Rhodes, like the rest of Greece, submitted to the empire of the Romans,
and, when that had been annihilated by the barbarians, it passed
under the yoke of the all-conquering Mahometans. In 1308, Foulques
de Villard, grand master of the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem,
formed the project of conquering this island, in order to make it the
head-quarters of his order. Seconded by several of the sovereigns of
Europe, he landed on the isle, beat the Saracens and the Greeks in
several encounters, and, after four years of fatigue and danger, made
himself master of Rhodes. The knights placed the isle in a formidable
state of defence, and, under their auspices, it became happy and
flourishing. These precautions were quite necessary, for Greeks,
Saracens, and Turks were continually attempting to gain footing in
this beautiful place. Mahomet the Second, the great conqueror of
Constantinople, wished to besiege it; but his generals were beaten,
and he himself died, while proceeding on this expedition. The glory
of taking Rhodes was reserved for Soliman the Second, whose troops
approached the isle in 1521. Villiers de l’Isle-Adam, grand master
of the Knights of St. John, reigned there at that time: he was an
intrepid, courageous, skilful captain, of great experience, and
fertile in resources. He had, at most, six thousand warriors to
oppose to two hundred thousand men. But, like their leader, these
warriors were filled with the most heroic valour, and preferred death
to slavery. Rhodes was invested, and the trenches were opened out of
the reach of the cannon. When the Turks ventured nearer, and erected a
battery, their works were speedily destroyed by the artillery of the
place. The frequent sorties of the knights filled up their works. The
discouragement became so general among the Turks, that Soliman was
obliged to show himself to his troops, and animate their operations by
his presence.
What had been written to him of the ill-behaviour of his soldiers,
and what he learnt of their cowardice on his arrival, determined him
to make them appear before him disarmed, and to surround them by the
troops he had brought with him. “If I had,” said he, in a haughty,
contemptuous tone, and casting terrible glances on all around him,
“if I had to address soldiers, I would have permitted you to appear
before me with your arms; but as I am reduced to the necessity of
speaking to wretched slaves, more weak and more timid than women, it
is not just that men so base should dishonour the marks of valour. I
should like to know if, when you landed in the isle, you flattered
yourselves that these crusaders would be still more cowardly than
yourselves, and that they would servilely hold out their hands for
the irons with which it would please you to load them? To undeceive
you, please to learn that in the persons of these knights, we have to
fight with the most intrepid among the Christians, and most thirsting
for Mussulman blood. It is their courage which has excited ours; in
attacking them, I have thought I had met with an enterprise and perils
worthy of my valour. Is it to you, then, base and effeminate troops,
that I am to look for a conquest; you who fly from an enemy before you
have seen him, and who would already have deserted, if the sea which
surrounds you had not presented an insurmountable obstacle? Before
experiencing such a disgrace, I will inflict such severe justice upon
all cowards, that their punishment shall restrain within their duty
such as might be tempted to imitate them.” Scarcely had Soliman ceased
to speak, than the soldiers drew their swords, as if to massacre those
of their comrades who had excited the indignation of the Sultan.
These unfortunate wretches, who saw death suspended over their heads,
implored with loud cries the mercy of their sultan. Their commander,
as agreed upon with him, supported their prayers. “Well,” said Soliman
to Peri, the general, “I suspend, to your prayers, the punishment of
the guilty; it remains for them to find pardon on the bastions and
bulwarks of the enemy.” This mixture of severity and clemency affected
all hearts; the greatest perils appeared to be beneath the valour of
the soldiers who had been the most discouraged. Officers and soldiers,
to efface the least traces of their murmurs, hastened to signalize
themselves under the eye of their master; and that armed multitude,
till that time to be little dreaded, became at length most formidable.
