The Sultan's Admiral (10 page)

In June that same year, the ruler of Tenez, a fair-sized city and port about ninety miles west of Algiers, raised the countryside against the Turks and marched eastwards against them. His own force is said to have consisted of ten thousand regular troops, backed up by local cavalry, while many of the mountain tribes who acknowledged his sovereignty joined in to swell his numbers. Many of the Moors, Arabs, and other inhabitants of North Africa were already beginning to realise that the Turks represented a far greater threat to their independence and to their established way of life than did the Spaniards. The latter, after all, were only concerned with maintaining garrisons at fixed points along the coast, and had shown no desire to extend their empire into North Africa proper. But it was already clear in what direction the Turks’ ambitions were moving. It was also abundantly clear that so long as there were Turkish forces on the coastline the Spaniards would be unlikely to leave North Africa in peace.

Aruj wasted no time, but set off immediately to meet his enemies in the field. Algiers could almost certainly have resisted a siege, even if his enemies had been armed with cannon. But to sit back and wait for an attack was not in his nature. Leaving Khizr behind to maintain the city, he took about 1500 Turks and Spanish Moors with him, all trained arquebusiers, and marched swiftly westwards to catch his opponents just as they were crossing a small river. Against the trained marksmen in Aruj’s force the hordes of desert cavalry and partially armed foot soldiers from Tenez had little or no chance. They were mown down in their hundreds, and soon the rest were in full flight, the ruler of Tenez amongst them. Again Aruj did not delay, but set off by forced marches after the beaten enemy—entering Tenez itself just as its prince was escaping with his followers to take refuge in the hills. Having given the town over to plunder, Aruj recalled the inhabitants, promised them his protection, and had himself proclaimed Sultan of Tenez.

It was a swift and brilliant campaign; a model of how to conduct a defensive action by immediately taking the offensive. It was clear that quite apart from their advantage in possessing modern weapons, the Turks had no military rivals in North Africa. They possessed the prime requirement of the soldier—an aggressive spirit.

As evidence that this spirit not only wins battles but also wins over any neighbours who may be wavering in their loyalties, a deputation now reached Aruj from Tlemcen. This was an important town and trading post, some seventy miles inland by road from Spanish-dominated Oran. Dissatisfied with their present ruler, the chief citizens offered Tlemcen and its surrounding territory to Aruj if he would help them. Naturally Aruj was far from unwilling—an important city dominating the hinterland and a permanent threat to Oran was much to his taste—but he was not foolhardy. Knowing that the Spanish Governor of Oran might well move against him and cut him off from his coastal route to Algiers, he despatched a message to Khizr. The latter was requested to bring round to Tenez by sea ten light cannon, ammunition, and other supplies.

Thus reinforced with cannon that could be used if necessary in a siege, and if not, against troops in the field, Aruj moved rapidly against Tlemcen. It was nearly two hundred miles from Tenez; it was midsummer; and his troops had been almost continually under arms since he had left Algiers in June. It is a tribute to their fitness and their fighting spirit that when they encountered the ruler of Tlemcen together with a force almost three times their own, the Turks were ready for immediate battle. Aruj’s foresight in bringing along the field guns was amply rewarded. The native troops, most of whom had never been under cannon fire before, turned and fled. In September 1517 Aruj entered the city of Tlemcen in triumph. In front of him went the head of its late ruler, borne before the conqueror on a lance.

With the exception of Oran and the fortress on the island off Algiers, as well as a few other defence points on the coast, Aruj was now master of almost all the territory that constitutes modem Algeria. With his brother at Algiers in command of the coast, and himself at Tlemcen in command of the interior, the Barbarossas were in a position to deal with any trouble that might arise among the native tribesmen. With a view to securing Tlemcen as his main inland base, Aruj acted as he had done at Algiers: he made sure that the leading citizens contributed not only to his coffers, but also to the defences of their city. During the winter of 1517-18 the citadel and the walls were expanded and renewed, for Aruj was well aware that he might soon have to face an attack mounted by the Spaniards from Oran.

