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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;panzerman, post: 4252501, member: 77704&quot;]The Knights of St-John Hospitaliers fought in the Crusades alongside the Templars/ Teutonic Knights. These where the Pope&#039;s elite formations fighting to free the &quot;Holy Land&quot; from Muslim Rule. It went bad after the loss of Jerusalem/ Acre to the Ayyubids. The one Order (Knights of St. John) escaped from Acre, settled on Cyprus. Eventually fed up with Cypriot politics, conquered the Island of Rhodes. There they built a fortress and made it their new headquarters. In 1521, Sulieman I/ Ottoman Sultan attacked Rhodes, after a bitter seige, the Grandmaster surrendered. Sulieman allowed the Knights to leave the island with all their possessions/ wounded. Karl V the HRE then gave the Order the Island of Malta as their new home. In 1798, First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte arrived on Malta to ask the GrandMaster permission to bring his fleet into Valetta harbour to refit/ resupply. The Grand Master refused, and with Admiral Nelsons fleet closing in, Napoleon after a fierce battle, took the Island. Thus ended the Order&#039;s Rule on Malta. Czar Paul I of Russia allowed them to take refuge in St. Petersburg in 1801.[ATTACH=full]1084853[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1084854[/ATTACH][/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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