The Irish rebellion: or, An history of the beginnings and first progresse of the general rebellion raised within the kingdom of Ireland, upon the three and twentieth day of October, in the year, 1641.: Together vvith the barbarous cruelties and bloody massacres which ensued thereupon. / By Sir Iohn Temple Knight. Master of the Rolles, and one of his Majesties most honourable Privie Councell within the kingdom of Ireland.

Captaine ANTHONY STRATFORD of Charl∣mount in the County of Armagh, Esquire,* 1.1 aged threescore yeers or thereabouts; sworn and examined before his Majesties Commissioners, by vertue of a Commission in that behalf, directed under the great Seale of Ireland: Deposeth and saith,

THat these Protestant Ministers following, about the beginning of the present Rebellion, were murthered in the Counties of Tyrone, Armagh, viz. Master John Matthew, Master Blyth, Master Hastings, Master, Smith, Master Durragh, Master Birge, and eight more, whose names this Deponent hath forgotten, by the Rebels, none of which would the Rebels permit to be buried; the names of such as murthe∣red, this Examinant knoweth not; his cause of knowledge of the said murthers is, that some of his, this Deponents servants, who were among the Rebels, did give him the relation, and he verily beleeveth them; and besides, this Deponent heard the same confessed and aver∣red by many of the Rebels themselves, and by some of those Prote∣testants that had escaped; and that he, this Deponent, was a prisoner

amongst the Rebels at Castle Gaufield neer the place of those murders where he continued fourteen moneths. And further saith, that in Dungannon, in the County of Tyrone, or neer thereunto, the Rebels murdered three hundred and sixteen Protestants, and between Charl∣mount and Dungannon, above four hundred, there were murdered and drowned at, and in the River by Benburb, the Black-water, between the Counties of Armagh and Tyrone, two hundred and six Protestants, and Patrick Mac Crew of Dungannon aforesaid, murdered thirty one in one morning, and two young Rebels, viz. John Begbrian Harie, mur∣dered in the said County of Tyrone, one hundred and forty poore wo∣men and children that could make no resistance, and that the wife of Brian Kelly of Loghgall in the County of Armagh (one of the Rebels Captaines) did with her owne hands murder forty five. And this Deponent further saith, that one Thomas King, sometimes Serjeant to the late Lord Caulfields Company (which this Deponent commanded) he being enforced to serve under the Rebels, and was one of their Provest Marshals, gave the Deponent a List of every housholders name so murdered, and the number of the persons so murdered; which List this Deponent durst not keep: At Portadowne there were drowned at severall times about three hundred and eight, who were sent away by about forty, or such like numbers at once, with con∣voyes, and there drowned: There was a Lawgh neer Loghgall afore∣said, where were drowned above two hundred, of which this Depo∣nent was informed by severall persons, and particularly by the wife of Doctor Hodges, and two of her sons, who were present and design∣ed for the like end, but by Gods mercy that gave them favour in the eyes of some of the Rebels, they escaped; and the said Mistris Hodges and her sons gave the Deponent a List of the names of many of those that were so drowned, which the Deponent durst not keep; and saith that the said Doctor Hodges was imployed by Sir Phelim O Neile to make Powder, but he failing of his undertaking, was first halfe hang∣ed, then cut down, and kept prisoner three moneths, & then murdered with forty four more within a quarter of of a mile Charlmount afore∣said, (they being by Tirlogh Oge O Neile, brother to Sir Phelim, sent to Dungannon prisoners, and in the way murdered. This Deponent was shewed the pit where they were all cast in, at a Mill-pond in the Parish of Killamen, in the County of Tyrone, there were drowned in one day three hundred; and in the same Parish, there were murdered of English and Scottish one thousand and two hundred, as this Depo∣nent was informed by Master Birge, the late Minister of the said Pa∣rish, who certified the same under his hand, which note the Depo∣nent

durst not keep: The said Master Birge was murthered three moneths after; all which murders were in the first breaking out of the Rebellion; but the particular times this Deponent cannot re∣member, neither the persons by whom they were committed: This Deponent was credibly informed by the said Serjeant and others of this Deponents servants (who kept company with the Rebels and saw the same, that many young children were cut into quarters and gob∣bets by the Rebels, and that eighteen Scottish Infants were hanged on a Clothiers tenterhook, and that they murthered a young fat Scottish man, and made candles of his grease; they took another Scottish man and ripped up his belly, that they might come to his small guts, the one end whereof they tyed to a tree, and made him goe round untill he had drawne them all out of his body, they then saying, that they would try whether a dogs or a Scotch mans guts were the longer.

Anthony Stratford.

Deposeth March 9. 1643. before us,

• ...Henry Jones.
• ...Henry Brereton.

Notes

• * 1.1

  The Province of Ulster.