Chapter 27: The Siege of Smyrna
After having a conversation with Sumeyye and speaking with the doctors about Sarukhan's health, I moved on to organizing my thoughts as after this brief intermission it is back to the road for me. I shall not officially marry Sumeyye until my campaign is over, where I plan to celebrate my conquests in Anatolia with a roman styled triumph and host a wedding celebration as well. This celebration shall carry on for a few days in the city, buying me some more popularity for sure after showing off such wealth and prestige to the populace.
Heading in for the night the drama of the day all faded away... Waking in the morning I began with overseeing the Saruhanid army, I and my commanders were checking the skill and armor of these soldiers. After an hour we decided to include only a small number of these men into our army, as adding too many of these auxiliaries into this core force will offset our speed and cohesion during battle and marches, but more importantly logistics.
We brought on 560 of their armored skirmisher troop, these men are armored and expertly trained similar to my Kapikulu ulufeci so they were added into the ulufeci as 7 unofficial units. The main reason they couldn't be added is simple, these men are not loyal to me and me alone therefore they need some training and some loot before they will be officially added to our elite corps. Hopefully, by the end of the campaign, these men shall come to see the light and as the light, I mean me Hehe. I must also mention, the 3 Saruhanid brothers will be the commanders of this official force and will accompany the army with them.
Moving on from that after that quick escapade, our army was already in marching order. I decided that before I set off I should check up on Sarukhan and my future wife Sumeyye. After chatting with them for another hour, I had the Saruhanid sign the contract of surrender and had the marriage included and full surrender of course. They shall here forth be considered Ottoman nobles, who will hereditarily rule as sanjak beys of Saruhan but the heirs will be educated and trained by the house of Osman and the sanjak bey will be chosen by the sultan.
After firmly establishing my hold on the Saruhanid, I left for my next conquest. Marching my army through this stretch of land is moderately dangerous, as the Knight's leadership must be aware of our intentions by now. The next marching route we must take allows for the enemies to have their pick of ambush zones, some hard for even my professional scouts and spies to find. So, during this march, we must be on our guard for hours at a time. These lands are similar to northern California in a way, where some long stretches have thickly forested lands, and some spaces are desert-like areas that are huge wide open areas populated with sparsely populated bushes throughout.
We pre-planned for such an occurrence, we have a few local guides leading us through the lands highlighting areas where armies can hide, and the many areas bandits use for ambushes more frequently. Using this information, we sent spies and scouts forward to seek a safe route through these hostile lands. Moving through the forests you could feel the tension in the air, and upon leaving everyone would leave a long sigh releasing that pent-up stress.
After arriving near the suburbs of the city, messengers of the Saruhanid garrison in the city were sent to me. These men served as my guide through the city and my key to bringing my army into the city as well. The situation here in Smyrna is strange, as the knights do not own the proper city of Smyrna itself, they are occupying the harbor or port castle. The Saruhanid have doggedly fought the invading crusaders in the past and held onto the acropolis and the city proper, but this is useless without the port as this tribe used to be well-known pirates.
Also, the Saruhanids have had trouble keeping the populace paying their taxes and keeping them from causing trouble. As the citizenry has been playing both sides, paying homage to the Christian knights when it benefits them and the Turks when it suits them as well. So, our goal is to drive these knights off the port as this is the most important for me, as it allows quick access from Thessalonica to my new Anatolian lands, and to further my trade influence in the Aegean Sea. If possible, I would like to kill off the entire knight garrison and their supporters, but these men are indeed legal pirates so even with my naval support some stragglers could wiggle their way out!
Moving into the acropolis my army began to establish our rear line here, after obtaining all the info we could from the garrison troops we practically fired these men. They were sent back to the Saruhanid capital, as they are not needed there anymore, and they could become a weakness as some of them are most likely compromised by the Christians. After establishing our position in the city's fortress, we moved to set up our siege lines and get into contact with the naval fleet that should be around here by now.
Whilst waiting for my army to set up the siege lines, I received good news from my spies that our navy led by Evrenos pasha is in the area and following the original plan. Perfect, perfect... It all comes together, I planned to leave my naval forces around the area but not directly blockading the port but having them chase down and attack all ships heading to the Smyrna port, as they can all be considered as giving support to our enemies. By doing this I hope to keep some of my naval power hiding still, and while having this many ships disappear will be suspicious, I doubt the Christians will share any info about their losses. Leaving the loss of a few ships as a dark matter in most of these states.
