The Shield and The Sword

by Ernle Bradford

  During the brief reign of Pinto’s successor, François Ximenes of the Langue of Aragon, an event occurred which showed only too clearly the increasing discontent felt by the Maltese people for these feudal overlords. In the past, however much they may have disliked being second class citizens in their own island, they had nevertheless enjoyed the prosperity, and indeed fame, which their small island enjoyed because of the presence of the Order. Maltese sailors and merchants visiting other Mediterranean countries could not fail to observe the want and misery to be found in nearly all of them. But in recent years, as the corso practically ceased to exist, and as heavier taxes were laid upon the Maltese to shore-up the declining fortunes of the island, they began more and more to see their masters as outmoded tyrants. A tax on bread—always the staple diet of the Maltese working man—was unwisely levied by Ximenes, while a further insult (rather than injury) was an edict forbidding the clergy to take part in any secular activities, in particular field sports. Now the rocky Maltese islands provided little enough opportunity for sport or outdoor activity, and one of the great pleasures of the parish priest had long been the shooting of quail and other birds during the migratory periods of spring and autumn. A plot was hatched to overthrow the Knights, in which the priesthood took the lead, and an insurrection took place in September 1775. The Order’s fleet was away blockading Algiers, and, taking advantage of the occasion, the rebels managed to seize one of the main defensive positions inside Valetta as well as the all-important fort of St Elmo. Yet, despite these initial successes, the insurgents were not joined by a sufficiently large number of the population to ensure success. The rebellion finally petered out with the capture of several hundred men, a few of whom were executed and a number of others given life imprisonment. The attempt had failed, but the insurrection of 1775 showed clearly enough which way the wind was blowing. Not even the death of the unpopular Ximenes in the same year could disguise the fact that Malta of the Knights was nearing its end. Even the efforts of his energetic and statesmanlike successor, François de Rohan, could not stem the tide of events. Despite considerable measures of reform, wise changes in the law, and the establishment of public schools, de Rohan was destined to fail in his efforts to put the Order of St John back on a financial and administrative footing capable of riding out the storm that was to follow. The prime cause of this was the French Revolution.

  It was inevitable that an aristocratic Order of Knights would be anathema to the French revolutionaries, and equally inevitable that it should side with Louis XVI in his attempt to retain his throne. When the king’s finance minister, Jacques Necker, appealed in 1789 to all land-owners for a voluntary contribution, the Order of St John was the first to come forward, giving him one third of the revenue from all its French commanderies. This in the long run would have been quite enough to ensure the destruction of the Order once the revolutionaries had come to power. But their error was compounded when they pledged their credit to the tune of 500,000 francs in order to assist the king in his attempted flight. The flight of Louis, which ended so disastrously at Varennes, heralded not only his death, but that of the Order of St John in Malta. The French Constituent Assembly now declared that the Order was a foreign power holding property in France, and that it was therefore liable to the same taxes as French citizens. Very shortly after this a further decree was passed, declaring that any Frenchman belonging to an order of knighthood which required proofs of nobility from its members could no longer be considered a French citizen. The final blow fell on September 19th, 1792. It was formally decreed that all the property of the Order of St John in Malta within the limits of France was automatically annexed to the French national domains. The axe had struck at the roots of this ancient oak.

  Chapter 27

  …AND FALL

  On the death of de Rohan in 1797 the choice for the next Grand Master fell upon Ferdinand von Hompesch—the first German to be elected as Grand Master in the history of the Order. He was also to enjoy the melancholy distinction of being the last Grand Master of Malta. It is said that he was unwilling to be a candidate for the post. This seems to be belied by the fact that he had spent a considerable amount of money in promoting his own cause, and that after the election he was permanently hampered by the debts he had incurred.

