Barbary Coast Stronghold Falls

Today’s installment concludes Franch Takes Algiers,
our selection from The Tricolor on the Atlas: or, Algeria and the French Conquest by Francis Pulszky published in 1854.

For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

Previously in Franch Takes Algiers.

Time: 1830
Place: Algiers

On the 1 8th some Arabs came stealthily to the French out posts, and disclosed to General Berthezene that he was to be attacked on the next day by all the forces of the Dey. One of them, a sheik of the Beni-Jad, told the General that the Arabs were tired of the war, and that his tribe was favorable to the French; he himself promised to pass over to them with all his followers. This promise was not fulfilled, but the predicted attack really took place. The battle was stoutly contested, es pecially by the Turks, yet the natives were everywhere routed, and lost many men. The struggle lasted long, for General Bourmont lingered in giving the order to attack. At last he mounted his horse and gave the signal, and the first two divisions advanced rapidly over the broken ground, covered with bushes. The Algerines fled; their artillery, camp, and baggage were taken, and with it the splendid tent of the aga, sixty feet long. This battle (called that of Staueli, from the name of the plain on which it was fought) cost the Dey from three thousand to four thousand men in dead and wounded; but the French, too, lost six hundred men. All the natives say that had the French continued the pursuit of their routed enemy, they could have immediately taken the city, as the troops fled in such unruly dis order and consternation that nobody thought of a serious de fence of the gates. But Bourmont remained faithful to his system of prudence and slow progress; he did not advance, and remained in Staueli up to June 24th.

Ibrahim Pacha, the commander of the Algerines, had lost his wits after the battle. He hid himself in his country-place, and did not dare to appear before his father-in-law, who sent the Moor Hamdan-ben-Othman-Khodja to him to cheer him up, in order to collect the remnants of the army. In the meantime the French entered into communication with one of the Arab tribes. The interpreter visited even one of their encampments and bought some oxen. The Arabs assured the French again that they felt weary of the war, and were ready to provide the French camp with victuals if protected against the revenge of the Turks, and principally if paid in cash. The French promised it; they were not yet aware of the character of this people, and put more trust in those overtures than they deserved. Bourmont exhorted the army to treat the Arabs kindly and honestly, as they were on the point of joining the French and fighting their oppressors the Turks. But a few days dispelled the delusion; on the 24th a new general attack was made on the French, both by Turks and by Arabs, who thought that the lingering of their enemies was a sign of weakness and cowardice. They were once more defeated, and yet the undecided Bourmont did not allow his men to pursue the enemy to the city.

The French army was occupied in building a solid highway for the convoy and baggage-wagons. The generals and engineers were so little accustomed to Arab war that they went forward only with the greatest prudence and circumspection. A few years later the most wanton rashness succeeded to the over anxious system of tarrying. While Bourmont required three weeks in summer to advance twenty-five miles on a field comparatively little broken, Marshal Clauzel undertook, in winter, 1836, an expedition to Constantine, across dangerous mountain-ridges and ravines, without having had the path reconnoitered. On the 28th a column of the enemy surprised a battalion of the Fourth Light-infantry Regiment, just in the act of cleaning their muskets, which they had unscrewed, and killed one hundred fifty of them, who were unable to make any resistance.

On the 29th the army advanced and occupied the heights and slopes of the Bujarea mountain, which commands the city and the forts of Algiers. The resistance of the enemy was not very serious, though they had now a more energetic commander than heretofore. The Dey, convinced by the failure of June 24th, of the incapacity of his son-in-law, had given the chief command to Mustapha-Bu-Mesrag, the Bey of Titteri, a courageous Turk. The trenches were at last opened on July 3d, and Admiral Duperre” appeared on the same day in the roadstead of Algiers. On the 4th the French batteries began their fire at once against the “Emperor’s Fort” and the Kasbah, the two principal defenses of the city. The Turkish batteries returned the shots with great energy for four hours. When, however, the majority of their cannons were dismounted and the walls riddled by the balls, the fire slackened, and was silenced toward noon. The Emperor’s Fort was evacuated, and its powder- magazine set on fire by order of the Dey. The explosion destroyed all the vaults and the inside walls. A few French companies immediately rushed forward and occupied the fort. They found three Turkish cannon still in good order; two French ones were carried into the fort, and with those five the fort Bab-a-Zun, on the shore, was fired upon and its batteries silenced. The fleet likewise attacked the fortifications on the sea side, but the fire made no impression on account of the distance.

Great consternation prevailed in the town after the fall of the Emperor’s Fort. The inhabitants, who dreaded the capture of the city by storm, and the disorder and outrages usual on such occasions, rushed in crowds to the Kasbah, and with great noise demanded that the Dey should capitulate. Hasan now sent his chief clerk to General Bourmont with the promise to pay the costs of war and to give any satisfaction. As the French General declined that proposal, the chief clerk, a worthless traitor, as were nearly all the grandees of that pirate State, offered to kill his master, saying that it would be easier to treat advantageously with the new Dey. But the French General, who had orders to extinguish the domination of the deys, rejected those proposals as incompatible with the honor of France.

Hasan Dey hereupon sent the Moors Achmet-Buderbah and Hamdan-ben-Othman-Khodja as negotiators to General Bourmont. Both were clever and cunning; they had lived a long time in Europe and spoke French with great facility. After a negotiation of about two hours a capitulation was brought about according to which the Kasbah and all the forts and gates of the city were to be delivered to the French army. The Dey was permitted to remove from the country with his family and his private property whither he pleased. An escort was to provide for his safety. The same concession was granted to the Turkish militia. On the other side, General Bourmont further pledged his honor to respect the religion, the personal freedom, property, commerce, and industry of the inhabitants. Hasan Dey accepted this capitulation, which was equivalent to an abdication.

On July 6th the French entered Algiers as victors; and their white flag, which soon was to change its color, was reared on the Kasbah and on the Emperor’s Fort. On the day after the capture of Algiers, General Bourmont, who soon afterward received the marshal’s baton, sent a column to Cape Matifu to take pos session of the stud and herds which were kept by the Dey on the Haush el Kantara (now Maison Carree) and Rassata (Rassota), two important crown domains. But Ahmet, the Bey of Constantine, had, on his return to his province, anticipated the French : he had plundered those two establishments, and the French found nothing but bare walls.

The army remained quietly in the neighborhood of Algiers up to July 23d. The destruction of the luxuriant gardens and handsome villas by the French took place in that time. Nobody knew then whether Algiers would be retained, and nobody cared for its future. The officers, therefore, remained indifferent when the first palms and orange-trees were felled by the axes of the soldiers, to be used for camp-fires. Gangs of French men broke into the neat villas, deserted by their frightened in habitants, and destroyed even the walls in the hope of finding hidden treasures. The traces of this vandalism are not yet all obliterated, especially on the Bujarea, where we often suddenly fall in with modern ruins in the midst of the finest gardens.

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