The affair was really brilliant. The rebels were encamped on a low hill, and, not expecting that Kalergy would depart from the usual practice of carrying on a long series of skirmishes, they had paid no attention to their position. The attack opened in the usual way by a fierce fire at a very long distance; but Kalergy, on perceiving the careless arrangements of his enemy, soon induced his troops to creep up pretty close to the Moreotes, when he suddenly jumped up, and shouted to his followers, “The shortest way is the best. Follow me!” and rushed forward. His whole band was within the hostile lines in an instant. The manœuvre was so unexpected, that few of the rebels fired; many were loading their muskets, and none had time to draw their swords or yatagans. About 170 were slain, and, if report may be trusted, one of the rebel chiefs was struck down by Kalergy, and the other taken prisoner after receiving a wound in personal combat with the young hero. The faction of the Moreote barons, as these greedy plunderers of the Greek shopkeepers would fain have been called, was dissolved by this unexpected victory. Many laid down their arms, and made peace with the government.
General Kalergy was afterwards present in the town of Navarin when it was besieged by Ibrahim Pasha, and marched out with his band when the place capitulated. This defeat, though he had only held a subordinate command, afflicted him greatly, and he looked round for some means of avenging his country’s loss on the Turks. He resolved at last to endeavour to make a diversion by recommencing the war in Crete; but without a strong fortress to secure the ammunition and supplies necessary for prosecuting a series of irregular attacks, it was evident that nothing important could be effected. In this difficulty, Kalergy determined to attack the impregnable island-fortress of Grabusa, as it was known that the strength of the place had induced the Turks to leave it with a very small garrison. Kalergy having learned that the greater part of this garrison was absent during the day, disguised a few of his men in Turkish dresses, and appeared on the beach at the point from which the soldiers of the garrison crossed to this island Gibraltar. The commander of Grabusa ordered the boat to transport them over as usual, and the Greeks entered the fort before the mistake was discovered. The place was in vain attacked by all the forces of Mohammed Ali; the Greeks kept possession of it to the end of the war. The sagacity and courage displayed by Kalergy in this affair placed him in the rank of the ablest of the Greek chiefs.
When General Gordon (whose excellent history of the Greek revolution we recommend to our readers[A]) attempted to relieve Athens, then besieged by Kutayhi, (Reschid Pasha,) Kalergy and Makriyani commanded divisions of the troops which occupied the Piræus. Subsequently, when Lord Cochrane and General Church endeavoured to force the Turkish lines, Kalergy was one of the officers who commanded the advanced division. In the engagement which ensued, his adventures afford an illustration of the singular vicissitudes of Eastern warfare. The Greek troops landed at Cape Kolias during the night, and pushed forward to within a mile and a half of the Turkish lines, where they formed a slight intrenchment on some undulating hills. They threw up some ill-constructed tambouria, (as the redoubts used in Turkish warfare are termed,) and of these some remains are still visible. A ravine descending from the lower slopes of Hymettus ran in front of this position, deep enough to shelter the Turkish cavalry, and enable them to approach without exposing themselves to the Greek artillery. This movement of the Turks was distinctly seen from the Greek camp at the Piræus, and the approaching attack on the advanced posts of the army was waited for in breathless anxiety. The map of the plain of Athens is sufficiently familiar to most of our readers to enable then to picture to themselves the scene which ensued with perfect accuracy.
The Greek troops destined for the relief of Athens amounted to about 3000 men, and of these about 600 were posted far in advance of their companions, in three small redoubts. The main body drawn up in a long line remained inactive with the artillery, and a smaller corps as a rear-guard seemed destined to communicate with the fleet of Lord Cochrane at Cape Kolias. At the Piræus, about 700 men were scattered about in all the disorder of an Eastern encampment, without making the slightest attempt to distract the attention of the Turkish troops. The French General Gueheneuc and the Bavarian General Heideck, both witnessed the battle.
