Donegal Annual / Bliainiris Thír Chonaill. Vol. 2, No. 2 (1952)

lncidenrs, recorded. by Archdea-· con Kerr in this Journal (Yol. 1 No. 1 }Ip 9/10. An objective :;tudy of contemporary do('uments disclosed that Cunning· ham was a eJmpany commander in Sir William Stewart's regiment (which began the Wtff, a.3 King's liegemen and ended it as Cromwell's henchmen) and that in Novem'b-er, 16411, hL<; ' comP<iny, in galleys, raided islandr, in the R::is~es and slew 6il women and children; for which act he was commonly "called the killer of uld women" (49). Hi:; act was, unfortunately, not .an isolated incident and we have raked tl1e embers of this ltarba!·- ou;; war in ireland to point out that nemesis overtook Cunningham .(or Conn,rngham as he is called in tradition) · some nine years afte:: his dreadful act. The Cromwellian Census of 1659 shows that the townland on which Doe Castle stcod ranked in the Barony of Kilmaerennan, next to Letterl\enny in the number of English and ScottL'h persons domiciled there. This -r elatively high numhr, 45 English and Scottif'h residents a'> against 11 I~·ish persons was largely made up of the warders, garri~on and their families. No "Titulado is 1·egiste red against the castle and the Hearth Money Rolls of a few years later (1665) also re\'~al t b at tb.~ Gov'ernment exempted it from Hearth tax on account of its being commandeered a5 a .inllitary depot (50) This assumptio:; is .confirmed by a return furnished in tr..e year, 1664, by Captain Webb, a famou~ military cngin·. ecr, in which i t i~ !'hown tl1at the ckvcrtiinent had spent £iuo Ca relatively large :;um for those c!ays) in repairing and stJ:engthening tl1e Castle and its defences. T,he Government fcl.t .ius l ifler1 in thi.; exJJcnditur·e for 'lhci:· spied jn Donegal so alarmed ttc Lord Lieutenant that he believed that a Tory War was al>out to break out in tlte County. Tlflis helief was based on a memorandum nresented to him (51) deposing that the brothers and scn of Colonel ~files Mac Swe.eney and otl1en; of their fnenu:s. were so truculent and eontemptuous of the laws that no peuc2 officei· wou'.d dare .proeeed against them. Fo!: thl:; they were listed a,; ''suspected of being Tories" and the J,ord Lieutenant ordered a company of Foot, stationed at Rapho~, tc, proceed at once to Doe Ca~tle with special inst!·uct ions that they "be careful in their duties and watchful in tl:e securit.y of the place" (52). Some mo.1ths later the master of Ordnance was o:de"·ed to supply th~ Castle with barre'.s of powde1 and "with l1all and mateh proport ioriate". In thP. vea r l 666 \.he garrison of Doe Castle netilioned "to settle down with their families and nlant". Thi;:; uetition was granted and the men were discharged hut not before their young commande•·, C a p t a in Claud Hamilton, had replaced them with a corresponding number of new recruits, drawn from the re:zimental muster. A month or so afterwards Captain Hamilton was ordered to withdraw hill troops from Doe C.n~tl e ancl

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