Cromwell, Protector of the Realm - Irish Cromwellian & Protestant song

The Portadown massacre took place in November 1641 at Portadown, County Armagh, during the Irish Rebellion of 1641. Irish Catholic rebels, likely under the command of Toole McCann, killed about 100 Ulster Protestants by forcing them off the bridge into the River Bann, and shooting those who tried to swim to safety. The Protestant settlers were being marched east from a prison camp at Loughgall. This was the biggest massacre of Protestants during the rebellion, and one of the bloodiest during the Irish Confederate Wars. The Portadown massacre, and others like it, terrified Protestants in Ireland and Great Britain.

The Cromwellian conquest of Ireland or Cromwellian war in Ireland (1649–1653) was the re-conquest of Ireland by the forces of the English Parliament, led by Oliver Cromwell, during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. Cromwell invaded Ireland with the New Model Army on behalf of England's Rump Parliament in August 1649.

Following the Irish Rebellion of 1641, most of Ireland came under the control of the Irish Catholic Confederation. In early 1649, the Confederates allied with the English Royalists, who had been defeated by the Parliamentarians in the English Civil War. By May 1652, Cromwell's Parliamentarian army had defeated the Confederate and Royalist coalition in Ireland and occupied the country, ending the Irish Confederate Wars (or Eleven Years' War). However, guerrilla warfare continued for a further year.

Lyrics

A cold winter's morn in 1641,
My lovely Anne was taken by O'Cane,
Taken and defiled at the point of rebel gun,
And drownèd in the murky River Bann.

Hundreds more were taken at this date,
Butchered and drowned, or buried in the sand,
O'Neill's false promises ensured the same fate,
I cursed his papist army to a man.

Then one day (on th') horizon I did see,
A hundred of our ships all coming to my land,
And off he stepped, Protector of the Realm,
And he smiled and placed a sword into my hand.

Off we marched to Drogheda, to Aston's guarded town,
Together we stormed it, with Cromwell at the helm,
He screamed, "You butchers! Remember Portadown,
And Cromwell, Protector of the Realm!"

And now I go with flowers to see my lovely Anne,
I go and tell her that her death was not in vain,
I tell my children about the Lord Protector,
And how he saved our people from the same.

Britain has had some brilliant/pretty good Kings and Queens,
Elizabeth I and Alfred come(s) to mind,
But the Lord Protector emulates them all
Oliver ??--['the top one you will find']--??

Cromwell, Cromwell the greatest British king,
Strong in his beliefs, he never let us down,
He fought for his people and he rid us of O'Neill,
As we took our due revenge for Portadown.

Cromwell, Cromwell the greatest British king,
Strong in his beliefs, he never let us down,
He fought for his people and he rid us of O'Neill,
As we took our due revenge for Portadown.