Cleveland daily leader. [volume] ([Cleveland, Ohio]) 1865-1873, 1866-04-20
Massacre Of Protestants I'm Italy.
VI305PVl4SaNN U tN5 IOauOl HeLAI4.I
FLORENCE, Tuesday, March 81.

Correspondents OF the London HerAld-)
FLORENCE, Tuesday, March 81.
We have bad news from the South.
The pleasant, thriving city of Barletta,
famous in history for the brilliant feat of
Italian arms, so graphically recorded in
NJ. DAzeglio's romance of "Ettore Fiera-
mosca," has Just been the scene of the
most ferocious outburst Of Christian Thug
gism. That religious fanatieism should
have produced such deplorable results in
the heart of the nineteenth century ap-
pears absolutely incredible. Unhappily
there is no doubt about the facts, which
are as follows: For about two years a
small Protestant society has existed in
Barletta. Beginning with two or three
individuals, this body had little by little
swelled to forty members, who managed
to support a little school and a chapel, in
which oficiated a pastor named Gsetano
Giannini, a native, 1 believe, of Florence!
The existence Of this modest evangelical
community was a thorn in the flesh to the
priests of the Romish faith who naturally
traced this alarming spread Of heresy to
the introduction of the pestilential Sar-
dinian statute. So far nothing can be
said. Prayers were offered up in the
churches for the conversion of these be-
nighted brethren, who probably returned
the compliment at their own Sunday ser
vices. Even this wa a polite attention
for which both parties might be recipro-
cally grateful. But so idyllic q state of
things was doomed to be abruptly termi-
mated by the arrival of three guaresiHIal-
istie, or Lenten preachers, dispatched to
the rescue of the faith, which appeared to
be on the wane in Barletta. These &C.
elesiastical firebrands (the names of two
of these are Fathers Postiglione and Prem
tadue) lost no time in denouncing the
the hideous wickeaness of which the folks
of Barletta had been guilty in tolerating
| the presence of these God-forsaken here
tics! And it was limited, that as the be-
nign influence ofprayer had proved inef-
fectual in the present case, a good oaken
cudgel might be ad~Yantageously substitu-
ted as a means of orthodox persuasion.
Nay, in case of need, the Church had often
found that a bundle or two of faggots
would admirably serve her purpose. In
this way it had been her privilege, by
Gods blessing, to save many millions of
| erring souls at the trihing cost of the de-
struction of the poor perishable bodies to
which they were temporarily attached.
This pious exhortation was renewed with
additional JUNCTION on St. Joseph's Day,
and the congregations, brimful of Divine
zeal, rushed out of the churches with
fendish yells of death to the Protest
antsl Death to the damned! Hurrah for
Jesus Christ Down with the hereticsl
Long live the Church! Long live Victor
Emmanuel! y etc. In fact all kinds of
cries were raised, any shout and any
weapon being good fol the occasion. The
houses of the Protestants were sacked, the
occupants thrown out of the windows or
hacked to pieces, and the mutilated vic
tims-some dead, some dying-burned in
the street, an immense fire having been
kindled for the purpose. The women were
reused to a pitch of indescribable fury,
stabbing and stoning many of the hapless
martyrs, and dancing with unearthly
shrieks round the flames at their duto-da-
'fe.
For two hours the rioters had it all
their own way, and as the Protestant
minister had taken refuge in the house of
the project, the place was besieged by the
mob, the officials were put to flight, and
all the furniture was thrown out of the
windows. The under-prefect received a
blow on the head from a stone, and a
delegate of police, who by some mistake
was supposed to be the Pastor Giannini,
received such i'll usage that he died on the
following day. In the course of time
order was restored, and four hundred SOL
diers are now quartered in the city. As
many as seventy-ive persons have been
arrested, including four priests, a Capu-
chin and six or seven women. The pris-
oners have been removed to TRAM, not
without a vigorous attempt to rescue them.
But the rioters were kept under, and for
tunately without bloodshed.
The clerical press is unmoved in the
presence of these terrible facts. Accord
ing to the UnitG Cdtholica, the whole
blame is to be imputed to the heretics,
who presumed to ~scandalize the faithful by
their perverse spirit of p~roselytism, and to
the Government, for encouraging schism.
Thirteen lives have been lost in this la
mentable affair, which appears to have
been no accidental circumstance, but to
have had its origin in certain general
measures concerted at Rome for the pur-
pose Of maintaining an agitation among
the ignorant classes, the Ultimate object
being evidently to produce a state of
things by which the Emperor of the
French may be induced to postpone the
withdrawal Of his troops from Rome.
Small disturbances, also provoked by the
clergy, are reported from various parts of
Sicily.