That Greece Might Still Be Free the Philhellenes in the War of Independence
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William St Clair That Greece Might Still Be Free The Philhellenes in the War of Independence From reviews of the first edition: ‘A brilliant and bitter history’. Richard Holmes, The Times ‘an author who aspires to the highest standards of scholarship and prose. the last word on its subject and likely to remain so for many years’. Sunday Telegraph ‘a magnificent narrative based on thorough research and careful judgment’. The Guardian ‘Mr. St Clair looks at the war as it involved the philhellenes. whose names are now associated with the myth of the glorious fight for Greek Freedom. His diligent and wide research has paid a rich dividend. He has added to the book’s value by including many portraits, paintings, and maps’. The Economist ‘tells their melancholy story with sardonic relish and lucid scholarship. Like his previous book on ‘Lord Elgin and the Marbles’ it is a brilliant and elegant performance that puts all previous work in the shade’. C.M. Woodhouse, The Observer One can pick a hero figure out of almost page of a classical dictionary, and without this magic appeal of antiquity it is improbable that Greece would have obtained independence so early in the century. As William St Clair points out in “That Greece Might Still Be Free” the bloody revolt of the Serbs against the Turks in 1808 aroused no interest in Western Europe. Yet when the Greek revolution broke out in 1821 Philhellene foreigners volunteered by the shipload to join a non-existent Greek army’. Daily Telegraph 'Mr. St Clair's study of the philhellenes in the Greek revolution is noteworthy for its sprightly narrative and vivid biographical sketches. the implausible yet fascinating activities of assorted opportunists, idealists, impostors, adventurers, and secret agents. Their collective impact on the course of events was by no means negligible and so far as the Western public was concerned, they were involved in a cause that roused deeper passions than any similar event until the Spanish Civil War more than a century later’. American Historical Review ‘he hates the sentimental bosh and unreal idealism which drew so many young men to needless and squalid deaths; which dresses up bandit chiefs in heroic costumes. His heroes are the Americans who, at the end of the war, brought relief to the starving Greek population’. Irish Independent ‘These philhellenes are Mr St Clair’s subject, and he goes beyond it to give us an excellent history of the war and a vivid picture of emergent Greece. His book is thoroughly researched, written with elegance and trenchancy, and altogether fascinating to read. The dominant theme is the contrast between the philhellenic vision of Greece and the Greek reality’. New Statesman For the student of Greek or European history this book is most valuable: furthermore no Greek library should be without a copy’. Greek Review ‘William St Clair, we may be sure from the non-punch-pulling exposure he has previously made of the history of Lord Elgin and the acquisition of the Parthenon marbles, is no writer to conceal unglamorous truth with smooth and even frayed face-saving formulae for ‘his own side’. Detached, he has repeated this tonic process—the just consideration of historic fact. It is a fine piece of dispassionate writing about the well-intentioned, the blundering, the effective, the interested and the often calamitous assistance given to the new-born and yet-battling State, between 1821 and 1829’. Athens Daily Post ‘Mr St Clair has dug deep into much primary source material: English, French, German, Swedish, American, Swiss, Danish and Italian; he has produced a brilliant and well-nigh unsurpassable book’. Asia and Africa Review ‘a readable and scholarly contribution to modern Greek history which should prove useful to all but the smallest libraries’. Library Journal ‘It is a book no Greek house should or can miss. Every historical page of the Nation belongs to us’. Hellenic News, Montreal [trans.] ‘It is both a fascinating study in itself and a valuable account of the background to Byron’s last adventure’. The Year’s Work in English Studies ‘The author is best, however, at describing the clash of “European” and “Eastern” cultures’. Slavic Review ‘Mr St Clair’s narrative is exceptionally lucid and entertaining; it has momentum and just enough of the tincture of irony. .This is a book which impressed me with the foolishness of striding around in history, or in day to day affairs, history as it is going on, in clumsy mental boots’. Geoffrey Grigson, Country Life THAT GREECE MIGHT STILL BE FREE William St Clair, FBA, FRSL, is Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of English Studies, School of Advanced Study, University of London, and of the Centre for History and Economics, University of Cambridge. His works