Malta's Guns

by Sam Barone

  “Yes, sir. I’ve been here before.”

  “Better escort him, sergeant. We don’t want him getting in trouble.” Broglia strode off to see to the departing wounded.

  Once again, someone was threatening to hang him. Perhaps it was better to be killed by the Turks. Otherwise, sooner or later, one of these fanatical Knights would actually carry out the threat. Nevertheless, Antonio kept his mouth shut this time and started toward the magazine.

  “Not that way,” the sergeant said. “The Turks brought down part of the wall, and we had to make a new entrance to the magazine.”

  “In that case, sergeant, you’d better lead the way.”

  As they trod with care through the darkness toward the center of the fort, the stink of the Turkish dead grew even stronger. Not only Turks, Antonio decided. The dead of St. Elmo would have joined them. The defenders had no way to bury their own casualties. By dropping them over the walls, their grisly corpses would help slow down the next wave of Turkish soldiers. The Knights of St. John would use every tool they could, even their own dead.

  Down in the innards of the fort, Antonio gazed about him in dismay. The careful organization that he and Señor Zanoguerra had put in place only days ago had vanished. Kegs stood stacked haphazardly around the walls, loose powder lay strewn across the work tables used for mixing loading the cartridges, and his bare feet felt the crunchy grit of more gunpowder lying loose on the floor. Only a single stump of a candle burned within its glass case. There should have been at least one more providing light inside the dim chamber.

  God must be on the side of the Knights, Antonio decided, otherwise the magazine should have blown itself up by now, and taken what little remained of St. Elmo with it.

  “It’s just as bad in the back,” Sachetti said, emerging from one of the secondary storage chambers carved from the native rock. “There are no cartridges ready, not for any of the guns, or even the smaller pieces. What do you want to do first?”

  Antonio’s escort had left him at the entrance, and the two of them were alone in the magazine. At least this deep beneath the fort, the stink of the dead bodies had faded, replaced by the more familiar smells of saltpeter, sulphur, and gunpowder. Antonio stared at the racks and tables where the prepared cartridges were supposed to be. Both tables and racks were bare. “Where are the men who are supposed to be working here?”

  “Haven’t seen anyone,” Sachetti said. “The men who carried the gunpowder all left. They didn’t want to stay here. Can’t say I blame them.”

  Zanoguerra’s orders, which Antonio assumed were still in force, demanded that at least one experienced man always be on duty in the magazine, even in the dead of night. Anyone familiar with the gunpowder stores should have come to meet the boat. Only experienced men were supposed to work in the magazine.

  Antonio smiled at his assistant. The boy, though the same age as Antonio, carried almost no weight on his bones. Thin and wiry to extreme, he might not be of much help in a fight, but his hands were quick and steady.

  “I warned you not to volunteer.” He shook his head at Sachetti. “See if you can get the loose powder up off the ground, before the whole place goes up. I’ll talk to the commandant. Make a list of what we’re missing, too. I think we’ll need it.”

  At the top of the steps, Antonio found his boots and dragged them back on. Loose rock and shattered bits of stone littered the ground, making any movement even more difficult. Guessing that Commandant Broglia would be done with the wounded by now, Antonio returned to the steps. Only one man guarded the access to the dock below – the sergeant Antonio had shoved to the ground.

  “Excuse me, sergeant, has the Commandant returned?”

  “Not yet, Antonio.”

  The soldier showed no rancor in his voice at their earlier encounter. Carrying grudges among St. Elmo’s remaining soldiers would be foolish indeed, Antonio decided, with the imminent threat of death by the Turks hanging over all of them.

  Footsteps sounded on the stairs, and a moment later, Sir Luigi Broglia completed his journey back to the fort. His brow furrowed as soon as he saw Antonio.

  “What are you doing here? You’re supposed to be in the magazine.”

  “Yes, My Lord. But if you have a few moments, I need to speak to you about the conditions in the magazine.”

  Broglia carried the weight of St. Elmo’s fate on his shoulders, and his impatience showed at yet one more request for his time. But with a deep breath, he kept control of his emotions. “A moment, then. No more. I must see to the men and the walls before dawn. The Turks may attack at first light.”

