THE MARCH OF THE THOUSAND
1860
Origin of the Expedition--Garibaldi at Marsala--Calatafimi--The
Taking of Palermo--Milazzo--The Bourbons evacuate Sicily.
During the journey from Turin to Genoa, Garibaldi was occupied in
opening, reading and tearing up into small pieces an enormous mass of
letters, while his English companion spent the time in vainly
speculating as to what this vast correspondence was about. When they
approached Genoa, the floor of the railway carriage resembled a
gigantic wastepaper basket. It was only afterwards that Lawrence
Oliphant guessed the letters to be responses to a call for volunteers
for Sicily.
The origin of the Sicilian expedition has been related in various
ways; there is the version which attributes it entirely to Cavour, and
the version which attributes it to not irresponsible personages in
England. The former was the French and Clerical official account; the
latter has always obtained credence in Germany and Russia. For
instance, the late Duke Ernest of Saxe-Coburg said that 'the mystery
of how 150,000 men were vanquished by a thousand Red-shirts was
wrapped in English bank-notes!' Of this theory, it need only be said
that the notion of Lord Palmerston (for it comes to that) supporting a
foreign revolution out of the British exchequer is not one that
commends itself to the belief of the average Englishman. With regard
to the other theory--namely, that Cavour 'got up' the Sicilian
expedition, it has been favoured to a certain degree, both by his
friends and foes; but it will not bear careful examination. As far as
Sicily goes (Naples is another thing), the most that can be brought
home to Cavour is a complicity of toleration; and even this statement
should be qualified by the addition, 'after the act.' It is true that,
in the early days after Villafranca, he had exclaimed: 'They have cut
me off from making Italy from the north, by diplomacy; very well, I
will make her from the south, by revolution!' True, also, that
earlier still, in 1856, he expressed the opinion, shared by every man
of common sense, that while the Bourbons ruled over the Two Sicilies
there would be no real peace for Italy. Nevertheless, in April 1860,
he neither thought the time ripe for the venture nor the means
employed adequate for its accomplishment. He was afraid that Garibaldi
would meet with the death of the Bandieras and Pisacane. No one was
more convinced than Cavour of the importance of Garibaldi's life to
Italy; and it is a sign of his true superiority of mind that this
conviction was never entertained more strongly than at the moment when
the general was passionately inveighing against him for the cession of
Nice. To Cavour such invectives seemed natural, and even justified
from one point of view; they excited in him no bitterness, and he was
only too happy that they fell upon himself and not upon the King,
since it was his fixed idea that, without the maintenance of a good
understanding between Victor Emmanuel and Garibaldi, Italy would not
be made. Few men under the sting of personal attacks have shown such
complete self-control.
As has been stated, when Francis II. ascended the Neapolitan throne,
he was invited to join in the war with Austria, and he refused. Since
then, the same negative result had attended the reiterated counsels of
reform which the Piedmontese Government sent to that of Naples--the
young King showing, by repeated acts, that not Sardinia but Rome was
his monitress and chosen ally in Italy. The Pope had lately induced
the French General Lamoricière to take the command of the Pontifical
troops, and he and the King of Naples were organising their armies,
with a view to co-operating at an early date against the common enemy
at Turin. In January 1860, Lord Russell wrote to Mr Elliot, the
English Minister at Naples: 'You will tell the King and his Ministers
that the Government of her Majesty the Queen does not intend to accept
any part in the responsibility nor to guarantee the certain
consequences of a misgovernment which has scarcely a parallel in
Europe.' Mr Elliot replied, early in March: 'I have used all
imaginable arguments to convince this Government of the necessity of
stopping short on the fatal path which it has entered. I finished by
saying that I was persuaded of the inevitable fall of his Majesty and
the dynasty if wiser counsels did not obtain a hearing, and requested
an audience with the King; since, when the catastrophe occurs, I do
not wish my conscience to reproach me with not having tried all means
of saving an inexperienced Sovereign from the ruin which threatens
him. The Ministers of France and Spain have spoken to the same
effect.' Even Russia advised Francis to make common cause with
Piedmont. In April, Victor Emmanuel wrote to his cousin, 'as a near
relative and an Italian Prince,' urging him to listen while there was
yet time to save something, if not everything. 'If you will not hear
me,' he said, 'the day may come when I shall be obliged to be the
instrument of your ruin!'
It has been said that the Sardinian Government, in tendering similar
advice, hoped for its refusal and contemplated the eventuality hinted
at with the reverse of apprehension. Of course this is true. Yet the
responsibility of declining to take the only course which might by any
possibility have saved him must rest with the King of Naples and not
with Victor Emmanuel and his Ministers. The attempt to make Francis
appear the innocent victim of a diabolical conspiracy will never
succeed, however ingenious are the writers who devote their abilities
to so unfruitful a task.
To trace the real beginning of the expedition we must go back to the
summer of 1859. When the war ended in the manner which he alone had
foreseen, Mazzini projected a revolutionary enterprise in the south
which should restore to the Italian movement its purely national
character and defeat in advance Napoleon's plans for gathering the
Bourbon succession for his cousin, Prince Murat. He sent agents to
Sicily, and notably Francesco Crispi, who, as a native of the island
and a man of resource and quick intelligence, was well qualified to
execute the work of propaganda and to elude the Bourbon police. Crispi
travelled in all parts of Sicily for several months, and in September
he was able to report to Mazzini that the insurrection might be
expected in a few weeks--which proved incorrect, but only as to date.
Mazzini forbade his agents to agitate in favour of a republic; unity
was the sole object to be aimed at; unity in whatever form and at
whatever cost.
