Miscellany: Colonel Lehmanowsky, And The Destruction Of The ...

The horrible tribunals of the. Papal ínqui:gition, as is well Tmown, were suppressed by Napoleon, by a decrec dated, Chamnrtin, December 4, 1308, in those palts of Spain which were Uien under llie governinent-of the French. In the course of a lecture delivered a 'few days ago, in the chapel of Brown University, Col. Lehmanowsky gavca most graphic description of the capture and deslruction ofone of these establishments, by soldiers under his own command. in the early part of the year 1809, Napoleon commanded all the buildings occupied by the Inquisition, to be destroyed. Col. L. j:cquested Napoleon to give him a command in an expedition against one of these dens of v'ice and cruelty. (If I remember right, iL wasI the Inquisition of Madrid.) "My request," sdid the Colonel, was complied with, and I had thecoinraand of the linh regiment of the line. Upon approaching the building we saw several soldiers on the walle. We cornmnnded thetn to eurrcnder in the name of the Emperor of the French; they'turned nnd bent over as if" conversing with some wlio were inside, and after carefuJJy scanning our number, whicli was but small, they answered our eummons by firing among us. Several were wounded, and one man We then prccured some Iieavy timbera, nnd by the united etrength of all the men made a breach, and entered within the walls. As soon as we were inside, we hnd a specimen of thecunning jesuitry of these rascáis. The wliole company of priests and incjuisitors carne towards us in a very hnmble attitude, with (heir hands crossed over their breasts, and the first we heard, the nrtful fellows were reprovig the soldiers on the walI for made nny resistance, and fornothaying politoly admitted these " very fine gentlemen" - although it was, of course, by tho direction of those very men, that resista anee had been ofTered. The only answer we gave, was by placing a guard over these noiv obüging fellows, with tiirections to keep a shárp iook out after them, that none might escape.Upon examininrr the interior of the building 1 we found it beautiful in the extreme;evervthint appeared quiet and in excellent order- muoi better order, indeed, than is common for Uu devil to keep. The floor of the principal hall was pave( with slabs of fine marble, and at the end o this hall was an nltar with several wax candies burning. The priests appeared so humbl and submïssive, and everything appeared se quiet and orderly, that niy suspicions," saic Col. L. "were almost lulled to sleep, (whicf was the effect they intend-;d to produce,) anc I be?an to suspect that a great rnany falsehoods liad been told obout the cruelties practised in these estabjishments. We could discover nothing of the secret rooms and underground cells, of which we had often heard and I was upon the point of retiring with nu men, and Ieaving the building, for the present in the hands of its old occupants, when e brother officer urged to a most diligent examination of the whole building. We proceedet to examine ?arefully the principal hall, to discover, if possible, some trap door or othei entrance to the regions Deiow. otnne 01 ujc soidiers tried to thrust thepoints of their bayonetts, others, of the swords, between the slabs of marble, but all without success. I was upon the point of giving up, when it was snggésted that water should be poured over the floor, to see if it would find an outlet through the crevices. After watching the water carefully, we observed one place where il evidently escaped beiween the slabs. "Ah," said some, "what's herg? we shall inake some discoveries now" - while the captive inquisitors stood by shaking with feo.r. Present ly a soldier struck a heavy blow with '.he but end of hia musket upon one side of a fclab, when all at once a spring seemed to give way, and the slab at once turned upon a pivot jy which it was fustened at the two sidep, disclosing an opening-, and a staircase leading down to Lomc dark cavity beneath. I at once walked up to the altar and seized some of the lighted candles, when one of the bald-pated priests stepped up to me and said vcry panctimoniously - "O, my son, .those are holy candles.you must not touch them." 'Uut,' said the Colonel, my only reply was - very wel!, want them for a holy purpose, I icant to see holy things. Below we found an apartment of considerable 6ze, furnished. with setfee, Sic. which we al once knew, by the' infernal contrivances, lo be the hall of torture. We went round and soon-discovered an alley, and on each ide of this alley a number of !;irk and gloomy cells. ín theSe cells were a large number of thevictimsofPopish cruelty, young and old, loaded with chains, and some of them, womon as well as men, literally as naked as their mnthers bare then. The 6oldiers threw their coats and cloaks over these poor miseiable wretches,and loosing them from their chains, proceeded to help Ihem to the hall of judgment above g round." When the soldiers had provided for the safety and comfort of these wecping wretches, they turned 'their atlention tothe inquisitors, and insitted upon putting them todeath. In their excited state of feeling," said the Colonel, ' it would have been vain for me to oppose their will. The eoldicrs woald not leave a single ojie of these minions of Papal cruelty alive. Aigong other instruments of torture, we found an image of the Virgin Mary, so contrived with &"pikes, knives, Sic. that when a persoñ went to kiss it, the arms closed, and the victim was pierced with a thoüsand wounds, and ci:t to pieces. .The soldiers insisted upon the chief inquisitor kissing this image; he refiued; they prickffd him with their bayonets, and compelled him to do so, when the arms closed and he was cut and hacked to deatir in a most shocking manncr. After taking out the most valuable books and other arliclcF, wc plncod a nmnber of barrels of gunpowder in tho building, and eeUing fireto....i.i.n.BaEinci i'"inHgBMBWBm.i.T1 the train, soon had the sntiafaction of seeing tbia horrid abode of Popisli cruelty a heap of smoking ruins.'1 After we had eeen the end of the Inquisition, we invited all in the neighborhood whose relations had been torn from them by the officers of this bloody tribunal, tocóme and convey to their homes such of them as they could find alive- "And," said the Colonel, "nevershall I forget that sight! The soldiere whom I commanded were men of blood; the sight of human mieery and slaughter had becomeso common lo them, that they could eat their meal with none the lesa relish becausc they were using the dead body of a comiade fora seat; but when they saw this miserable company of living skelctons standing before them, and their anxious relatives pressing around io discover their lost loved ones - when they saw, a weeping father or motlieremb-acing-, ns though they had recovered him from the dead, a be loved son- then a husband clasping in his arms the halfmurdered mother of his children - and theYi a weeping wife and motlier turning in despair from the search after a beloved husband and father, convinced that he liad a grave ín these hornd dungeons - when these iron-hearted warriors witnes.sed this sight," said Colonel L. "they wept and sobbed like children." I have only to add to this account, wnich is rclnted, as near as possible, in the words of tliis nged veteran, let the reader remember that these events occurred only thirty-four years agojthat the man is living who wilness ed them; that he is now a regular ordained Lulheran clergyman and worthy of implicil credit.