THE STORY OF THE BARBAROSSA BROTHERS

 

During these transactions in Germany, the emperor undertook his famous enterprise against the piratical states in Africa. That part of the African continent lying along the coast of the Mediterranean sea, which anciently formed the kingdoms of Mauritania and Massylia, together with the republic of Carthage, and which is now known by the general name of Barbary, had undergone many revolutions. Subdued by the Romans, it became a province of their empire. When it was conquered afterwards by the Vandals, they erected a kingdom there. That being overturned by Belisarius, the country became subject to the Greek emperors, and continued to be so until it was overrun, towards the end of the seventh century, by the rapid and irresistible arms of the Arabians. It remained for some time a part of that vast empire which the caliphs governed with absolute authority. Its immense distance, however, from the seat of government, encouraged the descendants of those leaders who had subdued the country, or the chiefs of the Moors, its ancient inhabitants, to throw off the yoke, and to assert their independence. The caliphs, who derived their authority from a spirit of enthusiasm, more fitted for making conquests than for preserving them, were obliged to connive at acts of rebellion which they could not prevent; and Barbary was divided into several kingdoms, of which Morocco, Algiers, and Tunis were the most considerable. The inhabitants of these kingdoms were a mixed race, Arabs, negroes from the southern provinces, and Moors, either natives of Africa, or who had been expelled out of Spain; all zealous professors of the Mahometan religion, and inflamed against Christianity with a bigotted hatred proportional to their ignorance and barbarous mariners.

Among these people, no less daring, inconstant, and treacherous, than the ancient inhabitants of the same country described by the Roman historians, frequent seditions broke out, and many changes in government took place. These, as they affected only the internal state of a country extremely barbarous, are but little known, and deserve to be so; but about the beginning of the sixteenth century, a sudden revolution happened, which, by rendering the states of Barbary formidable to the Europeans, hath made their history worthy of more attention. This revolution was brought about by persons born in a rank of life which entitled them to act no such illustrious part.

Horuc and Hayradin, the sons of a potter in the Isle of Lesbos, prompted by a restless and enterprising spirit, forsook their father’s trade, ran to sea, and joined a crew of pirates. They soon distinguished themselves by their valor and activity, and becoming masters of distinguishe small brigantine, carried on their infamous trade with such conduct and success, that they assembled a fleet of twelve galleys, besides many vessels of smaller force. Of this fleet, Horuc, the elder brother, called Barbarossa, from the red colour of his beard, was admiral, and Hayradin second in command, but with almost equal authority. They called themselves the friends of the sea, and the enemies of all who sail upon it; and their names soon became terrible from the Straits of the Dardanelles to those of Gibraltar. Together with their fame and power, their ambitious views extended, and while acting as corsairs, they adopted the ideas, and acquired the talents of conquerors. They often carried the prizes which they took on the coast of Spain and Italy into the ports of Barbary, and enriching the inhabitants by the sale of their booty, and the thoughtless prodigality of their crews, were welcome guests in every place at which they touched. The convenient situation of these harbors, lying so near the greatest commercial states at that time in Christendom, made the brothers wish for an establishment in that country. An opportunity of accomplishing this quickly presented itself, which they did not suffer to pass unimproved. Eutemi, king of Algiers, having attempted several times, without success, to take a fort which the Spanish governors of Oran had built not far from his capital, was so ill-advised as to apply for aid to Barbarossa, whose valor the Africans considered as irresistible. The active corsair gladly accepted of the invitation, and leaving his brother Hayradin with the fleet [1516] marched at the head of five thousand men to Algiers, where he was received as their deliverer. Such a force gave him the command of the town; and as he perceived that the Moors neither suspected him of any bad intentions, nor were capable with their light-armed troops of opposing his disciplined veterans, he secretly murdered the monarch whom he had come to assist, and proclaimed himself king of Algiers in his stead. The authority which he had thus boldly usurped, he endeavored to establish by arts suited to the genius of the people whom he had to govern; by liberality without bounds to those who favored his promotion, and by cruelty no less unbounded towards all whom he had any reason to distrust. Not satisfied with the throne which he had acquired, he attacked the neighboring king of Tremecen, and having vanquished him in battle, added his dominions to those of Algiers. At the same time he continued to infest the coast of Spain and Italy with fleets which resembled the armaments of a great monarch, rather than the light squadrons of a corsair. Their frequent and cruel devastations obliged Charles, about the beginning of his reign [1518], to furnish the marquis de Comares, governor of Oran, with troops sufficient to attack him. That officer, assisted by the dethroned king of Tremecen, executed the commission with such spirit, that Barbarossa’s troops being beat in several encounters, he himself was shut up in Tremecen. After defending it to the last extremity, he was overtaken in attempting to make his escape, and slain while he fought with an obstinate valor, worthy his former fame and exploits.

