FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   31   32   33   34   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55  
56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   >>   >|  
ng the seamen's wages. Unexpected boldness was forced upon them on the 25th of April. "I am now in a position," wrote Lord Cochrane to General Church at eight o'clock in the morning from the Piraeus, "to carry you all over to the rear of the enemy, if Karaiskakes's army have the courage to walk to this point, which is in their own possession, in order to land on the opposite shore at two hundred yards distance, and whereon is not a living soul. I can make such a diversion by means of the seamen at night as would enable Karaiskakes's army to move on by land towards the Phalerum, whilst those on the Phalerum, with the exception of a few, might take up a position near Athens or in the town. I can embark you and yours, and leave Karaiskakes's men without food, taking all the provisions to the advanced post, leaving him to starve or come on." That desperate expedient was averted. Two or three hours after suggesting it, Lord Cochrane was superintending the debarkation of some thirty soldiers, under cover of two gunboats. A party of Ottomans, seeing the operation, hurried down with the intention of harassing the new comers. Lord Cochrane's Hydriots, however, rushed to the rescue. Other Turkish troops came up, to be met by other Greeks, and the battle became general. Lord Cochrane, with nothing but his telescope in his hand, gathered the Christian troops round him, and, with encouraging words, led them on in an orderly attack upon the entrenchments about the monastery of Saint Spiridion. Within an hour, nine entrenchments were in the hands of the Greeks, who lost only eight men. Sixty Turks were slain, and then their comrades fled, most of them hurrying up to the camp of Athens, a few betaking themselves to the convent. "The Greeks," wrote Lord Cochrane to the Government, "have this day done as their forefathers were wont to do. Henceforth commences a new era in the system of modern Grecian warfare. If every one behaves to-morrow as all, without exception, have behaved to-day, the siege of the Acropolis will be raised and the liberty of Greece secured." By this success the Turks, with exception of the garrison in the convent, were driven back to the neighbourhood of Athens, and Karaiskakes was encouraged to remove his camp from Keratsina to the Piraeus. At a council of war held the same evening Lord Cochrane urged a sudden and united attack upon the Turkish camp on the morrow. Karaiskakes, however, declined to move a ste
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   31   32   33   34   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55  
56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Cochrane

 

Karaiskakes

 

exception

 

Athens

 

Greeks

 

Phalerum

 

morrow

 

entrenchments

 

attack

 
position

troops
 

seamen

 

Turkish

 
convent
 

Piraeus

 

comrades

 
telescope
 

gathered

 
Christian
 

general


battle
 

encouraging

 

Within

 

Spiridion

 

orderly

 

monastery

 

neighbourhood

 

encouraged

 

remove

 

driven


garrison

 

Greece

 

secured

 
success
 

Keratsina

 

sudden

 

united

 
declined
 

evening

 
council

liberty
 
raised
 

Henceforth

 

commences

 

forefathers

 

betaking

 

Government

 

system

 
modern
 

behaved