The soldiers and pioneers pushed on the trenches without relaxation;
they worked day and night; the grand master, finding them supported by
large detachments, did not think it prudent to continue the sorties,
in which he lost more by the death of one knight, than Soliman did by
that of fifty janissaries. Thus the infidels, having nothing to fear
but from the fire of the place, behaved with so much spirit that they
carried their works up to the counterscarp; and, to render their lines
more solid, they covered them without with posts and planks, bound well
together. The batteries were then increased, and continued incessantly
playing against the city, but without success, for their balls scarcely
grazed the parapets of the walls. They were warned of this by a Jew,
who served them as a spy in Rhodes. They immediately changed their
batteries, which from that time fired more effectively. Seeing that the
place might be said to be covered and buried under its fortifications,
the Turks resolved to build two cavaliers of a greater height than
its works, which should command the city and its boulevards. Soldiers
and pioneers, by order of the general, brought, during several days,
earth and stones, which they placed between the gates of Spain and
Auvergne, opposite to the bastion of Italy. These two points lay open
to the cannon of the place: thousands of men perished here; but such
losses were deemed nothing. At length two seeming hills appeared to
rise up, higher by twelve feet than the walls, and which completely
commanded them. The German post was the first attacked. The Turks
pointed their cannon towards the walls, and it was thought impossible
they could stand against these destructive machines. The grand master
went to the spot, and ordered the wall to be supported within by earth,
beams, posts, and fascines; and, as the artillery placed over the gate
of his palace, on an elevated spot, bore directly upon the infidels,
the Christian cannoniers poured their shot upon them, and knocked to
pieces their bastions and their parapets. New ones were obliged to be
constructed; the cannon of the city battered them down immediately,
whilst the Turkish artillery, on the contrary, badly served and
pointed, fired over the walls, without doing any injury. Disheartened
by the little effect produced by their batteries, the Sultan’s officers
transported them against the tower of St. Nicholas. They played upon it
with twelve guns; but they had the mortification to see their cannon
dismounted and their batteries ruined by those of the tower. To guard
against this effect of the skill of the Christian cannoniers, they
resolved to fire only by night, and during the day they buried their
cannon under the gabions in the sand: on the approach of darkness,
they were placed upon the platform. More than five hundred balls were
fired against the point of the wall looking towards the west, and
brought it down into the ditch. The Turks congratulated themselves upon
the success of this nocturnal battery, and felt certain of carrying
the fort at the first assault; they were astonished, however, to see
behind the ruins a new wall, terraced with its parapets, and bristling
with artillery which prevented all approach to it. Soliman caused all
the principal bastions of the place to be attacked, and the Ottoman
cannon, which battered them day and night during a whole month, did
them considerable damage. The numbers of knights and citizens in Rhodes
began to diminish fast. They were in want of powder; the grand master
caused some to be made, and hopes were entertained that this feeble
succour would enable them to hold out for a long time against the
Mahometan emperor. Up to this time, the war had only been carried on by
artillery; and although that of the Turks, in the multitude of fiery
mouths and abundance of powder, was very superior, they were not yet
masters of an inch of ground in the bastions or advanced works of the
place. The retirades and intrenchments dug by the knights, supplied
the places of the battered-down walls. These new works could only be
taken by assault; and to mount to it, it was necessary to attempt the
descent of the ditch, or to fill it up. Soliman having an immense
number of pioneers in his army, formed several detachments of them,
with orders to throw earth and stones into the ditch. But the knights,
by means of casemates, removed, by night, all the rubbish the Turks
had brought during the day. Other Turkish pioneers were employed in
digging mines in five different places, each one of which led to the
bastion opposite to it. Some of these were detected by the vigilance of
the famous De Martinengere, to whom is due the invaluable invention of
discovering, by means of stretched skins, where mining is being carried
on. The Turks had worked with so much address, that the different
branches of these mines went from one to another, and all, to produce
the greater effect, ended at the same place. Two of these mines sprang,
one after the other, under the English bastion. Their explosion was so
violent, that they threw down more than six toises of the wall, the
ruins of which filled up the ditch. The breach was so large and so
easy, that several battalions flew to the assault, with loud cries,
sabre in hand. They at once gained the top of the bastion, and planted
seven flags, and would have rendered themselves masters of it, if
they had not met with a traverse behind it, which stopped them. The
knights, recovered from the astonishment caused by the fearful noise of
the exploded mine, rushed to the bastion, and charged the Turks with
muskets, grenades, and stones.
