These eight men, armed with the keys, now came to the prison, whose doors they opened. The captives were ready and waiting. Foxe called on them to do their share, and the whole band—between two and three hundred—poured forth. To each section did Foxe bestow some duty. The eight prison warders were put to death, but some of the prisoners Foxe had wisely sent down to the water, where they got ready for sea the best galley, called the Captain of Alexandria. Whilst some were getting her launched, others were rushing about bringing her masts and sails and oars and the rest of her inventory from the winter quarters. The whole place was seething with suppressed excitement. Meanwhile there was a warm contest going on at the prison before all the warders were slain. The latter had fled to the top of the prison, and Foxe with his companions went after them with ladders. Blood and slaughter were all round them. Three times was Foxe shot, but by a miracle the shot only passed through his clothing on each occasion. But, as if by way of punishment for their greed, Unticaro and his two companions who had taken the ducats were killed outright, being “not able to weild themselves, being so pestered with the weight and uneasie carrying of the wicked and prophane treasure.”
In this conflict one of the Turks was run through with a sword and, not yet dead, fell from the top of the prison wall to the ground. Such a noise did he then begin to make that the alarm was raised, and the authorities were amazed to find the Christian prisoners were “paying their ransoms” by dealing death to their late masters. Alexandria was now roused, and both a certain castle as well as a strong fortress were bestirring themselves to action. It seemed as if the prisoners, after all their years of suffering, after having brought about so gallant an escape, were now to fail just as victory was well in sight. It was a saddening thought. But there was one road of escape and one only. Whilst some of the prisoners were still running down to the sea carrying munitions, some additional oars, victuals and whatever else were required for the galleys, others were getting ready for pushing off. The last of the Christians leapt aboard, the final touch was given to the gear, and up went the yards and the sails were unloosed. There was a good breeze and this, the swiftest and best of all Alexandria’s ships, was speeding on at a good pace. But ashore the Turks have already got to their guns, and the roar of cannon is heard from both the castle and fortress. The sea is splashing everywhere with Turkish ball and the smoke is swept by the breeze off the shore. Five and forty times did these guns fire and never once did a shot so much as graze the galley, although she could see the splashes all around her.
On and still on sailed this long, lean galley, increasing her speed all the time, till at length, by God’s mercy, she, with her long-suffering crew, who by years of involuntary training had learnt to handle her to perfection, were at last out of range of any Turkish cannon. In the distance they could see their late masters coming down to the beach “like unto a swarme of bees,” and bustling about in a futile endeavour to get their other galleys ready for the sea. But it was of little avail. The Christians had long been preparing for flight in the Captain, so the Turks found it took an unbearable time in seeing out the oars and masts, and cables and everything else necessary to a galley’s inventory lying hidden away in winter quarters. They had never suspected such a well-planned escape as this. Nothing was ready; all was confusion. And even when the galleys were at last launched and rigged, the weather was so boisterous, there was such a strong wind that no man cared about taking charge of these fine-weather craft just at that time.
So the escaping galley got right away, and then, as soon as they were a safe distance away, Foxe summoned his men to do what Nelson was to perform less than three centuries later at almost this very spot. You remember how, after the glorious battle of the Nile, when the British fleet had obtained such a grand victory over the French, Nelson sent orders through the fleet to return thanksgiving to Almighty God for the result of the battle. All work was stopped, and men who had spent the whole night risking death and fighting for their lives, dishevelled and dirty with sweat and grime, now stood bareheaded and rendered their thanks. So it was now on the galley Captain. Foxe “called to them all, willing them to be thankfull unto Almighty God for their deliverie, and most humbly to fall downe upon their knees, beseeching Him to aide them unto their friends’ land, and not to bring them into an other daunger, sith Hee had most mightily delivered them from so great a thraldome and bondage.” It must have been a momentous occasion. Men who, after being prisoners for thirty years and less, men who had just come through a night of wild excitement, men who had fought with their arms and sweated hard to get their galley ready for sea, men who even at the last minute had barely escaped being blown into eternity by the Turkish cannon, now halted in their work and made their thanksgiving, whilst most of them hardly could realise that at length they were free men and the time of their tribulation was at an end.
