“Captain Sewell.  We are treacherously dealt with here, therefore keep a very good look-out of any designs on you.  Have a good look to your two Trankers,[9] We hope to be with you to-night.  Take care and don’t frighten the women; we are in no great danger.  Give the bearer a Chequeen."[10]

But none of the English were to see Anjengo again.  That night, or the next morning, a sudden attack was made, the crowd surged in on the soldiers, overwhelmed them, and cut them to pieces.  The principal English were seized and reserved for a more cruel death.  In the confusion, Cowse, who was a favourite among the natives, managed to disguise himself, got through the crowd, and sought to reach Anjengo by a little frequented path.  By bad luck he was overtaken by a Mahommedan merchant who owed him money.  Cowse offered to acquit him of the debt, but to no purpose.  He was mercilessly killed, and thus the debt was settled.  ’Stone dead hath no fellow,’ as the chronicler of his death says.  The rest of the English were tortured to death, Gyfford and the interpreter being reserved for the worst barbarities.  Ignatio Malheiros was gradually dismembered, while Gyfford had his tongue torn out, was nailed to a log of wood, and sent floating down the river.

It is easy to picture to one’s self the consternation in Anjengo, that 12th April, when, soon after midday, Gyfford’s hasty note was received, and the same evening, when a score of wounded men (topasses) straggled in to confirm the worst fears; ’all miserably wounded, some with 12 or 13 cutts and arrows in their bodyes to a lower number, but none without any.’  Gyfford had taken away all the able men with him, leaving in the fort only ‘the dregs,’ old men, boys, and pensioners, less than forty in number.  At their head were Robert Sewell, who describes himself as Storekeeper, Captain and Adjutant by order of Governor Boone; Lieutenant Peter Lapthorne, Ensign Thomas Davis, and Gunner Samuel Ince.  The first three of them were absolutely useless, and Gunner Ince, whose name deserves to be remembered, was the only one of the four who rose to the situation.  His first care was for the three English women, whose husbands had just been killed.  By good fortune there happened to be in the road a small country ship that had brought a consignment of cowries from the Maldives.  Mrs. Gyfford, for the third time a widow, Mrs. Cowse with four children, and Mrs. Burton with two, were hastily put on board, and sailed at once for Madras.  No mention appears of Mrs. Gyfford having any children with her, but she carried off the factory records and papers, and what money she could lay her hands on.  She was no longer the confiding girl, who had given herself to Governor Harvey eleven years before.  She had learned something of the world she lived in, and intended to take care of herself as well as she could.  She even tried to carry off Peter Lapthorne with her, but Sewell intervened and prevented it.  So giving him hasty directions to act as her agent, she passed through the dangerous Anjengo surf and got on board.  A letter to her from Lapthorne, written a few weeks later, relates that the only property he could find belonging to her were ’two wiggs and a bolster and some ophium’ in the warehouse.