His brother Hayradin, known likewise by the name of Barbarossa, assumed the scepter of Algiers with the same ambition and abilities, but with better fortune. His reign being undisturbed by the arms of the Spaniards, which had full occupation in the wars among the European powers, he regulated with admirable prudence the interior police of his kingdom, carried on his naval operations with great vigour, and extended his conquest on time continent of Africa. But perceiving that the Moors and Arabs submitted to his government with the utmost reluctance, and being afraid that his continual depredations would, one day, draw upon him the arms of the Christians, he put his dominions under the protection of the Grand Seignior, and received from him a body of Turkish soldiers sufficient for his security against his domestic as well as his foreign enemies. At last, the fame of his exploits daily increasing, Solyman offered him the command of the Turkish fleet, as the only person whose valor and skill in naval affairs entitled him to command against Andrew Doria, the greatest sea-officer of that age. Proud of this distinction, Barbarossa repaired to Constantinople, and with a wonderful versatility of mind, mingling the arts of a courtier with the boldness of a corsair, gained the entire confidence both of the sultan and his vizier. To them he communicated a scheme which he had formed of making himself master of Tunis, the most flourishing kingdom, at that time, on the coast of Africa; and this being approved of by them, he obtained whatever he demanded for carrying it into execution.

His hopes of success in this undertaking were founded on the intestine divisions in the kingdom of Tunis. Mahmed, the last king of that country, having thirty-four sons by different wives, appointed Muley-Hacsen, one of the youngest among them, to be his successor. That weak prince, who owed this preference, not to his own merit, but to the ascendant which his mother had acquired over a monarch doating with age, first poisoned Mahmed his father in order to prevent him from altering his destination with respect to the succession; and then, with the barbarous policy which prevails wherever polygamy is permitted, and the right of succession is not precisely fixed, he put to death all his brothers whom he could get into his power. Alraschid, one of the eldest, was so fortunate as to escape his rage; and finding a retreat among the wandering Arabs, made several attempts, by the assistance of some of their chiefs, to recover the throne, which of right belonged to him. But these proving unsuccessful, and the Arabs, from their natural levity, being ready to deliver him up to his mere less brother, he fled to Algiers, the only place of refuge remaining, and implored the protection of Barbarossa, who, discerning at once all the advantages which might be gained by supporting his title, received him with every possible demonstration of friendship and respect. Being ready, at that time, to set sail for Constantinople, he easily persuaded Alraschid, whose eagerness to obtain a crown disposed him to believe or undertake anything, to accompany him thither, promising him effectual assistance from Solyman, whom he represented to be the most generous, as well as most powerful monarch in the world. But no sooner were they arrived at Constantinople, than the treacherous corsair, regardless of all his promises to him, opened to the sultan a plan for conquering Tunis, and annexing it to the Turkish empire, by making use of the name of this exiled prince, and cooperating with the party in the kingdom which was ready to declare in his favor. Solyman approved, with too much facility, of this perfidious proposal, extremely suitable to the character of its author, but altogether unworthy of a great prince. A powerful fleet and numerous army were soon assembled; at the sight of which the credulous Alraschid flattered himself that he should soon enter his capital in triumph.

