CHAPTER ONE

Ethics and the Culture of War

TWO absolute forms of struggle – War and Ethics – meet in Lawrence, a rare instance of a warrior and a scholar, who also happened to be a writer, who records the Agon of these two realms as they meet in his experience. These two elements, or forms, emerge very early in Lawrence’s life, and can be traced throughout his formative years, and indeed thereafter. The locus classicus for their medieval combination, which Lawrence studied so closely, is Chivalry. And within Chivalry can be discerned two of the paths which lead to personal perfection – the Monk and the Knight. And these two paths can be studied in ‘real’ history, or in literature. This combination inevitably generates its tensions and instabilities either within an individual’s lived experience, or between the two paths.

In any case, Lawrence’s early immersion in medieval history, particularly military architecture, the subject of his Degree thesis, armour, Archaeology, the military theorists, and above all, the Crusades, would have inevitably brought him to the literature of Chivalry. And it is in this literature, at least in Europe, and in the Crusader kingdoms of Latin Syria and the Middle East, where warfare first tries on its religious masks, whether Christian or Islamic, and militant spiritualities first encounter each other across Europe and the Middle East.

It seems indisputable that Lawrence began his studies as a Christian, although his education was also classically oriented in the Victorian culture of late 19th century Oxford. His mother and elder brother, Dr. M.R. Lawrence, were sufficiently dedicated to their faith to go to China as missionaries. And Lawrence himself taught at St. Aldgate’s Sunday School, and was an officer in the Church Lads’ Brigade. When the Reverend Alfred M.W. Christopher, a leader of the 19th century Evangelical Movement retired in 1905 from St. Aldgate’s, Lawrence and his brothers continued Bible study classes at his home. The impact of this early Christian study clearly mark the letters he wrote home on his first explorations of Palestine. In confirmation of the intensity of this early Christian formation, Mack notes, ‘I have seen the well-thumbed and extensively annotated and underlined Bibles from which the parents read to their children.’¹

It is from within this Christian culture that Lawrence conducted his first explorations of the military strategists and Chivalry through extensive readings, and bicycle journeys to castles and significant battlefields. The Letters to his Biographers (Robert Graves and Liddell Hart) are particularly instructive.²

Liddell Hart: When did you begin to read books on the theory of war as distinct from history?

Lawrence: In my 16th year, when at school in Oxford – about 1903(?).

Liddell Hart: What books did you begin with?

Lawrence: The usual schoolboy stuff – Creasey,³ Henderson,⁴ Mahan,⁵ Napier,⁶ Coxe,⁷ – then technical treatises on castle-building and destruction: Procopius,⁸ Demetrius Poliorcetes,⁹ and others which I have forgotten. I also read nearly every manual of chivalry. Remember that my ‘period’ was the Middle Ages, always.

Emphasising this preoccupation with Chivalry, Lawrence also writes to Robert Graves, [pg 48]: ‘At Jesus read history, officially: actually spent nearly three years reading Provencal poetry, and medieval French chansons de geste.’¹⁰

This relatively arcane branch of literature may seem remote from the literature of War, and even History, but Maurice Keen in his authoritative study of Chivalry demonstrates that the chansons de geste are ‘… the earliest sources that can fully and properly be called “Chivalrous”… and in them the wars against the heathen in the Carolingian age… hold the centre of the stage again.’¹¹

However much credence we may give to the time Lawrence devoted to medieval poetry, it seems clear that from his 16th year to at least his 23rd, initially, he devoted much of this approximate seven-year period to Chivalry and Christianity, and then the literature, history, architecture, and materiality [e.g. armour], of warfare. In fact, glancing ahead for a moment, we can see this interest continuing: for example, his Thesis on Crusader Castles, his later references to Xenophon, the continuing interest in Malory, and his praise of Caesar’s Gallic Wars. And this does not even begin to engage with the flurries of reference to military strategists in the Seven Pillars.

