Part 10

But this is not intended to be an epitome of Templar history; rather a brief statement of the reasons why they went proudly and sometimes stoically to their final downfall, and why the Hospital Order, though not always keeping up to its earlier standards, nevertheless so far eclipsed them, as to become the recipients of very much of the Templars' enormous resources and wealth, being thought worthy to be thus entrusted. And so it happened that, in 1307, Philip of France had all the Templars in France arrested and their property sequestrated. This led to a tripartite dispute in which were involved the Templars, the Pope and the King. In 1310 fifty-four Templar Knights were burned alive in Paris. At last the Pope, to prevent their property from falling into secular hands, made over to the Hospitallers most of the Templar estates, excepting however those in Spain. The Grand Master Molay and another Templar were burned to death on an island in the Seine.

So much then in brief, for purposes of contrast. Now to the avowed subject of this paper.

During the seventeenth century there rose a controversy as to the foundation of a hospital already in existence in Jerusalem, named after the Asmorean prince John Hyrcanus, (the son and successor of Simon Maccabaeus, who restored the independence of Judea and founded a monarchy over which his descendants reigned till the accession of Herod. He died 105 B. C.). This was at a time when the pious merchants of Amalfi planned a refuge for their pilgrims. It was this John whom many suppose to have been the patron of the order, though it seems now clearly established that the first sponsor or the first St. John, in this connection, was the Greek patriarch John surnamed Eleëmon, or the Charitable, because of his practical philanthropy. (See "St. John the Almsgiver," Rev. H. T. F. Duckworth, 1901). But by the time the Crusaders, under Godfrey of Bouillon, had taken Jerusalem from the Saracens, St. John Baptist seems to have become the acknowledged patron saint of the hospital, his image being worn by epileptic patients, and being later adopted as the regular badge for those engaged in hospital work.

But this term hospital must not be regarded in its present acceptance; it was used in a broader sense to imply any house of refuge, even from wild animals; in fact a hospice.

This particular hospice seems to have been erected on the ruins of one founded by St. Gregory in 603, where it is known that the French Benedictines worked. Two centuries later Charlemagne had claimed the title of Protector of the Pilgrims. ("De Prime Origine Hospitaliorum," by La Roulx. Paris. 1885).

This institution was naturally located in close proximity to the most sacred places, which early Christian traditions made such to the pilgrims who came from all over Western Europe. It was in existence in 1099. It was made doubly necessary by not only the hardships of travel, but by the ill usage of the natives, at a time when the Holy City was in the hands of the Moslems, who demanded an entrance fee often beyond the pilgrims' means. Thus subjected to indignities indescribable, robbed often before their arrival, these misguided pilgrims often died of want, or returned with their primary pious object unattained. Had it not been for one Gerard, the first administrator of the hospice, their hardships had been even greater.

The buildings of the Order, at first meagre, were finally enlarged to cover a square, nearly 500 ft. on each side, with one side on the Via Dolorosa and another fronting the Bazaar, and all a little south of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Nearby were other churches and hospices. This was the arrangement before the establishment of the kingdom of Jerusalem in 1099. During the next century the Order, under Raymond du Puy, had enlarged the church of St. John Eleëmon into the conventual church of St. John Baptist, while along the south of the square above mentioned ran an excellent building, the hospital of St. John. When Saladin recaptured Jerusalem, in 1187, this church was converted by the Turks into a mad-house, known as the "Muristan," this being finally ceded to Germany in 1869.

From the new kingdom of Jerusalem the Hospitallers obtained a constitution, and the Gerard above mentioned was made their first "Master." He was succeeded in 1118 by du Puy, while Baldwin II was the Latin King of Jerusalem. The Hospital had been recognized by the Archbishop of Caesarea in 1112, and had widely extended its sphere of usefulness. It was King Baldwin who was anxious to stamp upon the Order a military character, similar to that conferred upon the Order of the Temple in 1130. This was natural since the kingdom was isolated, surrounded by fanatic enemies and always beset by and in danger from them. Thus the necessities of the times and the environment made it requisite that all who were able should bear arms, and coöperate for mutual defence.

Thus it came about that the Order was divided into three divisions, the first in rank being the Knights of Justice, each of whom must be of noble rank or birth, and have received the accolade of knighthood from secular authority. The second division comprised the ecclesiastics, who were later divided into two grades, the Conventual Chaplains, who were assigned to duty at headquarters, and the Priests of Obedience who served other priories and commanderies in various parts of Europe. The third grade were the Serving Brothers, also divided into the Servants at arms or Esquires, and the Servants at office. The Servants at arms attended the Knights of Justice as their Esquires, and might eventually become eligible to the first division. The Servants at office were little if anything more than menials or domestics. Even these latter, however, possessed certain privileges and emoluments which made admission to this grade advantageous to men of humble origin and faculties.

