In March, 1799, Commodore Sir William Sidney Smith, in command of the
English 74-gun ship, Tigre, then lying off Alexandria, was invested by
the British government with the rank of Minister Plenipotentiary to the
Sublime Porte.
In consequence of an express received from Achmed Djezzar, Governor of
Syria, with the information that Bonaparte had invaded that country,
and had carried Jaffa by storm, and that the French were also preparing
an expedition by sea, Sir Sidney sent off the Theseus, Captain Miller,
to Acre, as well as a small vessel to reconnoitre the Syrian coast and
rejoin the Theseus at Caïffa.
Acre was the next town and fortified place on the coast, north of
Jaffa, and was in a bay of the same name, the southern port of which
was the headland celebrated from very ancient times as Mount Carmel.
The bay is very much exposed to winds from every quarter but the east
and south, and at all times is a rough and uncertain anchorage. Just
within the southern cape of Carmel, where the Mount drops away and
the country becomes flat, is the town of Haïffa or Kaïffa, and beyond
that, at the turn of the bay, before one comes to Acre, is the mouth of
the river Kishon. This mouth, except when the river is in flood, is
obstructed by sand bars, and is generally to be forded, with care.
On the 13th of March the Theseus, a 74, arrived at Acre, and on the
15th the Tigre, Alliance and Marianne also anchored in that port; and
Sir Sidney Smith, finding that the Turks were disposed to defend the
place, used every exertion to put the walls in a state to resist an
attack. On the 17th the Theseus was sent to the southward, and Sir
Sidney, with the boats of the Tigre, proceeded to the anchorage of
Caïffa, under Mount Carmel. That evening, after dark, the advanced
guard of the French was discovered, mounted on asses and dromedaries,
and passing along the coast road, close to the seaside, and a launch,
with a 12-lb carronade, was sent to the mouth of the river, to defend
the ford.
At daybreak the next morning this launch opened a most unexpected fire
on the French column, and compelled it to change its route, so that
when they took the Nazareth road they became exposed to the attacks
of the Samaritan Arabs. The guns of the British ships preventing
the French from making an attack from the north, they invested Acre
on the northeast side, where the defences were much stronger. As no
artillery was used in replying to the British boats, it was evident
that the French had none with them. Expecting that a flotilla was to
bring artillery up to them, a lookout was kept, and, on the morning of
the 18th a French corvette and nine sail of gun vessels was seen from
the Tigre. They were promptly chased and the gun-boats taken, but the
corvette escaped. The prizes were full of battering cannon, ammunition
and siege stores, which they had brought from Damietta.
These guns, which had been intended for the destruction of Acre, were
now landed for its defence, and the gun-boats employed to harass their
late owners, and cut off supplies.
That same day an English boat expedition met with a disastrous repulse
in an attack upon four French transports, which had come into Caïffa
anchorage with supplies for the French army, losing heavily in officers
and men; and soon after all the English vessels were obliged to put to
sea, on account of bad weather, and were not able to return again until
the 6th of April.
In the meantime Bonaparte had been pushing the siege operations with
the energy peculiarly his own, and it seemed impossible for the Turkish
garrison and the English sailors to resist his determined approach.
During the absence of the British ships he had pushed his approaches
to the counter-scarp, and in the ditch at the northeast angle of the
town was mining the towers to widen a breach already made by his field
pieces. As much danger was apprehended from this approach, a sortie was
determined on, in which the English seamen and marines were to bear a
prominent part. They were to force their way into the mine while the
Turks attacked the enemy’s trenches on the right and left. The sortie
took place just before daylight, but the Turks rendered abortive the
attempt to surprise the enemy by their noise and impetuosity. The
English sailors, armed with pikes and cutlasses, succeeded in entering
the mine, and destroyed its supports, and partly filled it up. The
marines supported and protected them while doing this, and the party
was covered on its return by a cross fire from one of the ships. This
sortie much delayed Bonaparte’s operations; but, in the meantime,
Rear-Admiral Perrée of the French navy, who had been hovering about the
coast with a squadron, succeeded in landing supplies and some 18-lb
guns, at Jaffa, which were immediately brought up, overland. Napoleon
attached the utmost importance to the speedy capture of Acre, which was
necessary to the success of his plans, and he pushed the siege with
tremendous energy, and reckless disregard for the lives of his troops.
The garrison continued to make sorties, under cover of the boats of
the English squadron, but the 1st of May found the French successful
in establishing a breach, from the concentrated fire of twenty-three
pieces of artillery. They then made a desperate attempt to storm the
place.
The Theseus was moored on one side of the town, and the Tigre on the
other, while the gun-boats and launches flanked the enemy’s trenches.
Notwithstanding a tremendous fire from the shipping, and in the very
face of a heavy fire from the walls of the town, the French bravely
mounted to the assault; but, in spite of all their efforts, were
repulsed with great slaughter. Several English officers and seamen
were killed in this affair, and Colonel Philipeaux, a French Royalist
officer of engineers, serving with the English against Bonaparte, died
of excessive fatigue.
The French continued to batter in breach, and continued their attempts
to storm; in spite of which Sir Sidney Smith managed to construct
two ravelins, within musket shot of the besiegers. All this involved
the most extreme fatigue on the part of both the besiegers and the
besieged. Frequent sorties were made, which impeded the French in their
work; and on May 7th a reinforcement of two Turkish corvettes, and
twenty-five transports with troops, arrived.
Bonaparte determined to make one more effort to capture the place
before these troops could be landed. Although the British fire from
the vessels was kept up, Bonaparte had succeeded in throwing up
epaulements and traverses, with his great engineering ability, which
in a great degree protected his working parties from the naval party.
