Daniel Axtell

Colonel Daniel Axtell (1622 – 19 October 1660) was captain of the Parliamentary Guard at the trial of King Charles I at Westminster Hall in 1649. Shortly after the Restoration he was hanged, drawn and quartered as a regicide.

He was a Baptist from Berkhamsted in Hertfordshire, who was apprenticed as a grocer. He joined the New Model Army, serving in John Pickering's regiment of Foote, and rose to the rank of colonel. Apart from his participation in the regicide, he is best remembered for his participation in Pride's Purge of the Long Parliament. His defence at his trial as a regicide, that he was only obeying orders at the trial of the King, was refuted by several witnesses who testified that Axtell had behaved discourteously towards the King, encouraging his men to jeer at or shout down the King when he tried to speak in his own defence. He was executed by being hanged, drawn and quartered. His commanding officer Colonel Francis Hacker had also been condemned as a Regicide and had been executed. Axtell went to his execution unrepentant, declaring "If I had a thousand lives, I could lay them all down for the [Good Old] Cause".

The Civil War
Axtell played a big part in the Civil War after being recruited by Parliament in 1643. He fought as an infantryman and was present at the sieges of Lindon (May 1644) and York (June 1644), along with the battle of Marston Moor and many other sieges and battles. Axtell was a keen puritan and in 1646 he and some other puritan soldiers started preaching in churches in Oxford. At that time it was illegal to preach unless one was a qualified clergyman, so he had to force the clergymen to give way.

Ireland
Axtell was a figure of some prominence in the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland. He played a Promethean part in the storming of Drogheda and the massacre that ensued. After the towns walls and the internal earthworks had been successfully stormed by English Parliamentarians, Arthur Aston, the Royalist governor of Drogada, and others retreated to a citadel on Windmill Mount, which was heavily fortified and could not easily be taken by assault. "Colonel Axtell, with some twelve of his men, went up to the top of the mount, and demanded of the governor the surrender of it, who was very stubborn, speaking very big words, but at length was persuaded to go into the windmill at the top of the mount, and as many more of the chiefest of them as it could contain, where they were disarmed, and afterwards all slain."

- Letter in Perfect Diurnal, 1–8 October 1649.

It was on direct orders from Oliver Cromwell that the quarter that had been given to the defenders on Mill Mount by Axtell was overturned, and the unarmed prisoners were killed.

On 25 October 1650 Axtell led the Parliamentarian army to victory at the battle of Meelick Island (a Crannog on the Shannon, on which the Connaught Irish army was camped) after launching a sudden attack on the Irish army under cover of darkness. After fierce hand-to-hand fighting the Parliamentarians were victorious, killing several hundred of the Irish soldiers and capturing their weapons and equipment. After the conflict, however, it was alleged that many of the Irish had been killed after the promise of quarter. Axtell was court-martialled for this by Henry Ireton and sent back to England. It is possible that Axtell was a scapegoat; Cromwell had committed similar atrocities a year earlier at Drogheda and at Wexford, in the sense that no quarter had been offered. It is possible that the leaders of the Parliamentarian forces in Ireland (if not the Parliamentarian leadership in Britain) felt that the 'shock' tactics initially adopted in Ireland were counter-productive. For example, Ireton's request for lenient surrender terms to be made known by Parliament were refused. Axtell's actions may have run counter to a less ruthless strategy putatively adopted by Ireton in the field.

Granny Castle
Granny Castle beside the river Nore is an imposing ruin. Its early history is identified with that of its founders and proprietors the earls of Ormond. "In the civil wars" writes Grosse "it was strongly garrisoned for the King and commanded by Captain Butler, Colonel Axtell, the famous regicide who was governor of Kilkenny, dispatched a party to reduce it, but they returned without accomplishing their orders; upon which Axtell himself marched out with two cannon and summoned the castle to surrender on pain of military execution.  Without any hope of relief it is no wonder the garrison submitted".

Miscellaneous
In 1678 Daniel Axtell, the son of the regicide, fled to Carolina after his house in Stoke Newington was searched for seditious libels. He died in 1687.