Returning to Chivalry and its literature: it is not that we have here first Christianity, then War, as two separate domains, but that medieval literature and history, particularly of the Crusades, (‘the epitome of chivalrous activity’– Keen) show us religious faith with sword in hand, and at the same time, warfare itself as a culture of spiritual values with complex and unstable relations with Christianity. Celebrated organisational forms for this amalgam were, of course, the military religious orders: the Templars, the Hospitallers, the Teutonic Knights. And not for nothing is a well-known study of these orders appropriately entitled The Monks of War.¹² In passing, we can also see another layer of meaning in Lawrence’s description of his entry into the RAF, as like a monastery, and his quasi-religious/vocational view of the ‘conquest of the Air.’

However, the development of a Warrior Ethos, or code, can also be discerned in the systematically elitist literature and practices of Chivalry, whether it wears the Crusader Cross or not. And this aspect of Chivalry connects less directly to the ‘spiritual’, and more to the ancient cultures of ‘Honour’, which can be traced back at least as far as Homer. For example, just as in Homer, Geoffroi de Charny, a 14th century warrior and writer on Chivalry, advises knights to ‘Love and serve your friends, [and] hate and harm your enemies.’¹³ In fact, as late as 1928, Lawrence made the connection between Homer and the chanson de geste in a letter to Emery Walker. Speaking of the Odyssey, Lawrence remarks that, ‘The author writes in metre, as that was the consecrated form of the early novel or chanson de geste..’¹⁴ Even in connection with Krak des Chevaliers, Lawrence locates its entrance as ‘… a long way after’ Rum Kalaat, and then, parenthetically, adds, ‘[Hromgl of Walter von der Vogelweider]’ – thus casually connecting major Crusader Castles with the greatest of the early German Minnesinger.¹⁵

Lawrence had multiple routes of access to the world of Chivalry, castles, and warfare, from boyhood onwards. Along with the interest in the medieval world, and a ‘passionate absorption in the past’,¹⁶ went deep involvements in heraldry, monumental brasses, church architecture, old coins, and pottery. And these interests led to friendships with archaeologists including Leonard Woolley and D.G. Hogarth, as well as other staff at the Ashmolean Museum. Gradually the exploration of castles expanded – from England in 1905 (to Colchester, Norwich and King’s Lynn), by bicycle with his father, to Wales, and then to France in 1906, 1907 and 1908. The latter tour was the longest of this period; Lawrence’s authorised biographer remarks that this 2,400-mile journey was ‘not exceptional.’¹⁷ In passing, the letters home of this period also register an almost Spartan austerity. By preference perhaps, or as a test, living on one or two Francs per day, and eating a diet of fruit, bread, and milk, whilst cycling long distances (up to 100 miles per day). In the summer of his 21st birthday, Lawrence walked 1,100 miles through Palestine and Syria visiting every Crusader Castle of importance. The overt official project was that he could establish his Thesis considering the influence of Levantine military architecture on that of the West. Liddell Hart opines that, ‘His basic intention in exploring Syria was a strategic study of the Crusades.’¹⁸ Lawrence obtained first class honours in History, but his letters of the period also exhibit a profound grasp of the strategic problems of waging war in Palestine and Syria. He asserts, finally, that the ‘whole history of the Crusades was a struggle for the possession of [certain] castles’,¹⁹ thus demonstrating his feel for territory and the siting of fortresses but, even more presciently, the importance of sea power to support the Crusaders: ‘Latin Syria lived on its fleets.’²⁰ This was to be exactly the strategy of support in the Arab Revolt 6-7 years later.

