The Battle of Lepanto by Nanami Shiono

Author:Nanami Shiono [Shiono, Nanami]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kodansha USA
Published: 2020-06-29T00:00:00+00:00

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The decision having been made, the war council quickly settled on the details. They would set out on September 16th. They chose that date because it was a Sunday, the Christian holy day.

Messina – September 1571

The allied fleet set to depart from Messina Harbor in Sicily was composed of the following: 204 war galleys, 6 galleasses, 50 scout vessels, 30 large transport vessels, 1,815 cannons, 13,000 sailors, 43,500 oarsmen, and 28,000 soldiers.

Most of the large cannons, especially those that fired the largest projectiles, were loaded onto the galleasses. Since the war galleys’ effectiveness relied on their mobility, they were not loaded with heavy ordnance. Venice supplied more than half of the war galleys and galleasses, 112 of the 210 total warships.

When it came to the soldiers, however, those serving the King of Spain, though levied from the vassal states of southern Italy and Genoa, numbered three times as many as those from Venice. In other words, the Spanish king paid the salaries of three quarters of the soldiers.

The twenty-eight thousand soldiers were not divided equally among the galleys. In line with Don Juan’s proposal, Spanish troops were transferred to the short-handed Venetian ships, but Malta, Genoa, and Savoy wanted the ships carrying admirals to be boarded by soldiers under their own authority. This resulted in an unavoidable difference in the numbers of soldiers on each galley, ranging from Venetian ships with less than a hundred men, to Spanish ships that averaged a hundred and fifty, to some that exceeded a hundred and eighty.

While many of the Venetian ships were compelled to take on Spanish soldiers, those vessels that would play a decisive role in the battle fought fiercely to maintain a Venetian-only crew. There wasn’t a single foreign soldier on any of the six galleasses. Capitano Generale de Mare Veniero’s ship and that of Barbarigo, Provveditore Generale, along with those of Provveditore Quirini and Provveditore Canale, also faithfully upheld this policy.

Even after the departure date was set, the war council continued for several days to deliberate. First, they decided to adopt a tripartite battle formation with left and right flanks and a central main fleet. There would also be a reserve flotilla that could rapidly reinforce allied forces in areas where the fighting was particularly fierce.

The first ship position to be decided was that of Supreme Commander Don Juan’s flagship, which would serve as the alliance’s headquarters. It would assume its place at the very center of the formation, with Venetian admiral Veniero’s ship just to its left and Colonna’s ship to its immediate right. The Spanish side was adamant at first that Don Juan’s vessel had to be flanked by Spanish ships to ensure the royal prince’s safety. Lord Requeséns and other ministers of the King of Spain would be aboard those two ships to keep the king’s brother in sight at all times during the fighting.

Veniero opposed this. He argued that being flanked by Spanish ships with inexperienced crews would endanger the supreme commander, not make him safer.

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