The Massacre of the Mamelukes

Mamelukes (2 syl.) or Mamalukes (Arabic, mamluc, a slave).
A name given in Egypt to the slaves of the beys brought from the Caucasus, and formed into a standing army. In 1254 these military “slaves” raised one of their body to the supreme power, and Noureddin Ali, the founder of the Baharites, gave twenty-three sultans; in 1832 the dynasty of the Borjites, also Mamlucs, succeeded, and was followed by twenty-one successors. Selim I., Sultan of Turkey, overthrew the Mamluc kingdom in 1517, but allowed the twenty-four beys to be elected from their body.
In 1811, Mohammed Ali by a wholesale massacre annihilated the Mamelukes, and became viceroy of Egypt.

(from E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898)

“Upon our return, fresh instances were not wanting of ill-blood and renewed animosities between the Turkish and Albanian soldiery, but Mahomet Ali was meditating to turn their fierce dispositions to better account, than by leaving them to destroy one another. For the insolence of the Wahabees, and their power and influence in Arabia, being daily upon the increase, and the pilgrim, caravans plundered by them, or arrested and sent back at their pleasure, both his honour and interests were engaged to put them down, if possible; and this he had determined to do.

The preparations were carried on with corresponding activity; and, besides the great force already collected in and about the city, there were fresh reinforcements every day, and new encampments and cantonments of Turkish and Albanian troops drawing together upon every side, so that the numbers became very large, and much was added to Mahometan ardour and enthusiasm by the title now openly given to the expedition, which was that of the redemption of Mecca.

The command of it was destined to the favourite son of our Pasha, called Tossoon¹, who was younger a great deal than Ibrahim Bey, not having, at that time, attained to more than his seventeenth year²; he had good natural parts, and had received more education than falls to the lot of Eastern princes in general; he also bore an unblemished character, and was much beloved, especially by the soldiery.

Just as all seemed ripe for this campaign, it was found necessary to take prompt measures of security against those pardoned Mamelukes resident within the city, for it was ascertained that they had already began caballing³, and only waited for the marching of the army, or for the absence of the Pasha himself, to throw all into confusion, and overturn his government; who, being fully informed of the plot, and seeing at once the critical nature and extreme hazard of his situation, resolved on striking a decisive blow, and prepared his counter-mine accordingly, by which the whole race that gave him umbrage was to be exterminated in a single day.

It is not known that he consulted previously upon this matter with any other besides the Albanian Chief, Hassan⁴ Pasha, the most confidential of all his advisers.

Dissembling, therefore, all suspicion upon his part, and at the same time shunning everything that might excite it on the part of the Mamelukes, he invited their chief, Saim Bey, to an audience, and led him into familiar conversation, opening to him first his own views on this holy war, and inviting him to join in it.

Mohammed Ali

The Bey had always passed for a man of craft and penetration; but he was overreached in this instance, for acceding at once, and seeming flattered at the proposal, lie entered freely afterwards into many details, and enumerated. those whom he considered to be more or less under his disposal and influence, speaking at the same time in so high and confident a tone of the attachment and union of his followers, as to leave no doubt at all of his ambitious views on the mind of Mahomet Ali; who, therefore, proceeding in his scheme, as concerted with Hassan Pasha, concluded the interview by inviting him, with all his adherents capable of bearing arms, to present themselves in the citadel on the following Friday, in order that arrangements might be made as to the part which this important body should bear in the campaign.

On his return from the audience, the Bey communicated the whole substance of what had passed to such of the Mamelukes as were most in his confidence, one of whom, who had more discernment than the rest, cried out immediately, “We are betrayed!” “So much the worse,” replied Saim, “if it be so:” and, rebuking him with a look, added, “if there be danger, we shall not want courage to meet it.” Then calling together the principal, as well inferior officers, over whom he presided, he recommended to them that they should all accompany him to the citadel, at a certain hour of the forenoon on the day appointed.

In the mean while the Pasha was not idle in concerting his measures for receiving them.

Before dawn, upon the Friday named⁵, the drums were beating throughout the city to call the troops together as for some great parade; few, if any of us, had received any intimation of this beforehand, so that all hurried from their quarters to know what it meant, and were marched off to the citadel as they arrived, and stationed there.

No specific instructions were given, but each man was strictly charged, after his arms had been examined, on no account to quit the post assigned him, and to wait there for further orders⁶.

