T. E. Lawrence: Lawrence Of Arabia

Lawrence In Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East, Scott Anderson, c. 2013. See first comment below. Scott Anderson appears to be a contemporary American author.

Lawrence of Arabia: The Life, The Legend, Malcolm Brown, c. 2005; coffee table; quick read; lots of photos, graphics. Best quick-read book. 208 pages.

Lawrence: The Uncrowned King of Arabia, Michael Asher, c. 1998, 378 pages.

A Touch of Genius: The Life of T. E. Lawrence, Malcolm Brown and Julia Cave, c. 1988, 233 pages.

The Golden Warrior: The Life and Legend of Lawrence of Arabia, Lawrence James, c. 1990; new preface, 1993, 406 pages.

A Prince of Our Disorder: The Life of T. E. Lawrence, John E. Mack, c. 1976; 561 pages.

Hero: The and Legend of of Lawrence of Arabia, Michael Korda, c. 2010; 800 pages.

2nd of 5 illegitimate children of Sarah (house servant) and Robert Tighe Chapman, outside of Dublin, an Anglo-Irish landowner. Sarah's last name not known: Maden, Jenner, or Junner.

He never divorced his first wife, who had become "insanely" religious, and now consider marital relations sinful. Robert had four legitimate children by his first wife.

Once he "eloped" with Sarah, the two of them were on the run. The first child was born in 1885, in Dublin. They adopted a surname for their first son, Lawrence, perhaps after the first name of Sarah's natural father. Regardless, the second son (the future "Lawrence of Arabia") was born in Wales in 1888; a third son in Scotland (1889); a fourth son, Frank, in the Channel Islands in 1893; and, finally a fifth son, in 1900, in Oxford, where they apparently settled.

T. E. was known as "Ned." He had trouble dealing with his illegitimacy because it did not fit his ideal of royalty which he aspired to in some fashion.

He graduated from honors, Magdalen, Oxford, in 1910, following his thesis comparing Crusaders castles in the Mideast with castles in Europe.

He enlisted and was enrolled by the geographical division of Military Intelligence in the War Office in London. First employed as a civilian, he soon became a second lieutenant on the Special List: i.e., an officer without regimental affiliation. He would remain 'unattached' throughout the war, while rising ultimately to the rank -- distinctly unusual for a 'Hostilities Only" officer -- of Lieutenant Colonel. "For a man supremely unfitted for the camaraderie of an officers' mess, this was a role that fitted his personality best." -- Malcolm Brown, p. 35.

The brothers in WWI:

• the eldest: a physician in the Royal Army Medical Corps
• the third: the Royal Flying Corps -- dead within the first year of combat
• the fourth: the infantry -- dead within the first year of combat
• Arnold: too young to be involved, and nothing more about him

Sent to Cairo for two years (intelligence); felt he would "die" there; hated the monotony, but during that time came up with the idea of uniting the Arabs; and leading an Arab Revolt which he would make his own and give his name to it.

His plan: get to Damascus first and throw the French out, as well as the Turks, and give Arabia to the Arabs (exactly how the Brits fit in, he did not say). About 1915.

Would later discuss, in correspondence with Liddell Hart, his role in terms of generalship -- p. 40, Malcolm Brown.

Fifteen months after he wrote that, June, 1916, Sherif Hussein, emboldened with French and British support, began the attack on the Turks. Hussein handed the war over to his four sons: Ali, Abdullah, Feisal, and Zeid.

Lawrence went to Arabia / Sherif Hussein, in October, 1916, because Hussein had accomplished little. Lawrence would return home (England) in October 1918, exactly two years.

Lawrence first meets Hussein's second son Abdullah, and his first son, Ali. But Lawrence's career really begins when he meets the third son, Feisal, who was encamped a hundred miles inland (in the movie, this is really how it begins -- his trip across the desert with his friend, who is killed at the well). Lawrence rides on alone to meet Feisal. Stories differ how they came to terms, but suffice it to say: "Feisal the flame, Lawrence the brain." -- Malcolm Brown, p. 39.

