Madam, - In her letter of November 14th, Annette Lyne refers to my earlier letter on Smerwick Harbour. I should like to inform Ms Lyne that my account was based almost entirely on the State Papers of Ireland (1573-1585). She refers mainly to John Hooker and the Hollinshed Chronicles. Data from these I am unable to accept.
The Hollinshed Chronicles, Volumes I and II in their day were not taken seriously - they were thought to have been gathered from a variety of sources, which even then, and more so now, were regarded as untrustworthy. The scandal was such that the Privy Council ordered both volumes to be expurgated in 1597. Parts were republished in 1723.
I am convinced there were no women massacred at Smerwick. In 1579, the year before the massacre, James FitzMaurice FitzGerald, together with the first band of Italians and Spanish to land in Ireland, arrived on July 19th at Dingle. Prayers of thanksgiving were offered by their Jesuit priest, Dr Sanders.
The men then went ashore where they pillaged, raped and butchered the inhabitants - many of them the families of Spanish merchants. The town was then fired and completely destroyed. At the same time as this tragedy, the whole countryside was suffering from famine and fever.
A year later, at the unexpected second landing at Smerwick, Pelham, who was surveying the area, wrote: "Dingle has no inhabitants at all." In 1583, Sir William Stanley wrote: "There is nothing in this town or country to be had, nor hath been for a long tyme." In none of the papers have I found mention of women and there can have been none.
Lord Grey, racing to reach Smerwick, camped outside Dingle on November 5th, 1580. Two days later, on the 7th, Grey broke camp and, with a grilling march, pressured his men to reach Smerwick and then to handle cannon from the warships which lay in the Bay, as well as to dig a deep ditch to the rear of the fort. A brief battle began. By four o'clock on November 9th, the defeated Italians raised a white banner.
In the Denny Papers, there is a letter written the following day by Ned Denny. In it he shows jubilation, claiming he was Ward of the Day. In Vice-Admiral Bingham's account, he reports that sailors infiltrated the fort from the ships on the seaward side and, together with Denny's soldiers, set to killing the unfortunate Italians until not one was alive.
There was, among a list of army and naval names present at Smerwick, no mention at all of Sir Walter Raleigh. - Yours, etc,
VALERIE BARRY, Callinafercy House Stud, Miltown, Co Kerry.