But just as this unhappy prince was going to embark, he was arrested by order of the sultan, shut up in the seraglio, and was never heard of more. Barbarossa sailed with a fleet of two hundred and fifty vessels towards Africa. After ravaging the coasts of Italy, and spreading terror through every part of that country, he appeared before Tunis; and landing his men, gave out that he came to assert the right of Alraschid, whom he pretended to have left sick aboard the admiral galley. The fort of Goletta, which commands the bay, soon fell into his bands, partly by his own address, partly by the treachery of its commander; and the inhabitants of Tunis, weary of Muley-Hascen’s government, took arms, and declared for Alraschid with such zeal and unanimity as obliged the former to fly so precipitately, that he left all his treasures behind him. The gates were immediately set open to Barbarossa, as the restorer of their lawful sovereign. But when Alraschid himself did not appear, and when instead of his name, that of Solyman alone was heard among the acclamations of the Turkish soldiers marching into the town, the people of Tunis began to suspect the corsair’s treachery. Their suspicions being soon converted into certainty, they ran to arms, with the utmost fury, and surrounded the citadel, into which Barbarossa had led his troops. But having foreseen such a revolution, he was not unprepared for it; he immediately turned against them the artillery on the ramparts, and by one brisk discharge, dispersed the numerous but undirected assailants, and forced them to acknowledge Solyman as their sovereign, and to submit to himself as his viceroy.

His first care was to put the kingdom, of which he had thus got possession, in a proper posture of defence. He strengthened the citadel which commands the town; and fortifying the Goletta in a regular manner, at vast expense, made it the principal station for his fleet, and his great arsenal for military as well as naval stores. Being now possessed of such extensive territories, he carried on his depredations against the Christian states to a greater extent, and with more destructive violence than ever.

Daily complaints of the outrages committed by his cruisers were brought to the emperor by his subjects, both in Spain and Italy. All Christendom seemed to expect from him, as its greatest and most fortunate prince, that he would put an end to this new and odious species of oppression. At the same time Muley-Hascen, the exiled king of Tunis, finding none of the Mahometan princes in Africa willing or able to assist him in recovering his throne, applied to Charles (April 21, 1535 ), as the only person who could assert his rights in opposition to such a formidable usurper. The Emperor, equally desirous of delivering his dominions from the dangerous neighborhood of Barbarossa; of appearing as the protector of an unfortunate prince; and of acquiring the glory annexed in that age to every expedition against the Mahometans, readily concluded a treaty with Muley­Hascen, and began to prepare for invading Tunis. Having made trial of his own abilities for war in the late campaign in Hungary, he was now become so fond of the military character, that he determined to command on this occasion in person. The united strength of his dominions was called out upon an enterprise in which the emperor was about to hazard his glory, and which drew the attention of all Europe. A Flemish fleet carried from the ports of the Low-Country a body of German infantry; the galleys of Naples and Sicily took on board the veteran bands of Italians and Spaniards, which had distinguished themselves by so many victories over the French; the emperor himself embarked at Barcelona with the flower of the Spanish nobility, and was joined by a considerable squadron from Portugal, under the command of the Infant Don Lewis, the empress’s brother; Andrew Doria conducted his own galleys, the best appointed at that time in Europe, and commanded by the most skilful officers; the pope furnished all the assistance in his power towards such a pious enterprise; and the order of Malta, the perpetual enemies of the Infidels, equipped a squadron, which, though small, was formidable by the valor of the knights who served on board it. The port of Cagliari in Sardinia was the general place of rendezvous. Doria was appointed high admiral of the fleet; the command of the land forces under the emperor was given to the Marquis de Guasto.