First Yenbo, where Lawrence winters over in 1916 - 1917.

Then to Wejh, up the Red Sea coasat from Yenbo, Aqaba, both farther south.

Wejh was a major gain, giving the Arabs a strong base from which to attack the Turkish railway.

It was at Wejh (January, 1917) where the veteran chief of the Howeitat tribe, Auda Abu Taji, arrived: to Lawrence, Auda seemed like a warrior out of medieval romance, a knight-errant, almost a Wagnerian Siegreid. 

Florid dispatches by Lawrence. "It has been long claimed by such authors as the American Paul Fussell, that the war of the Western Front was a literary war. The same could be stated of the Arabian campaign, and here the undoubted star was T. E. Lawrence, though there were not a few other contributors of distinction, such as Storrs, Newcombe, Hogarth himself (T. E. Lawrence's mentor), and later, the redoubtable traveler, H. St. John Philby. -- p. 47 -- Malcolm Brown.

It was Auda who wanted to take Aqaba, northern end of the Red Sea. This is the big scene in the movie of Lawrence/Arabs going across the desert, attacking Aqaba from inland, not from the sea, as the Turks expected.

Lawrence to Cairo to tell the news. A new general, Allenby.

Egypt could now join the Arabs in throwing the Turks out.

The Balfour Declaration of November, 1917: the British viewed with favor the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine; Lawrence had to "carry the water" to the Arabs to convince them to carry on.

Lawrence was present at Allenby's triumphant entry into Jerusalem, December, 1917.

Meets Lowell Thomas in Jerusalem which is how the myth of Lawrence truly began. Thomas never saw Lawrence in battle and was only in the Mideast for a short period of time.
 
Darkest moment of the war for Lawrence: Deraa, November, 1917. Deraa, 2/3rds of the way from Aqaba to Damascus, just south of Damascus.

"He would never again be the man he was before Deraa." -- Malcolm Brown, p. 52.

Tafas Village massacre. Home of a tribal chief traveling with Lawrence, Tallal.  Tallal fell in a barrage of bullets; Audu led the charge/massacre; for the first time in his war Lawrence ordered a 'no prisoners' eye-for-an-eye revenge." -- p. 53, Malcolm Brown. (The movie does not make it clear that the Turks had just massacred the village as they were retreating, killing "all" women and children. That puts the Arab charge into perspective.

Damascus entered October 1, 1918. Three days later, with Allenby's permission, Lawrence returns to England. 

Enlists in Army for two years; enlists in Royal Air Force. Dies in motorcycle accident in England.

The popular abridged edition of Seven Pillars of Wisdom was published in 1927.

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Michael Asher's biography: a fair amount of forensic psychology. Feels TEL's penchant for masochism stemmed from beatings by his mother, Sarah. Makes strong case suggesting that the "incident at Daraa" was fabricated by TEL. No corroborating evidence and original journal/diary is missing one page, obviously ripped out, and would have been recorded at the time he was supposedly in Daraa. Just prior to Daraa he had failed in a mission and would have had to convey that failure to his general, General Allenby.

Michael Asher, opening paragraph, p. 7:

In 1879, a beautiful young woman called Sarah Lawrence alighted from a ferry at Dublin to begin the great adventure of her life. She was to be governess to the children of a wealthy gentleman called Thomas Chapman, who owned a mansion and a vast estate near Delvin in County Westmeath. Though just eighteen, Sarah was a woman of extraordinary dominance and ability, who had already overcome social barriers which many would have found insurmountable. Born the illegitimate daughter of a Tyneside shipwright names John Lawrence, deserted by her father and orphaned at nine by her own alcoholic mother, she had been brought up by an Episcopal minister and his wife in the highlands of Scotland and the Isle of Skye. In the late Victorian era, when illegitimacy attracted dire social stigma, when the classes were almost as fixed in their orbits as the celestial bodies, she was determined to leap the gulf between deprived working-class orphan and respectable, middle-class housewife. If she could not become a queen or a lady of the manor, she could at least use her power to captivate the heart of a nobleman -- and that is precisely what she did.