“Majesty, we have eighty more large guns to deploy. I think that when they are in place, and we begin bombardment simultaneously with all our weapons, it will have a devastating effect. The knights are not capable of responding to so many positions firing at them at once.”
Suleiman nodded. He motioned Mustapha to follow him, and then walked the few steps to his waiting horse. The Janissaries and Sipahis quickly formed the ring of protection around the Sultan, and the procession began its march to the encampment some two miles nearer the city.
Mustapha rode at Suleiman’s side. Ibrahim held his position a few steps behind his master. Both Ibrahim’s black charger and Suleiman’s brown one were edgy and difficult to control. After waiting inactively at Marmarice, the seven-hour boat ride did nothing for the horses’ temperaments. They skittered and moved sideways in the sand. Both riders had to rein in tightly to keep the horses on the trail.
The trail from the beach was difficult. There was no direct road from the bay to the city. The party had to cover rough rocky ground over several substantial hills before reaching the main road.
“How far is our camp from the fortress itself, Mustapha?” The Sultan was preoccupied, and seemed to be focusing on controlling his mount.
“It’s over a mile west of the city, my Lord. Well out of range of the knights’ batteries. There is a villa that was not too badly destroyed by the knights. It lies on the slopes of Mount Saint Stephen, and has a view of both the sea as well as the city. It is also well out of range of the knights’ batteries. We have set up your camp there, and repaired most of the damage. But, I thought you would be more comfortable in your own serai, rather than in the stinking pigsty used by the knights. There is a villa nearby, abandoned by the Sons of Sheitan. They have no sense of cleanliness, my Lord. They live here much as they do in Europe. Open sewers; garbage everywhere. Until this morning, there was a foul stench at the camp, but our troops have cleaned the area, and I am sure it will be to your liking now.”
Suleiman nodded. His mind was still on the early defeats of his forces. He said no more as the procession turned onto the main road at Koskinou and headed north to the camp.
Piri Pasha waited in his tent at Suleiman’s camp. He had been feeling sick since his arrival on Rhodes, and the task of setting up the command post had been more fatiguing than in the past. This time, his heart was not in it. He knew that these knights would not surrender so easily. Other armies trembled in fear at the approach of the Ottomans. But, here on Rhodes, the knights showed none of it. This would, indeed, be a long and bloody campaign. For the first time in his long service to his Sultans, Piri Pasha was in doubt as to how the battle would end.
When his servant brought news of the impending arrival of the Sultan, Piri dressed in his military uniform. He wore the new jeweled scimitar that Suleiman had given him as a present in Istanbul. Then, he sent for his new horse. This, too, was a present from the Sultan, though Piri longed for his old comfortable familiar mount. The new horse had just a bit too much energy for the old Vizier. This is a mount for a young Sipahi, he thought, the first time he had ridden the horse. My fat bottom has grown used to the soft rolling gait of my own horse.
Piri walked his horse from the encampment, and proceeded down the road to meet the Sultan and escort him into camp. As the huge procession came into view, Piri took a deep breath and dug in his spurs. The stallion broke into a cantor, and Piri held the reins tightly to keep the animal from breaking into a full gallop. He squeezed his knees into the horse’s sides to maintain control. It would not do to rush headlong at the Sultan. It might spook the Sipahis or the Janissaries guarding the procession. And, it certainly wouldn’t do for the Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire to fall off his horse.
As he approached the vanguard, Piri waved his hand in the air. His blue caftan flapped in the wind, and twice he had to reposition his tall turban so it would not fall off. I am becoming a parody of an old Grand Vizier, he thought. Though, I should be happy to grow old. There are not many Grand Viziers who have lived long enough to become old and fat!
Suleiman loosened the reins on his horse, and with scarcely a flicker of his boots against the horse’s flanks, the animal sped to a controlled cantor. The Sultan passed a few of his guard, and rode up to meet Piri alone. Mustapha and Ibrahim waited in their place in the procession. They knew that the Sultan wanted to greet his Vizier alone, and perhaps would vent some of his anger on the old man instead of them.
