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" ... the (Saint) Columban abbey had passed away, its cloisters were ruined and tenantless (from the vicious Elizabethan English persecution) but the Dominicans still lingered in the neighbourhood and kept burning the lamp of faith. We can trace their history in letters of blood all through the 17th and far into the 18th century. Some time towards the end of Elizabeth's reign, the Friars, thinking them selves secure, gathered back into their wrecked convent to the number of 33, when all at once as they recited their office the cry got up 'the soldiers are upon us.' 32 were put to death: one alone escaped to tell the tale." (Source: Derry Columbkille booklet in honour of St. Columba, in the Long Tower Church, Derry, page 106, 1899)

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