The Knights of St. John

by Augusta Theodosia Drane

Again, then, the victory is with the Christians; there is a service of thanksgiving in the great church of St. John’s, and a call for fresh volunteers; for out of the four hundred who held St. Elmo that morning not a hundred are left alive. Seventeen of the knights had fallen, and among them the brave Medrano, who, in the act of tearing a Turkish standard from the rampart, was himself struck down by a bullet from an arquebuse. Before nightfall, the reinforcement, led by thirty knights, is safe within the walls, ready, when the morning comes, to renew the combat with undiminished valour. It is said that La Valette himself marvelled at the ardour of his brethren: they contended for the glorious post of sacrifice as though for martyrdom; and such perhaps it was,—for their death was not for conquest or ambition, but for the safety of the Christian world.

The Turks now resolved to cut off all communication between the fortress, and St. Angelo and the town, by continuing the line of intrenchments to the Great Harbour, where a battery of heavy guns could command the landing-place. While the works were in progress the garrison were kept in a state of perpetual alarm: all through the day an incessant fire was directed against the already ruined ramparts, and at night continual attacks, real or feigned, allowed the exhausted defenders no interval of repose. On the 18th of the month the investment was complete, and the little garrison knew that their hour was come. It was with unspeakable anguish that La Valette had watched that impassable barrier closing each day around the devoted band, unable to offer any succour to his brethren, or even to embarrass or retard the enemy’s work. The 20th was the Feast of Corpus Christi, and never perhaps was it celebrated under circumstances of greater solemnity, or such as were more calculated to inspire devotion. The Blessed Sacrament was borne in procession the whole circuit of the town, care only being taken to avoid such points as were most exposed to the enemy’s artillery. At its head walked the grand master, and after him came the Knights, clad in their dark robes with the white cross upon their breasts. The entire population accompanied them to the great church, where, prostrate on the pavement, they adored the Most Holy enthroned above the altar, and besought Him to have pity on them in their extremity, to grant to their brethren at St. Elmo the aid which no human power could give, and not to allow His worshippers to fall into the hands of the enemies of the faith.

All through the 21st the cannonading continued with increased severity, until the tottering walls of the castle were in many places levelled to the surface of the rock on which they stood; and on the next day the second assault was made: the whole army of the infidels against four hundred men. Thrice the enemy renewed that terrible charge, and thrice they were withstood. The defenders seemed to be possessed of a supernatural strength and a presence that was ubiquitous; and once again the shout—a feeble shout indeed—of “Victory! victory!” which reached the borgo, told the Christians that their comrades had gained the day. But a messenger from the fort, diving under water, and with wonderful dexterity escaping through the Turkish boats, brought a letter which told La Valette that two-thirds of their numbers were fallen, and the rest, wounded and exhausted, could scarcely lift their swords. Fresh succours were instantly despatched, but for the first time found it impossible to approach; for eighty of the Turkish galleys lying off the harbour darted forward to intercept them on their way, and so rapid were their movements, that, seeing they would infallibly be surrounded if they attempted to force a passage, the volunteers were forced reluctantly to retire. The garrison had watched them from the wall, and now learnt too surely that there was nothing more to hope. Daybreak would bring the last assault, and they could but die; but how should the night be passed? Surely as became the Hospitallers of the Cross. They dressed each other’s wounds, and each man comforted his fellow with noble and religious words; Miranda and the bailiff devoted themselves to the soldiers; and all confessed and communicated; then, embracing one another like brethren in Christ, they went to the walls, and those who could not stand were carried thither in a chair, and sat at the breach grasping their swords in both hands, and waiting for the enemy.

The morning broke at last; it was the vigil of St. John. The Turks came on with shouts of certain victory, which were proudly answered by the cheers of the garrison. For four long hours they withstood charge after charge from their assailants with heroic firmness; those who could not rise on their feet still kept up a fire of musketry, until their ammunition was so exhausted that they were forced to collect the grains of powder out of the pockets of their fallen brethren. At the end of that time only sixty men were left alive; but these maintained the defence with such undaunted courage, that at eleven o’clock the infidels discontinued the assault, and gave them a brief respite while they prepared to renew the combat with redoubled fury.

