On this day in 1575, English soldiers savagely martyred 3 Franciscans in Down, Ireland.

The book Our Martyrs recounts their murders:

IN 1575 a certain Englishman named John Britton, or Brereton, accompanied by a body of soldiers, seized Brothers John O’Locran, Edmund Fitzsimon, and the Donogh O’Roarke, priests, in the convent of Down, and after putting them to the torture repeatedly, hanged them near the place commonly called St. John’s Well, the spot where the angels appeared to St. Patrick. He hanged two more in the garden of the convent from a tree, though he had received a large sum of money from the townsmen to set them free. It is said that the tree, which formerly bore fruit in abundance, soon became withered, and never after sent out a leaf. Bruodin gives January 21st, 1575, as the date of their martyrdom.

Father Loughran’s killing was the depicted in recent EWTN film Faith of Our Fathers.

You can publish the full book of Our Martyrs here, proceeds go to Aid to the Church in Need.