The pieces which annoyed him most were in the light-house tower, and in
the north ravelin, and two 68-pounders, mounted in native flat-bottomed
vessels and throwing shells. These were all manned by the English
seamen.
In spite of all this, Bonaparte gained ground, and having battered
down the northeast tower of the walls, the ruins formed a sort of
ladder, and at daylight on the 8th of May the French stormed again, and
succeeded in planting their colors on the outer angle of the tower.
Their position was sheltered by two traverses, which they had
constructed during the preceding night, composed of sand-bags and
bodies of the dead built in with them, and forming a wall so high that
only their bayonets could be seen above them.
In the meantime the reinforcement of Turkish troops, under Hassan Bey,
were being debarked, which only increased Bonaparte’s endeavors to get
possession of the place before they could be put in position.
It was a most critical moment, and Sir Sidney, to gain time, himself
led the British seamen, mostly armed with pikes, to the defence of the
breach. Here he found a few Turks, who were hurling huge stones down
upon the French. The latter, being reinforced, charged up, and the
fight became a hand-to-hand one.
[Illustration: SIEGE OF ACRE, 1799.]
According to the ancient custom of the Turks, Djezzar Pasha had been
sitting in his palace rewarding such as brought to him the heads of
his enemies; but when he heard that Sir Sidney was on the breach he
hastened there to persuade him to retire, saying that “if harm befell
his English friends all would be lost.” Hassan’s troops were now close
at hand, and Sir Sidney led up the Chifflic regiment, armed and
disciplined in the European style, and made a determined sally. They
were beaten back, however, by the desperate fighting of the French,
with great loss; but in doing so, the latter were obliged to expose
themselves, and suffered terribly from the flanking fire of the English
guns.
Napoleon had entered Syria with about fifteen thousand men, and many of
his best generals, but by this time his losses had been so great that
he feared he should be unsuccessful in his undertaking of seizing the
whole of that country, for which undertaking he had made such exertions
and sacrifices. But he was not the man to retire from any enterprise
before he had exhausted all his resources.
On the 9th and 10th he continued to batter the defences, day and night,
in preparation for one final, desperate effort. Every shot brought
down large pieces of the wall, which was less solid than the tower
they had been so long battering, and a new breach was effected, to
the southward of their first lodgment. Bonaparte was now distinctly
seen by the defenders most energetically directing operations from
an elevated mound called after Richard Cœur de Lion, addressing his
generals with great energy of gesture, and sending off aides-de-camp in
every direction. The night before he had himself inspected the breach
closely, rousing the enthusiasm of his veteran troops by the way in
which he exposed himself, at the very foot of the walls, to the hottest
fire. About noon he made dispositions for storming. Kleber’s grenadiers
were to lead, their chief, Venoux, saying, “If Saint Jean d’Acre is not
taken this evening you may be certain that Venoux is dead.” And he did,
indeed, die, that evening, at the breach.
Just before sunset a massive column of the French was seen advancing,
and it was suffered by the Turks to mount the breach, but, in the
Pasha’s garden, came upon a second and almost impregnable line of
defence, erected by Philipeaux in view of just such an event. Here
the Turks rushed upon them in overwhelming numbers, and the advance
of the French were massacred almost to a man. The rest retreated
precipitately, leaving General Rambeaud dead, and carrying off General
Lannes, wounded. A reinforcement of English coming up, the officers
very nearly suffered the fate of the French advance, for many of the
newly arrived Turkish troops did not know the English uniform, and took
them for French. The fighting consequent upon this assault did not
terminate until the next day.
Kleber’s division had been ordered to the assault again, but were met
by a sortie, in which the besieged gained the third parallel of the
attack, and spiked some of the French guns, and Kleber, instead of
storming the fortress, was occupied in recovering their works, which
involved great loss on both sides. During the progress of the siege, a
dreadful accident occurred on board the English ship Theseus--seventy
large shells exploding on her poop--killing and wounding eighty-seven
of her officers and ship’s company. The ship herself was dreadfully
shattered.
After the failure of Kleber’s attack the French troops could not be
brought to mount the breach again. The plague, which had committed
such ravages among them at Jaffa, broke out again, probably from the
horribly putrid stench of the great number of unburied bodies, and
especially of those built into the epaulements and traverses, added to
fatigue and shortness of provisions; a flag of truce was sent in, to
propose a cessation of hostilities, to allow them to bury the dead.
This Djezzar would not permit. The flag had hardly performed its
duties and withdrawn, when a shower of shot and shell from the French
batteries announced the commencement of another attack, which was made
with fury and desperation. But the garrison was prepared, and the
French were once more driven back, with great slaughter. In the night
of the 20th of May the French raised the siege, and made a precipitate
retreat, leaving twenty-three pieces of battering cannon behind them.
Sir Sidney Smith remained at Acre until the middle of June, rendering
the Turks all assistance in once more placing the fortress in a state
of defence.
This celebrated siege lasted sixty-one days. The besiegers had marched
to the assault no less than eight times, while the besieged made eleven
desperate sallies. Bonaparte, in his reports to the French Directory,
gave many flimsy reasons for his want of success.
Speaking of it afterwards, at St. Helena, he attempted to put the whole
blame of his non-success upon the French naval officers who had failed
to engage and drive away Sir Sidney Smith and his squadron. He said
that if he had succeeded in his plans the whole face of the world would
have been changed. “Acre,” he said, “would have been taken; the French
army would have gone to Damascus and Aleppo; in the twinkling of an
eye they would have been on the Euphrates; the Syrian Christians would
have joined us; the Druses, the Armenians, would have united with us.”
Some one remarked, “We might have been reinforced to the number of one
hundred thousand men.” “Say six hundred thousand,” Bonaparte replied;
“who can calculate the amount? I would have reached Constantinople and
the Indies; I would have changed the face of the world!”