The hour of audience was at hand, and a procession of about five hundred⁷ Mameluke officers, of higher or lower degrees, presented themselves at the gate of the citadel, and went in; they made rather a splendid show, and were led by three of their generals, among whom Saim Bey was conspicuous: when entered, they proceeded directly onwards to the palace, which occupies the highest ground; and as soon as their arrival there was announced to Mahomet All and Hassan Pasha, who were sitting in conference together within, an immediate order was given for the introduction of the three Chiefs, who were received with great affability, both Pashas entering into a good deal of conversation with them, and many compliments and civilities passed.

After a time, according to Eastern custom, coffee was brought, and, last of all, the pipes; but at the moment when these were presented, as if from etiquette, or to leave his guests more at their ease, Mahomet Ali rose and withdrew, and sending privately for the captain of his guard, gave orders that the gates of the citadel should be closed; adding, that as soon as Saim Bey and his two associates should come out for the purpose of mounting, they should be fired upon till they dropped, and that at the same signal the troops, posted throughout the fortress, should take aim at every Mameluke within their reach; while a corresponding order was sent down at the same time to those in the town⁸, and to such even as were encamped without, round the foot of the fortress, to pursue the work of extermination on all stragglers that they should find, so that not one of the proscribed body might escape.

Saim Bey, and his two brothers in command, finding that the Pasha did not return to them, and being informed by the attendants that he was gone into his harem (an answer that precluded all further inquiry), judged it to be time to take their departure. But no sooner did they make their appearance without, and were mounting their horses, than they were suddenly fired upon from every quarter, and all became at once a scene of confusion, and dismay, and horror, similar volleys being directed at all the rest who were collected round and preparing to return with them, so that the victims dropped by hundreds.

Saim himself had time to gain his saddle, and even to penetrate to one of the gates of the citadel; but all to no purpose, for he found it closed like the rest; and fell there pierced with innumerable bullets.

Another Chief, Amim⁹ Bey, who was the brother to Elfi, urged the noble animal which he rode to an act of greater desperation, for he spurred him till he made him clamber upon the rampart, and preferring rather to be dashed to pieces than to be slaughtered in cold blood, drove him to leap down the precipice, a height that has been estimated at from thirty to forty feet, or even more; yet fortune so favoured him, that, though the horse was killed in the fall, the rider escaped.

An Albanian camp was below, and an officer’s tent very near the spot on which he alighted; instead of shunning it, he went in, and throwing himself on the rites of hospitality, implored that no advantage might be taken of him; which was not only granted, but the officer offered him protection, even at his own peril, and kept him concealed so long as the popular fury and the excesses of the soldiery continued.

Of the rest of that devoted number, thus shut up and surrounded, not one went out alive; and even of those who had quietly remained in the town, but very few found means to elude the active and greedy search that was made after them, a high price being set upon every Mameluke’s head that should be brought.

All Cairo was filled with wailing and lamentations; and, in truth, the confusion and horrors of that day are indescribable, for not the Mamelukes alone¹⁰, but others also, in many instances, wholly unconnected with them, either from mistake, or from malice, or for plunder, were indiscriminately seized on, and put to death; so that great as the number was that perished of that ill-fated body, it yet did not comprehend the total of the victims.

For myself, I have reason¹¹ to be thankful that though I was one of the soldiers stationed in the citadel that morning, I shed none of the blood of those unhappy men, having had the good fortune to be posted at an avenue where none of them attempted to pass, or came near me, so that my pistols and musket were never fired.

The strange fact of the leap and escape of Amim Bey, and of his asylum in the officer’s tent, reached at last the Pasha’s ears, who sent instantly to demand him; and. when the generous Albanian found that it would be impossible any longer to shelter or screen his fugitive, he gave him a horse, and recommended him to fly with all speed into Asia; where I afterwards saw him, living in the palace of Suleyman Pasha at Acre, at the time of my first visit there with Mr. Bankes.

Meantime, here and there, even in Cairo itself, a few Mamelukes, by chance or contrivance, had survived the day of general slaughter, and were lying concealed or barricadoed, either at their own homes, or in the houses of such friends and dependents as were willing to harbour them, for the edict of destruction was still in full force.

In some instances, where a desperate resistance was expected from them, no opportunity was given for a defence, for combustibles were set fire to, and the places of refuge burnt, with every soul that was in them. Whilst in others, among these petty sieges, the soldiers preferred the risk of their lives (of which many were sacrificed) to the loss of their plunder, all Mameluke property whatever being left at their discretion, and abandoned to them; – a licence which they abused, or construed so largely in some instances, that the dwellings of quite indifferent persons were pillaged and destroyed¹².

