How Were The Crusading Military Orders Templars Hospitallers Different Than Normal Crusading

What was the difference between the Knights Templar and the Knights Hospitaller during the Crusades?

Originally, the Hospitallers were organized to help the pilgrims to the Holy Land, primarily with medical and other needs, while the Templars were organized to protect pilgrims from the dangers of the Holy Land (bandits mostly). The Hospitallers did not originally have a military function, it is only in the era of the 9th Grand Master that there is any mention of military role for the order.Soon, though, the organizations diverged from their original goals, and both became militant fighting orders defending the Holy Land. Both became shock troops in the Crusades, highly prized by Crusader leaders for their discipline and fighting effectiveness.Over time, the Templars became more involved in money transfers between Europe and the Holy Land, and evolved into bankers as one of the few international organizations in Europe who had branches throughout the continent. Pilgrims would put their assets on deposit in their home countries, and then take the letters of credit abroad. Both orders also received large donations from devout nobles, who would leave their wealth to the orders when they died. It was as a bank that the Templars became most well known after the Europeans were pushed out of the Middle East at the end of the 13th century. Soon after, King Phillip of France (who was deeply in debt to the Templars) pushed to have the Order dissolved, and it at this point that the various charges against the Order surfaced (often under torture from the Templars themselves). The Pope dissolved the order in 1312, although the trials went on for another couple of years. Much of the Templar infrastructure was then folded into the Hospitallers, with much of the Order’s wealth going into royal coffers (surprise, surprise). So, the Templars started off as the more militant order and became bankers, and were dissolved because they had too many powerful people who owed them money. With the end of the Crusades in the Middle East, the Hospitallers relocated to Cyprus and Rhodes, where they were driven out later that century in epic siege by the Sultan of Egypt. They withstood a couple of sieges on Rhodes, before being defeated in 1522. They were finally given the island of Malta by King Charles the First of Spain.

In what ways did the Knights Hospitaller, Knights Teutonic, and Knights Templar differ and how have they made a mark on history?

The Knights Hospitaller were by far the most influential. They were originally created to provide care for poor, sick and injured pilgrims to the Holy Land. After the First Crusade in 1099 they received a papal charter to defend the routes to the Holy Land. When the Holy Land was lost, the order moved to Rhodes, receiving most of the assets of the dissolved Templars, where it operated as an independent military state for 200 years before being defeated and ejected from the island in 1522 by Suleiman The Magnificent. From there the Order moved to Malta, which it controlled as a vassal of Sicily in exchange for an annual gift of one Maltese Falcon (which is incidentally the basis of the plot of the film, The Maltese Falcon). In 1565 Suleiman again sent forces against them, but this time the Knights were able to withstand the Siege and they remained on the island until it was taken by Napoleon's forces in 1798In the preceding 200 years, the Knights had become increasingly irrelevant but they did control the sealanes and got rich on taxing, confiscating and reselling any goods with the most remote or tangential association with the Ottoman Empire. With the loss of Malta, the Order dispersed, although it did not cease to exist, and in 1834 was reconstituted as the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, based in Rome. It still exists today; it has Sovereign status, issues its own passports etc and has its own ambassadors. The work of the order is again focused on hospitals and helping the sick especially those injured in conflictIt is however not true that the order evolved into St John's Ambulance brigade. The English langue, or division of the Knights had all its property seized by Henry VIII and effectively ceased to exist. In 1831 the Venerable Order of St John was formed, an organisation which runs the St John Ambulance Service . Since 1963 this entity has been recognised by the Military Order of Malta, and is part of the Alliance of the Orders of St John of Jerusalem but there is no direct historical link