The Sword and the Cross: Two Men and an Empire of Sand

By Fergus Fleming

Book Overview

Whether writing of the Alps, the high seas, or the North Pole, Fergus Fleming has won acclaim as one of today's most vivid and engaging historians of adventure and exploration. The Sword and the Cross takes us to the Sahara at the end of the nineteenth century, when France had designs on a hostile wilderness dominated by deadly Tuareg nomads.
Two fanatical adventurers, Charles de Foucauld and Henri Laperrine, rose to the cause of their country's national honor. Abandoning his decadent lifestyle as a sensualist and womanizer, Foucauld founded a monastic order so severe that during his lifetime it never had a membership of more than one. Yet he remained a committed imperialist and from his remote hermitage continued to assist the military. The stern career soldier Laperrine, meanwhile, founded a camel corps whose exploits became legendary. During World War I the Sahara's fragile peace crumbled. In the desert mountains Foucauld paid a tragic price for his role as imperial pawn. Laperrine, by then recalled to the Western Front, returned to avenge his friend.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0802141730
• ISBN13: 9780802141736
• Release Date: October 2004
• Publisher: Grove Press
• Length: 368 Pages
• Weight: 1.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Thorough and entertaining history

A very, very good book. Provides a great overview of the early French colonial involvement in North Africa through the lens of the two enigmatic figures at the centre of the book.

An account of the wasteland of Africa

An interesting book on an extraordinary topic. When the French began to penetrate the Sahara in the 1830s they had no idea how much of a wasteland it was. The Sahara in fact is so big it could swallow the United States whole. In the last 19th century explorers and military adventurers began to venture into the vast wasteland, usually the expeditions originated from the south. Charles de Foucauld and Henri Laperrine star as the main characters in this historical account of colonialism and adventure. One is a wandering womanizer turned saint, a fanatic whose insane ideas knew no bounds. The other is a strict military officer. The only characteristic the two men had in common was devotion and strict discipline. They became fast friends as the fanatic led the soldier across the desert in search of empire and national redemption. The author details in great photographic text the many stories and adventures these two men had, one of which included the creation of a camel corps to explore the desert wasteland where no man could survive.This book is perfect for anyone interested in survival/adventure stories, anyone interested in the Sahara and life in the desert as well as colonial enthusiasts. This is not an overview of the French colonial experience in Algeria, although many of the subjects, like the rise of Muslim fundamentalism are touched upon, this book looks at the French colonial experience through the eyes of two very eccentric if typically French individuals. An important book on an oft not covered subject.