cromwell would you trust more? Explain in detail
b. Whose sentiments would you go along with, the Pogues’ or Antonia Fraser’s?
(Some explanation of justification and sentiments may be required)

Bailey, Cromwell at Drogheda, 3

The plantation of Ulster

The Vintners’ Settlement

at Bellaghy,
County Londonderry,
Ulster, 1622
The Making of the United Kingdom
by C. Culpin, Collins Educational
0-00327-243-5, p. 51

Plantation of Londonderry
The Race to Rule. Ireland and Europe 1570-1700
by A. Hodge, Colourpoint Books, 1-89839-249-8, p. 64

Province of Ulster
Rivalry and Conflict by A.Logan & K Gormley
Colourpoint Books, 1-89839-212-9, p. 27

Bailey, Cromwell at Drogheda, 4

Division

IRISH
• Roman Catholic
• English were taking their lands for plantations
• English did not understand their way of life
• English behaved brutally

ENGLISH
• Protestant
• Irish could rebel at any time with foreign help
• Irish were backward savages
• English settlers the best way of civilising Ireland
• Irish behaved brutally

‘A vicious circle’
The Making of the United Kingdom by C. Culpin, Collins Educational, 0-00327-243-5, p. 51

An English view of an incident in the Irish Rebellion of 1641

Bailey, Cromwell at Drogheda, 5

Cromwell on Drogheda
His own report to Parliament in England about what happened at Drogheda, Dublin, 17th September 1649

Sir,
Your army came before the town of Drogheda on 3rd September. On Monday 9th the battering guns
[cannon] began to play [fire at the town]. I sent Sir Arthur Aston, the Governor, [commander of the
defenders] a summons [order] to deliver the town [surrender].

Receiving no satisfactory answer, the guns fired two or three hundred shot, beat down the corner tower,
and opened tip two reasonable breaches [big holes] in the east and south wall.

Upon Tuesday the 10th, about five o'clock in the evening, we began the storm [attacked the town] and after
some hot fighting we entered, about seven or eight hundred men, the enemy disputing it very stiffly with
us. Several of the enemy retreated to the Mill Mount, a place very strong and difficult to attack. The
Governor, Sir Arthur Aston, being there, our men getting up to them were ordered by me to put all to the
sword [kill all of them]. And indeed, being in the heat of the action, l forbade them to spare any people
who carried weapons in the town and I think that night they put to the sword 2, 000 men.

Many of their officers and soldiers fled over the bridge into the other part of the town, where about 100
of them possessed [went into] St Peter's church steeple. These being summoned to yield to mercy [told
they would be treated well if they surrendered, refused, whereupon I ordered the steeple of St Peter’s
Church to be fired [set on fire]. One of them was heard to say in the flames ‘God damn me, God confound
me. I burn, I burn’.

The next day the other two towers were summoned [asked to surrender], in one of which was about six
or seven score [120 - 140 soldiers]. But they refused to yield [surrender]. We knew that hunger must force
them and set good guards to stop them running away.

'When they submitted [surrendered], their officers were knocked on the head [killed] and every tenth man
of the soldiers killed. The rest were captured.

The last Lord’s Day [Sunday] before the storm, they had a Mass [Catholic church service] in St Peter’s
Church. About one thousand Catholics were put to the sword, fleeing there for safety. I believe all the friars
[Catholic preachers] were knocked on the head except two. One the soldiers took [captured] and made
an end of [killed]. The other was captured in the round tower. He confessed he was a friar, but that did
not save him.

I believe that this is a righteous [good] judgement of God upon these barbarous wretches, who leave dipped
their hands in so much innocent blood [murdered many innocent people]. And it will help to prevent more
bloodshed in the fixture. It was God who gave your men courage. It is good that God has all the glory.

I do not think we lost 100 men, though many

be wounded.

Your most obedient servant,

Oliver Cromwell.

A plan of Drogheda in the mid-

seventeenth century.
Cromwell’s soldiers broke into the town at St
Mary’s Churchyard (A).
The massacre of the garrison took place at
Millmount (B).
St Peter’s Church (C) was burned down on
Cromwell’s orders.

Bailey, Cromwell at Drogheda, 6

Interpretations

A. ‘Young Ned of the Hill’, The Pogues

A curse upon you, Oliver Cromwell,

You who raped our motherland,
I hope you’re rotting down in Hell,
For the horrors that you sent.
To our misfortunate forefathers
Whom you robbed of their birthright,
‘To Hell or Connaught’* - may you burn in Hell tonight.

Cromwellian land settlement, 1652

* Connaught is an area of Western Ireland with poor rocky soil. The Race to Rule. Ireland and Europe 1570-1700
Thousands were forced to live there after Cromwell’s conquest of Ireland. by A. Hodge, Colourpoint Books, 1-89839-249-8, p. 64

B. From Antonia Fraser’s biography of Cromwell, 1973

1. Drogheda taught the lesson of what a siege and a storm meant. It undoubtedly frightened
many lesser garrisons into peaceful surrender. Militarily then the sack of Drogheda could
fairly be said to have done what Cromwell wanted.

2. The conclusion cannot be escaped that Cromwell lost his self-control at Drogheda, literally
saw red - the red of his comrades’ blood - after the failure of the first assaults, and was
seized with one of his sudden brief and cataclysmic rages. There were good military
reasons for behaving as he did, but they were not the motives that drove him at the time,
during the day and night of uncalculated butchery. The slaughter itself stood quite outside
his normal record of careful mercy as a soldier.

Bailey, Cromwell at Drogheda, 7

Appendix
‘Young Ned of the Hill’, The Pogues
Have you ever walked the lonesome hills
And heard the curlews* cry
Or seen the raven black as night
Upon a windswept sky
To walk the purple heather
And hear the westwind cry
To know that’s where the rapparee* must die

Since Cromwell pushed us westward

To live our lowly lives
There’s some of us have deemed to fight
From Tipperary mountains high
Noble men with wills of iron
Who are not afraid to die
Who’ll fight with Gaelic honour held on high

A curse upon you Oliver Cromwell

You who raped our Motherland
I hope you’re rotting down in hell
For the horrors that you sent
To our misfortunate forefathers
Whom you robbed of their birthright
‘To hell or Connaught’ may you burn in hell tonight

Of one such man I’d like to speak

A rapparee by name and deed
His family dispossessed and slaughtered
They put a price upon his head
His name is known in song and story
His deeds are legend still
And murdered for blood money
Was young Ned of the hill

You have robbed our homes and fortunes

Even drove us from our land
You tried to break our spirit
But you’ll never understand
The love of dear old Ireland
That will forge an iron will
* Curlews - Shore birds
As long as there are gallant men
* Rapparee - Vagabond, one with no home
Like young Ned of the hill

Bailey, Cromwell at Drogheda, 8