On the sixteenth of July, the fleet, consisting of near five hundred vessels, having on board above thirty thousand regular troops, set sail from Cagliari, and after a prosperous navigation landed within sight of Tunis. Barbarossa having received early intelligence of the emperor's immense armament, and suspecting its destination, prepared with equal prudence and vigour for the defence of his new conquest. He called in all his corsairs from their different stations; he drew from Algiers what forces could be spared; he despatched messengers to all the African princes, Moors as well as Arabs, and by representing Muley-Hascen as an infamous apostate, prompted by ambition and revenge, not only to become the vassal of a Christian prince, but to conspire with him to extirpate the Mahomedan faith, he inflamed those ignorant and bigoted chiefs to such a degree, that they took arms as in a common cause. Twenty thousand horse, together with a great body of foot, soon assembled at Tunis, and by a proper distribution of presents among them from time to time, Barbarossa kept the ardor which had brought them together from subsiding. But as he was too well acquainted with the enemy whom he had to oppose, to think that these light troops could resist the heavy-armed cavalry and veteran infantry which composed the Imperial army, his chief confidence was in the strength of the Goletta, and in his body of Turkish soldiers, who were armed and disciplined after the European fashion. Six thousand of these, under the command of Sinan, a renegade Jew, the bravest and most experienced of all his corsairs, he threw into that fort, which the emperor immediately invested. As Charles had the command of the sea, his camp was so plen­tifully supplied not only with the necessaries, but with all the luxuries of life, that Muley-Hascen, who had not been accustomed to see war carried on with such order and magnificence, was filled with admiration of the emperor’s power. His troops, animated by his presence, and considering it as meritorious to shed their blood in such a pious cause, contended with each other for the posts of honor and danger. Three separate attacks were concerted, and the Germans, Spaniards, and Italians, having one of these committed to each of them, pushed them forward with the eager courage which national emulation inspires. Sinan displayed resolution and skill becoming the confidence which his master had put in him; the garrison performed the hard service on which they were ordered with great fortitude. But though he interrupted the besiegers by frequent sallies, though the Moon and Arabs alarmed the camp with their continual incursions; the breaches soon became so considerable towards the land, while the fleet battered those parts of the fortifications which it could approach, with no less fury and success, that an assault being given on all sides at once, the place was taken by storm [July 25]. Sinan, with the remains of his garrison, retired after an obstinate resistance, over a shallow part of the bay towards the city. By the reduction of the Goletta, the emperor became master of Barbarossa's fleet, consisting of eighty-seven galleys and galliots, together with his arsenal, and three hundred cannon, mostly brass, which were planted on the ramparts; a prodigious number in that age, and a remarkable proof of the strength of the fort, as well as of the greatness of the corsair’s power. The emperor marched into the Goletta, through the breach, and turning to Muley-Hascen who attended him, “Here”, says he, “is a gate open to you, by which you shall return to take possession of your dominions”.

Barbarossa, though he felt the full weight of the blow which he had received, did not, however, lose courage or abandon the defence of Tunis. But as the walls were of great extent, and extremely weak; as he could not depend on the fidelity of the inhabitants, nor hope that the Moors and Arabs would sustain the hardships of a siege, he boldly determined to advance with his army, which amounted to fifty thousand men, towards the Imperial camp, and to decide the fate of his kingdom by the issue of a battle. This resolution he communicated to his principal officers, and representing to them the fatal consequences which might follow, if ten thousand Christian slaves, whom he had shut up in the citadel, should attempt to mutiny during the absence of the army, he proposed as a necessary precaution for the public security, to massacre them without mercy before he began his march. They all approved warmly of his intention to fight; but inured as they were, in their piratical depredations, to scenes of bloodshed and cruelty, the barbarity of his proposal, concerning the slaves, filled them with horror; and Barbarossa, rather from the dread of irritating them, than swayed by motives of humanity, consented to spare the lives of the slaves.

By this time the emperor had begun to advance towards Tunis; and though his troops suffered inconceivable hardships in their march, over burning sands, destitute of water, and exposed to the intolerable heat of the sun, they soon came up with the enemy. The Moors and Arabs, emboldened by their vast superiority in number, immediately rushed on to the attack with loud shouts, but their undisciplined courage could not long stand the shock of regular battalions; and though Barbarossa, with admirable presence of mind, and by exposing his own person to the greatest dangers, endeavored to rally them, the rout became so general, that he himself was hurried along with them in their flight hack to the city. There he found everything in the utmost confusion; some of the inhabitants flying with their families and effects; others ready to set open their gates to the conqueror; the Turkish soldiers preparing to retreat; and the citadel, which in such circumstances might have afforded him some refuge, already in the possession of the Christian captives. These unhappy men, rendered desperate by their situation, had laid hold on the opportunity which Barbarossa dreaded. As soon as his army was at some distance from the town, they gained two of their keepers, by whose assistance knocking off their fetters, and bursting open their prisons, they overpowered the Turkish garrison, and turned the artillery of the fort against their former masters. Barbarossa, disappointed and enraged, exclaiming sometimes against the false compassion of his officers, and sometimes condemning his own imprudent compliance with their opinion, fled precipitately to Bona.