Le Massacre des Mameluks

The work of rapine lasted six days; and, though present at many of these scenes, with a comrade of mine, I bore little part in them, and shall hardly be accused of having laid hands on a very large share of plunder, when I mention that, with the exception of a saddle, which I brought home, richly mounted in silver gilt – a piece of magnificence in great estimation with the Beys, – and a slave girl that had belonged to one of them, I took no advantage of the permission given to make prize of whatever we found in their houses.

The girl was young and pretty, and, as it happened, did not come empty-handed, for she had contrived to secrete about her some trinkets and money from the harem which she had belonged to.

I lodged her at first in the house of an acquaintance of mine in middle life, and there went often to visit her; but, by-and-by, a proclamation coming out from the citadel, that such soldiers as should deliver up any women taken from the Mamelukes should receive the full equivalent in money, I consulted my little slave, and gave her her choice; to which she answering that she preferred to continue with me, I was so pleased with her, that I determined on making her my wife, and was married accordingly after the Turkish form, which is purely a civil contract.

I could, however, only pass the alternate weeks with my bride, for the great encampment of the Mecca expedition, to which I belonged, was now near the village of Matarieh¹³, some miles to the northward of the city, and I was required on duty seven days in every fourteen.”

from Narrative of the Life and Adventure of Giovanni Finati native of Ferrara
by Giovanni Finati, 1830

Notes

¹ Tossoon had been himself created a Pasha of two tails in 1809.

² Mengin says only 16. – Vol. i., p. 372.

³ Il avoit même appris diton, qu’ils (the Mamelukes) avoient concu le projet de l’enlever à son retour de Suez. — Mengin, vol. i., p. 371.

⁴ The name is always written Asam in the original, but I have conformed to Mengin in writing it as the common name Hassan. According to Mengin, not only Hassan Pasha, but Sâleh-Koch, as well as the Kiayah Bey, and the Selictar also, were in the dreadful secret yet possibly this might not be till that very morning.

⁵ First of March, 1811.

⁶ Mengin differs in several points in his account of this transaction, and says that the Mamelukes were attracted to the citadel in order to be present at the investiture of Tossoon Pasha with the Pelisse; but as that ceremony did not, by his own shewing, take place till a month afterwards, the pretext here given seems much more probable.

⁷ Four hundred and seventy was the exact number, according to Mengin, vol. i., p. 363. Amyn, who alone escaped, not being comprehended.

⁸ Mengin adds to this, that the Divan Effendi wrote orders to all the provincial governors to carry on the same extermination in their several districts, and makes the total number of victims amount to 1000.

⁹ Mengin writes the name Amyn, vol. i. p. 292; and, what is very strange, though he notices his escape, says nothing of his famous leap, which I have heard from the Bey himself, and which is known to all Cairo, and the spot pointed out to strangers. Sir F. Henniker says of him, “his horse leapt over the parapet, like leaping out of a four-pair of stairs window. The horse was killed. The Bey entrusted himself to some Arabs, who, notwithstanding the offer of a large reward, would not deliver him up.” – p. 64. The Bey’s own account agreed with the text, and was probably, indeed, the foundation of it.

¹⁰ Beaucoup d’individus étrangers à cette scene périrent malgré leur innocence, tant le soldat etoit animé en carnage. – Mengin, vol. i., p. 362. The horrors of the two succeeding days are described p. 365.

¹¹ In justice to the writer, I should state that I have thought it right to abridge this paragraph, and here and there to change an expression, in consideration of his being still a resident in. Egypt; for it will be seen, in a note to page 371 of Mengin, that such a precaution might not be superfluous. “Mohammed-Aly Pacha ayant su que des voyageurs lui reprochaient dans leurs écrits le massacre des Mamlouks,” &c.

¹² Mengin gives an instance of this, vol. i., p. 365, in which the aggressors were put to death for it by the Governor’s order; and says that the pillage was put a stop to by Tossoon on the third day, after five hundred houses had been sacked or destroyed. – p. 366. Speaking of the women of the Mamelukes, he tells us, “Les Turks, qui ne pouvaient épouser que des femmes d’une classe inférieure, voyaient avec deplaisir que celles d’un plus haut rang dédaignent leur alliance, témoignaient de l’empressement lorsqu’il s’agissait d’épouser un Mamlouk. Ils eurent la bassesse de se venger, clans cette occasion, d’une sexe sans défense.” – p. 365.

¹³ Anciently Heliopolis. The little lake, called Birket-al-Hadje (from its being the usual rendezvous of the Mecca pilgrimage at starting), is in the neighbourhood, and. is the point by which Mengin designates this camp. – Vol. i., p. 375.