The Great Siege of Malta

by Allen, Bruce Ware

  The offer was initially accepted, then rejected. We can assume political interference at work. The papal troops, which Pope Pius had dispatched only by June (after initially sending insubstantial good wishes), were under the command of Pompeo Colonna, a cousin of Don Garcia’s wife. Colonna was best known for having killed his mother-in-law two weeks after having married her fourteen-year-old daughter. Condemned to death, excommunication, and a ten thousand ducat fine, he saw his sentence suspended when he joined his father at the 1554 Siege of Siena, after which it seems to have been forgotten. The reason given for rejecting the offer was that “such a young man” as Gianandrea Doria was not to be exposed to so much danger, and therefore Andrea Provana di Leyní (who had been with Don Garcia at Peñón de Vélez de la Gomera in 1564), captain of the galleys of Savoy, was sent instead.11 Three triremes transported Colonna with six hundred of the pope’s chosen men from Rome and a good number of chosen Knights of St. John from diverse places.12 They were to work off signals from Valette indicating whether it was safe to enter the harbor. In the event, the naval blockade was too much to overcome, and this expedition came to nothing—but Don Garcia was trying.

  So was Mustapha. Starting on July 22, he ordered sixteen guns, two basilisks, and two morlacchi to begin five days of continuous bombardment, so loud that it could be heard in Sicily, with smoke so thick that “like clouds they blocked out the sun light.”13 Some shots were directed against the curtain walls, in particular those between the posts of Castile and Germany, in the continuing effort to break them down; others were lobbed into the town itself to kill and terrorize the inhabitants. In addition to cannon fire, Mustapha launched repeated sallies against the walls, sometimes real, sometimes fake, to keep the defenders exhausted and off balance. Streets within Birgu were now visible to Ottoman gunners, and Valette had walls thrown up to protect those inside. It helped, but in truth there was no place of greater safety, and sudden death could come by day or night. Nevertheless, the Christians continued to resist everything the Ottomans could throw at them.

  Anastagi and his cavalry raiders from Mdina continued to harass the Ottoman foraging parties, in particular those searching for water. Balbi describes one such encounter in which sixty Turks were killed against only one Christian14—good numbers for the side that had lost nearly a quarter of all its soldiers in the defense of Fort St. Elmo.

  At the end of July, the commander of the Janissaries approached the Post of Robles with a white flag and asked for a parley. All combat ceased as he flattered the Christian for his service in other campaigns and suggested that the fight be ended without further effusion of blood. As he went on in this manner, spectators behind the wall noticed some of the rubble at the foot of the wall shifting, and even a spear point protruding—a Muslim digger presumably trying to gauge if they had reached the stone walls. This was a clear violation of the spirit of truce at the very least, and the Christians reacted with anger.

  Andres de Muñatones, Robles’s lieutenant, immediately rushed to the spear point with his own sappers, who furiously began to dig an opening into the Ottoman tunnel. (Likely the Ottoman sharpshooters were under orders not to fire for the duration of the parley.) Muñatones had thought to bring three or four fire grenades with him and tossed one inside, after which he himself jumped in. Three of his men, armed with arquebuses and swords, followed suit and together they began to chase the enemy back down the tunnel. Once satisfied that he had seen them off, Muñatones retraced his steps and then ordered masons to block off the tunnel, but to leave loopholes so the Christians could fire on anyone who thought to try again.

  For this, Valette awarded Muñatones a gold chain worth three hundred scudi (the soldiers received a few ducats each), munificence unparalleled in the accounts of the siege.15 Valette was under no illusions concerning these men. Money had boosted morale at St. Elmo; it would do the same here. Muñatones clearly snatched the gold ring in this carousel. However much piety might inspire the hired men, it was cash that told in the end, and the defenders knew that the Ottomans could pay handsomely for a good soldier of whatever faith. They were already profligate with cannonballs, firing essentially at random—at houses, at inside walls, even overshooting into the harbor, “as if to show us that they could afford to waste ammunition.”16 No wonder then that by the end of a five-hour battle on August 1, Marshal Robles gave thanks to God for the victory, then immediately turned to address the soldiers who did the actual fighting:

  “Gentlemen, here and before God I award you ten extra scudi, for I saw your actions today and if Don Garcia should not be prepared to pay it, then I promise that I will pay it myself, if I live. But I have faith in the munificence of our king who, learning of your valor, will not only confirm this award, but will provide even greater.”17

  Valette, desperate for intelligence and doubting that another Lascaris would jump the lines, was now offering fifty scudi to any man who could get him a Turkish prisoner. Romegas, always game for a challenge and distressed at Valette’s anxiety, offered one hundred scudi above and beyond that sum, and this from his own pocket.18 That same night, August 1 and 2, Romegas’s men slipped out of Birgu on small boats and headed toward Turkish lines. The expedition, however, was quickly scotched when they ran into a Turkish brig far in excess of anything they could hope to fight. They were forced to alter course, then to abandon ship and arms, and swim back to the fort with only their lives. The Ottomans were far from defeated.

  Money worked in the other direction as well. On August 6, Francisco de Aguilar, a Spanish soldier with a wife and family on Gozo, deserted.

  He apparently had been planning this for some time, contriving to get himself into the good graces of senior officers, to be present in the main conference rooms when strategy was being discussed, to tour the various posts and positions, watching and chatting with the soldiers about the various states of preparedness. If he had gone too far, it was in quizzing Toni Bajada about the various routes he took when carrying messages between Mdina and Birgu. This was valuable information. Several of the couriers had been captured already, and it was getting harder to find people willing to take the risk. Bajada observed that if he, Bajada, had not known Aguilar to be a trustworthy fellow, then he might feel inclined to report him to the grand master.

  It was unfortunate that he did not. On the night in question, Aguilar went to the post of Provence, gun in hand, and began chatting with the men on duty. He put it out that he wanted to kill a Muslim. This was perfectly all right with the soldiers, and they let him settle near a suitable embrasure to try his luck. He lit the slow match on his arquebus, gazed out over the landscape, and complained, “I can’t see any of those dogs.”19 Having set the stage, he waited a considerable time for his moment, long enough for his fellows to get bored and relaxed. Then suddenly he slid through the opening, landed in the ditch, and ran headlong to the Ottoman trenches. The Christians, startled, dismayed, and angered at being duped, cried out and tried to shoot him, but failed to hit their mark. Aguilar was brought straight to Mustapha, who was pleased at this turn of fortune.

  If there was any good news for the Christians to be had from this event, Aguilar would, as others had in the past, “tell the pashas how determined we were to die rather than to surrender.”20 Small comfort. He would also tell the Ottomans that there were fewer than five hundred combat-ready soldiers behind the walls and that these were “exhausted, weakened, and badly battered”; besides them were only civilians (genti): old women, children, the ill, wounded, and maimed.21

  Valette would now have to discredit Aguilar. One trick was to bring out all men with guns to line the walls and, an hour or so after dusk on August 6, have them “load and fire four times, so as to make the enemy think we had many men, as our shooting made it appear that our five hundred men were five thousand arquebusiers.”22 How effective this was is unknown. In any case, with what soldiers he could, he redeployed to the Post of Castile and Fort St. Michael. He also sent boat crews to build defense works beh
ind the spur of St. Michael, where the walls were largely razed. He saw to it that the posts were provisioned with arms, powder, incendiaries, trumps, and cauldrons of pitch kept constantly at the boil. Finally, he had his armorers improvise caltrops, nails driven through large planks, then flipped and laid down where the enemy was most likely to leap over and land feet first. All that could be prepared was prepared. The timing proved providential.

  21

  ONSLAUGHT OF THE OTTOMANS

  They assaulted St. Michael and the Post of Castile together with such noise and the sound of martial music that we would have been astonished if we had never heard it before.

