CALAFAT HASSAN – THE TALE OF A CORSAIR REIS: PART 3

(This post is a continuation of Calafat Hassan – the Tale of a Corsair Reis: Part 2. If you haven’t done so already, it’s best to read Parts 1 and 2 before continuing on here.)

News of Calafat Hassan Reis’s capture and subsequent imprisonment in Naples soon reached Algiers.

When Calafat Hassan Reis’s wife heard what had happened to her husband, she went straight to the Divan—the ruling council of Algiers—and demanded that they find a captive in Algiers of sufficient rank and importance so that he could be exchanged for her husband. Calafat Hassan Reis was one of the foremost corsair captains in Algiers at this time, and the Divan readily agreed.

The captive they settled on was Don Pedro de Carvajal, a Spanish gentleman of high rank who had been taken by Algiers corsairs while sailing from Spain to Oran. Naples was a Spanish possession at this time, so choosing a high ranking Spanish captive made perfect sense.

Negotiations were begun to swap Don Pedro for Calafat Hassan Reis.

Things progressed slowly, though—very slowly—and after four years there was still no resolution. Calafat Hassan Reis remained chained up in a Naples dungeon; Don Pedro remained a slave in Algiers.

And then a report arrived in Algiers that Calafat Hassan Reis had been executed in Naples by being burned alive at the stake. The news spread quickly throughout Algiers, causing widespread fury. Calafat Hassan Reis’s wife, along with her parents, marched to the Divan at the head of an angry mob to demand justice. Since Calafat Hassan Reis had been burned at the stake, they said, Don Pedro must also suffer the same fate.

The members of the Divan agreed to their demand. Moreover, they offered up a second Spanish Gentleman—a man named Don Juan—as well. It was a way to send a message to their Spanish enemy: if the Spanish dared to roast an Algiers corsair alive, the Algiers authorities would roast two Spanish gentlemen in return. Don Pedro and Don Juan were immediately seized and imprisoned in preparation for their execution.

As all this was playing out, however, the parents of Calafat Hassan Reis’s wife—now widow—began hatching a scheme of their own.

Don Pedro was a wealthy, educated man from a powerful family. The widow’s parents persuaded themselves that if they could convince him to convert and become a renegado (the name used to designate European converts, from the Spanish word for “renegade”), he would naturally be an important man in Algiers and so make a suitable husband for their daughter. They visited Don Pedro in prison and made the offer to him: die a painful death, or convert, marry our daughter, and begin a new life in Algiers. This is not as odd an offer as it might seem. Algerine society at this time was remarkably fluid, and there were many European renegados in positions of importance. Becoming Muslim wiped the slate clean, and a man could begin a new life.

Not only did Don Pedro decline their offer, he ridiculed it and said that he would rather stay true to the faith of his fathers and die than live as an apostate.

Don Pedro and Don Juan were taken from their prison and hauled through the streets in chains to the place of their execution. A great crowd followed, shouting angrily.

Don Pedro was to be burned first. He was shackled to an upright stake and a pyre of deadwood built up around him. As the wood was set ablaze, the crowd pressed forward, taunting him. Don Pedro held his head high and recited his prayers—until the flames and the smoke stifled his words.

Then it was Don Juan’s turn.

Don Juan, however, had seen enough. He cried out and raised his finger theatrically towards heaven—the recognized symbol that a person wished to become a Muslim. He was immediately freed of his chains and paraded back through the city streets to the Palace of the Pasha (the Ottoman Governor of Algiers). To general applause, the Pasha issued Don Juan new clothing and enrolled him among the janissaries (the Ottoman troops stationed in Algiers), so that he would draw pay as they did.

And so Don Juan became a renegado and took up a new life in Algiers.

A report of the burning of Don Pedro soon reached Naples. The news spread quickly throughout the city, causing widespread fury, and an angry mob filled the streets, demanding justice. The city authorities needed little encouragement for they were as outraged as the ordinary citizens.

For Calafat Hassan Reis had not been burned at the stake. He had remained in the Naples dungeon all this time.

The false report of his execution had been spread about in Algiers by a corsair captain who loved Calafat Hassan Reis’s wife. He had hoped that news of her husband’s death would make her more inclined to accept him. Perhaps it did; perhaps it didn’t. There is no way for us to know.

It did have one clear effect, though.

Calafat Hassan Reis was taken from his dungeon and hauled through the streets in chains. A great crowd followed, shouting angrily. He was shackled to an upright stake and a pyre of deadwood built up around him. As the wood was set ablaze, the crowd pressed forward, taunting him. He died with his jaw clamped, staring straight ahead, as if indifferent to them all.

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The tale of Calafat Hassan Reis comes from two works written by Pierre Dan, a Trinitarian friar who was in Algiers in the summer of 1634 as part of an unsuccessful ransoming expedition (see the two-part Father Pierre Dan and the 1634 Ransoming Expedition to Algiers post here in the Captives section of this blog for the story of that ransoming expedition).

The details of Calafat Hassan Reis’s summer of plunder and eventual capture come from Les plus illustres captifs: recueil des actions héroïques d’un grand nombre de guerriers et autres chrétiens réduits en esclavage par les mahométans (The Most Illustrious Captives: a Collection of the Heroic Actions of a Large Number of Warriors and other Christians Enslaved by Muslims), Volume 2, (published 1892), edited by Le R. P. Calixte, pp. 323 -330.

The details of Don Pedro’s execution, Don Juan’s conversion, and Calafat Hassan Reis’s death come from Histoire de Barbarie et de ses corsaires, des royaumes, et des villes d’Alger, de Tunis, de Salé et de Tripoly (The History of Barbary and its Corsairs, its Kingdoms, and the Cities of Algiers, Tunis, Salé, and Tripoli), Second edition, (published in 1649), pp. 444-446.

Father Dan says in Histoire de Barbarie that he heard the story of Don Pedro and Don Juan while in Algiers.

Father Dan spent the latter part of his career at the headquarters of the Trinitarian Order in Paris. There, he heard numerous stories of captivity and escape directly from the captives themselves as they returned and passed though the Order’s headquarters. It was here that he heard the story of the three Capuchin friars and the capture of Calafat Hassan Reis.

He also recorded one other thing in Histoire de Barbarie: that he had heard that Don Juan was filled with painful remorse for having abandoned the religion of his birth.

Maybe. Maybe not. It is what Father Dan would have wanted to hear, after all.

Don Juan was, perhaps, a practical man who valued being alive more than being religiously faithful. There were more than a few men like that.

Such were the times in which they lived.