include Lord Elgin and the Marbles and The Reading Nation in the Romantic Period. http://ies.sas.ac.uk/fellows/senior research fellows/williamstclair.htm Roderick Beaton is Koraes Professor of Modern Greek and Byzantine History, Language and Literature at King’s College London. http://www.kcl.ac.uk/schools/humanities/depts/bmgs/staff/beaton Lord Byron as Philhellenic soldier. William St Clair THAT GREECE MIGHT STILL BE FREE The Philhellenes in the War of Independence New edition, revised, corrected, and with additional illustrations and updated bibliography With a new Introduction by Roderick Beaton The mountains look on Marathon— And Marathon looks on the sea; And musing there an hour alone, I dream’d that Greece might still be free. Lord Byron Cambridge 2008 Published by 40 Devonshire Road, Cambridge, CB1 2BL, United Kingdom http://www.openbookpublishers.com First edition published in 1972 by Oxford University Press. © 2008 William St Clair (except for the Introduction) Introduction © 2008 Roderick Beaton Some rights are reserved. This book is made available under the Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 UK: England & Wales Licence. This licence allows for copying any part of the work for personal and non-commercial use, providing author attribution is clearly stated. Details of allowance and restrictions are available at: http://www.openbookpublishers.com. As with all Open Book Publishers titles, digital material and resources associated with this volume are available from our website: http://www.openbookpublishers.com. ISBN Hardback: 978-1-906924-01-0 ISBN Paperback: 978-1-906924-00-3 ISBN Digital (pdf): 978-1-906924-02-7 All paper used by Open Book Publishers is SFI (Sustainable Forestry Initiative), and PEFC (Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification Schemes) Certified. Printed in the United Kingdom by Lightening Source, Milton Keynes for Open Book Publishers Contents Acknowledgements xii Introduction by Roderick Beaton xiii 1 The Outbreak 1 2 The Return of the Ancient Hellenes 13 3 The Regiment 23 4 Two Kinds of War 35 5 The Cause of Greece, the Cause of Europe 51 6 The Road to Marseilles 66 7 Chios 78 8 The Battalion of Philhellenes 82 9 The Battle of Peta 92 10 The Triumph of the Captains 103 11 The Return Home 111 12 The German Legion 119 13 Knights and Crusaders 127 14 Secrets of State 132 15 Enter the British 138 16 Lord Byron joins the Cause 150 17 ‘To bring Freedom and Knowledge to Greece’ 155 18 Arrivals at Missolonghi 164 19 The Byron Brigade 173 20 Essays in Regeneration 185 21 The New Apostles 195 22 The English Gold 205 23 The Coming of the Arabs 224 24 The Shade of Napoleon 244 25 ‘No freedom to fight for at home’ 251 26 French Idealism and French Cynicism 263 27 Regulars Again 277 28 A New Fleet 294 29 Athens and Navarino 314 30 America to the Rescue 334 31 Later 348 Appendix I. Remarks on Numbers 354 II. The Principal Philhellenic Expeditions 357 Note on the Select Bibliography 360 Select Bibliography 361 Bibliography of Primary and Secondary Material Published Since 1972 366 Notes 375 Index 401 Illustrations Cover Lord Byron dreaming of Greek freedom. From a lithograph by Adam Friedel in the Gennadios Library, Athens. Frontispiece Lord Byron as Philhellenic soldier. Lithograph, allegedly sketched from the life, published in London by Friedel in February, 1825, private collection. 1. Greece before the Revolution (I) Facing page a. A tower belonging to a wealthy Turkish landowner in the Peloponnese, surrounded by extensive cultivated fields, plantations, orchards, vineyards, and gardens. One of many that ‘the moon devoured’ in 1821. b. The fortress of Coron (Koroni) that, although besieged, remained in Ottoman hands throughout the revolution. From A.L. Castellan, Lettres sur la Morée, L’Hellespont, et Constantinople (Paris 1820). 2 2. Greece before the Revolution (II) An Albanian woman living near the ruins of the ancient temple at Sounion, in Attica. From F.C. H. L. Pouqueville, Travels in Southern Epirus, Acarnania, Aetolia, Attica (London 1822). 3 3. Greece before the Revolution (III) a. An Albanian soldier. The Ottoman garrisons employed Albanians who had lived there for so long that nobody knew when they had first arrived. b. The bazaar at Larissa in Thessaly. From J. S, Bartholdy, Voyage en Grèce (Paris 1808). 12 4. Philhellenism before Byron ‘I wrote while my companion drew’. French travellers recording and contemplating the ruins of ancient civilization. From M. Guys, Voyage Littéraire de la Grèce (3rd edition Paris 1783). 13 5. Greece calls on Europe for help, 1821 Frontispiece to Salpisma polemisterion [in Greek ‘A Trumpet Call to War’], pamphlet by Adamantios Koraes that purports to have been printed ‘In the Peloponnese from the Hellenic Press of Fearless of Marathon’, but was printed in Paris by overseas Greeks, 1821. 16 Illustrations ix 6. Leaders of the Revolution a.