THE WAR OF GREEK INDEPENDENCE 1821 TO 1833 BY W.ALISON PHILLIPS 1897

FATE OF THE FUGITIVES 201
Here at last they hoped to be safe;
for here, according
to the plan, Karaiskakis and his Armatoli were
to have awaited them. No Greeks, however, appeared ;
and their signals were unanswered. At last, wearied
out with the fight and their former privations, they
halted in the deep shadows of the forest to rest, and to
collect their scattered forces. Suddenly on all sides of
them the thick undergrowth was ablaze with the
flashes of muskets, and a deadly hail of lead fell once
more among their broken ranks. Instead of falling
among the friendly Armatoli, they had stumbled into
an ambuscade of Kiutayeh's Albanians. There was no
attempt at resistance. Many fell at the first volley.
The rest, favoured by the darkness, continued their
weary flight up the mountain. Of all the defenders of
Missolonghi only some thirteen hundred souls, including
about seven women and a few children, ultimately
reached a place of safety.
Many who had escaped
the sword of the Turks perished of hunger and
exposure
in the mountains. Plain and forest were
strewn with the bodies of the dead, and in Missolonghi
itself Ibrahim erected a ghastly trophy of three thousand
heads. But, living or dead, the Missolonghiots
had kept their word, and were free.
The fall of Missolonghi marks an epoch in the
story of the Hellenic revolt. Even after the lapse