of 700 soldiers and a motley crew of land-hungry
militia while the Waldensians sent their women,
children and animals a la Brua, to the high pastures
at the head of the valleys. Meanwhile 500 men
stayed in trenches under the redoubtable partisan
leader Bartolomeo Jahier.
Pianezza occupied Torre Pellice on the valley
floor, and with Pianezza’s troops busy looting, a
stalemate would have ensued had not a company
of Irish Catholic mercenaries going to fight against
the Spanish for the Governor of Villanova d’Asti
appeared coming over the Sestriere Pass at the
head of Val Chisone, the neighbouring Waldensian
valley. They thus threatened the Waldensian
rear. Pianezza invited these willing freebooters in
exchange for booty, wine and rape to massacre the
Waldensians in their mountain refuge.
However, what made this the massacre of the
‘Madama Cristina’,
Christine Marie of France,
Duchess of Savoy, artist
unknown.
Piedmontese Easter [the Protestant Easter was different from the Catholic,
still-Gregorian Calendar date] was that Pianezza learnt that six French Regiments,
again composed of, or including, Irish mercenaries, were also marching
over the Alps going to besiege Pavia, which had just been captured from the
French by the Spanish.
On 19 April Pianezza reported, ‘there arrived here with great cheerfulness’
Sir James Preston’s Irish Regiment. ‘I have lodged them to their satisfaction
and had them provided with wine at the expence of these “barbette” [Wal-
6