In March 1860 he had an interview in London with the man who was to
become the actual initiator of the revolutionary movement in South
Italy. This was Rosalino Pilo, son of the Count di Capaci, and
descended through his mother from the royal house of Anjou, whose
name, Italianised into Gioeni, is still borne by several noble
families in Sicily. Rosalino Pilo, who was now in his fortieth year,
had devoted all his life to his country's liberties. After 1849, when
he was obliged to leave Sicily, he sold his ancestral acres to supply
the wants of his fellow exiles, and help the work of revolutionary
propaganda. Handsome in person, cultivated in mind, ready to give his
life, as he had already given most of what makes life tolerable, to
the Italian cause, he won the affection of all with whom he was
brought in contact, and especially of Mazzini, from whom he parted
after that last interview radiant with hope, and yet with a touch of
sadness in his smile, as if in prevision that the place allotted to
him in the ranks of men was among the sowers, not among the reapers.
Rosalino Pilo believed, as Mazzini believed, that Sicily was ripe for
revolution, but he realised the fact that under existing circumstances
there was an exceeding probability of a Sicilian revolution being
rapidly crushed. It was the tendency of Mazzini's mind to think the
contrary; to put more faith in the people themselves than in any
leader or leaders; to imagine that the blast of the trumpet of an
angered population was sufficient to bring down the walls of all the
citadels of despotism, however well furnished with heavy artillery.
Pilo saw that there was only one man who could give a real chance of
success to a rising in his native island, and that man was Garibaldi.
As early as February he began to write to Caprera, urging the general
to give his co-operation to the projected movement. It is notorious
that the scheme, until almost the last moment, did not find favour
with Garibaldi. In spite of his perilous enterprises, the chief had
never been a courtier of failure, and he understood more clearly than
his correspondent what failure at that particular juncture would have
meant. The ventures of the Bandieras and of Pisacane, similar in their
general plan to the one now in view (though on a smaller scale). ended
in disasters, but disasters that were useful to Italy. A disaster now
would have been ruinous to Italy. Garibaldi's hesitations do not, as
some writers of the extreme party have foolishly assumed, detract from
his merit as victorious leader of the expedition; they only show him
to have been more amenable to political prudence than most people
have supposed.
Rosalino Pilo wrote, finally, that in any case he was determined to go
to Sicily himself to complete the preparations, and he added: 'The
insurrection in Sicily, consider it well, will carry with it that of
the whole south of the peninsula,' by which means not only would the
Muratist plots be frustrated, but also a new army and fleet would
become available for the conquest of independence and the liberation
of Venetia. The writer concluded by wishing the general 'new glories
in Sicily in the accomplishment of our country's redemption.'
True to his word Rosalino Pilo embarked at Genoa on the 24th of March,
on a crazy old coasting vessel, manned by five friendly sailors. He
had with him a single companion, and carried such arms and ammunition
as he had been able to get together. Terrible weather and the
deplorable condition of their craft kept them at sea for fifteen days,
during which time something of great importance happened at Palermo.
On the 4th of April the authorities became aware that arms and
conspirators were concealed in the convent of La Gancia, which was to
have been the focus of the revolution. Troops were sent to besiege the
convent, which they only succeeded in taking after four hours'
resistance; its fall was the signal for a general slaughter of the
inmates, both monks and laymen. The insurrection was thus stifled in
its birth in the capital, but from this time it began to spread in the
country, and when, at last, Rosalino Pilo landed near Messina on the
10th of April, he found that several armed bands were already roving
the mountains, as yet almost unperceived by the Government, which had
gone to sleep again after its exhibition of energy on the 4th. Events
were, however, to awake it from its slumbers, and to cause it to renew
its vigilance. It required all Rosalino Pilo's skill and courage to
sustain the revolution of which he became henceforth the responsible
head, till the fated deliverer arrived.
Pilo's letters, brought back to Genoa by the pilot who guided him to
Sicilian waters, were what decided Garibaldi to go to the rescue.
Some, like Bixio and Bertani, warmly and persistently urged him to
accept the charge; others, like Sirtori, were convinced that the
undertaking was foredoomed, and that its only result would be the
death of their beloved captain: but this conviction did not lessen
their eagerness to share his perils when once he was resolved to go.
Like all born men of action, Garibaldi did not know what doubt was
after he came to a decision. From that moment his mental atmosphere
cleared; he saw the goal and went straight for it. In a surprisingly
short time the expedition was organised and ready to leave. 'Few and
good,' had been the rule laid down by Garibaldi for the enrolments; if
he had chosen he could have taken with him a much more numerous host.
When it was the day to start few they were (according to the most
recent computation the exact number was 1072 men), and they were
certainly good. The force was divided into seven companies, the first
entrusted to the ardent Nino Bixio, who acted in a general way as
second-in-command through both the Sicilian and Neapolitan campaigns,
and the seventh to Benedetto Cairoli, whose mother contributed a large
sum of money as well as three of her sons to the freeing of Southern
Italy. Sirtori, about whom there always clung something of the
priestly vocation for which he had been designed, was the head of the
staff; Türr (the Hungarian) was adjutant-general. The organisation was
identical with that of the Italian army 'to which we belong,' said
Garibaldi in his first order of the day.
One name is missing, that of Medici, who was left behind to take the
command of a projected movement in the Papal States. By whom this plan
was invented is not clear, but simultaneous operations in different
parts of the peninsula had been always a favourite design of the more
extreme members of the Party of Action, and Garibaldi probably yielded
to their advice. All that came of it was the entry into Umbria of
Zambianchi's small band of volunteers, which was promptly repulsed
over the frontier. Medici, therefore, remained inactive till after the
fall of Palermo; he headed the second expedition of 4,000 volunteers
which arrived in time to take part in the final Sicilian battles.
Garibaldi's political programme was the cry of the Hunters of the Alps
in 1859: _Italy and Victor Emmanuel._ Those who were strict
republicans at heart, while abstaining from preaching the republic
till the struggle was over, would have stopped short at the first word
_Italy_. But Garibaldi told Rosalino Pilo, who was of this way of
thinking, that either he marched in the King's name or he did not
march at all. This was the condition of his acceptance, because he
esteemed it the condition on which hung the success of the enterprise,
nay more, the existence of an united Italy.