  Balbi

  An hour before dawn on August 7, several Ottoman columns marched down from Corradino to the walls of Fort St. Michael.1 Aguilar apparently had convinced Mustapha about the state of defenses there. What had failed before must succeed now. Twelve thousand men, virtually the entire Ottoman army, were arrayed for the day’s battle, eight against Fort St. Michael, four against the Post of Castile—an unnerving presence, full of menace. The sun rose, and gray shadows slowly took on color. On the ramparts, Christians stared out at the assembled mass. Scattered along the wall at the ready were unlit fire hoops and cauldrons of bubbling pitch. Supplies of bread and wine and vats of water to calm burn wounds were only steps away. Men fingered their weapons nervously, muttering prayers for their own safety and salvation, and death and damnation to the Turks.

  Mustapha surveyed his army, waiting for the tension to build. The thin, piercing wail of brass horns and thudding of the kettledrums sounded, agitating the troops and releasing adrenaline into their bloodstreams. The order to attack came down, a shout went up, and the first wave rushed forward toward the post of Marshal Robles and Bormla. Gunners on the wall pumped scattershot and arquebus fire into the mass, with as much effect as pebbles thrown into a wave. The men kept coming, rising from the trenches, and were caught in the crossfire of two traverses. Guns fired on both sides of the attacking column, slowing them, but not stopping them. Wild-eyed Algerians scrambled up the heaped rubble or threw scaling ladders against the walls. Fire hoops sailed gracefully from the ramparts and over the thickest parts of the crowd, then dropped on the crush of men in threes and fours, setting their light cotton clothing on fire and preventing them from dropping and rolling. Men scrambling up scaling ladders looked straight up to see cauldrons of thin, sticky, scalding hot pitch being slowly tipped over the wall’s edge.

  Their leaders were with them. Candelissa was again in the vanguard, the first to reach the parapets. He was immediately killed by a bullet in the chest.2 Other men took his place and pushed forward, closing the gap between Muslim and Christian. The fighting became close ordered, blade to blade and hand to hand. On the ground below, Mustapha watched all parts of the assault, eager that this should be the killing blow. Piali Pasha meanwhile was waiting with four thousand men before the Post of Castile, expecting the grand master to rush troops to St. Michael.3 Valette disappointed him, and after an hour, Piali made his move. Ottomans charged toward the walls, crawled up the shattered battlements, and entered a hail of fire and steel and stone and lead. The oncoming troops faltered, fell back, then pushed forward again, earning some admiration from the Christians, as “the assaults that day were very brave and well fought on all sides with much blood and cruelty.”4

  Valette had spent his morning in a piazza, ready to lead the reserves to wherever they were needed. Eventually the call arrived. A knight ran up and said that the breaches at the Post of Castile were being overrun. Quickly grabbing his helmet and a pike, Valette called to his entourage, “Come, my knights, let us all go there and die! This is the day!”5 He went as far as the gate that led to the breach, where Romegas and other senior captains urged him to stay back. He refused and began to climb to the spur of Castile to take on the Turks who had seized that position. It was, however, too much, and he was persuaded to another spot, the battery of Claramonte, where he took an arquebus and shouted, “There, boys, there!” (Alla, alla, hijos) firing upward at the enemy.6 It worked. The defense stiffened, and Christians began to push back the Muslims with fire and stone until the immediate danger was over.

  The Ottomans may have fallen back, but they were far from calling it quits. Mustapha himself was in the middle of the force attacking Fort St. Michael, urging his men on, leading by example. Fighting takes its toll on even the most fit men, and Mustapha was steadily cycling in fresh troops for each new surge. A dozen separate assaults that morning were broken by short, welcome intervals when monks and priests and old men and women and children carried bread and wine to refresh the exhausted, brought water to extinguish fire and soothe burns. Soon enough, and to the extent they were able, this support staff joined in the fighting itself.7 There was no question of the defenders breaking off and letting reserves take over for a time. There were no reserves.