  The situation for the Order in Malta looked desperate after the confiscation of all their French possessions, but a gleam of light came from a somewhat unexpected quarter. The Tsar Paul I, who had recently succeeded Catherine II, was now in possession of the Priory of Poland, and it happened that the Tsar, among his numerous other eccentricities (which were to end in outright insanity), was a passionate enthusiast for the concepts of knighthood and chivalry. He had long been an admirer of the Order, and he now proceeded to change the Polish Priory into a Russian one. He gave it a revenue of 300,000 florins and incorporated it into that curious hybrid which had sprung up in 1782, the Anglo-Bavarian Langue, George III of England having given his consent to this part-revival of the defunct Langue of England. The Tsar, as it were, now took Malta under his protection. This was made clear by the fact that he was granted by the Order the title of ‘Protector of the Order of Malta’.

  Russian interest in this small island was not new in itself. As far back as the seventeenth century Peter the Great had announced: ‘I am not looking for land, I am looking for water.’ One of his close friends, the Boyar Czeremetev, who had been an active campaigner against the Turks, was permitted by Peter to make a visit to Rome in fulfilment of a vow—but only on condition that afterwards he went to Malta and inspected its fortifications and cast an eye over its fleet. He had been received by Grand Master Perellos, had attended High Mass in St John’s, and had been invested with the Gold Cross of Devotion by the Grand Master. Nothing further came from this initial Russian probe into the island and its affairs, for events in Russia immediately engaged the attention of both Peter and Czeremetev. The word ‘Malta’, however, had found its way into the Russian archives, and an interest in the island as a possible outlet for Russian involvement in the Mediterranean had been excited.

  This was to be revived during the reign of Catherine the Great, who despatched an Italian nobleman, Cavalcabo, to Malta to ingratiate himself with the ageing Pinto and to act as her chargé d’affaires in Malta. Cavalcabo became involved in a plot against the administration and was very nearly dismissed the island in disgrace. He managed, however, to survive through the brief reign of Grand Master Ximenes and was then involved in yet a further plot in the early months of the reign of de Rohan. The latter acted quickly, a cache of arms was found in a cellar below Cavalcabo’s house, and he was recalled in disgrace by his sovereign. These incidents, though petty in themselves, showed that Russia had definite designs upon this Mediterranean island with the object of furthering her ambitions not only against the Turks but against the European powers. The Tsar Paul’s interest in the Order, although it probably stemmed from his own delusions of grandeur and passion for orders of chivalry, was no doubt prompted by ministers who had a more practical eye to affairs.

  But despite the fact that the Tsar had clearly indicated that he regarded the Order (which in effect meant Malta) as within the Russian sphere of influence, the French were determined to act—and act quickly. Two hundred of the Knights, out of a total of about 300, were members of the three French Langues. They were therefore readily susceptible to influence from the new France, and keenly aware of the attractions of the French empire that Napoleon was so busily constructing. Against the glamour of the rising star of French imperialism even the aristocratic prejudices of a number of these Knights were bound to yield. Meanwhile, Napoleon had sent a cousin of the French consul at Malta, Possielgue by name, to keep him posted as to the state of affairs in the island. Possielgue found the native Maltese disaffected, the treasury almost bare, and in von Hompesch a man who deserved no more than the title of ‘Grand Master of Indecision’. Clearly the moment was ripe for French intervention. It happened to coincide perfectly
with Napoleon’s plans for his expedition to Egypt. Malta lay right in the path of his fleet’s invasion course, and it would be unthinkable to leave it in its present state when it might so easily be occupied by the English, who would use it as a base from which to cut the French line of communications.

  A decree published by the French Directory on April 12th, 1798, signed the death-warrant of the Order of St John in Malta. This time it was not the Turks, not the eternal Moslem enemy, but the French—once the foremost of all crusaders—who achieved more or less by the stroke of a pen what all the cannons, fleets, sappers and miners, Janissaries, Generals, and Admirals of the Sublime Porte, together with the innumerable private raiders of the Barbary coast, had failed to do. After declaring that the Order in Malta had clearly proclaimed itself an enemy of the French Republic, the edict went on to issue its specific instructions to ‘The General in Command of the army of the East’. He was to ‘take possession of the island of Malta…for which purpose he will immediately proceed against it with all the naval and military forces under his command.’ It went on to say that these orders were secret, ‘not to be printed’, and added the rider that General Bonaparte as commander-in-chief of the army destined for Egypt was ‘to obtain possession of the island of Malta’ unless for any reason he found this objective might interfere with the main purpose of the expedition.

