Jackson’s Narrative affords further dreadful details of the Protestant martyrdoms enacted on Wexford bridge:—
‘They thus continued till about seven o’clock to convey parties of prisoners, from ten to twenty, from the gaol, the market-house, and the prison ship, where many of them were confined, to the bridge, where they butchered them. Every procession was preceded by the black flag, and the prisoners were surrounded by ruthless pikemen, as guards and executioners, who often insultingly desired them to bless themselves.
‘The mob, consisting of more women than men, expressed their savage joy on the immolation of each of the victims by loud huzzas.
‘The manner in general of putting them to death was thus: Two rebels pushed their pikes into the breast of the victim, and two into his back; and in that state (writhing with torture) they held him suspended till dead, and then threw him over the bridge into the water.
‘After they had massacred ninety-seven prisoners in that manner, the insurgents were taken off their blood-thirsty work by the cry “to camp! to camp!”’
Musgrave, in the Appendix to his Memoirs, relates:—‘After taking possession of Enniscorthy they planted the Tree of Liberty, with shouts of “Vive la République” and “Erin go Bragh!” Here the work of blood immediately began, and continued every day, more or less, for twenty-five days—a dreadful specimen of what might be expected from such a government. One day they were so diabolical as to murder all the Protestants they had; and not satisfied with this, they sent to Wexford for more, and every day parties ranged the country, dragging forth all they could find, to satiate their thirst for blood.’
It is said that not less than four hundred Protestants were massacred in Enniscorthy and on Vinegar Hill, the bodies of whom lay unburied during several days.
Meanwhile, the final scene of the tragic occurrences promised to equal, and perhaps exceed, the terrible events which had preceded it. There is little doubt that a general and unsparing massacre of the Protestants had been resolved upon; and although, assisted by an alarm that their camp was being attacked, the Catholic bishop and clergy had induced the greater number of the insurgents to quit the town, still the most ferocious wretches remained, and seemed determined to conclude a period of anarchy and terrorism by a scene of indiscriminating slaughter.
During the confusion which the precipitate flight of the rebels occasioned (when they proposed to fire the town, only had no time!), the bloody Thomas Dixon, mounted on a very fine horse, rode through the streets with a broad sword drawn and upbraided the rebels for their timidity and their dilatoriness. ‘If you had followed my advice,’ he said, ‘in putting all the heretics to death three or four days ago, it would not have come to this pass.’ Mrs. Dixon—a worthy mate of her sanguinary husband—who accompanied him on horseback with a sword and case of pistols, clapped the rebels on the back and encouraged them by saying, ‘We must conquer; I know we must conquer!’ and she exclaimed repeatedly, ‘My Saviour tells me we must conquer!’ They repaired to the bridge to stop the retreat of the rebels, but in vain, though Mrs. Dixon drew a pistol and swore vehemently ‘that she would shoot any one who would refuse to return with her to put the remainder of the heretics to death!’ They endeavoured to raise the portcullis of the bridge to prevent retreat, but were unable to do so.
It has been said that the butcheries on Wexford bridge were perpetrated by a small section of the insurgents, kept by that sanguinary monster, Thomas Dixon, in a state of constant drunkenness, and ever ready to execute his ruthless orders. Every means were used by the ruffian to play upon the credulity and excite the worst passions of his followers, and his fiendish inventions to irritate a brutal mob appear almost incredible.