The Knights of St. John

by Augusta Theodosia Drane

The gallantry displayed by the Hospitallers on this occasion is illustrated by many anecdotes. Among others who distinguished themselves was a young French knight, Nicholas de Villegagnon, who, being wounded severely by a Moorish horseman, sprang behind his adversary on the crupper of his steed, and, plunging his dagger into his heart, spurred the animal through the ranks of the Moors, and so reached his own line in safety. A rally was made round the banner of St. John, and the struggle was maintained with spirit, when Ferdinand Gonzaga, one of the imperial generals, rode up to the spot. “Sir Hospitaller,” he cried, addressing the grand bailiff of the order, “it is not enough to beat these dogs,—chase them back to Algiers, and enter the city with them; your knights are used to take towns without guns.” His words roused the enthusiastic chivalry of those to whom they were addressed; and dashing upon the Moors with wild impetuosity, they drove them before their horses like a flock of sheep until they reached the city-gates, which the governor closed in the very face of his own soldiers, lest the Christians should enter with them. Nevertheless Ponce de Savignac, the standard-bearer of the order, rode up fearlessly and drove his poniard into the doors, and galloped away before his audacity was perceived. He fell, however, in the combat of the ensuing day, directed exclusively on the Maltese quarter; for, as the knights a second time pursued their enemies to the gates of Algiers, he was struck by a poisoned arrow. Feeling himself wounded, he called a soldier to support him. “Help me to bear up the standard,” he cried; and leaning on the shoulder of his comrade, he had the courage and resolution to stand there, with the banner in his grasp, until he fell dead upon the ground.

The losses sustained in these conflicts were by no means the worst disasters that befell the Christian army. A terrible tempest nearly destroyed their fleet; and as galley after galley was driven upon the rocks, the troops were sad spectators of the slaughter of their crews by the inhuman Arabs. The number of vessels destroyed in this tempest was something incredible. The crew of one of the Maltese galleys, The Bastard, believing it impossible to save her, endeavoured to run her on the rocks, that they might abandon her; but Azevedo, the commander, obstinately refused his consent. In vain they represented that she was old and unfit for service; and that the lives of the men were of more value than a few worm-eaten timbers. “I know nothing of all that,” he replied, “but only that this galley has been intrusted to my care by the order; and, by the arm of St. John! I will slay the first man who talks of leaving his post;—you will save her, or die upon her decks.” And, inspired by his resolution, they did save her, and brought her safe back to Malta.

The army meanwhile, without tents, provisions, or hospital equipage, was soon reduced to extremity; and the siege was raised.

The successor of Barbarossa in the chieftainship of the Moorish corsairs was the celebrated Dragut (or Torghoud). Brought up from childhood in the service of the Ottomans, he had attained the highest reputation for skill and ferocity among all the brigands of the African coast. He had recently possessed himself of the strong city of Mehdijé,[40] situated between Tunis and Tripoli; and his neighbourhood to the two towns in possession of the Christians rendered an attack on this fortress absolutely necessary. The imperial fleet was led by Doria; and 140 knights, under the bailiff De la Sangle, joined the expedition with 400 troops (1530). The siege was long and bloody; but it is scarcely so much to the military operations before the walls of Mehdijé that we desire to direct the reader’s attention, as to a far more beautiful and impressive spectacle which was then displayed. La Sangle may be taken as a fair and worthy example of the spirit of his institute;—wise in council, dauntless in battle, but in all characters most religious and humane. The prolonged siege soon produced the usual sufferings among the invading army; and pestilence made even greater ravages among the troops than the arms of the enemy. The brave old Hospitaller, however, only felt the emergency to be a call upon the best exertions of himself and his knights. “Our first duty, gentlemen,” he said to his comrades, “is hospitality, for to that we are bound by our vows; let, therefore, every Hospitaller give his tent to the hospital of the order, and serve, as becomes him, in the infirmary.” The proposal was received with enthusiasm; a kind of canvas hospital was improvised out of the tents of the knights; all the sick were received into it, and served tenderly and unweariedly by these brave and noble men: and never, surely, did their deeds of prowess gain them half the title to our praise, and to the recompense of eternal fame, which was earned by their heroic charity in the hospital of Mehdijé.

Dragut was a formidable adversary, and kept his opponents well employed; every day witnessed some sortie and bloody conflict, in which the Christians suffered considerable loss. During the second assault on the town the knights claimed the post of honour; the great banner was carried at their head by the commander De Giou, and as the attack was made on the side of the sea, they advanced to the assault through the water, which rose as high as their shoulders; for, impatient at the stoppages of the boats against the sandbanks, they threw themselves sword in hand into the sea, and thus gained the foot of the ramparts under the fire of the garrison. In a few moments the banner of St. John waved from the summit of the walls; but its brave defender fell dead at the same instant. Copier, another commander, instantly seized it ere it fell; and through the whole of the combat that followed, in the very thick of the firing, he stood calm and unmoved, holding it aloft above his head. The imperial troops, however, despairing of carrying the place, were about to give way, when Gimeran, a commander of the order, discovered a narrow entrance, through which he forced his way at the head of the knights into the heart of the city. This decided the day, and the place was immediately taken and sacked: the principal mosque, however, was blessed and converted into a church; and there the knights and officers who had fallen in the bloody contest were interred. When the town was afterwards abandoned, the remains of these heroes were removed to Sicily, and placed in a magnificent mausoleum in the Cathedral of Montreal.