  “The dead made the fight more difficult for the living, and many Turks were killed and injured while falling among them: and so too were the Christians, though not in such great number. Some wore the blood of their enemies on their arms and shoulders, others were bathed in their own, and with great pain and determination the souls of the dead set themselves free, some commending themselves to God, others to Mohammed.”8

  The sun kept rising and the attacks kept coming. The outside slope glistened red, then mat black with dried blood. The dead and wounded Ottomans littered the ground, bodies “without heads, arms or legs, burned or with their limbs torn to pieces.”9 Suleiman’s standard was seen over the top of the Post of Castile, hauled down, and replaced with another green pennant until it too was toppled. The stink of burnt powder and flesh, of blood, guts, and human waste, clogged the air. Men were fighting hand to hand, close enough to breathe in each other’s air and feel the heat of each other’s blood. The defenses frayed a little more with each attack. The most severely wounded were dragged off to the uncertain comforts of the infirmary, and each time the remaining men were a little less able to throw the enemy back. Another push, maybe another two, and the green banners of Islam would fly over the ramparts.

  And then the cavalry came.

  There is a 1570 portrait of Fra Vincenzo Anastagi by El Greco now housed in the Frick Collection in New York City. At first glance, the subject doesn’t appear all that remarkable. He is wearing dark green, inflated pantaloons typical of the period presumably to showcase fine legs; we can only judge his calves, which appear overdeveloped and befitting a soldier. His helmet rests behind him, his arms and chest are protected by a black cuirass, and a sword hangs from the sash across his right shoulder and breast. He has prominent fleshy ears, a sharp nose, and a heavy close-cut beard. His hairline is receding, his temples are touched by gray, lines mark the corners of his eyes, and his head appears a trifle small for such large hands and legs. This is a man who has seen a lot, a steady man, watchful and intelligent, perhaps tending slightly toward melancholy.

  Anastagi was born in 1531 and was inducted into the Order in 1563 at age thirty-two—relatively late in life. His early years are not recorded, but there is the note in his application referring to him as “an expert in military matters for many years and consequently of great utility to the Order.”10 Where exactly he might have come by this expertise and over what period of years is not given, but he clearly was a skilled, brave, and resourceful soldier, and gifted in the art of cavalry raiding.

  A large part of his job was as an intelligence officer. This was not limited to interrogating prisoners. Mdina was the transit point for letters between the grand master and Don Garcia. One such message arrived at a time when communications into Birgu were impossible. Seven couriers failed to get the note to Valette, and none volunteered to be the eighth. Unable to forward the message and suspecting its importance, Anastagi set about decoding the cipher. It took him sixteen hours, but he succeeded—it was a message from Don Garcia that he was sending three ships to enter Grand Harbor by night and that Valette was to set up signal lights
warning them off in case of danger. The Ottomans had in fact blocked off the harbor with ten ships, and so Anastagi undertook to ride out several nights running and light the signals when needed, and in so doing saved the ships from potential catastrophe.

  Anastagi believed that there would be a large attack in early August. He lacked only a date. From the final night of July and the eight nights following, he gathered his horsemen and led them out as close as he could to the Marsa. There was a depression about a mile from the Ottoman camp where even a squadron of horse could be hidden. They came, they waited, and when nothing significant happened, they returned to Mdina, only to repeat the process the following night. So it continued until August 7 when the assault finally came. The all-too-familiar sound of battle carried from St. Michael as Janissaries and spahis and corsairs fell against the wall, scrambling upward in their desperate attempt to take the city. Anastagi waited among his men, their restless horses pawing the ground, everyone painfully aware of the battle raging just a short ride away. All the while, their commander stood listening, waiting, gauging by some unknown personal calculus exactly when he should act.

  At the wall of St. Michael, the Ottoman armies continued to lose men, but so did the defenders. Wave followed wave, and Mustapha showed no sign of letting up. He felt sure, with apparently good reason, that this was to be the final battle. Halfhearted measures would not do. Mustapha was at the full flush of battle, the high point of his entire career. His enemy was palpably fading, his men, crawling over the bodies of their comrades, were just moments short of victory.