In the meantime, he despatched emissaries to the rulers of Fez and Tunis. He was now in a position to treat with them as an equal. Having made himself Sultan of Middle Barbary, he naturally wished to have friendly relationships on his east and west boundaries. He promised both Fez and Tunis that he would be their ally against their common enemy, the Christians, while he added the additional clause for the ruler of Fez that he would assist him against the latter’s main enemy, the King of Morocco. That winter was the high point of Aruj Barbarossa’s career. Starting from nothing but two small galleots in 1504, he and a handful of fellow Turks had made themselves a power upon the sea. He himself was now master of a kingdom that was in no way inferior to any in North Africa. Indeed, by concentrating upon the Algerian coastline, he had secured not only one of the most prosperous agricultural areas but the one which was in the best position to harass Spain and dominate the east-west trade route of the Mediterranean. He was now Sultan of Tlemcen, Tenez, and Shershell—and recognised as Ruler of Algiers, with the official title of Beylerbey, by Selim the Grim, Sultan of all the Ottoman Empire. It was no mean achievement.

While the brothers were busy in Tlemcen and Algiers, the Governor of Oran, the Marquis of Comares, had set out for Spain to wait upon the new King, Charles I of Spain (later the Emperor Charles V). The Marquis pointed out the desperate situation that now obtained in North Africa. The garrison fort in Algiers was virtually cut off, and only Oran was under full Spanish control. “Before the Barbarossa brothers were able to gain complete control of their kingdom,” the Marquis urged, “now was surely time to unseat them.” In a year or more, they might be virtually unassailable, and they would be in a position to cut off Oran itself by land and sea. Not unnaturally, the seventeen-year-old monarch saw a brilliant opening to his career in extirpating these Turks from the coastline and ports that threatened his country and its trade. Orders were given for an expedition to be prepared over that winter. It was to sail in early spring to secure Oran, and to drive the Turks clean out of the country.

Aruj had word of what was under way, and sent a despatch to the Sultan of Fez asking his help against the Spaniards. He was well aware that he had neither the men, the cannon, nor the equipment to hold out in Tlemcen against a large and disciplined force. But the Sultan prevaricated and delayed. He had his own problems on his Moroccan border. Besides, like other North African rulers, he was not entirely happy with the presence of these Turks, who seemed to have a habit of helping themselves to Sultanates while at the same time provoking the retribution of Spain. When the spring came and the Spanish fleet, with troopships laden with about ten thousand veterans, had reached Oran and disembarked, the Sultan had still failed to send any help to his new ally.

Aruj found himself with 1500 men (his Turkish and Morisco arquebusiers) in Tlemcen, two hundred miles from Algiers, and with a large army advancing inland to lay siege to the city. He was in little doubt that, despite the hard work of the winter, the defences of Tlemcen would not hold out against the siege artillery of the Spaniards. When it was quite clear that there were only two alternatives, to stay and die in Tlemcen, or to retreat,

Aruj set out overnight for Algiers. By forced marches, and using his intimate knowledge of the country, he hoped to break through to the coastal roads and get safely within the walls of Algiers before the Spaniards could catch up with him. For once he had delayed too long. He had, perhaps, made a mistake that he had never in his life made before—he had relied on help from another. It is difficult to believe that he would have delayed so long at Tlemcen if he had not confidently expected reinforcements from the Sultan of Fez to come in from the west and cut off the Spaniards from their base at Oran.

The Marquis of Comares got wind of the Turks’ departure from Tlemcen, and knowing that Aruj would certainly march northeast to get through the mountain valleys in the direction of the sea, he swung his forces swiftly in that direction. Leaving some of his infantry to follow on behind, he mounted all he could on captured Moorish horses. Then, together with his regular cavalry, he set off in hot pursuit. He came in sight of the Turks about thirty miles east of Tlemcen. They were heading for a river, one of those precipitous, gorgelike wadis which are often as dry as dust in summer but which still have a good flow of water through them in spring. Aruj quickened his pace in order to reach the far side, from which he might be able to prevent the enemy crossing. It is said that in order to delay the Spaniards he even resorted to that age-old stratagem (first used by Hippome-nes, Atalanta’s suitor, when he dropped behind him the golden apples of the Hesperides) and scattered in his flight gold, gem stones, and other treasure amassed from Tenez and Tlemcen. This ruse, says the Spanish chronicler somewhat smugly, “might have passed, had it been practised upon any others but Spaniards.” But, as Morgan relates, the Spaniards, urged on by the Marquis, “trampled under foot that for which all the world goes by the ears, and soon fell in with the enemy’s rear.”