As the besieged were enjoying the short breathing-space the signal was heard for the re-commencement of the attack; the Turks poured in on every side, and in fact there was nothing to keep them out,—the walls were gone, and the guns silent now for want of powder,—only a few brave men, too weak to stand, with broken limbs and ghastly bleeding wounds; yet with their last breath, wielding their pikes and two-handed swords, they confronted the invaders, and seemed to defy them to do their worst. “In, followers of Islam!” shouted the pasha; “the dogs can do you no harm!” and with yells of fiendish malice the wild troops of the Spahis and Dahis burst into the fortress. The gallant old bailiff D’Egueras was the first to meet them lance in hand, and the first to fall from a blow that severed his head from his body, and laid his white hairs on the bloody ground. Francis Lanfreducci, before he died, struggled to the spot where a beacon was prepared to give notice to the borgo that all hope was gone; he fired it, and at the same moment expired from his wounds. The fight was soon over for want of combatants, yet one was left alive—Paul of Novara, who, summoning his last energies, charged boldly at the whole front of his enemies and drove them bodily from the breach; then, overpowered by numbers, he fell with his face to the foe, and the bloody scene was over. Five Maltese soldiers alone escaped by casting themselves into the water and swimming to the shore. Nine knights also, it is said, who were posted near the end of the fosse, were taken prisoners by the corsairs. These were the sole survivors of the massacre; for the Turks gave no quarter, Mustapha having offered a prize for every Christian head, and this in pursuance, as is said, of orders from the sultan. Twelve others at the point of death were found, like Bridier de Gordamp, lying before the chapel-altar, and being seized, were hung up by the feet, and then crucified.

The pasha himself now entered the fort, and struck by the insignificance of the place, rightly judged that the conquest of the borgo would be no easy task. “What,” he exclaimed, “will be the resistance of the parent when the child has cost us eight thousand of our bravest men?” To intimidate the knights, therefore, he had recourse to horrible barbarities. The heads of four of the principal brethren, among them those of Miranda and the brave old bailiff, he caused to be fixed aloft upon a pole with their faces towards the town; then ordering search to be made among the heaps of dead that covered the ramparts, he selected the bodies of the knights, some of whom still breathed, and first gashing their breasts crosswise and tearing out their hearts, he cut off their heads and feet, and nailed their mangled trunks upon wooden crosses;[44] then, throwing over each their scarlet surcoats, he cast them into the sea, trusting that the waves would bear them to the foot of the castle of St. Angelo, where they might meet the eyes of the grand master and his knights. The evening tide brought them to the shore; the sight drew tears from the eyes of La Valette, and those torn and mangled bodies, being lifted reverently and tenderly, were kissed and honoured as the relics of glorious martyrs. Happy were they in their comrades’ eyes, thus bearing the cross, and bound to it to the last. “Grieve not for the fall of St. Elmo,” said La Valette to his council, “but rather give God thanks that the noble few who held it could keep their post so long. If now they have been forced to yield, yet has their death been glorious, and their end, which the infidels deemed disgrace, fit funeral for Hospitallers of the Cross.”

Yet, spite of his words, the anguish of the grand master was not to be concealed; and he changed his residence, so as no longer to see from the windows of his palace the fort which recalled the slaughter of his comrades; and his countenance, though it lost nothing of its lofty serenity, was lined and worn by suffering strongly mastered and suppressed.

From this time La Valette gave no quarter, as, notwithstanding the contrary inhuman practice of the Turks, he had hitherto done. So far, at least, he was justified by the laws of war; but not satisfied with this, he was carried on to the committal of an act which,—whatever might be the usage of those days, and whatever excuse may be framed for it from the consideration of the ferocious barbarity of the adversary he had to deal with, and the maddening horror inspired by the sight of the mangled remains of his brethren, bearing on them the marks of the torments they had undergone,—cannot but be regarded as a stain on the pure glory of this Christian knight. He gave instant orders for the execution of the prisoners; and that the brutal foe might learn the sudden vengeance which their cold-blooded cruelty had brought down upon their comrades, he caused their gory heads to be fired into the Turkish camp. Doubtless he hoped to strike terror into the infidels, and to teach them the danger to themselves of converting warfare into butchery. But such fierce reprisals seldom produce any salutary effect, while the recital gives a painful jar to the feelings with which we love to regard these heroic champions of the Cross.

The loss of the Christians in the defence of St. Elmo is differently estimated; but the common account puts it at 1300 men, of whom 130 were knights.[45] When we reflect that a handful of warriors withstood for the space of a month the whole strength of the Ottoman army, and consider the deliberate nature of their sacrifice in an enterprise where victory was never once contemplated, but in which they sought only to secure the safety of the island by a prolonged resistance, we shall not hesitate to place their devotion at least on a level with that of the three hundred heroes of Thermopylæ,—far above it, if we remember that in their case patriotic ardour was rendered holy by religious zeal: “The profession of our oath,” said the grand master in his letter, “is to sacrifice our lives for Christendom.”