And then they resumed their rowing, and instead of working till they dropped for faintness, each man helped his neighbour when weariness was stealing over the oarsmen. Never did a more united ship’s company put to sea. One object alone did they all possess—to come to some Christian land with the least possible delay. They had no charts, but Foxe and his English fellow-seamen knew something about astronomy, and by studying the stars in the heavens they roughly guessed the direction in which they ought to steer.
With such haphazard navigation, however, they soon lost their position when variable winds sprang up. Those light-draught ships made a good deal of leeway, and as the wind had been from so many points of the compass “they were now in a new maze.” But troubles do not come singly: they were further troubled by their victuals giving out, so that it seemed as if they had escaped from one form of punishment only to fall into a worse kind of hardship. As many as eight died of starvation, but at last, on the twenty-ninth day after leaving Alexandria, the others picked up the land again and found it was the island of Candia. Their distance made good had thus been about 350 miles north-west, which works out at about twelve miles a day. But though this is ridiculously small it must be borne in mind that their courses were many and devious, that to row for twenty-nine consecutive days was a terrible trial for human endurance, and latterly they were rowing with empty stomachs. They came at length to Gallipoli in Candia and landed. Here the good abbot and monks of the Convent of Amerciates received them with welcome and treated them with every Christian hospitality. They refreshed these poor voyagers and attended to their wants until well enough to resume their travels. Two hundred and fifty-eight had survived, and good nourishment, with kindly treatment on land, restored their health and vigour.
We need not attempt to suggest the warmth of the welcome which these poor prisoners received and the congratulations which were showered upon them in having escaped from the hands of the Turks. It was in itself a remarkable achievement that so many had come out alive. As a token and remembrance of this miraculous escape Foxe left behind as a present to the monks the sword with which the Englishman had slain the keeper of the prison. Esteeming it a precious jewel it remained hanging up in a place of honour in the monastery. When the time came for the Captain to get under way again, she coasted till she arrived at Tarento (in the heel of Italy) and so concluded their voyage. They were once again in a Christian land and away from their oppressors. The galley they sold at this port and immediately started to walk on foot to Naples. Yes, they had escaped, but by how little may be gathered from the fact that the Christians having started their long walk in the morning, there arrived that self-same night seven Turkish galleys. But the latter were too late: their captives were now inland.
Having reached Naples without further adventure, the Christians separated and, according to his nationality, made for their distant homes. But Foxe proceeded first to Rome, arriving there one Easter Eve, where he was well entertained by an Englishman who brought the news of this wonderful escape to the notice of the Pope. Foxe was without any means of livelihood, and it was a long way to walk to the English Channel, so he determined to try his luck in Spain. The Pope treated the poor man with every consideration, and sent him on his journey with a letter to the King of Spain. “We, in his behalf, do in the bowels of Christ desire you,” wrote His Holiness, “that, taking compassion of his former captivity and present penury, you do not only suffer him freely to pass throughout your cities and towns, but also succour him with your charitable alms, the reward whereof you shall hereafter most assuredly receive.”
Leaving Rome in April 1577, Foxe arrived in Spain apparently the following August. The Spanish king appointed him to the office of gunner in the royal galleys at a salary of eight ducats a month. Here he remained for about two years, and then, feeling homesick, returned to England in 1579. “Who being come into England,” as we read in Hakluyt, “went unto the Court, and shewed all his travell unto the Councell: who, considering of the state of this man, in that hee had spent and lost a great part of his youth in thraldome and bondage, extended to him their liberalitie, to helpe to maintaine him now in age, to their right honour, and to the incouragement of all true heartied Christians.”
Such, then, was the happy ending to Foxe’s travels sixteen years after his ship had set forth from Portsmouth. He had shown himself not merely to be a man of exceptional physical endurance, but a man of considerable resource and a born leader of men in times of crisis and despair We may well relish the memory of such a fine character.