Aruj and half of his force had already forded the river and established themselves on the eastern bank when the Spanish cavalry came up with the Turks who were still descending the further slopes. Aruj was ever a brave man, and he would not stay in safety while the men who had been his companions for many years were being slaughtered. He recrossed the river, gathered them round him, and stationed them on a small hillock that dominated the fording place. There the Turks “turning their faces and breasts to the enemy, like men determined to die bravely” made their last stand. Among them, Aruj, “though he had but one arm, fought to the very last gasp like a lion.” It was an end such as a man of his calibre would have sought:

… Not in curtained solemnity die

Among women who chatter and cry and children 

who mumble a prayer.

So died Aruj Barbarossa, son of a janissary and a Greek woman, born in Lesbos, resident for fourteen years in North Africa, and the founder of the Kingdom of Algiers. Morgan’s eighteenth-century English translation catches something of the flavour of Abbot Haedo’s tribute, and it must always be remembered that the latter not only knew men who had served with Aruj, was himself a long-time resident in Algiers, but that he was, above all, a Spanish Catholic. This tribute, then, from one who had every reason to detest the Barbarossas, is all the more convincing: “Aruj Barbarossa, according to the testimony of those who remember him, was, when he died, about forty-four years of age. He was not very tall of stature, but extremely well-set and robust. His hair and beard perfectly red; his eyes quick, sparkling and lively; his nose aquiline, or Roman;-and his complexion between brown and fair. He was a man excessively bold, resolute, daring, magnanimous, enterprising, profusely liberal, and in no wise bloodthirsty, except when in the heat of battle, nor rigorously cruel except when disobeyed. He was highly beloved, feared and respected by his soldiers and domestics, and when dead was by them all in general most bitterly regretted and lamented. He left neither son nor daughter. He resided in Barbary fourteen years; during which the harms he did to the Christians are inexpressible.”

Not all the Turks who had crossed to the far side of the river had Barbarossa’s courage and resolution to return and make an end in the company of their comrades. Some of them fought their way back through that harsh and difficult countryside until they reached the safety of Algiers.

The crimson brocade cloak which Aruj was wearing when he was killed was later taken to the episcopal see of Cordova, a city that owes its distinction to the Moorish architects who had dignified and beautified it during their occupation of Spain. Here, in the cathedral which had formerly been the largest sacred building in Islam (except for the Kaaba at Mecca), it was turned into a cloak for Saint Bartholomew. It was still to be seen in the eighteenth century on the saint’s image, and was known locally as La Capa de Barbarossa. Tlemcen was restored by the Spaniards to a local ruler, on condition that he paid an annual fee of vassalage of 12,000 golden ducats, twelve Arab horses, and six falcons to the King of Spain.

A Spanish lieutenant, Garcia de Tineo, is said to have been the one who finally struck down the old sea wolf with a pike thrust, and afterwards cut off his head. Duro relates that his family were subsequently allowed to incorporate the head of Barbarossa in their coat of arms. Even his enemies considered that Barbarossa was worthy of epic treatment, for he was the subject of an eighteenth-century Spanish heroic poem and, as late as the nineteenth century, of a stage tragedy. The King of Fez did finally arrive to aid his new ally—fifteen days too late. He had with him, according to one account, 20,000 men. However inefficiently armed and undisciplined, it is almost certain that such a force would have been more than enough to cut off the Spaniards from their base at Oran and deliver the whole area safely and forever into Moslem hands. But, hearing on the borders of Algeria what had happened to Aruj and his Turks, “he hastened away for fear of the Spaniards and their allies.” “Put not your trust in princes.” It was a mistake that cost Aruj his life.

The death of Aruj was a bitter blow to the Turks, but it was by no means the disaster that it would have been had it occurred a few years earlier. They were now firmly established throughout North Africa, from Djerba to Tenez, and the Sultan in Constantinople had already seen what advantages could accrue to his empire by having his left flank in the hands of fellow Turks. There is little doubt that, even before Aruj’s death, there had been friendly and regular communications between the Sublime Porte and the Barbarossa brothers. Automatically, the mantle of high command now fell upon the able shoulders of Khizr. He had learned much from his brother in the past fourteen years, and he was soon to show that he had every bit as much aptitude for war, and even more for negotiation, politics, and—ultimately—for statesmanship.