Meanwhile, in the Chivalrous literature which Lawrence was studying at the time, the pressures of war-making in the Holy Land were registering themselves in certain cultural developments. Some historians of war, for example John Keegan, argue plausibly that the principal response to these pressures was ‘an ever closer assimilation of the code of warriordom by which they lived, with the appeal to Christian service that drew them across the Mediterranean in the first place. It was no longer sufficient to have a horse, a coat of mail and a Lord to follow, the basis of fealty itself was changing from certain material considerations to ceremonial and religious relations. The oath/vow of fealty which bound a knight in personal service to his lord—swore not merely to obey but also to behave in knightly fashion, which meant to lead an honourable and even virtuous life.’²¹ In short, both Christianisation and the introduction of a culture of Honour had begun. It is clear that Lawrence was profoundly immersed in this world, and by giving it due weight many of his later views and reactions become understandable and even admirable.

Endnotes

¹   J.E. Mack, Prince of Our Disorder, pp. 13, 14. Also Wilson, p. 44.

²   Letters to His Biographers, pp. 50-51.

³   Sir E.S. Creasey, author of Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World.

⁴   George Francis Henderson, 1852-1903. Colonel in British Army. Active service in India and Egypt; taught military history at Sandhurst and at Staff College. Intelligence Officer to the British Commander–in-Chief during Boer War. Held a particular interest in the American Civil War; his biography of Stonewall Jackson became a military classic. ‘It is the leader who reckons with the human nature of his troops and the enemy, rather than with their mere physical attributes, numbers, armaments and the like, who can hope to follow in Napoleon’s footsteps.’ Quoted in Tsouras, pp. 205, 507.

⁵   Either – Alfred Thayer Mahan (1840-1914). Rear Admiral U.S. Navy, author of the Influence of Sea Power in History, which revolutionised naval strategy. ‘The love of glory, the ardent desire for honourable distinction, by honourable deeds, is amongst the most potent and honourable of military motives.’ Tsouras, pp. 193, 515.
Or – Dennis Hart Mahan (1802-1871). Engineer and Educator. Dean of the Faculty at West Point. Nearly all the great Civil War Generals were his students. ‘It is in military history that we are to look for the source of all military science.’ ‘To do the greatest damage to our enemy with the least exposure to ourselves, is a military axiom lost sight of only by ignorance of the true ends of victory.’ Tsouras, pp. 199, 286, 515.

⁶   Sir William Napier (1785-1860). Lieutenant General, British Army. Served in Portugal 1809-11. Became Governor of Guernsey. Wrote History of The War in the Peninsular [1828-40], and History of the Conquest of Scinde [1844-46]. ‘An ignorant officer is a murderer.’ Tsouras, pp. 254, 518.

⁷   William Coxe, author/editor of the Memoirs of Marlborough (1847).

⁸   Born between 490-507 B.C. Byzantine Historian. From 527-531 he was advisor to the military commander Belisaurus, about whom Robert Graves wrote a novel. His Secret History is a later supplement to his more extensive writings on The Persian Wars, the Vandal Wars in Africa, and the Gothic Wars in Sicily and Italy. Several references in Crusader Castles. See Oxford Edn.

⁹   Demetrius I Poliorcetes (336-283 B.C.). Son of Alexander’s general, Antigonus I. Macedonian General and Ruler. Involved in the Wars of the Diadochi. Captured by Seleusis 1.

¹⁰  Chansons de geste: a genre of poetry. Geste = an exploit, a tale of adventure, a romance. From the old French/Latin Gesta = things done.

¹¹  Maurice Keen, Chivalry, p. 51.

¹²  Desmond Seward, The Monks Of War – The Military Religious Orders.

¹³  Geoffroi de Charny, Book of Chivalry, p. 129.

¹⁴  Quoted in Wilson, p. 842.

¹⁵  See Keen, Chivalry, p. 36.

¹⁶  See Garnett, Letters, p. 39.

¹⁷  Jeremy Wilson, Lawrence of Arabia, p. 45.

¹⁸  T.E. Lawrence to his Biographers, p. 49.

¹⁹  See ‘Letter to Leonard Green’, Letters of T.E. Lawrence, pp. 36-39 (1911).

²⁰  Letters, Edited by Garnett, p. 38.

²¹  Keegan, A History of Warfare, p. 294.