1571: Naval Battle of Lepanto
Naval battles tend to be far more decisive than land battles. The cost of the ships combined with the possibility of having them sunk or captured to aid the enemy weighed heavy on a nation’s finances. It took hundreds to crew and fight on a ship. Even in ancient times, we see casualties in the hundreds of thousands. So, when the Christian states finally prepared for a decisive blow to Ottoman power, a naval battle made the most sense.
The formation of the Holy League occurred under the call of Pope Pius V to rescue the last great fortress on Cyprus, Famagusta. Famagusta would be under siege for nearly a year as 200,000 Ottomans kept up steady bombardments and assaults against the 10,000-man Venetian garrison. A massive fleet was formed from the nations of Venice, Spain, Genoa, the Knights of Malta, the Papal States, and others.
As the fleet assembled, the Venetians at Famagusta had no choice but to surrender with promise of safe passage to Crete. The Ottoman commander had lost up to 50,000 men and his own son during the siege, however, and changed his mind on the terms. The Christians were accused of butchering Muslims and a retaliatory slaughter of the Christians began. The Venetian commander, Bragadin, was humiliated and tortured. He was skinned alive and his flayed skin was stuffed with straw and sent to the Sultan as a trophy.
This horrible breaking of terms of surrender and brutal execution infuriated the Christians and they sent out with bad intentions. The fleet of 212 ships met the Ottoman fleet of 251 ships in the Gulf of Corinth near Patras. The Holy League ships were newer and had more guns and cannons while the Ottomans still used lots of bowmen, though they were experienced enough to match the gunpowder weapons of the day.
As battle-lines formed the wind was against the Christians, who couldn’t quite get their right flank into position before the battle formed. Fearing a wide flanking attack, the commander of the Christian right sailed away to counter such a move as the rest of the forces clashed. The Christian left was closest to the coast and skirted the shallows to get into the best positions on a ship-by-ship basis.
Both commanders near the coast were killed as ships smashed into each other and hand to hand fighting raged. The center was even worse as multiple ships collided together to create massive, uneven platforms for a pseudo-land battle. Sections of ships sunk as other broken vessels miraculously stayed afloat despite having half of another ship rammed through the hull.
As most Turkish ships were rowed by Christian slaves, the Christian freed these men as soon as they were able. These slaves, certainly including former soldiers, immediately joined the fighting, easily turning the tide on the tangled bunches of ships as the average ship had hundreds of rowers yearning to be free and join the fight. All was nearly won on the Christian left.
The Christian right was a different story. Going further right to prevent a flank attack created a gap that the Ottoman dove into. The charge threatened to collapse the Christian center, but they barely held on. much credit was given to the Venetians in the league, fighting with unnerving ferocity considering the atrocities committed at Famagusta.
Eventually, the victories on the Christian left and the holding of the center won the battle for the Holy League. Stray Ottoman ships fought into the night, most notably those crewed by Janissaries who reportedly threw food at Christian ships when they ran out of ammunition.
The Ottomans would lose almost 200 ships and most of their experienced archers and Janissaries. The power of the Ottoman Empire was still immense, however; no Ottoman territories would be won over by the Holy League after their great victory and a new Ottoman fleet was quickly constructed. But the battle was still a crushing defeat, costing the Empire a great deal especially considering the construction of a new fleet from scratch. The victory didn’t give the Christian powers any territory but prevented any Ottoman expansion in the West for the time.