The Thousand embarked at Quarto, near Genoa, during the night of the
5th of May on the two merchant vessels, the _Piemonte_ and _Lombardo_,
which, with the complicity of their patriotic owner, R. Rubattino, had
been sequestered for the use of the expedition. On hearing of
Garibaldi's departure, Cavour ordered Admiral Persano, whose squadron
lay in the gulf of Cagliari, to arrest the expedition if the steamers
entered any Sardinian port, but to let it go free if they were
encountered on the high seas. Persano asked Cavour what he was to do
if by stress of storms Garibaldi were forced to come into port? The
answer was that 'the Ministry' decided for his arrest, which Persano
rightly interpreted to mean that Cavour had decided the contrary. He
resolved, therefore, not to stop him under any circumstances, but the
case did not occur, for the fairest of May weather favoured the
voyage, and six days after the start the men were quietly landed at
Marsala without let or hindrance from the two Neapolitan warships
which arrived almost at the same time as the _Piemonte_ and
_Lombardo_, an inconceivable stroke of good fortune which, like the
eventful march that was to follow, seems to belong far more to romance
than to history.
On the day before, the British gunboat _Intrepid_ (Captain Marryat),
and the steam vessel _Argus_, had cast anchor in the harbour of
Marsala. Their presence was again and again spoken of by Garibaldi as
the key to the mystery of why he was not attacked. No matter how it
was done--it may have been a mere accident--but it can hardly be
doubted that the English men-of-war did practically cover the landing
of the Thousand. Lord John Russell denied emphatically to the House of
Commons that they were sent there for the purpose, as to this day is
believed by some grateful Italians, and by every Clerical writer who
handles the subject. The British Government had early information of
Italian revolutionary doings, just then, through Sir James Hudson, who
was in communication with men of all shades of opinion, and it is
credible that orders which must necessarily have been secret, were
given to afford a refuge on board English ships to the flying patriots
in the anticipated catastrophe. More than this is not credible, but
the energy shown by Captain Marryat in safeguarding the interests of
the British residents at Marsala caused the Neapolitan ships to delay
opening fire till the very last Red-shirt was out of harm's way on dry
land. Then and then only did they direct their guns on the _Piemonte_
and _Lombardo_, and fire a few shots into the city, which caused no
other damage than the destruction of two casks of wine.
On the 12th, Garibaldi left Marsala for Salemi, a mountain city
approached by a steep, winding ascent, where he was sure of a warm
reception, as it had already taken arms against the Bourbon king.
Hence he promulgated the decree by which he assumed the dictatorship
of Sicily in the name of Victor Emmanuel.
The Neapolitan army numbered from 120,000 to 130,000 men; of these
30,000 were actually in Sicily at the time the Thousand landed at
Marsala, 18,000 being in and about Palermo, and the rest distributed
over the island. At Salemi, Garibaldi reviewed his united forces: he
had been joined by 200 fresh volunteers, and by a fluctuating mass of
Sicilian irregulars, which might be estimated to consist of 2,000 men,
but it increased or decreased along the road, because it was formed of
peasants of the districts traversed, who did not go far from their
homes. These undisciplined bands were not useless, as they gave the
Bourbon generals the idea that Garibaldi had more men than he could
ever really count upon, and also the peasants knew the country well.
When they came under fire they behaved better than anyone would have
expected. The first batch joined the Thousand half-way between Marsala
and Salemi. There might have been fifty of them, dressed in
goat-skins, and armed with the old flint muskets and rusty pistols
dear to the Sicilian heart, which he would not for the world leave
behind were he going no farther than to buy a lamb at the fair. The
feudal lord marched at the head of his uncouth retainers--a company
of bandits in an opera--yet, to Garibaldi, they seemed the blessed
assurance that this people whom he was come to save was ready and
willing to be saved. He received the poor little band with as much
rapture as if it had been a powerful army, and, in their turn, the
impressionable islanders were enraptured by the affability of the man
whom the population of Sicily soon came seriously to consider as a new
Messiah. It is a fact that the people of Southern Italy did believe
that Garibaldi had in him something superhuman, only the Bourbon
troops looked rather below than above for the source of it. The
picturesque incidents of the historic march were many; one other may
be mentioned. While the chief watered his horse at a spring a
Franciscan friar threw himself on his knees, and implored to be
allowed to follow him. Some of the volunteers thought the friar a
traitor in disguise, but larger in faith, Garibaldi said: 'Come with
us, you will be our Ugo Bassi.' Fra Pantaleo proved of no small use to
the expedition.
A glance at the map makes clear the military situation. Garibaldi's
objective was Palermo, and if anything shows his genius as a
Condottiere it is this immediate determination to make straight for
the capital where the largest number of the enemy's troops was massed,
instead of seeking an illusionary safety for his weak army in the open
country. As the crow flies the distance from Marsala to Palermo is not
more than sixty or seventy miles, but the routes being mountainous,
the actual ground to be covered is much longer. About midway lies
Calatafimi, where all the roads leading from the eastern coast to
Palermo converge, and above it towers the immensely strong position
called Pianto dei Romani, from a battle in which the Romans were
defeated. These heights command a vast prospect, and here General
Landi, with 3,000 men and four pieces of artillery, prepared to
intercept the Garibaldians with every probability of driving them back
into the sea.
The royal troops took the offensive towards ten o'clock on the 15th of
May. They met the Red-shirts half way down the mountain, but were
driven up it again, inch by inch, till, at about three o'clock, they
were back at Pianto dei Romani. A final vigorous assault dislodged
them from this position, and they retreated in disorder to Calatafimi.
Not wishing to tempt fortune further for that day, Garibaldi
bivouacqued on the field of battle. In a letter written to Bertani, on
the spur of the moment, he bore witness with a sort of fatherly pride
to the courage displayed by the Neapolitans: 'It was the old
misfortune,' he said, 'a fight between Italians; but it proved to me
what can be done with this family when united. The Neapolitan
soldiers, when their cartridges were exhausted, threw stones at us in
desperation.' How then, with much superior numbers and a seemingly
impregnable position, did they end in ignominious flight? The answer
may be found in the reply given to Bixio, bravest of the brave, who
yet feared, at one hotly-contested point, that retreat was inevitable.
