Saint Paloren's Day Massacre

The Saint Paloren's Day Massacre was a terrorist attack on the annual Feast of Saint Paloren celebration in Roselawn in 1844. The attack was perpetrated by a wing of the Merending independence movement known as the Greencloaks. Forty-seven people were killed, most of whom were civilians.

Background

In the early 1800s, a new wave of Merending nationalism began sweeping through the Maromere. Exacerbated by the dissolution of the Empire of Räsgard and the establishment of the Principality of Aufmar, a group of independence fighters began to coalesce into a group that came to be known as the Greencloaks. Under the leadership of a man named Sogerix, the self-styled Marsh-King, they began a campaign of violence against military targets in Aufmar.
In 1842, a number of attacks began occurring against civilian targets seen as collaborators. Two years later, Sogerix would order an attack on the annual Roselawn celebration of the Feast of Saint Paloren. To many extremists, this celebration was seen as a bastardization of Merending culture.

The Attack

On the evening of March 19, 1844, a group Greencloaks including Sogerix infiltrated the festival at the Roselawn Fairgrounds. At a predetermined time, five of them activated illegally-obtained scrolls of Fireball. The ensuing explosions claimed the lives of 42 people in attendance at the festival, with nearly another hundred injured. Sogerix himself was not in possession of one of these scrolls, and later claimed under interrogation that there were supposed to be three other explosions but did not know why they were not activated. Sogerix was later publicly executed in Roselawn.

Aftermath

While the group had been active for some time, this marked the organization's first international attack. In the aftermath, the Hildonian government began making plans for an invasion of the Maromere to hunt down the Greencloaks in retaliation. The Hildonian military saw a massive surge in new volunteers, a majority of whom of Curtheni descent. However the day before the expeditionary force was scheduled to depart, Queen Harriet abruptly called off the invasion in fear that a Hildonian invasion of Aufmar could lead to all-out civil war. In response, thousands of those who had willingly volunteered deserted the army, seeing the cancellation as a betrayal.

Saint Paloren's Day Massacre

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Location: Roselawn Fairground
Date: March 19, 1844
Attack type: Massacre
Deaths: 47 (8 guards, 34 civilians, 5 Greencloaks)
Injured: 80+
Perpetrators: Sogerix, 5 other unidentified
Motive: Anti-colonial sentiments, Merending independence