  Each dawn might bring a fresh attack on the fort, usually but not always starting with a heavy bombardment that could last a few hours or until noon. Antonio realized the burden this doomed Knight bore. He knew better than anyone what was coming. The first two Commandants had died in St. Elmo, and Broglia would likely share their fate.

  “My Lord, I need the men who’ve been working in the magazine reassigned back to their duties. The situation there is serious, and the risk of an explosion is high. No cartridges are prepared, nor any of the other explosives.”

  “I’ll send you some men,” Broglia said, and started to push past.

  Antonio moved into his path. “I need men who’ve worked in the magazine before, men trained by Zanoguerra in how to handle gunpowder. If there’s an attack at dawn, we won’t be ready with sufficient cartridges without them.”

  Broglia’s frown and clenched jaw would have frightened an angry lion, but Antonio refused to move back or step aside. “I need to know what Señor Zanoguerra has done and what he left undone.”

  “Zanoguerra and his assistant were both killed by the same cannon ball. I suggest you get to your duties, or I’ll find a place on the wall for you.”

  Antonio’s anger flared again, but he knew better than to display any emotion to the Knight. “Sir, I was told by the Grand Master that you needed a master gunner. But if that’s not the case, I’ll take a place on the wall. It will be safer than working in the magazine.” He stepped aside, so that the Knight could pass.

  “Your insolence is trying my patience . . . what is your name? Antonio? Have you started preparing the cartridges needed for the morning?”

  “No, My Lord. But if you want me to prepare cartridges and all the other things you’ll need, then you’ll need to give me a few of the men who’ve been working in the magazine. And some time to work.”

  The Knight’s fist clenched, but Antonio refused to flinch. He prepared himself for what might come. A blow from Broglia’s fist, a sword thrust into his stomach, or even the rope around his neck. But the commandant, with a thousand worries on his mind, managed to keep his rage and frustration in check. “Sergeant, give this man whatever men he needs until dawn. Then I want all the men back on the wall.”

  Broglia brushed past Antonio and disappeared into the gloom. Antonio realized he’d been holding his breath, and he let it out with a long sigh of relief.

  The sergeant chuckled from behind Antonio. “Last man that spoke to our Commandant like that went screaming over the battlement with a rope around his neck. The Turks didn’t even bother to shoot, just let him dangle until he died.” He laughed again. “I thought Broglia would gut you right here.”

  “So did I, sergeant, so did I.”

  “Come on, then, let’s see if we can find a few of the men. If any of them are still alive. We’re shorthanded as it is.”

  “I understand. And thank you for your help.”

  Twenty minutes later, Antonio had three of Sergeant Zanoguerra’s survivors back in the magazine. The men were glad of the change in orders. Manning the wall meant you ate, slept, fought, and relieved yourself at your post. Your weapons had to be readied at all times, and you still risked being blown apart by a random cannonball. The longer defenders stood on the wall, the closer they came to an inevitable death.

  While the Turks silenced most of their weapons during the night – darkness mixed with t
orches always increased the danger of something exploding – they often fired a few shots toward the fort, if for no other reason than to keep St. Elmo’s defenders from getting any respite.

  So these men were glad for the chance to relax in the relative safety of the magazine, buried deep beneath the fort. Of course an unlucky cannonball might still bury them all alive at any time, but that possibility existed anywhere within the fort.

  Under Antonio’s direction, they cleaned up the magazine first, sweeping up the gunpowder. Then Sachetti took two men and began preparing cartridges. The boy knew more than enough for that, especially since the cartridges didn’t need much precision. The fort’s few remaining cannons were fired at point-blank range. Meanwhile the other man, the most senior of the three, worked with Antonio to prepare the other weapons needed.

  Ruvo had hurriedly explained to Antonio about the various devices being used by St. Elmo’s defenders, but not all of them had been used in the single attack against St. Angelo, and Antonio had only seen the one firework hoop used in action on the Castile wall. Now he not only had to prepare wildfire, trumps, and firework hoops, but he had to take personal charge of their use. He also learned that they could be as dangerous to the defenders as to the Turks.