Meanwhile Charles, satisfied with the easy and almost bloodless victory which he had gained, and advancing slowly with the precaution necessary in an enemy's country, did not yet know the whole extent of his own good fortune. But at last, a messenger despatched by the slaves acquainted him with the success of their noble effort for the recovery of their liberty; and at the same time deputies arrived from the town, in order to present him the keys of their gates, and to implore his protection from military violence. While he was deliberating concerning the proper measures for this purpose, the soldiers, fearing that they should he deprived of the booty which they had expected, rushed suddenly, and without orders, into the town, and began to kill and plunder without distinction. It was then too late to restrain their cruelty, their avarice, or licentiousness. All the outrages of which soldiers are capable in the fury of a storm, all the excesses of which men can be guilty when their passions are heightened by the contempt and hatred which difference in manners and religion inspire, were committed. Above thirty thousand of the innocent inhabitants perished on that unhappy day, and ten thousand were carried away as slaves. Muley-Hascen took possession of a throne surrounded with carnage, abhorred by his subjects on whom he had brought such calamities, and pitied even by those whose rashness had been the occasion of them. The emperor lamented the fatal accident which had stained the luster of his victory; and amidst such a scene of horror there was but one spectacle that afforded him any satisfaction. Ten thousand Christian slaves, among whom were several persons of distinction, met him as he entered the town; and falling upon their knees, thanked and blessed him as their deliverer.

At the same time that Charles accomplished his promise to the Moorish king, of reestablishing him in his dominions, he did not neglect what was necessary for bridling the power of the African corsairs, for the security of his own subjects, and for the interest of the Spanish crown. In order to gain these ends, he concluded a treaty with Muley-Hascen on the following conditions; that he should hold the kingdom of Tunis in fee of the crown of Spain, and do homage to the emperor as his liege-lord; that all the Christian slaves now within his dominions, of whatever nation, should be set at liberty without ransom; that no subject of the emperor’s should for the future be detained in servitude; that no Turkish corsair should be admitted into the ports of his dominions; that free trade, together with the public exercise of the Christian religion, should be allowed to the emperor's subjects; that the emperor should not only retain the Goletta, but that all the other sea ports in the kingdom which were fortified should be put into his hands; that Muley-Hascen should pay annually twelve thousand crowns for the subsistence of the Spanish garrison in the Goletta; that he should enter into no alliance with any of the emperor’s enemies, and should present to him every year, as an acknowledgment of his vassalage, six Moorish horses, and as many hawks. Having thus settled the affairs of Africa; chastised the insolence of the corsairs; secured a safe retreat fox the ships of his subjects, and a proper station to his own fleets, on that coast from which he was most infested by piratical depredations; Charles embarked again for Europe [Aug. 17], the tempestuous weather, and sickness among his troops, not permitting him to pursue Barbarossa.

By this expedition, the merit of which seems to have been estimated in that age, rather by the apparent generosity of the undertaking, the magnificence with which it was conducted, and the success which crowned it, than by the importance of the consequences that attended it, the emperor attained a greater height of glory, than at any other period of his reign. Twenty thousand slaves whom he freed from bondage, either by his aims, or by his treaty with Muley-Hascen, each of whom he clothed and furnished with the means of returning to their respective countries, spread over all Europe the fame of their benefactor's munificence, extolling his power and abilities with the exaggeration flowing from gartitude and admiration. In comparison with him, the other monarchs in Europe made an inconsiderable figure. They seemed to be solicitous about nothing but their private and particular interests; while Charles, with an elevation of sentiment which became the first prince in Christendom, appeared to be concerned for the honor of the Christian name, and attentive to the public security and welfare.