The only reason we are capable of pulling off such a strange strategy is that Evrenos pasha's experience as a pirate and the secret coves of the Aegean, and My concubine Aurelia Della Scala's connections in the catholic colony ports where most of these ships will leave from as she too was a pirate. It will be more difficult to destroy or capture all support ships, but just stopping 60 or 70% of these ships is enough.
On land, our siege will begin once the cannons are ready to fire. They will continuously fire day and night upon the outside walls until a few sections fall, then we will push the defenders back to their sea fort. But the main strategy is simple, we will undermine the main fortress walls starting tonight the mining will begin, and under the direction of the engineer corps a few professional miners will dig their way to the walls, and we will plant a few explosive barrels there and boom. This should speed up the conquest to less than a week, but the longest estimated time is a week and a half, as the cannons will blow the walls apart if the miners cannot. With nothing to do, I just went to bed under the guard of my Kapikulu men.
Ah, sleeping in a bed is much better than a padded floor mat! The Acropolis is comfortable for a castle, the Romans know how to live a life of luxury! Leaving the castle in the company of Omar who is now the commander of the Kapikulu Sipahi, showing him favoritism is a good thing as he is not incompetent at all. He has also been studying well while in the capital truly I wish I could appoint more generals through the system as Omar would top the list as of now, then the former Turko Mongol bey who is also a commander in my Kapikulu guard.
But once we arrived at the siege front line, the area looked completely different than when we arrived and also slightly different than the first siege. The biggest difference is the army formation, as they are not only guarding the cannons and the forts gates, but they are also stationed throughout the assortment of buildings located in between the walled city, and the walled port. The enemies may not have noticed these men as the view from their walls is not capable of seeing the locations of these soldiers and that is why they are located there. The places where the soldiers in the suburb are stationed mark the locations where our mine entrances are.
The other feature of this siege formation is the use of my Musketeers. The musketeers are placed behind small wooden walls or gates, these small defenses are used not only to guard against enemy munitions. But to allow the musketeers to mount their muskets onto the gate and use it to hold the weight and take some recoil of the shot. These two factors are even more essential than defense as these sharpshooters can whittle the number of defenders and destroy enemy morale as well. We also have archers located a little closer to the walls, as their accuracy range is not as far as our long muskets, but they will loose arrows upon the enemy, and then hide behind their defenses.
While looking at the formation, our cannons began to fire cannonballs at the port's defenses and its unlucky defenders. *Boom Boom Boom* Some mortars also fired upon the port defenses and the Castle behind it as it has superior range to my heavier cannons. We continued this process all day and the weaker outer walls are starting to crumble in many different spots, seeing this I ordered the cannons to stop firing as if they were to fall in the night the defenders may plug the gap with the rubble that fell making our progress slower and may result in higher casualties.
The night passed by quickly, and the new day began with the shelling of the cannons. After 2 more rounds of cannon fire, the first section of the wall crumbled leaving a section of the wall for us to attack. But I held my troops back and called the engineer corps to the front allowing them to utilize the field cannons. Moving in front of the assault squad the cannons were in a position to advance when necessary. Now it is all on the siege cannons they need to blast at least 2 more gaps, so the defenders will be spread out, or they will run away altogether.
After another few volleys, the outer wall was like Swiss cheese. Allowing my men to attack but with a superior position. The assault squad moved forward at a moderate pace, whilst the cannons aimed toward the breach and some aimed up toward the battlements hoping to deter any defenders. When the assault squad moved closer to the breach the musketeer and archers began to move forward behind them.
Entering through the breach, the defenders abandoned the wall and went into the fort for their last stand. After seeing it was abandoned, I ordered everyone to walk carefully and check for any traps! These men can be quite sneaky... And after a brief search, a ton of naphtha was discovered in barrels within a hold behind the wall. These men will have more of this stuff, I ordered all my men to be very careful as if they want to be suicidal, they could take a lot of us with them when the final battle is fought.