The Turkish cavalry, to the number of about 700, having formed in the ravine, rode slowly up towards the brow of the hill on which the tambouria of the Cretans, the Suliots, and the regular regiment were placed. As soon as their appearance on the crest of the ridge exposed them to the fire of the Greeks, they galloped forward. The fire of the Greeks, however, seemed almost without effect, yet the Turks turned and galloped down the hill into the shelter of the ravine. In a short time they repeated their attack with a determination, which showed that the preceding attempt had been only a feint to enable them to examine the ground. As they approached this time very near the intrenchments, the fire of the Greeks proved more effectual than on the former occasion, and several of the Delhis, horse and man, rolled on the ground. Again the Turks fled to conceal themselves in the ravine, and prepared for another attack by dividing their force into three divisions, one of which ascended and another descended the ravine, while the third prepared to renew the assault in the old direction. The vizier Kutayhi himself moved forward to encourage his troops, and it became evident that a desperate struggle would now be made to carry the Greek position, where the few troops who held it were left unsupported.
The Turkish cavalry soon rushed on the Greeks, assailing their position in front and flanks; and, in spite of their fire, forced the horses over the low intrenchments into the midst of the enemy.[B] For the space of hardly three minutes pistol shots and sabre cuts fell so thick, that friends and foes were in equal danger. Of the Greeks engaged not one had turned to flee, and but few were taken alive. The loss of the Turks was, however, but trifling—about a dozen men and from fifteen to twenty horses.
The centre of the Greek army, on beholding the destruction of the advanced guard, showed little determination; it wavered for a minute, and then turned and fled towards the shore in utter confusion, abandoning all its artillery to the Turks. The Delhis soon overtook their flying enemies, and riding amongst them, coolly shot down and sabred those whose splendid arms and dresses excited their cupidity. The artillery itself was turned on the fugitives, who had left the ammunition undestroyed as well as the guns unspiked. But our concern with the battle of the 6th May 1827, is at present confined to following the fortunes of Kalergy. He was one of the prisoners. His leg had been broken by a rifle-ball as the Turks entered the tambouri of the Cretans, and as he received an additional sabre cut on the arm, he lay helpless on the ground, where his youthful appearance and splendid arms caught the eye of an Albanian bey, who ordered him to be secured and taken care of as his own prisoner.
On the morning after the battle, the prisoners were all brought out before the tent of Kutayhi, who was encamped at Patissia, very near the site of the house subsequently built by Sir Pulteney Malcolm. George Drakos, a Suliot chief, had killed himself during the night; and the Pasha, in consequence, ordered all the survivors to be beheaded, wishing, probably, to afford Europe a specimen of Ottoman economy and humanity, by thus saving the lives of these Greeks from themselves. Two hundred and fifty were executed, when Kalergy, unable to walk, was carried into the circle of Turkish officers witnessing the execution, on the back of a sturdy Albanian baker. Kutayhi calmly ordered his instant execution; but the prisoner having informed his captor that he would pay 100,000 piastres for his ransom; the Albanian bey stepped forward and maintained his right to his prisoner so stoutly, that the Pasha, whose army was in arrears, and whose military chest was empty, found himself compelled to yield. As a memento of their meeting, however, he ordered one of Kalergy’s ears to be cut off. The ransom was quickly paid, and Kalergy returned to Poros, where it was some time before he recovered from his wounds.
Capodistrias on his arrival in Greece named Kalergy his aide-de-camp, and as he was much attached to the president, he was entrusted with the command of the cavalry sent against Poros and Nisi, when those places took up arms against the arbitrary and tyrannical conduct of Capodistrias. We are not inclined to apologize for the disorders which the Greek cavalry then committed; they were unpardonable even during the excitement of a civil war.
The marriage of Kalergy was as romantic as the rest of his career. Two chiefs, both of the family of Notaras, (one of the few Greek families which can boast of territorial influence dating from the times of the Byzantine empire,) had involved the province of Corinth in civil war, in order to secure the hand of a young heiress. The lady, however, having escaped from the scene of action, conferred her hand on Kalergy, whose fame as a soldier far eclipsed that of the two rivals.