No Quarter at Drogheda - Warfare History Network

On September 11, 1649, the Massacre of Drogheda, Ireland took place. Oliver Cromwell's army killed over 3,000 Royalists. An excerpt from the article:

"The Strategic Outcome of the Slaughter

Figures vary, but somewhere between 2,000 and 4,000 Irish and Royalist soldiers and civilians died at Drogheda. Cromwell’s army suffered 150 killed and an unknown number wounded. Cromwell later justified the slaughter in a letter to William Lenthall, speaker of the Parliament, by saying that the victory at Drogheda belonged to the Almighty. “I am persuaded that this is a righteous judgment of God upon these barbarous wretches,” Cromwell wrote to Lenthall, “who have imbrued their hands in so much innocent blood for the future, which are the satisfactory grounds to such actions, which otherwise cannot but work remorse and regret.”

Cromwell’s strategy was brutally simple. By giving no quarter to the enemy, he believed that other Irish towns in his path would waste no time in laying down their arms to avoid further bloodshed. In the beginning, the plan worked extremely well. The slaughter at Drogheda had a tremendous negative impact upon the Irish, at least for the time being. Immediately following Drogheda, the towns of Trim, Dundalk, Carlingford, and Newry all surrendered without a struggle.

At the same time, Ormonde had a difficult time convincing his troops to fight Cromwell’s soldiers and defend their country. “It is not to be imagined how great the terror is that those successes and the power of the rebels [the English] have struck into this people,” he informed King Charles II. “They are yet so stupefied, that it is with great difficulty I can persuade them to act anything like men towards their own preservation.”

When Cromwell’s army reached Wexford, the Royalist commander there, David Sinnott, refused to give up the town without a fight. Once again, the Parliamentarians fought their way into the city (after an eight-day siege) and killed another 2,000 soldiers and citizens in the marketplace. Cromwell left Ireland soon afterward, leaving behind a distinctly mixed legacy. For Irish Catholics and English Royalists, the slaughter of innocents at Drogheda and Wexford took on the air of religious martyrdom. Stories spread throughout the countryside of the wicked English commander who butchered women and children with no remorse. When the news reached England, however, the population was overjoyed and declared a day of thanksgiving to celebrate the fact that the heinous Irish rebels had received their just rewards."