and very many of the garrison were put to the sword, and the town
miserably plundered. The king's forces killed divers who prayed
quarter, and put divers women to the sword,[35] and other women
and children they turned naked into the streets, and many they
ravished. They hanged Mr. Reynor and Mr. Sawyer in cold blood; and
at Wighton they smothered Mrs. Barlowes, a minister's wife, and
her children.'[36]

Lord Clarendon admits the rapine and plunder, and that the king
regretted that some of his friends suffered with the rest.[37]
Humphrey Brown deposed that he was present when the garrison, having
surrendered upon a promise of quarter, he saw the king's soldiers
strip and wound the prisoners, and heard the king say--'cut them
more, for they are mine enemies.' A national collection was made
for the sufferers, by an ordinance bearing date the 28th October,
1645, which states that--'Whereas it is very well known what miseries
befell the inhabitants of the town and county of Leicester, when
the king's army took Leicester, by plundering the said inhabitants,
not only of their wares in their shops, but also all their household
goods, and their apparel from their backs, both of men, women,
and children, not sparing, in that kind, infants in their cradles;
and, by violent courses and tortures, compelled them to discover
whatsoever they had concealed or hid, and after all they imprisoned
their persons, to the undoing of the tradesmen, and the ruin of
many of the country.'

Can we wonder that 'the king was abused as a barbarian and a
murderer, for having put numbers to death in cold blood after the
garrison had surrendered; and for hanging the Parliament's committee,
and some Scots found in that town?' The cruelties practiced in the