But this was not the case. The sight of Piri gave Suleiman some hope that his armies would rally and conquer these knights in short order. Somehow, seeing his father’s Vizier riding toward him, Suleiman felt the power of Selim and the old guard that was so successful in battle. Surely Piri Pasha would make it right.
“Piri Pasha!” Suleiman shouted. “How wonderful you look upon that horse. It suits you well.”
The horses stamped and shifted from side to side as the riders approached each other. Suleiman’s horse circled in place as Piri’s moved sideways to avoid the other. The horses gradually calmed down enough to allow the men to close the gap and reach out to clasp the other’s forearm.
Piri smiled and made a gallant attempt to look martial and strong. “My Sultan! It lifts my heart to see you safely here. Allah smiles upon you. Now we can begin, at last, to drive the vipers from our realm. Now you are here! Now we can begin!”
Then Piri waved to Ibrahim, who had just ridden up to where the Sultan’s horse was standing.
“Salaam Aleichum, Piri Pasha.”
“Aleichum salaam, Ibrahim.”
Suleiman looked carefully at Piri Pasha. He rode alongside the old man, and realized now that his own initial enthusiasm had clouded his vision. The Grand Vizier was not the man Suleiman knew at Belgrade. He was certainly not the man who rode at Selim’s right hand for eight years. Piri’s face was wan and gaunt. Though he was obese, he had the look of a starved and hungry man. He had new bags under his eyes, and the eyes had lost their sparkle. Could this be the same man who greeted me at my serai in Istanbul? thought Suleiman. Is this the man who will lead my armies to victory over the Christian dogs?
The Sultan felt a heaviness in his chest. He looked back to Ibrahim. Ibrahim nodded sadly. Though no words were spoken, the lifelong friends had read each other’s minds. The party formed back into line and continued along the short way into the camp of the Sultan. Piri moved his horse closer to Suleiman. “Majesty, a word if I might.”
“Of course. Are you not my Grand Vizier?” Suleiman made his voice especially light to hide the pain he was feeling at the sight of Piri.
“Majesty, we need your presence here to deal with a problem before it gets out of hand.”
“And this problem is?”
“The Janissaries. They are very unhappy about this campaign. I fear they could get out of control, unless you act quickly.”
“More tipped cooking pots on the horizon?”
“That, and worse, Majesty.”
“Be specific, Piri.”
“They have never been in favor of this campaign. They knew from the start that it would be long and difficult. You know that they love to go into battle, defeat the enemy quickly, and return home burdened with booty.”
Suleiman nodded. Piri went on. “They have been grumbling since we arrived on the island. No, even before. They stomp around the camp. They swagger, they curse. There have been fights.”
“What do you think I should do about it, Piri? I think you have something in mind.”
“If I may, Majesty. You are officially a Janissary. You are a noncommissioned officer in their ranks. One of them. I was there when you took your pay from the Paymaster. They would have died for you on the spot that day.”
“And?”
“Go among them. Dressed in your battle clothes. Tomorrow at dawn, review the troops as a Janissary, yourself.”
Suleiman thought for a moment. “Why tomorrow? The battle begins at dawn. Why not right now?”
“Now?�
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“Yes, now. Send ahead to the camps. Have the men assembled. There is no better time than now. You’re right, we will stop this discontentment before it starts. They will long for battle when I am done with them.”
“Yes, Majesty!” Piri sent his personal guard ahead with the instructions. Then, he and Suleiman stopped at the roadside. A tent was quickly set up, and the Sultan’s wardrobe brought to the roadside. His servants dressed him in the full battle gear of his Janissaries. His loose tunic was light blue, and his pants white. He wore a steel helmet wrapped in white silk and topped with the white feathers of his men. He mounted his horse, and was immediately joined by Ibrahim and Piri Pasha.
“Now, let us see these unhappy Janissaries of mine. Come Ibrahim, stay close by my side with Piri. Before the sun sets over that damned fortress, we will have the cheers of a hundred thousand men to send us off to battle.”