Dragut, in despair at the loss of Mehdijé, repaired to the court of Solyman, and represented that the cause of the Crescent would be ruined and for ever disgraced if the Knights of St. John were not speedily exterminated. The sultan, who readily entered into his views, and was continually irritated by hearing of fresh victories achieved by an order he had thought to crush for ever, empowered Dragut to assemble all the corsairs of Africa, in order that, being united to the Turkish fleet, they might proceed to the work of “extermination” by carrying fire and sword to Tripoli and Malta, the two chief nests of the “dogs of giaours.”

At the first rumour of an attack on Malta, the knights hastened to assemble for its defence, without waiting for a summons. Among those first to arrive in the island was the commander Nicholas de Villegagnon—the same whose prowess before Algiers we have already noticed. He was one of the most popular men of his order; the more so, perhaps, that Homedez, the grand master at that time, showed a cold and avaricious disposition which raised him many enemies, and rendered the display of reckless and romantic chivalry, such as that of Villegagnon, doubly welcome among the younger knights. Malta was in a most destitute state; and Homedez, as is said, from motives of self-interest, resisted all the representations that were made to him as to the necessity of securing its defences. “It was a needless expense,” he said; “these rumours of Turkish armaments were premature and ridiculous; and if you attended to them, you might attend to nothing else.” Nevertheless, on the morning of the 16th of July 1551, three days after he had expressed himself to this effect, he beheld from the windows of his palace the arrival of the whole Ottoman fleet, sailing before a favourable wind, and about, as it seemed, to cast anchor before the principal fort of the island. That of the old city, or borgo, was defended only by a small fort, now without a garrison; for all the forces on the island had been called in to guard the fortifications of St. Angelo, then the residence of the order. The terrified inhabitants of the city hastened to despatch messengers to Homedez imploring succour: but the grand master refused; he had need, he said, of all his forces to defend St Angelo. “At least,” returned the envoy in despair, “let us have Villegagnon with us”—a singular compliment to the bravery of that knight; nor did he decline the post, although, as he represented, the defence of the old city required at least the presence of a hundred men. “I expect courage and obedience, not reasoning, from a knight,” replied Homedez. “You can have six companions; if they are not enough, and you are afraid of the business, some one else may be found to undertake it.” Villegagnon keenly felt the taunt, and instantly rose to depart. “I will show you, sir,” he replied, “that fear, at least, has never made me shrink from danger.” He set out at once, accompanied by six French knights; finding some horses grazing outside, they threw themselves on their backs without saddles or bridles, and reached the town. Gliding unperceived to the bottom of the walls, they made signals to the inhabitants, who lowered a rope; and thus all seven with their guide entered the fort under the eye of the enemy.

Meanwhile the Turkish fleet had been making the circuit of the island, considering the best point of attack. As they appeared before the fortified heights of St. Angelo, Sinam, the Ottoman general, called Dragut to his side. “Is that the castle you have represented so weak and defenceless?” he exclaimed; “why, no eagle could choose a better eyrie.” “Truly, signior,” added a veteran corsair, who stood by his side, “it were hard to steal the eagle’s eggs. Dost thou see yon rampart, where the scarlet banner floats? When I was a slave in the giaours’ galleys, some twenty years ago, my shoulders helped to carry up the stones that built it; and you may take my word for it, ere you cast it to the ground, summer shall go and winter come, for its foundation is the rock itself.” “Enough,” replied Sinam, “we land at the town below; and ere we batter the kennel of these dogs about their ears, we will teach the islanders how to show hospitality to the sultan’s troops.” Accordingly the troops landed on the lower part of the island, and prepared to invest the old city, when a shout from the walls was heard, accompanied with discharges of musketry and repeated cries of joy;—it was the welcome which the citizens were giving to Villegagnon and his comrades. “It is the Spanish fleet!” exclaimed one; “The galleys from Naples!” cried another; “The garrison of St. Angelo are coming down!” cried a third: and within an hour Sinam’s troops had re-embarked. After a descent on Gozo, in which they succeeded in carrying off six thousand of the inhabitants into slavery, the fleet directed its course to Tripoli; but it must be allowed that this was but a pitiful commencement of the war of “extermination.”

The garrison of Tripoli consisted chiefly of some fresh levies of Spanish and Calabrian troops; and the mutiny of these men, unaccustomed to face the enemy, brought about the speedy fall of the place; for Vallier, the marshal of the order, who held the command, perceiving the impossibility of resistance, felt himself justified in agreeing to terms of capitulation; a determination, however, which disgraced him in the eyes of his order, and on his arrival at Malta with his knights he was condemned to imprisonment.