  A sad characteristic of the Knights in their latter days was that something of the fatalism of the East, the ennui of the Lotus Eaters, had overtaken them. The Maltese themselves are prone to say ‘X’Tista Taghmel?’ (What can you do?), and there is another local saying, ‘Even St Paul was shipwrecked on Malta.’ This conviction of the inevitability of things, and of the inability of man to do anything against them, seems to have written itself into the hearts of the Knights during their last days in Malta. As Whitworth Porter wrote in 1883, in his History of the Knights of Malta, ‘One power alone continued careless and inactive in the midst of the general alarm. Whilst the note of preparation arose in every other country in Europe the island of Malta remained in a state of supine and indolent security.’

  Von Hompesch had been warned that the expedition against Egypt was also directed to capture Malta en route. He failed to take any action at all. It was as if he, like the whole island, was hypnotised by the magnitude of its prowess in the past, by the certainty that ‘Malta of Gold, Malta of Silver’ would forever remain inviolate. He looked around him at the massive fortifications of Valetta, at the scarps and counterscarps of Floriana, at the restored star-shaped fortress of St Elmo. He put his trust in these just as much as the Order had done for centuries in the hand of St John the Baptist in its jewelled reliquary in the cathedral. Under the inactive sky and the bright sun of early June, when the whole island shrugged its shoulders and prepared for the long mid-summer sleep, its German Grand Master sat indolent as a peasant in the shade.

  On June 6th, 1798, the advance guard of the French fleet, consisting of over eighty vessels, sailed up to the island and a launch was sent ashore asking for permission for some of the vessels to enter Grand Harbour and water. The Order’s position throughout this period of history was a difficult one. They had endeavoured—as they did now—to maintain a position of strict neutrality between the warring powers, according watering facilities equally to ships of whatever nation might ask for them. Permission was therefore granted for two transports to come in and water, as well as for a frigate which was in need of repairs. Three days later there hove up on the horizon a fleet such as not even Suleiman the Great at the height of the Ottoman Empire’s powers could have envisaged. As Doublet wrote, ‘Malta had never seen such an enormous fleet in its waters. For miles around the sea was covered with ships of every size. Their masts looked like a huge forest.’ Under the command of Napoleon, the whole French fleet and army destined for Egypt was now assembled off the eastern coast of Malta. It consisted of fourteen ships-of-the-line, thirty frigates and 300 transports. One of the largest warships in the world, the battleship L’Orient, held the commander-in-chief, a man who, however active ashore, disliked the sea intensely. Napoleon regarded this whole part of the expedition as no more than an unattractive prelude to the glories awaiting him in the shadow of the pyramids. While he perused an account of the voyages of Captain Cook, Napoleon had also brought with him, among innumerable other volumes on the East, a copy of the Koran. It was a strange quirk of fate that it should be a Frenchman who now read the words of Mohammed as he prepared to capture the island that had resisted the onslaughts of the followers of the Prophet for so many centuries.

  A message was promptly sent by Napoleon via the French consul asking the Grand Master to admit the whole fleet into the harbour for water. Von Hompesch called the Council who, with only one dissentient (a Spaniard who pointed out that his country was an ally of France), unanimously declared that in accordance with a treaty made some years beforehand between the Order and the governments of France, Naples, and Spain, only four warships at a time might enter harbour. Napoleon no doubt had been expecting just such a refusal, for the entrance of the whole fleet and army would in itself have been an admission of the island’s capitulation. ‘They have denied us water,’ he said, ‘then we shall take it.’ His reply to von Hompesch’s courteous answer was couched in the words of the all-conquering warlord: ‘The commander-in-chief is extremely indignant to learn that permission to water is restricted to only four vessels at a time… How long at this rate would it take for 500 sailing vessels to water and victual? General Bonaparte is determined to take by force what ought to have been given him freely under the rules of hospitality which govern your Order.’