'Here,' retorted the chief,'we _die_.' Men who really mean to conquer
or die can do miracles.
The moral effect of the victory was tremendous. The world at large had
made absolutely sure of the destruction of the expedition. 'Garibaldi
has chosen to go his own way,' said Victor Emmanuel; 'but if you only
knew the fright I was in about him and the brave lads with him!' In
Sicily, where the insurrectionary activity of April was almost totally
spent, the news sent an electric shock of revolution through the
whole island. In the mountains Rosalino Pilo still resisted, weary of
waiting for the help that came not, discouraged or hopeless, but
unyielding. Food and ammunition were almost gone; his ragged band,
held together only by the magnetism of his personal influence, began
to feel the pangs of hunger. A price was set on his head, and he was
harassed on all sides by the Neapolitan troops, whose attacks became
more frequent now that the Government realised that there was danger.
He knew nothing of Garibaldi's movements; but he was resolved to keep
his promise as long as he could: to hold out till the chief came. At
the hour when everything looked most desperate, a messenger arrived in
his camp with a letter in Garibaldi's handwriting, which bore the date
of the 16th of May. 'Yesterday,' it ran, we fought and conquered.'
Never was unexpected news more welcome. Filled with a joy such as few
men have tasted, Rosalino read the glad tidings to his men. 'The cause
is won,' he said. 'In a few days, if the enemy's balls respect me, we
shall be in Palermo.'
Meanwhile Garibaldi had occupied Calatafimi, and was proceeding
towards Monreale, from which side he contemplated a descent on the
capital. On the high tableland of Renda he met Rosalino Pilo with his
reanimated band. That day the Garibaldian army, all told, amounted to
5,000 men. On the 21st of May, Rosalino was ordered to make a
reconnaissance in the direction of Monreale; while carrying out this
order a Neapolitan bullet struck his forehead, causing almost
instantaneous death. 'I am happy to be able to give my blood to Italy,
but may heaven be propitious once for all,' he had written when he
first landed, words realised to the letter.
The Neapolitans were put in high spirits by Rosalino Pilo's death; the
discomfiture of Calatafimi was forgotten; they represented Garibaldi
as a mouse that was obligingly walking into a well-laid trap. In fact,
his position could not have been more critical, but he had recourse to
a stratagem which saved him. He succeeded in placing the enemy upon a
completely false scent. Abandoning the idea of reaching Palermo from
the east (Monreale), he decided to attempt the assault from the south
(Piana de' Greci and Misilmeri), but, all the while, he continued to
throw the Sicilian _Picciotti_ on the Monreale route, and gave them
orders to fire stray shots in every direction and to light innumerable
camp-fires. These troops frequently came in contact with the
Neapolitans in trifling skirmishes, and kept their attention so well
occupied that General Colonna, in command of the force sent in search
of the 'Filibuster,' did not doubt that the whole Garibaldian army was
concentrated over Monreale. Garibaldi rapidly moved his own column by
night to its new base of operations. The ground was steep and
difficult, and a storm raged all the night; fifteen years later he
declared that none of his marches in the virgin forests of America was
so arduous as this. While the Neapolitans remained in ignorance of
these changes, three English naval officers, guided by a sort of
sporting dog's instinct, happened to be driving through the village of
Misilmeri just after Garibaldi established his headquarters in that
neighbourhood. Of course it was by chance; still, Misilmeri is an odd
place to go for an afternoon drive, and the escapade ended in the
issue of a severe warning to Her Majesty's officers and marines to
keep in future 'within the bounds of the sentinels of the royal
troops.' Luckily record exists of the experiences of Lieutenant Wilmot
and his two companions at Misilmeri. Garibaldi, on hearing that three
English naval officers were in the village, sent to invite them to the
vineyard where he was taking his dinner. They found him standing in a
large enclosure in the midst of a group of followers who all, like
himself, wore the legendary red flannel shirt and grey trousers. Fra
Pantaleo's brown habit formed the only exception. Several Hungarian
officers were present, and by his father stood Menotti, then a stout
youth of nineteen, with his arm in a sling from the severe wound he
received at Calatafimi. Around were soldiers who looked like mere
boys. They gazed with delight on the English uniforms. Garibaldi
requested his guests to be seated and to partake of some
freshly-gathered strawberries. He spoke of his affection and respect
for England, and said it was his hope soon to make the acquaintance of
the British admiral. He mentioned how he had seen and admired from the
heights the beautiful effect of the salutes fired in honour of the
Queen's birthday, two days before. He then retired into his tent, made
of an old blanket stretched over pikes; a child, under the name of a
sentry, paced before it to keep off the crowd.
To complete the deception of the enemy the Garibaldian artillery,
under Colonel Orsini, was ordered to make a retrograde march on
Corleone previous to joining the main force at Misilmeri. Orsini
narrowly escaped getting caught while executing this movement, and for
the sake of celerity was obliged to throw his five cannon (including
one taken at Calatafimi) down deep water courses. He returned to pull
them out again when the immediate danger was past. General Colonna,
who followed him closely, was convinced that the whole of the
Garibaldians were in disorderly retreat as witnessed by the mules and
waggons purposely abandoned by Orsini along the route. For four days
Colonna believed that he had Garibaldi flying before him, and sent
intelligence to that effect to Naples, whence it was published through
the world. On the fifth day he was immeasurably surprised by hearing
that Garibaldi had entered Palermo!
It was at early dawn on Whitsunday, the 27th of May, that Garibaldi
reached the threshold of the capital, and after overcoming the guard
at Ponte dell' Ammiraglio, pushed on to Porta Termini, the strategic
key to the city. The royalists, though taken by surprise in the first
instance, had time to dispose a strong force behind walls and
barricades before Garibaldi could reach the gate, and it required two
hours of severe fighting to take the position. Many Red-shirts were
killed, and Benedetto Cairoli received the severe wound from which he
never wholly recovered. Success, however, was complete, and the
Palermitans got up to find, to their frantic joy, the Liberator within
their gates. According to the old usage their first impulse was to run
to the belfries in order to sound the tocsin, but they found that the
royalists had removed the clappers of the bells. Nothing daunted, they
beat the bells all day with hammers and other implements, and so
produced an indescribable noise which had a material influence on the
nerves of the terrified Neapolitan troops. Being disarmed, the only
other help which the inhabitants could render to their deliverers was
the erection of barricades.
