densians]. As far as bread goes I hope that they will be able to find plenty
soon where they are headed to and perhaps even some better things.’ On 21
April arrived the Chamblay Regiment, the Grancey on the 22nd, the Villa on
the 23rd and the Carignan and the Montpezat on the 29th. In all 5000 men
were quartered with license to massacre, rape and pillage among a population
about twice that. The figure of 1712 killed of both sexes is the most reliable.
At the end of April Pianezza reported: ‘Yesterday they began to throw away
their arms wherever they happened to be and simply pleaded for mercy. It is
amazing to see to what misery they have been reduced; losing themselves in
flight across the snow, abandoning their own children of whom some have
died … most of the heretics have crossed the mountains though many have
died from cold and avalanches.’
A Jesuit priest, Fabrizio Torre, whose task was to deal with Waldensian
recantations wrote to a fellow Jesuit: ‘It is not a matter of war, but rather
of exterminating a multitude of enemies of God and rebels against their
prince….And who can tell of the public devotions, the confessions, the
communions and prayers before the Blessed Sacrament, so that the troops
imbued thereby with faith and courage swept over the snow-laden Alps
hunting down the wild beasts of hell with such butchery that to escape
death by steel they rushed headlong with wives and children into the valleys
where they saw nothing but fire and slaughter….the soldiers terrified these
wretches, who could find no better way to escape than to kill themselves.
Others taking better advice came in their hundreds, in remorse and humility,
to the Holy Catholic Faith.’
7