From the ranks, the Janissaries appeared, led by their military band. Drums and cymbals sounded in the afternoon glare. Trumpets and flutes blared their salutes, and rebounded off the walls of the city. From every camp came cheering throngs of soldiers: Janissaries and Sipahis rushed to greet their Sultan. Azabs and archers, miners and sappers poured out of their tents to see Suleiman, Kanuni. They pressed Suleiman’s guard to touch his stirrups. Everywhere the bands played and the crowds roared with delight. The knights on the battlements heard the music, and thought that the Turks were massing for an attack. They knew from their sources that Suleiman’s armies always preceded a major attack with drums and trumpets and fanfare. This was to be the last time that they would hear such music without having to pay for the pleasure in blood.
Suleiman’s procession moved past the walls, post after post; tower after tower; rampart after rampart; always just out of cannon range. His procession was dwarfed by the massiveness of the walls and the overpowering depth and width of the ditches. His armies appeared tiny beneath the bastions of stone. For the remaining hours of the day, Suleiman rode with his entourage from sea to sea in the giant crescent that encircled the city.
At dawn on the following morning, July 29th, 1522, the battle for Rhodes would begin.
The Fortress of the Knights of Rhodes
July 29th, 1522
The sun had just appeared over the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Rays of pink light reached from the horizon to touch the parapets of the Port of Italy. As the minutes passed, the sky brightened and the light ran down the battlements of the fortress, coloring the pale brown walls with a rosy hue. Soon the warmth of the summer sun began to perfuse the air. The guards on the walls rotated their necks to ease the aching that had beset their muscles after a night of staring into the darkness at the encampment of the enemy. They stretched and waited for their comrades to come and relieve them of their duties. Breakfast would be waiting at each Auberge. A few hours sleep would be welcome.
As the morning watch appeared on the ramparts, the knights straightened their uniforms for the formal changing of the guard. Each langue’s captain greeted his fellow officer, and passed on the orders of the day. As the men formed up for the exchange, a series of blasts shook the air. Instinctively, the knights ducked and took shelter behind the walls. The noise intensified, coming from all sides at once. Several of the blasts struck the walls directly below the guards. The stones at their feet reverberated with the impact. The guards huddled behind the wall trying to maintain discipline and assess the extent of the attack.
Within moments, it was clear that a massive artillery barrage had begun, and that all the ramparts of the fortress were under fire simultaneously. Though the knights were unaware of the actual numbers, more than sixty of the Sultan’s cannons were firing stone balls up to nine feet in circumference and weighing hundreds of pounds, from points all around the city.
As the impacts became more closely spaced, dust and rubble flew up from the walls. Some of it blew into the city on the winds that came in from the sea. Several stone balls flew over the walls and into the city itself. The huge cannonballs crashed into the cobblestone streets and smashed on impact into sharp, flying shards. People began to run in panic; some to their homes, others to the nearest Auberge, seeking safety in the quarters of the knights. The knights themselves ran to muster at each of the Auberges before proceeding to their assigned posts.
Chaos in the city increased. Thousands of panicked citizens impeded the progress of the knights and the civilian militias. Though they had waited for this day for many months, the actual start of the barrage was nothing the people could have envisioned. The massiveness of the attack and the constancy of the barrage was beyond imagining. Few could have conceived of such a force of arms aimed at their city. Even the few knights and citizens who remembered the siege led by Suleiman’s great-grandfather forty-two years earlier were shocked by the force and violence of these huge new weapons.
The first casualties of the war came within a few minutes of the start of the barrage; four citizens of Rhodes lay dead. These were not knights fighting on the parapets, nor were they artillerymen responding to the Turkish fire. Rather, they were a small family, seeking the safety of their home; the shelter and refuge they had known for seventy years. Dead were an old man and woman in the center of the Jewish Quarter. Hiding on their bed, they held tightly to their two grandchildren and prayed. They affirmed the unity of God, as they had every day of their lives. “Shemah Yisrael, Adonoi elohehu. Adonoi echod.” Seconds later, after they had bolted their door and huddled together on their only bed, a stone ball smashed through the roof and crushed them all beneath its massive weight. The door of the small house was blocked by the cannonball as it rested upon the dead bodies of the family.