Even after Garibaldi's entry, it is thought that General Lanza could
have crushed him in the streets by sheer force of superiority in
numbers and artillery had he made proper use of his means. However, at
about three p.m., he chose the less heroic plan of ordering the castle
and the Neapolitan fleet to bombard the city. Most of his staff
opposed the decision, and one officer broke his sword, but Lanza was
inexorable. The measure so exasperated the Palermitans that even had
it achieved its end for the moment, never after would they have proved
governable from Naples. Thirteen hundred shells were thrown into the
city. Lord Palmerston denounced the bombardment and its attendant
horrors as 'unworthy of our time and of our civilisation.' The
soldiers helped the work by setting fire to some quarters of the city.
Among the spots where the shells fell in most abundance was the
convent of the Sette Angeli. The Garibaldians escorted the nuns to a
place of safety and carried their more valuable possessions after
them. The good sisters were charmed by the courtesy with which the
young Italians performed these duties.
Fighting in the streets went on more or less continuously, and the
liberators kept their ground, but every hour brought fresh perils. A
Bavarian regiment arrived to reinforce General Lanza, and the return
of the Neapolitan column from Corleone was momentarily expected. The
Garibaldians, and this was the gravest fact of all, had used almost
their last cartridge. The issue of the struggle was awaited with
varying sentiments on board the English, French, Austrian, Spanish and
Sardinian warships at anchor in the bay. Admiral Mundy had placed his
squadron so close to the land that the ships were in danger of
suffering from the bombardment, a course attributed to the humane
desire to afford a refuge for non-combatants, and in fact, the
officers were soon engaged in entertaining a frightened crowd of
ladies and children. The _Intrepid_ in particular, was so near the
Marina that a fair swimmer could have reached it in a few minutes;
nobody guessed, least of all Garibaldi, that her mission in the mind
of the British admiral was to save the chiefs own life in what seemed
the likely case of its being placed in peril.
Admiral Mundy begged the authorities to stop the bombardment before
the city was destroyed, but Lanza appeared to have no intention of
yielding to his counsels, and it is still uncertain what at last
induced him on the 30th of May to sue the Filibuster, hastily
transformed into his Excellency, for an armistice of twenty-four
hours. 'God knows,' writes Garibaldi, 'if we had want of it!' The
royalists had lost nearly the whole city except the palace and its
surroundings, and, cut off from the sea, they began to feel a scarcity
of food, but not to a severe extent. It seems most probable that with
his men panic-stricken and constantly driven back in spite of the
bombardment, Lanza looked upon the game as lost, when had he known the
straits to which the Garibaldians were reduced for ammunition, he
might have considered it as won.
An unforeseen incident now occurred; the royalist column, recalled
from Corleone, which was largely composed of Bavarians, reached Porta
Termini and opened a furious fire on the weak Garibaldian detachment
stationed there. Was it ignorance or bad faith? Lieutenant Wilmot, who
happened to be passing by, energetically waved his handkerchief and
shouted that a truce was concluded; the assailants continued the
attack till an officer of the Neapolitan staff who was in conference
with Garibaldi at the time hurried to the spot, at his indignant
request, and ordered them to desist. A few minutes later, Garibaldi
himself rode up in a wrathful mood, and while he was renewing his
protests, a shell fell close by him, thrown from a ship which
re-opened the bombardment on its own account. Lieutenant Wilmot, who
witnessed the whole affair, was convinced that there was a deliberate
plan to surprise and capture the Italian chief after he had granted
the armistice.
At a quarter past two on this eventful day, the 30th of May 1860,
Garibaldi and the Neapolitan generals, Letizia and Chretien, stepped
on board the flag-ship _Hannibal_ which Admiral Mundy offered as
neutral ground for their meeting. Curiously enough, both parties,
reaching the mole simultaneously, were rowed out in the same ship's
boat, which was waiting in readiness. The Neapolitans insisted that
Garibaldi should go on board first, either from courtesy or, as the
admiral suspected, out of desire to find out whether he would be
received with military honours. With instinctive tact he had donned
his old and rather shabby uniform of a major-general in the Sardinian
army; the admiral's course was, therefore, marked out, and Garibaldi
received the same salute as the two generals who followed him. After a
foolish attempt on the part of the Neapolitan officers to make
themselves disagreeable, which was repressed with dignified decision
by Admiral Mundy, business began, and things went smoothly till the
fifth article of the proposed convention came under discussion: 'That
the municipality should direct a humble petition to his Majesty the
King expressing the real wants of the city.' 'No,' cried Garibaldi,
starting to his feet, 'the time for humble petitions to the King, or
to anyone else, is past; I am the municipality, and I refuse.' General
Letizia grew excited at this declaration, but afterwards he agreed to
submit the question of quashing the fifth article to his chief,
General Lanza. The armistice was prolonged till nine the next morning.
As soon as he was back on shore, Garibaldi issued a manifesto, in
which he announced that he had refused a proposal dishonouring the
city, and that to-morrow, at the close of the armistice, he should
renew hostilities. There was a splendid audacity in the threat; his
powder was literally exhausted; nothing was left for him to do but to
die with all his men, and to do this he and they were unquestionably
ready. The conduct of the citizens was on a level with the occasion.
As soon as the manifesto came to be known, the inhabitants rushed to
the Palazzo Pretorio, where the man who had so proudly answered in
their name, addressed them in these terms: 'People of Palermo; the
enemy has made me propositions which I judged humiliating to you, and
knowing that you are ready to bury yourselves under the ruins of your
city, I refused.' Those who were present say that never did Garibaldi
seem so great as at that moment. The answer was one deafening shout,
in which the women and children joined, of 'War! war!' In the evening
the city was illuminated as on a feast-day.
