At first it was the Spaniards who took the place as rulers of North Africa. They had gradually driven the Mohammedans out of southern Spain, and during the first ten years of the sixteenth century had occupied the seaports from Oran right down to Bougie, including Algiers. But these conquests did not really interest them as their eyes were turned to the Indies. Moreover, in the meanwhile the brothers Barbarossa were scouring the Mediterranean, and when they were asked to rid Algeria of the Spaniards it did not take them long to do it. But once the deed was accomplished, the Turks refused to leave, and in 1546 took possession of Algiers.
For the next three hundred years the White City became the stronghold of the pirates of the Mediterranean. At first their fleet was nominally a national navy, fighting against Charles Quint, but little by little all form of legitimate warfare disappeared and open piracy became the sole occupation of these wild seamen. Their ships became independent rovers of the sea; built lighter and more handily than the average cargo- or war-vessel of other nations, they fell upon their prey regardless of its flag, captured it, and brought it back to Algiers. Here the cargo was divided: a quarter to the state, and the rest to the owner and crew of the vessel. The sailors or passengers on board the prize were employed as slaves, those who knew trades, to build and beautify the palaces of their masters, the more common to work in the quarries or to row in the galleys. If they were men of importance, they were held to ransom. Among other prisoners who spent a not too pleasant sojourn in Algeria were Cervantes, the author of Don Quixote, and the French poet Regnard.
It was not long, however, before the powers in Europe began to occupy themselves with these acts of open brigandage. In 1541, Charles Quint led an expedition, but partly by reason of adverse weather, and partly by the strength of the Turkish lair, he was entirely defeated, and just escaped with a small portion of his forces.
The squadron sent by Cromwell under Blake in 1655 fared better. Part of the Turkish Fleet was destroyed at Tunis, and the release of the British prisoners was obtained. Louis XIV sent two fleets in 1682 and 1688, under Duquesne and d’Estrès respectively, but, though their bombardments did a good deal of damage to the fortifications, and temporarily hampered the pirates’ activity, the effect did not last long.
About the same time Sir Thomas Allen, and a little later Sir Edward Spragg, inflicted minor defeats on the Turkish fleets, but on the whole little harm was done; and though Lord Exmouth won a decisive victory in 1816 and seriously battered the fortifications, he was unable to land, and it remained for the French in 1830 finally to shake and destroy a rule which had dominated the Mediterranean for three centuries. With their entry on to the scene, the period of anarchy begun by the Vandals finally disappeared, and the task almost completed by the Romans started again on almost as barren a soil as that faced by the great colonists of the Mediterranean a hundred years before Christ.
CHAPTER IV
THE FRENCH CONQUEST OF ALGERIA
It will be easily understood that this undisputed mastery of the Mediterranean basin had given the Turks of Algeria a very great impression of their importance, and had left them with little respect for the European powers. Consideration, therefore, for representatives of those powers was on the same scale, and when one day the French Consul, Deval, paid an official visit to the Dey Hussein to protest about the non-payment of a debt to a French subject, Hussein summarily sent him about his business with a flick over the face with his fan.
This took place in 1827, but it was not until 1830 that the French really decided to have done with the insolence of the dey. An army of thirty-five thousand men was organized under General Bourmont, one of Napoleon’s officers, escorted by a fleet of three hundred ships. Curiously enough the success of the expedition was greatly facilitated by the lack of vigilance of British guards some twenty years before.
In 1808 Napoleon had practically decided to conquer Algeria and Colonel Boutin had been sent on a secret mission to Algiers with orders to reconnoiter the land. During his return journey the ship on which he was traveling was captured by a British man-of-war and the Colonel was imprisoned at Malta.
He, however, succeeded in escaping, and, returning to France, laid his report before the Emperor, who had by that time decided that Egypt was a more interesting goal.