(Note: In the account of James Huston we have followed the spelling used by Chas. A. Hanna in The Scotch-Irish. Others have used the more familiar form, Houston.)

While the closing of the gates as related in the song occurred December 7, 1688, the actual siege began April 18, 1689. An unknown number of Houstons were inside the walls, soldiers and civilians, men, women and children. After assaults failed to reduce the walled town, and sallies from within hurt but failed to drive away the besieging army, the Irish and French command decided to starve out the city. Inside the walls 7,000 fighting men were organized into well-disciplined regiments. The English Episcopalians and the Scottish Presbyterians, faced by a common danger, worked in close harmony.

With all outside food supply cut off, hunger and disease ravaged the defenders. A fleet of 30 ships sent from England for relief, loaded with food, stood out in the Lough for six weeks, the commander being afraid to brave the shore batteries to venture the four miles up the river Foyle to the besieged town. Eventually the famine inside the walls was a greater menace than the bullets and bombs from without. Woodburn relates that provisions were so scarce that "even the soldiers were compelled to Jive on the flesh of horses, dogs, cats, rats, and mice. Plague, brought on by this unwholesome diet, made its appearance, and people died in such numbers that it was impossible for the survivors to bury them. Everywhere there were lying the bodies of the dead and dying, and the air was poisoned by the stench." 1

One of the most cruel attempts to force surrender was perpetrated by General Rosen who was sent by James to take command of the besieging forces. He ordered his soldiers to round up all the Protestants, the old men, women and children, who lived within a ten-mile radius and drive them under the walls of the city. The defenders, seeing a great mass of people moving toward the walls thought it was an assault and fired upon the crowd. To their consternation they found they had killed some of their own friends and relatives. Rosen vowed to keep the civilians there without food until the city surrendered. The defenders, seeing their friends outside, starving, were in a quandary. If these people were brought in, the food supply would be gone in a few days. The suffering people beg.

1 Woodburn, p. 156.