  This was an open declaration of war, and Napoleon had made all necessary plans well in advance of sending his original request to von Hompesch. General Reynier was assigned to the capture of Gozo, General Baraguey-Hilliers was to land at Mellieha Bay in the north-east of Malta, General Vaubois at St Julian’s Bay a little to the north of Marsamuscetto, and General Desaix at Marsasirocco in the south of the island. Even if the Knights, even if the soldiers, even if the Maltese militia, had been of the frame of mind and calibre of their forebears in 1565 there can be little doubt as to what would have been the outcome against the massive numbers of men and artillery at Napoleon’s disposal. True, Valetta itself, with its fantastic defensive system, should have been able to hold out for weeks if not months, but the strongest battlements are useless unless those who man them have an equal strength of purpose. But Malta had long had its fifth column. Even while von Hompesch irresolutely paced the floors of the Grand Master’s palace, the agents of the French Republic were everywhere urging the inhabitants to join the victorious Tricolour, to adopt the new principles of liberty and freedom which all Europe was embracing, and to discard the Order of St John, that unwanted relic of feudalism.

  Historians of the Order have sometimes been too inclined to attribute its successes in warfare—whether in Rhodes or in Malta—to the unswerving dedication of the Knights, and to their unconquerable courage. Much is to be said for this outlook—for if an army lacks good officers it is useless. But an army is nevertheless composed of a number of noncommissioned officers and a vast bulk of men. These need training, need a sense of purpose, and need above all to believe that the men who are leading them are worthy of their trust. At Malta in 1798 all these ingredients were lacking. As Roderick Cavaleiro puts it:

  Of the 200 French, 90 Italian, 25 Spanish, 8 Portuguese, 5 Bavarian and 4 German Knights, 50 were either too ill or too old to fight. The ancient guns, repeatedly painted up to look like new, but unused for nearly 100 years except for ceremonial purposes, were wheeled out. The powder was found to be rotten, the shot defective. The urban militia, drilled on Sunday afternoons by officers too lazy to learn the language [Maltese], ill-disciplined, given over to obstinate stupidity and malingering, shuffled into place terrified at the prospect of fighting the French.

  Even if he had not had very adequate information about the state of things in Malta
long before his expedition had set out, Napoleon might have deduced from the reports of random travellers that the Order and the island were as soft as rotten fruit.

  They fell into his hands with disgraceful ease, von Hompesch displaying an irresolution that seems scarcely credible. He sat alone in the palace, except for one aide-de-camp, making no attempt to co-ordinate the resistance or even to give orders as to what resistance, if any, was to be offered. Everything was left to the individual commanders of the various fortresses and strong points, who for their part having received no orders, were indecisive as to what to do—which meant that most of them did nothing. Before nightfall Desaix moving up with his forces from the south had invested those formidable Cotonera lines Upon which Grand Master Cotoner had lavished his fortune, and was in possession of Fort Ricasoli which guarded the southern point of Grand Harbour. Elsewhere the story was much the same. Reynier had landed at Ramla Bay on the east coast of Gozo and, although he came under fire from the heights surrounding this sandy beach, he too by nightfall had captured the citadel of Gozo’s capital, Rabat, as well as taking Fort Chambrai which guarded the entrance to Gozo’s one small harbour. The only real resistance that seems to have been offered in any part of the island was by members of the Maltese Militia. But, ill-disciplined and ill-officered as they were, they could hardly be expected to be a match for the finest troops in Europe. At one point, outside the massive fortifications of Floriana, the French were for a time held at check. A Knight of the Langue of Auvergne led a sally which brought his militia men under a murderous cross-fire, driving them back to Floriana. At this point the Standard of the Order of St John fell into the hands of General Vaubois.