Nothing new under the sun

      Nothing new under the sun

This passage recounts a defeat of the Scots by the English under the reign of Elizabeth I.
“The result was a bloodbath.  The ‘constable’ of the castle (Rathlin in Scotland, 1575), his family, and a prisoner being held by the Scots... were secured, but the English soldiery ... murdered every other Scott they could find on the island, men, women, children, the aged, the feeble and the helpless, without distinction. ... However, after butchering two hundred of  the prisoners on the surrender of the castle, they roamed about the island for several days, rooting out several hundred more from their refuges in caves and among the cliffs, and chopping them down on the spot.  In addition, the soldiers seized 300 cows, 3,000 sheep and 100 horses, and they confiscated a large quantity of corn, sufficient, ... to have kept 200 men for a year.”

Slaughter of innocents, enslavement of captives, mayhem within the troops - all sanctioned by a  cause ( justice be damned).  So what’s new today?