The dress of the Order was a black robe with cowl, having a white linen cross of eight points over the left breast, and was at first worn by all. Later, under Pope Alexander IV, the fighting knights wore their white crosses upon a ground gules.

The first recorded appearance of a body of Hospitaller knights in actual war was at Antioch, in 1119, while the complete military constitution of the Order of St. John was achieved in 1128. During the balance of the existence of the Kingdom of Jerusalem then, two colleges or companies of military monastic knights existed, side by side, in the Holy Land, the "chief props of a tottering throne." (Bedford). Between these rival bodies arose in time such jealousy, and within them such intrigues,--aggravated always by the animosities of the ordinary clergy, who took offense at the patronage bestowed upon the orders by the Popes, aggravated also by similar difficulties on the part of the knights of the Teutonic Order and that of St. Lazarus,--that the best interests of the kingdom and of the Church suffered as much from intestine dangers as from those arising from the Moslems surrounding them. Nevertheless it may be said that the Order of the Hospital never lost sight of its primary purposes, and never disgraced itself by the treasonable and treacherous dealings, and correspondence with enemies which disgraced not a few members of other and rival Christian organizations.

The result of such disreputable actions lead--as ever--to disunion and final disruption, and this to final capitulation and surrender of Jerusalem, in 1187. This meant the abandonment not only of their old home, but of their usefulness there. The Saracens occupied their buildings and premises from that time till ruin overtook them. Thus rudely compelled to emigrate the Order moved the same year (1187) to the town of Margat, where was also a castle of the same name. But the work in Jerusalem had not been abruptly discontinued, since Sultan Saladin, in evidence of his esteem, allowed them possession of their hospital for another year, in order that their charitable work should not be abruptly interrupted, and even made them liberal donations. When during the third Crusade, in which Richard Coeur de Lion bore so valiant a part, Ptolemais was captured, it was then and there that the Order established its headquarters, in 1192, wherefore the town became named St. Jean d'Acre. Here they abode nearly a century.

Various other towns in Palestine held out for a time against the Turks, e. g., Carac, Margat, Castel Blanco and Antioch, and in spite of the intense rivalry between the Orders, Thierry, the Grand Master of the Templars, reported in a letter to King Henry II, that the Hospitallers bore themselves even with fervor and the greatest bravery, and praised the aid they gave in the capture of the Turkish fleet, at Tyre, when seventeen Christian galleys manned by friars, and ten Sicilian vessels commanded by General Margarit, a Catalan, defeated the infidels, and captured their admiral and eight Emirs, with eleven ships, the rest being run aground, where Saladin later burned them, to keep them from falling into Christian hands. (Bedford).

Notwithstanding all this, however, the joint occupation of Acre with the Templars had a bad effect on both Orders, who turned not only to luxury and license, but their swords against each other. Acre was at this time a most cosmopolitan city; here mingled at least seventeen different nationalities and languages, each occupying its own part of the city, so that in time extravagance and lust flourished to the last degree of demoralization. The Hospitallers were at this time far more wealthy than the Templars, who were exceedingly jealous thereof, and both at Margat and still worse at Acre this jealousy was exhibited in many bloody affairs. Weakened thus by this intestine strife they were in reverse proportion strengthened. The Pope who had defended them as against the scathing censure of Emperor Frederick, found need, in 1238, to accuse the knights--alike of both orders--of sheltering loose women within their precincts, of owning individual property, both of these in violation of their vows of chastity and poverty, and of treacherously assisting the enemy. Yet many bore witness to the actual good they accomplished, even at this time. In 1259 Pope Alexander, bewailing the lack of a more distinctive dress, permitted the decree that the fighting knights might wear black mantles, while in war they were permitted to wear red surcoats, with a white cross.

Later it was permitted to women to join the Order, and many ladies of high degree took advantage of the permission, rivalling in religious zeal and in charitable deeds the most sanctified of the brethren. As the King of Hungary wrote, at one time, after visiting some of their houses, "In a word the Knights of St. John are employed, sometimes like Mary in contemplation, and sometimes like Martha in action, and this noble militia consecrate their days either in their infirmaries or else in engagements against the enemies of the cross."

The deterioration of Acre was not so great as to make cowards of our Knights, however, and with the continued and aggressive siege laid by the Saracens against that city the Hospitallers and the Templars finally made common cause, each endeavoring to outdo the other in deeds of bravery and daring. Though defeated again and again, the Moslem ranks were renewed by fresh soldiers, while the militant and other monks imprisoned within the city saw their combined members steadily diminish. At last it remained for John Villiers, Grand Master, with his few surviving fighters, to carve their way to their boats, leaving no combatants behind them, and then to embark in their galleys to seek a harbor of refuge in the island of Cyprus.