Neighbors tried to rescue their friends, but they found no way to enter the house. The only window was filled with stone rubble, and the cannonball wedged the front door tight. Three knights paused on the way to their battle stations, but it was instantly clear that there could be no survivors in that pitifully crushed little house, for the ball itself practically filled the entire room. “Je suis desolé, monsieur. Ils sont déjà certainment morts,” the knights said to a pleading neighbor who was trying to rescue the family. I am sorry, Sir. They are already certainly dead. The knights saluted and hurried to their stations, leaving the neighbors wringing their hands in despair.
In the Palace of the Grand Master, the Piliers and lieutenants were converging on the meeting room. Philippe was standing at the great oak table. The windows were shuttered against the attack, the room lit by candles. For the knights rushing in from the bright daylight, it took a moment for their eyes to adjust to the dim lighting. Thomas Docwra was speaking to Philippe as the others arrived.
“They have formed a crescent around the walls. Complete encirclement, as we expected. Our scouts are trying to find out the exact deployment, as well as the numbers of men in each camp. So far, we have counted nearly sixty cannons firing from about twenty positions around the city. They seem to be concentrating the heaviest fire on our weakest walls.”
Philippe was distressed to hear this information, as it suggested that the Muslims had learned about the relative strengths and weaknesses of the city. “How severe is the damage so far?”
“It’s too soon to tell, my Lord. Most of the cannonballs have been swallowed by the walls. They have penetrated the outer stones, but they are lost in the earth and the inner reaches. Thus far, there are no serious breaches.”
John Buck, Philippe’s lieutenant, had been listening to the Grand Master and interrupted. “They have been at it only a few minutes, my Lords. Already there is some damage to the Bastion of England. However, we are now returning fire, and I think we’ll inflict some heavy damage to their batteries within the hour. Our positions are well aimed, and the Muslims are only firing for effect, making corrections. I hope we can destroy many of their cannon before very long.”
Gregoire de Morgut rushed into the room. “My Lord, we have had our first deaths.” The other knights stopped talking and turned to
Morgut. “I was coming from the Auberge, and some of the knights told me of a house in the Jewish Quarter that was hit directly with a large stone. It crushed four people to death. They tell me that the stone ball was massive. Bigger than any we have seen before.”
Philippe looked at his knights. There was silence in the room. Then, d’Amaral and his servant-at-arms, Blasco Diaz, came in together. They walked to the head of the table and waited there in silence.
“Chancellor,” Philippe said, acknowledging d’Amaral.
“Grand Master,” d’Amaral replied.
Then, turning away from the Chancellor, he said, “Our presence is required out on the battlements,” Philippe said to all the men gathered. “We need no further planning. The battle has been joined, and I doubt there will be much letup for some time to come. Get to your men, and make sure that the militia and the mercenaries perform as we have trained them. Andrea, muster the Inns of Castile and Aragon, and lead them yourself. We need all of the officers at the forefront of this battle.”
“D’accord, Seigneur,” the Chancellor said. He nodded to Diaz, and the two hurried out to the battle.
“For the moment,” Philippe continued, “we need to see just how the Muslim plans to execute this siege, and most of all, to keep the citizens calm. Urge those who are not fighting to stay indoors and keep out of the way.”
The knights bowed and hurried from the room.
John Buck remained behind. When all the knights had left, he approached the Grand Master, who was pouring over the diagrams of the city’s defenses.
“My Lord?”
Philippe looked up, surprised to see his lieutenant still there. “Yes, John?”
“My Lord, I have a man waiting outside whom I think you should see.”
“Yes? What’s this about?”
“He is Basilios Carpazio, from Karpathos; a Greek fisherman, and he has a plan that may help us.”
“What plan, John? What does he want to do?”
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