  At least that explained the mystery of how Zanoguerra died. He should have remained safe in the magazine. Instead, he had died on the wall, working with these unstable weapons.

  Wildfire, or Greek Fire as many still called it, had been in use in the Mediterranean since the days of the ancient Greeks. Wildfire consisted of a compound formed from saltpetre, pounded sulphur, pitch, salts of ammonia, certain resins, and turpentine. Mixed in the right proportions, the thick slurry was poured into thin clay pots with a narrow mouth that could be gripped in a man’s hand and thrown 20 or 30 yards.

  The mouth of each pot was secured with two cords soaked in sulfur and tied in a cross, the four ends being left free. When the Turks attacked and approached the base of the walls, the four ends of the wildfire pot were lit at the same time and the device thrown into the enemy’s ranks. When the pot burst on impact, the burning cords would ignite it, sending the flaming substance in every direction.

  Sergeant Ruvo had insisted Antonio memorize the precise mixture of the secret formula that the Knights’ master gunners employed. These formulae varied slightly from country to country, or even from fort to fort, but Ruvo had assured him that the mixture the Knights used was powerful. “Just keep the proportions as exact as you can, to extract the maximum explosive. And make sure you’re not captured. If they find out you’re a master gunner, they’ll wring the formula out of you before you die.”

  Antonio didn’t think much about his chances of being captured alive, not by the battle-crazed Turks enraged over St. Elmo’s holding out. Still, he hated all these special devices used to burn a man to death. At least a cannon ball or blast of grapeshot finished a man quickly.

  Making wildfire slurry, filling the pots, attaching the cords, it all had to be done with extreme care. A blast of Greek fire in the magazine would probably destroy it, along with half of St. Elmo. By rights the compound should have been mixed out in a field, away from explosives, flames, and anything else liable to set it burning. Assembling such weapons in a magazine seemed insane, but within St. Elmo’s walls that no longer seemed to matter.

  Constructing trumps was almost as bad. Long tubes of wood or metal were filled with a similar concoction of Greek fire, only with the addition of more turpentine to thin the slurry somewhat and keep it more liquid. When a soldier lit the business end of the tube, a fearsome stream of liquid fire belched out, like sound from a trumpet, incinerating anything the flames touched.

  Sometimes the deadly tubes were affixed to a long pole, to allow the trump to reach farther from the walls. Like wildfire, the flames could not be extinguished. Skin, clothes, it didn’t matter. The fire burned and burned until the last trace of fuel was utterly consumed.

  Use of the trumps worried Antonio even more than the wildfire pots. It took a daring soldier to light the trump, and then extend it out over the wall and sweep it back and forth, with half a hundred Turks trying to kill you. Antonio doubted he had the nerve to use one.

  As for the firework hoops, the only time Antonio had seen one of them, he’d almost laughed. It looked like a child’s toy. Ruvo claimed it was invented by one of the Knights, Ramon Fortunii, only 10 years ago. The hoops were constructed of the lightest wood, dipped in brandy, rubbed with oil, then covered with wool or cotton bound tight. The whole thing was then soaked in a combustible liquid mix that contained saltpetre, gunpowder, and the other highly flammable liquids used to make Greek fire.

  When the Turks reached the ditch at the base of the walls, the hoops were lit. They would burst into a furious flame, and a soldier would pick the hoop up with tongs and hurl it over the wall and into the advancing enemy. The theory was that the Turks would get entangled by the hoops, and their light cotton clothing would catch fire.

  Antonio doubted the hoops had much practical use, but Ruvo had insisted they would wreak havoc on closely packed men. Effective or not, the Knights demanded their preparation and use, and so Antonio had to supervise the mix for that weapon, too.

  The heat in the magazine grew more oppressive. Sweat covered Antonio’s body, and he’d removed his shirt long ago. Nevertheless, the pile of hoops, trumps and wildfire grew. Sachetti had assembled a good supply of cartridges long ago and dispatched men to carry them to the men manning the guns. To Antonio’s mind, the fort’s cannons made up its main defense, and he wanted to insure a plentiful supply of cartridges. But at this hour, Sachetti, too, had joined Antonio in preparing the other combustibles.