Once more in history, the game of greatly daring succeeded. Appalled
by the reports of the dreadful threats emanating from a population
without arms, and a handful of volunteers without powder, distrustful
henceforth of the courage of his soldiers, and, if the truth must
be told, of the fidelity of his fleet, Lanza sent General Letizia
to Garibaldi betimes, on the 31st of May, with an unconditional
demand for the continuance of the armistice. A convention was drawn up,
which conceded the fullest liberty to the royalists to supply their
material wants, succour the wounded, and, if they desired, embark
them on board ships with their families for Naples. Garibaldi, always
humane, had a special tenderness for the victims of that civil strife
which his soul abhorred, and he never forgot that the enemy was his
fellow-countryman. His influence sufficed to secure to the royal
troops an immunity from reprisals which was the more creditable
because some horrid crimes had been done by miscreants in their ranks
when they found that they were getting the worst of it in the
street-fighting. Unfortunately the same mercy was not extended to some
of the secret agents of Maniscalco, head of the Sicilian police, who,
discovered in hiding-places by the mob, were murdered before any
protection could be given them. At the time the act of barbarity was
judged, even by English observers, with more leniency than it deserved
(because cruelty can have _no_ excuse), so great was the disgust
excited by the most odious system of espionage ever put in practice.
The convention bore the signatures of 'Ferdinando Lanza,
General-in-Chief,' and of 'Francesco Crispi, Secretary of State to the
Provisional Government of Sicily.' One article provided for the
consignment of the Royal Mint to the victors; a large sum was stored
in its coffers, and Garibaldi found himself in the novel position of
being able to pay his men and the Sicilian _squadre_, and to send
large orders for arms and ammunition to the Continent.
General Letizia made two journeys to Naples, and on his return from
the second he came invested with full powers to treat with Garibaldi
for the evacuation of the city. On the 7th of June, 15,000 royal
troops marched down to the Marina to the ships that were to take them
away. At the entrance of the Toledo, the great main street of Palermo,
Menotti Garibaldi was on guard, on a prancing black charger, with a
few other Red-shirts of his own age around him, and before this group
of boys defiled the might and pomp of the disciplined army to which
King Bomba had given the thoughtful care of a life-time.
The closing formalities which wound up these events at Palermo formed a
fitting ending to the dramatic scenes which have been briefly narrated.
On the 19th, General Lanza went on board the _Hannibal_ to take leave of
the British admiral. He was covered with decorations and attended by his
brilliant personal staff. There, in the beautiful bay, lay the ship on
board which he was to sail at sunset, and twenty-four steam transports
were also there, each filled with Neapolitan troops. The defeated
general was deeply moved as he walked on to the quarter-deck. 'We have
been unfortunate,' he said--words never spoken by one officer of
unquestioned personal courage to another without striking a responsive
chord. When he quitted the _Hannibal_, the English admiral ordered the
White Flag of the King of the Two Sicilies to be hoisted at the
foretop-gallant masthead for the last time in Sicilian waters; and a
salute of nineteen guns, the salute due to the direct representative or
_alter ego_ of a sovereign, speeded the parting guest. Thus, wrapped in
the dignity of misfortune, vanished the last semblance of the graceless
and treacherous thraldom of the Spanish Bourbons in the capital of
Sicily. The flag of Italy was run up on the tower of the Semaphore.
Everywhere the revolution triumphed except at Messina, Milazzo and
Syracuse. Even Catania, where a rising had been put down after a
sanguinary struggle, was now evacuated and left to itself.
So the 20th of June dawned, and the Queen's ships in the harbour put
forth all their bravery of flags in commemoration of her accession,
which display was naturally interpreted by the Palermitans as a
compliment to the Dictator, who had fixed that day for calling on the
British, French and Sardinian admirals and on the captain of the
United States frigate _Iroquois_. With what honours the American
captain received him is not recorded; for certain it was with cordial
goodwill; of the others, Admiral Mundy treated him as on the previous
occasion; the French admiral affected to consider him a 'simple
monsieur' who had unexpectedly come to call, whilst Admiral Persano,
on board the _Maria Adelaide_, gave him a salute of nineteen guns,
which formed a virtual recognition on the part of Piedmont of his
assumption of the dictatorship. Cavour had ordered Persano to act on
his own responsibility as the exigencies of the hour demanded, and the
admiral knew that these vague instructions assigned him a more
vigorous policy than the other ministers would have agreed to
officially. His bold initiative was therefore justified. As some
severe words will have to be said of Persano in a later chapter, it is
well to remark here that during his Sicilian command he behaved like a
thorough patriot, although it was not in his power to render such
great moral services to freedom as were undoubtedly rendered by
Admiral Mundy, who at the same time acted with so much tact that his
neutrality was not impugned, and he even won the equal personal
gratitude of both parties. On the other hand, the Austrian commodore,
Baron von Wüllersdorf, succeeded in pleasing no one and no one pleased
him. He did not expect that the Garibaldians would lose much love to
him, but he took it unkindly that the royalists fired at his boat with
himself in it, and the Austrian flag at the stern. In high dudgeon he
related this grievance to his British colleague, who gently suggested
that since Austria had always supported the Bourbon system of
Government, it was hardly strange if the royalists were hurt at
receiving neither assistance nor even sympathy from the Austrian
squadron which witnessed their destruction. The remark was acute; even
Austria was, in fact, tired of the Bourbons of Naples; a portent of
their not distant doom. But it was not likely that the royalists
should appreciate the phlegmatic attitude of their erewhile
protectors.
The concluding military operations in Sicily presented a more arduous
task than, in the first flush of success, might have been anticipated.
