The last knight of Malta - Thomas Freller

From the tender age of 14 up to his death at 64, Joseph Maria
von Rechberg was prominently involved in many of the most
important events at the end of the Ancien Rgime and the
chequered history of the Order of Malta. Rechberg was a boy when
he participated in the fatal campaign of Algiers, as already a
most respected military man he participated years later
prominently in the defence of Malta against the French. It was
Rechberg who fired the last bullet against Napoleon's French
armada, long after Grand Master Hompesch had surrendered the
island. The newly discovered fact that Rechberg had warned the
government of the Order about an imminent French attack puts the
surrender of Malta in June 1798 in a new light. In the turbulent
years of the early 19th century he served as spy and envoy for his Order. The
Napoleonic wars, namely the French campaign in Russia and the
Battle of Waterloo, are world history. Joseph Maria von Rechberg
was prominently involved in them.