  The by-now unfamiliar sound of heavy boots on the steps made Antonio lift his eyes. Commandant Broglia descended into the magazine, glancing around, his weary eyes taking in the tables nearly covered with explosives. In the candlelight, his face showed the fatigue that came from lack of sleep.

  “Is everything prepared?”

  Antonio straightened, his back stiff from the constant bending over. “Yes, My Lord, we’ve plenty of cartridges for the guns and we’re . . .”

  “I saw no firework hoops on the battlements. Are they being prepared?”

  “We’re working on them now. We’ll have twenty or twenty-five of them ready soon.”

  Broglia crossed the chamber, his hobnail boots loud in the magazine, to stand across the table from Antonio. “I need at least double that number, and all the wildfire pots you can fill. Do you have them?”

  “Not yet. Their construction takes more time, and these men and I don’t have that much experience preparing them. We’ll have . . .”

  “I asked for a master gunner who knows his business, and they send me an apprentice who doesn’t know his craft. Don’t waste time on the guns. They can’t be reloaded fast enough. The hoops and wildfire are what stops the Turks in the ditch. Do you understand me?”

  Antonio winced at the harsh words and realized he had made a mistake. His father had told him time and again, never admit in front of the buyer, or in this case St. Elmo’s commandant, that you don’t know everything about being a master gunner. “Yes, My Lord. The hoops and trumps and wildfire pots will be ready soon.”

  Broglia stared at him for a moment, then turned and left without a word, his boots scraping on the steps. Antonio felt a sense of relief that he’d swept them clean.

  Sachetti moved beside Antonio. “He thinks more of these toys than of cartridges for the guns?”

  “Perhaps he knows more than we do.” Antonio shrugged. “Forget the hoops for now. Let’s work on the wildfire pots. They’re easier to construct.”

  The five of them got back to work. Antonio decided speed was more important than caution. He worked faster, measuring ingredients by eye, and mixing them with less care. The pile of wildfire pots grew, and soon tray after tray of the combustible pots went up the steps. By now Antonio had no idea what hour of the night it was. He just k
ept mixing the slurry and hoping the formulae Ruvo had given him worked. If the Greek Fire didn’t work properly, Broglia would probably kill him before the Turks could manage it.

  “Everyone to the walls!”

  The loud voice boomed down into the depths of the magazine. Antonio looked up to see a pair of boots already disappearing back up the steps. He started to put on his shirt, then decided it wouldn’t be necessary. He struggled into his brigandine jacket, found his sword, and snatched up his dented Spanish morion hanging from the wall. As he mounted the steps, he wondered how long he had to live.

  Chapter 36

  June 7

  At the top of the steps, Antonio paused and glanced around. The eastern sky showed only the first rosy glow of dawn. A murmuring of sounds drifted up the peninsula from the Turkish lines, but they hadn’t started their daily cannonade yet. Antonio wondered if they might just launch an attack at first light. They had thousands of men to launch against the few hundred huddling inside St. Elmo.

  All around him grim men moved about, carrying weapons, arquebuses, swords, even long poles that would be used to repel ladders thrust against the walls. Sachetti stood there as well, rubbing his eyes and looking toward the east.

  “What are you doing standing about? Get to your position on the wall!”

  Antonio turned to find a heavily-bearded sergeant glowering at him. “I don’t know my position. I’ve been in the magazine all night.”

  The sergeant stepped closer and peered into his face. “Ah, you must be the new master gunner, the pup who stood up to Broglia. Good for you. What’s your name?”

  So that story had already spread throughout the fort. “Antonio.”

  “Welcome to St. Elmo, Antonio. Come, I’ll show you where to go.”

  It wasn’t far, only a few paces from the entrance to the magazine, up a narrow flight of steps, into what had once been one of the central towers in St. Elmo. Another flight of steps took them to what was now one of highest points in St. Elmo. Once a demi-bastion, the Turkish gunners had blasted it almost beyond recognition.