Cyprus and Rhodes. Settled in Cyprus, the Knights renewed their zeal and their resources. Here they began to build that fleet of galleys which, increased later in Rhodes, became most formidable. When they and the Templars left forever the Holy Land the Templars took the position that their vow to protect the holy places was now either fulfilled or at least at an end, and they distributed themselves among their numerous preceptories all over Europe, where they made themselves personae non gratae to their civil rulers, because of their own real power, their oriental ostentation, and their secularization and distasteful entrance into and interference with the social and political life and customs of their new environment. Things went from bad to worse, public feeling was more and more aroused, and their extermination was only a matter of time. Finally Pope Clement V and King Phillip le Bel undertook this task with barbarous ruthlessness. Kings, nobility and the people joined hands in the common task. The Templars had acquired various properties, by capture, by bequest, and in every lawful and unlawful manner, which yielded in the aggregate relatively enormous revenues, too strong a temptation for needy secular rulers to resist. The Pope had at last to intervene in order to prevent the total secularization of all this great spoil, and thus it happened that no small proportion of it was, after its sequestration, allotted to the Order of St. John, whose Grand Masters and Knights had not forgotten nor abandoned their original vows and purposes, and who held that the inviolacy of their obligations required their continuous residence in some such oriental city as Rhodes.

And here we may part company, as did they, only quite peacefully, with the Templar Knights. Driven from Europe they made their last stand in Great Britain, and of their lives and deeds there we have no more readable nor interesting historical account than Scott has given us in Ivanhoe. Any further allusion to them here will be most casual. They offer the conventional picture, only in extenso, of original poverty and self-abnegation, coupled with devotion and valor, changed to arrogance, treason, abandonment of purpose, unbridled lawlessness leading to crime and cruelty, all brought about because of affluence, acquired power, selfishness, cupidity and every debasing human weakness. Small wonder then, that they could be no longer tolerated in Christendom.

So turn we again to the Hospitallers, now made rich and powerful at the expense of their old rivals and at last enemies. It had soon been made evident that Cyprus did not meet their wants and necessities. Its king was not over friendly, and they sought further. Their gaze fixed on the island of Rhodes, which possessed a fertile soil, a city with an excellent harbor, not too far from the main land, i. e. not too isolated, which was under the--by that time merely nominal--suzerainty of the Emperor of the Eastern or Greek empire. After several futile efforts they at last, in 1310, under the twenty-fourth Grand Master Villaret, captured the island, where under their ceaseless energy both hospitals and forts were built. To Rhodes were brought also Christian refugees from the various Turkish provinces, and thus their numbers were rapidly strengthened. Their fleet, already begun (vide supra) was greatly increased, and with it they had many a conflict with the Turkish corsairs, whose inroads they practically checked.

About the beginning of the fourteenth century changes had been made in the Order, which was now divided into Langues, or arranged according to nationalities, yet without materially altering the original division into the three classes (Knights, Chaplains and Serving Brothers). In this way the Order was apportioned between seven nations or languages, Provence, Auvergne, France, Italy, Aragon, England and Germany. Finally under pressure from Spain the Langue of Aragon was divided into two, Aragon and Castile, the latter including Portugal. The various dignities and offices were divided among these langues, whose principals became a kind of Privy Council to the Grand Master, and were known as Conventual Bailiffs. They were given different names in each country; thus the Grand Commander of the English langue was known as the Turcopolier, of France the Grand Hospitaller, of Italy the Admiral, etc. As the new fortifications arose around the city of Rhodes, each was placed in charge of one of these langues or divisions, while each erected quarters for its own men. It did not follow, however, that every member of each langue came from the country which it represented. While Scotland was an independent kingdom it contributed to the Turcopolier, while many Scotchmen belonged to the French or even the other langues. At this time the inhabitants of the City of Rhodes consisted largely of Christian refugees, who owed their security, even their lives, to the fact that the Knights Hospitaller still adhered to their primary objects, the liberation of the captive and giving assistance to the sick and distressed. This they afforded through their fleet and their hospices. When Smyrna nearly fell into the hands of Timour the Tartar, about the middle of the fourteenth century, the Order strengthened their harbor by erecting a new fort, which they named Budrum (corrupted from Petros-a Rock), where any Christian escaping from slavery found shelter. Here was also kept a remarkable breed of dogs, who were trained not only as watch dogs but to render services similar to those afforded by the Alpine dogs of St. Bernard.

As time went on the Sultans became more and more jealous of the naval power possessed by the Order. With the fall of the Eastern Empire and the final retaking of Constantinople by Mahomet II, in 1453 (See "Prince of India"), it was made evident that danger to the Order from this direction was rapidly increasing. This became so urgent that in 1470, after Mahomet had taken the island of Negropont, the Grand Master commanded that all members of the Order should repair at once to Rhodes. In 1476 d'Aubusson began the most active measures for the defense of the place, and thus was ready for the attack, in May, 1480, when 80,000 men in 160 ships, landed on the island coast. In this siege no small part was played by renegade traitors, the most prominent being one George Frapant, a German, whom the Grand Master finally hung in July. In the last sorties which terminated this siege deeds of the greatest bravery were performed; yet here we can only commemorate the fact that the Turks were summarily defeated, leaving 3,500 corpses on the ground after the last decisive attack. The losses of the besieged were small as compared with those suffered by the Turks.

