"...at first cleansing the countryside" 

"In the six months following Stirling Bridge, Wallace led a force to York, at first cleansing the countryside..."

This is such a touching reference to genocide that I cannot let it pass. If you're going to write history then you're going to have to stop making weasel comments excusing wanton killing of civilians whose only crime was to be born English. If I remember rightly, Mel Gibson's "Braveheart" did the same trick of mentioning this ethnic cleansing as a segue between scenes. It's just as morally reprehensible as the English doing this to the Scots, or Serbs doing this to Croats or...you get the idea.

On the other hand, if you're writing blatent propaganda then this is as good a place as any. I'm sure that Wikipedia's admins will support you, because they don't know any better.