As the days continued to warm and the soggy ground dried out, the Crusaders constructed siege towers with the wood imported by the Italian merchant ships. Four stories high and capable of holding up to 500 men, these movable towers loomed as high as the walls of Acre. They were covered with hides soaked in vinegar and urine, which, it was believed, could provide protection from the deadly Greek fire that had been flung down by the garrison.

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By the end of April 1190, the towers were ready. While Frankish bowmen in the crenelated tops dueled archers on the walls, thousands of Christian peasant soldiers and camp followers scurried to fill the city’s moat with rocks and fascines of brush. Once the ditch was filled, it was hoped, the towers could be pushed up against Acre’s parapets to disgorge their occupants and carry hand-to-hand combat to the enemy.

Boulders and fire pots hurled from Muslim mangonels had little effect on lumbering siege machines, which were reinforced with iron. The garrison was saved, however, by the son of a Damascus coppersmith who developed a new formula for making Greek fire. Initially scoffed at, he was finally allowed to try his creation.

On May 5, the new combustibles were shot from a mangonel and allowed to drench the siege towers. The Christians, believing they had nothing to fear, crowded the towers with archers as they jeered the defenders. Then, according to chronicler Ibn al-Athir, the man from Damascus launched a flaming pot: ‘The fire at once spread everywhere, the tower was consumed, and the outbreak happened so swiftly that the Christians had no time to flee. Men, weapons, everything was burned.’ Letters to Saladin’s camp reported that the moat around Acre had become ‘a pool of fire with the tower as a fountain.’

Crusaders and Muslims clashed on eight successive days in June, the heat baking the growing mounds of bodies. Clouds of flies accompanied the terrible stench, and disease gripped both camps. For nearly a month after, little fighting took place.

The Frankish men-at-arms tired at last of the waiting game. On St. James’ Day, July 25, they staged an attack on the Muslim lines north of Acre. It was a poorly conceived affair, with few armored knights participating. The Christian surge was primarily made up of peasant soldiers armed with pikes and axes. At-Adil, Saladin’s brother and the Muslim commander in that sector, lured the Christians into his own camp, where they broke ranks to plunder the tents. Saladin quickly sent reinforcements of Mosuli and Egyptian troops to hem in the enemy. Had it not been for the courageous efforts of Ralph de Hauterive, archdeacon of Colchester in England, the embattled soldiers might have been wiped out. Surrounded by his personal guard, the heavily armored Ralph cut a line of retreat through the Muslim ranks. The damage, however, had been done. A Muslim officer reported more than 9,000 Franks stain, including the gallant Ralph.

Three days later, on July 28, the besiegers welcomed the arrival of 10,000 men under Henry of Champagne. Henry’s army formed the vanguard of a much larger force that King Philip Augustus of France was bringing to the Holy Land. By fall, an English contingent headed by Baldwin, archbishop of Canterbury, landed with word that King Richard I of England had also embarked on the Crusade. It would be some time, however, before either Philip or Richard arrived at Acre.

While Henry of Champagne planned assaults on the city, including the use of battering rams, Saladin received word that Frederick Barbarossa had died while crossing a shallow river near Armenia. Although leadership fell to Barbarossa’s son Frederick of Swabia, the German crusade began to disintegrate. Numerous German nobles returned to Europe. Those who remained with the Duke of Swabia were beset by famine and stain in great numbers by Muslim Seljuk and Kurdish tribesmen. ‘We had many dead,’ reported a German knight. ‘We were obliged to kill our horses and eat their meat, and to feed the fire with our lances.’ Only 5,000 ragged survivors reached friendly Tripoli, finally joining the siege at Acre in October.

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