Later in the same year the island suffered from a severe earthquake. Mahomet died not long after this, was succeeded by his son Bo-jazet who made truce with the Order, presenting them with a relic of supposedly inestimable value, namely the hand of St. John, which the Turks had taken at Constantinople.

Years of comparative quietude succeeded until in the following century, in 1522, Solyman the Magnificent landed upon the island in July, with 100,000 soldiers and 60,000 pioneers. Again ensued all the horrors of a siege. The defenders did their part so bravely that the Sultan publicly disgraced his generals. But the inevitable famine wrought consequent disaffection on the part of the native population, who clamored for capitulation, and sought treasonable terms therefor, because of which one of the most prominent of them was tried, found guilty and executed. Finally under stress of circumstances no longer endurable Grand Master Adam agreed to honorable surrender, and on the first of January, 1523, the Hospitaller Knights relinquished the island, the Sultan himself speaking in terms of extravagant praise of their heroism, while at the same time he scathingly censured the Christian monarchs of Europe who had failed to come to their relief. Thus after two hundred and twenty years of occupation and rule of the island of Rhodes, some 5,000 Knights and other members of the Order, and natives, left it to take abode for a short time in their Priory at Messina. Driven from here by plague, they moved on to Viterbo, while their Grand Master travelled in search of a new home.

Malta. Malta had been early proposed for this purpose, and offered by Charles V, while many wishes turned to the city of Modon, in Greece. After seven years of wandering and indecision Grand Master L'Isle Adam accepted Malta as the best solution of the difficulty. Thither the Order now removed, and there Adam died in the Castle of St. Angelo, erected by the Norman Count Roger of Sicily, still active in improving its existing defences. In 1555 the Order lost nearly all of its fleet in consequence of a violent hurricane, which accident for a while laid the island open to piratical attacks, especially of a corsair named Dragut; but he did little damage, save that with the knowledge of the island and its defences thus gained he persuaded Solyman to undertake another attempt to crush the Order, the latter being justly furious because some galleys belonging to the Order had captured a ship that happened to be loaded with rich valuables belonging to the ladies of his harem. Therefore war was again declared in 1565.

The Turkish fleet was made up of 130 galleys with 50 smaller boats, and carried the Janissaries and 34,000 other soldiers, against whom the Grand Master could only oppose some 9,000 men, 700 of whom, however, were desperate men, released from the galleys of the enemy, and eager for vengeance. On May twenty-fourth the siege of St. Elmo was in reality begun by a fierce bombardment, the walls being soon battered, and the garrison forced to take shelter in excavations made in the solid rock. And now the besiegers' force was augmented by the arrival of Dragut, in those days the dreaded corsair of the sea, who came with thirteen more ships and 1,500 more men. June thirteenth saw a desperate conflict when, after six hours of fierce fighting and the loss of only 300 men, the besiegers were repulsed. Soon after this Dragut was killed. Again on June twenty-third another general attack was repulsed, though the garrison was thereby reduced to 60 men. Even this small force, many crippled and maimed, repulsed the first onslaught of the Turks, but had later to sell their lives as dearly as they could.

The Turkish general Mustapha took barbarous revenge, even on the corpses of the Knights which he decapitated and then tied to planks that they might float past St. Angelo. La Vallette retaliated by beheading some of his captives and firing their heads at the Turks from his cannon.

At this juncture the garrison was reinforced by the arrival of 700 men and 42 Knights from Sicily. Refusing all opportunities to surrender and all parley under flags of truce, Grand Master La Vallette built new defences and strengthened the old, in spite of a fierce July sun. Meanwhile the Turks, also reinforced, prepared for still more desperate sorties, selecting for the land attack men who knew not how to swim, in order that they might fight the more fiercely, and drawing off the boats as soon as their loads were emptied, so that no retreat could be possible. One thousand Janissaries were embarked in ten large barges, but nine of these were sunk by the artillery fire from the forts. On the other side of the defences a large attacking column was completely routed. The loss to the Turks this day was 3,000 men, that of the garrison 250.

And so the siege went on; attack after attack, with but small success to the investing army. But the heroic defenders suffered increasingly under the constant strain, and both armies were exhausted, the Turks losing 800 men from dysentery alone. To such an extent was this true that when the Turkish officers drove their soldiers to the charge by blows of their own swords, it was but necessary to cut down those who led the charges, when the rest would turn and fly.