The grand master, at the moment of the explosion of this volcano,
was in a neighbouring church, imploring, at the foot of the altar,
the aid of God. He judged, by the horrible noise he heard, that the
explosion of the mine would be followed by an assault. He arose at the
very moment the priests, to commence the office, were chanting this
preliminary prayer--_Deus, in adjutorium meum intende!_ (Lord, come to
my help!) “I accept the augury,” cried the pious general; and turning
towards some knights who accompanied him, “Come, my brothers,” said he,
“let us change the sacrifice of our praises into that of our lives,
and let us die, if it be necessary, in defence of our holy faith.” As
he spoke, pike in hand, he advanced with a menacing air. He mounted
the bastion, met the Turks, and struck down and killed all who came
in his way or resisted him. He tore down the enemy’s ensigns, and
regained the bastion in a moment. Mustapha, Soliman’s general, rallied
the fugitives and led them back towards the enemy, by dint of blows as
well as menaces. He marched forward himself with the greatest audacity.
The combat was renewed, and the _mêlée_ became bloody. Steel and fire
were equally employed on both parts; they slaughtered each other hand
to hand, or at a distance, by musket-shots or sword-cuts. They even
proceeded to struggle body to body, and the stronger or more adroit
killed his enemy with dagger-thrusts. The Turks, at once exposed to
arquebusses, stones, grenades, and fire-pots, at length abandoned the
breach and turned their backs. In vain their chiefs, by menaces and
promises, endeavour to reanimate their valour. They do not listen to
him. All fly, all disperse, and Mustapha himself turns unwillingly
from the foe, after having lost more than three thousand men. It was
with such inveteracy that the superiority was contested up to the 24th
of September, when Soliman issued the order for a general assault.
At daybreak the Mahometans, divided into four bodies, or rather four
armies, advanced on four sides boldly towards the breach, in spite
of the thunders which poured from the place, in spite of a deluge of
balls, arrows, darts, and stones. Nothing could stop them. The knights
crowded to the point of conflict; they repulsed the assailants; they
precipitated them from the walls; they overthrew the ladders. The
infidels returned to the charge with more impetuosity than ever,
but all their efforts were useless: the knights were invincible.
The priests, monks, old men, and even the children, all insist upon
taking their share of the peril, and at length repulse the enemy. The
women do not yield in exertions to the pioneers, or in courage to the
soldiers. Many lost their lives in defending their husbands. A Greek
woman, exceedingly handsome, the mistress of an officer who commanded
in a bastion, and who was just killed, frantic at the death of her
lover, and resolved not to outlive him, after having tenderly embraced
two young children she had had by him, and imprinted the sign of the
cross upon their brow--“It is better, my children,” said she, with
the tears streaming from her eyes, “it is better for you to die by my
hands than by those of our pitiless enemies, or that you should be
reserved for infamous pleasures, more cruel than death.” Frantic with
grief and rage, she seized a knife, slaughtered them, and threw their
bodies into the fire; then clothing herself in the garments of her
lover, stained with his blood, with his sabre in her hand, she rushed
to the breach, killed the first Turk who opposed her, wounded several
others, and died fighting with the bravery of a hero. The ill success
of so many assaults rendered Soliman furious. He ordered Mustapha to
be shot with arrows, and several other captains would have undergone
the same fate if they had not persuaded him that he might still succeed
in his undertaking. Incessant combats and attacks were carried on up
to the middle of winter. At length the Ottomans triumphed; Rhodes,
almost entirely destroyed, had no means of resistance left. Most of
the knights had been killed defending the fortifications. The grand
master, Villiers de l’Isle-Adam, seeing with the deepest grief that all
his resources were exhausted, felt that it would be madness to resist
longer. He resolved to surrender; but his persuasion that he who makes
the first proposals loses an advantage, made him positively determine
to wait till the Turks should propose capitulation. His project
succeeded. Deceived by the continued brave defence, the Turks were
ignorant of the real state of the place, and offered the besiegers more
honourable conditions than they might have expected. This famous isle,
which had been for nearly three centuries the bulwark of Christianity,
was wrested from the hands of its few surviving defenders, the wreck
of a society of heroes. As soon as the capitulation was signed,
Soliman entered the city for the purpose of expressing to l’Isle-Adam
his admiration of his noble defence. After a long conversation the
conqueror retired, saying, “Although I came here alone, do not imagine
I was without an escort; I had the parole of the grand master and the
faith of his knights, a security stronger than a whole army.” Soliman
did not abuse his victory. He treated the grand master generously; he
visited him, pitied him, and consoled him as that last of a race of
heroes deserved.