In the general panic, one, if one only, royalist officer, Colonel Del
Bosco, turned round and stood at bay. His spirited course was not far
from undoing all that had been done. Fortunately Garibaldi had
received important reinforcements. General Medici touched the Sicilian
shores three days after the evacuation of Palermo with 3500
volunteers, well-armed and equipped out of the so-called 'Million
Rifle Fund,' which was formed by popular subscription in the north of
Italy. The Dictator went as far as Alcamo to meet the hero of the last
glorious fight of Rome, whom he greeted with delight and affection.
Later, arrived the third and last expedition, consisting of 1500 men
under Cosenz, till recently commander-in-chief of the Italian army.
The Sicilian _squadre_ had been brought into something like military
organisation; and an Englishman, Colonel Dunne, had raised a picked
corps of 400 Palermitans which contained, besides its commander,
between thirty and forty of his countrymen, and was hence called the
English Regiment. This battalion was ready to do anything and go
anywhere; it performed excellent work both in Sicily and on the
mainland.[5]
Garibaldi arranged his forces in three divisions; one, under Türr, was
sent to Catania; the second, under Bixio, to Girgenti; the third,
under Medici, was to follow the northern sea-coast towards Messina,
the strongest position still in the enemy's hands. All three were
ultimately to converge with a view to the grand object of crossing
over to the mainland. Medici had 2500 men; the royalists in and about
Messina could dispose of 15,000. The Garibaldians did not expect much
opposition till they got near Messina, but when they reached
Barcelona they heard that the garrison of Milazzo had been reinforced
by Del Bosco with 4000 men, with the evident design of cutting off
their passage to Messina. It is said that this move was made in
consequence of direct communications between that officer and Francis
II., whose ministers had already decided to abandon the whole island.
But Del Bosco secretly assured his King that such a measure was not
necessary, and that he would undertake not only to bar Medici's
advance, but to march over the dead bodies of the Garibaldians to
Palermo. Milazzo is a small hilly peninsula, on which stands a fort
and a little walled city. The spot was well chosen. On the 17th of
July, Del Bosco attacked the Garibaldian right, and it was not without
difficulty that Medici retained his positions. Some further
reinforcements were sent to Del Bosco from Messina, though not so
numerous as they ought to have been, but they would have almost
ensured him the victory had not Medici also received help; Cosenz'
column, and, yet more important, Garibaldi himself with the 1000 men
he had kept in Palermo, hastening at full speed to the rescue. The
belligerents were, for once, about equally balanced in numbers when on
the 20th of July Garibaldi attacked Del Bosco with the purpose of
driving him on to the tongue of the peninsula, thus cutting him off
from Messina and leaving the road open. A desperate engagement
followed. The Neapolitans showed that they could fight if they were
properly led, and inflicted a loss of 800 in killed and wounded (heavy
out of a total of 5000) on their gallant opponents. Garibaldi's own
life was nearly sacrificed. He was standing in a field of prickly
pears in conversation with Major Missori when a party of the enemy's
cavalry rode up, the captain of which dealt a violent blow at him with
his sword, without knowing who it was. Garibaldi coolly parried the
blow, and struck down his assailant, while Missori shot the three
nearest dragoons with his revolver. Hearing the noise, other
Garibaldians hurried up, and the chief was saved. For a long time the
issue of the battle remained uncertain, and it was only after hours of
severe fighting that Del Bosco was compelled to recognise his defeat,
and to take refuge on the projecting strip of land as Garibaldi had
meant that he should do.
A few days later, four transports arrived in the bay of Milazzo to
carry Del Bosco and his men to Naples. The ministry had prevailed, and
the complete abandonment of the island was decreed. General Clary,
commandant of Messina, informed Garibaldi that he had orders to
evacuate the town and its outlying forts; the citadel would be also
handed over if the Dictator would engage not to cross to the mainland,
but this conditional offer was declined. The citadel of Messina
therefore remained in the power of the royalists, but on agreement
that it should not resume hostilities unless attacked. It only
capitulated in March 1861. Garibaldi reigned over the rest of the
island. The convention was signed on the 28th of July by Marshal
Tommaso de Clary for the King of Naples, and Major-General Giacomo
Medici for the Dictator.
Before following Garibaldi across the Straits, some allusion is called
for to the general political situation both in Sicily and in Italy.
And first as regards Sicily. When a government is pulled down another
must be set up, and the last task is often not the easiest. Garibaldi
appointed a ministry in which the ruling spirit was Francesco Crispi.
A Sicilian patriot from his youth, and one of the Thousand, he has
been judged the man best fitted to direct the helm of United Italy in
days of unexampled difficulty. This is enough to prove that he was not
the first-come ignoramus or madman that some people then liked to
think him. But Crispi had the art of making enemies, nor has he lost
it. Though volumes have been written on the civil administration under
the dictatorship, the writers' judgments are so warped by their
political leanings that it is not easy to get at the truth. It would
have been strange had no confusion existed, had no false steps been
made; yet some of the old English residents in Sicily say that the
island made more real progress during the few months of Garibaldi's
reign than in all the years that have followed. Towards the end of
June, Garibaldi appointed Agostino Depretis as Pro-Dictator. Of the
many decrees formulated and measures adopted at this period,
Garibaldi, who had many other things to think of, was personally
responsible only for those of a philanthropic nature. Busy as he was,
he found time to inquire minutely into the State of the population of
Palermo, and he was horrified at the ignorance and misery in which the
poorer classes were plunged. Forthwith, out came a bushel-basket of
edicts and appeals on behalf of these poor children of the sun. He
visited the orphan asylum and found that eighty per cent. of the
inmates died of starvation. One nurse had to provide for the wants of
four infants. Garibaldi wrote off an address to the ladies of Palermo,
in which he implored them to interest themselves in the wretched
little beings created in the image of God, at the sight of whose
wasted and puny bodies he, an old soldier, had wept. He had money and
food distributed every morning to the most destitute, at the gates of
the royal palace, where he lived with a frugality that scandalised the
aged servants of royalty whom he kept, out of kindness, at their
posts. Theoretically, he disapproved of indiscriminate almsgiving, but
in the misery caused by the recent bombardment, such theories could
not be strictly applied, or, at any rate, Garibaldi was not the man to
so apply them; whence it happened that though, as _de facto_ head of
the State, he allowed himself a civil list of eight francs a day, the
morning had never far advanced before his pockets were empty, and he
had to borrow small sums from his friends, which next morning were
faithfully repaid.
