Stop 23 of 25
Fort St Elmo & the War Museum
Twenty-eight days that saved Europe’s southern flank
Free to hear. You have 3 of three free stops left, on any tours.
Guide to Fort St Elmo & the War Museum
Fort St Elmo stands on the tip of the peninsula, between the Grand Harbour and Marsamxett, and whoever holds this point controls the entrance to both. In 1565 the Ottoman commanders expected it to fall in four or five days; it held for twenty-eight, and the month it cost them decided the Great Siege. It now houses the National War Museum.
Twenty-eight days
The fort was thrown up in a hurry in 1552, a star fort of no great size. When the Ottoman army landed in May 1565, taking it would have handed them the harbour, after which the Knights' headquarters across the water could be dealt with at leisure.
A few hundred knights and Maltese soldiers held it, resupplied by boat across the harbour at night, under bombardment from the heaviest artillery train in the Mediterranean and assault after assault. When the walls were breached they fought in the breaches. By 23 June it was over and almost every defender was dead.
It had cost the Ottomans thousands of men, the corsair Dragut among them — their most experienced admiral, killed here by a splinter of stone. It had also cost them four weeks of the campaigning season, and the Knights used every day of it to thicken the defences across the water while the relief force gathered in Sicily. Their commander is said to have looked at the ruins and asked what the mother would cost, if the daughter had come so dear.
Four more centuries of service
The fort was rebuilt, enlarged and used continuously afterwards. In the Second World War it served as an anti-aircraft position and helped fight off an Italian naval raid on the Grand Harbour in 1941.
It was restored and reopened in 2015.
The National War Museum
The collection runs from prehistory to the twentieth century, but its heart is the Second World War, and two objects stand out.
One is Faith, the battered fuselage of a Gloster Gladiator: an obsolete biplane, and for a few weeks in 1940 one of the very few aircraft standing between the island and the bombers. The other is the George Cross. Britain's highest civilian decoration for gallantry went in April 1942 to no individual but to Malta itself and everyone on it, and the small silver cross has been in the corner of the Maltese flag ever since.
What to look at
- The star plan: angled bastions with no blind spots, the state of the art in 1552
- Faith, the Gloster Gladiator, in the war museum
- The George Cross itself, and King George VI’s handwritten letter awarding it
Practical
- Museum
- National War Museum, open daily. Paid entry, allow 60–90 minutes.
- Re-enactment
- In Guardia parades are staged in the fort on selected dates — check the calendar.
- Terrain
- Uneven stone, ramps and steps, exposed to sun and wind.
Walk to stop 24 · The Sacra Infermeria
From the fort approach, follow Mediterranean Street along the Grand Harbour side of the city, with the water on your left. The long low building running down the slope on your right is the infirmary.
About 2 min · 114 m
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