When he walked about the town, the women pressed forward to touch the
hem of his _poncho_, and made their children kneel to receive his
blessing. On one occasion a convent of nuns, from the youngest novice
to the elderly abbess, insisted on giving him the kiss of peace. An
idolatry which would have made anyone else ridiculous; but Garibaldi,
being altogether simple and unselfconscious, was above ridicule. One
of the good works that he initiated was the transformation of the
Foundling Hospital, of which the large funds were turned to little
account, into a Military School under the direction of his best
officers. In less than a month the school could turn out two smart
battalions, and there were few mornings that the Dictator did not go
to watch the boys at their drill. He encouraged them with the promise
that before long he would lead them himself to the wars.
Such actions smell sweeter from the dust, than the old story of the
antagonism that sprang up in those days between Garibaldi and Cavour,
between Crispi and La Farina. This dualism, as it was called, was the
fruit of a mutual distrust, which, however much to be deplored, was
not to be avoided. Although Cavour had a far juster idea of Garibaldi
than that entertained by his _entourage_, he was nevertheless haunted
by the fear that the general's revolutionary friends would persuade
him to depart from his programme of 'Italy and Victor Emmanuel,' and
embark upon some adventure of a republican complexion. He was also
afraid that the Government of the Dictator would, by its
unconventional methods, discredit the Italian cause in the eyes of
European statesmen. These reasons caused him to desire and to
endeavour to bring about the immediate annexation of Sicily to the
Sardinian kingdom. On the other hand, Garibaldi's faith in Cavour had
ceased with the cession of Nice, and he believed him to be even now
contemplating the cession of the island of Sardinia as a further sop
to Cerberus--a project which, if it existed nowhere else, did exist in
the mind of Napoleon III. With regard to immediate annexation, he had
no intention of agreeing to it, and for one sufficing reason: had he
consented he could not have carried the war of liberation across the
Straits of Messina. His Sicilian army must have laid down their arms
at a command from Turin were it given. And it would have been given.
La Farina, like Crispi, a Sicilian by birth, arrived suddenly at
Palermo, representing Cavour, as everyone thought, but in reality he
represented himself. Strong-willed and prejudiced, he was, in his own
way, a perfectly good patriot, and he had done all that was in his
power (though not quite so much as in later years he fancied that he
had done) to aid and further the expedition of the Thousand. But he
tried to force the annexation scheme by means so openly hostile to the
government of the day, that Garibaldi at length sent him on board
Persano's flag-ship with a request that the admiral would forward him
to Turin.
After the evacuation of Messina by the royal troops, Garibaldi
received persuasions of all sorts to let the kingdom of Naples alone.
On the part of King Francis an offer was made to him of 50,000,000
francs and the Neapolitan navy in aid of a war for the liberation of
Venice. Almost simultaneously he received a letter from Victor
Emmanuel sent by the hand of Count Giulio Litta, in which the writer
said that in the event of the King of Naples giving up Sicily 'I think
that our most reasonable course would be to renounce all ulterior
undertakings against the Neapolitan kingdom.' This was the first
direct communication between the King and Garibaldi since the latter's
landing at Marsala; it is to be surmised that of indirect
communications there had been several, and that they took the form of
substantial assistance, sent, probably without Cavour being aware of
it, for Victor Emmanuel carried on his own little conspiracies with a
remarkable amount of secrecy. What induced him now to address words of
restraint to Garibaldi in the midway of his work, was the arrival of a
letter from Napoleon III. in which the Emperor urged him in the
strongest manner to use his well-known personal influence with the
general to hold him back. It was not easy for Victor Emmanuel to
refuse point blank to make the last effort on behalf of his cousin.
Francis had appointed a constitutional ministry, promised a statute,
granted an amnesty and engaged to place himself in accord with the
King of Sardinia, adopted even the tricolor flag with the royal arms
of Bourbon in the centre. Concessions idle as desperate on the 25th of
June 1860, the date which they bore. Their only consequence then was
to facilitate the fall of the dynasty, the usual result of similar
inspirations of the eleventh hour. Had all this been done on the day
of the King's accession it might have imperilled Italian unity--not
now. But the fatal words, 'Too late,' would have fallen with ill grace
from Victor Emmanuel's lips. Garibaldi answered his royal
correspondent that when he had made him King of Italy he would be only
too happy to obey him for the rest of his life.
The King's letter, though delivered after the battle of Milazzo, was
written before it. That event convinced Cavour, and doubtless the King
with him, that it was utterly impossible to arrest the tide at Cape
Faro. It convinced him of a great deal more. He saw that if Piedmont
continued much longer a passive spectator of the march of events, she
would lose the lead forever And he prepared to act.
Meanwhile counsels reached Garibaldi from quite a different quarter
not to abandon Naples, but to go there from Rome instead of by
Calabria. This daring scheme was favoured by Mazzini, Nicotera,
Bertani; indeed, by all the republicans. A corps of about 8000
volunteers was ready to start for a descent on the coast of the Papal
States. At present it was in the island of Sardinia, awaiting the
arrival of Garibaldi to assume the command. And now occurred
Garibaldi's mysterious disappearance from Cape Faro, which at the time
excited endless curiosity. The truth was, that he actually went to
Sardinia, but instead of taking command of the volunteers bound for
Rome, he induced them to alter their plans and to join his Sicilian
army in the arduous undertaking before it of overthrowing the Bourbons
in the Neapolitan kingdom. Thus he gained a reinforcement of which he
knew the enormous need, for though he was willing to face
difficulties, he was not blind to them, as were many men of the
extreme party. He also prevented what would have been a step of
exceeding danger to the national cause, as it would have obliged the
Sardinian Government to break off all relations with Garibaldi and to
use force against the patriots in suppressing a movement which, if
successful, would have brought a hostile French army into Italy.