Lawrence of Arabia: The Man Behind the Legend

Now, I suspect that plenty of youngsters today wouldn't have the foggiest idea who he was. Those of us who went to school in an era when history lessons involved actual history, however, are likely to remember him.

A British gentleman with piercing blue eyes, riding a camel across the desert, dressed in flowing Arab robes and looking every inch the adventurer.

Had social media existed in his day, he might well have given Taylor Swift a run for her money.

For us, the name Lawrence of Arabia brings to mind the magnificent 1962 film, with Peter O'Toole in the title role. It helped turn an already remarkable historical figure into a legend.

But how much do we really know about the man behind those piercing blue eyes?

The man behind the legend

Thomas Edward Lawrence was born in Wales on 16 August 1888. He developed an early fascination with history, archaeology and the Middle East, eventually studying at Oxford. His travels and archaeological work in the region gave him a knowledge of its landscape, history and people that would prove invaluable when the First World War came along.

His archaeological work at Carchemish, in what is now southern Turkey, was far more than a passing interest. Lawrence spent several years working in the region, learning Arabic and becoming familiar with its people, history and landscape. He was not simply a young Englishman who arrived in the desert and suddenly discovered he had a gift for adventure. He had done his homework, and that knowledge would prove invaluable when war arrived.

When Britain went to war against the Ottoman Empire, Lawrence was working with British military intelligence in Cairo.

The Ottoman Empire, which had ruled much of the Middle East for centuries, had joined the Central Powers. Britain and France, meanwhile, had their own strategic interests in the region.

In 1916, an Arab revolt began against Ottoman rule. Sharif Hussein of Mecca and his sons, including Faisal, were among its leading figures. They wanted greater independence for the Arabs, and Britain offered support for their struggle.

Lawrence was sent to work with the Arab forces.

He wasn't the entire Arab Revolt, despite what some later accounts might have us believe. Nor was he the only man doing the fighting. But he became an important liaison between the British and Arab leaders, and his understanding of the region helped him build relationships with the people with whom he worked.

One of his most celebrated exploits was the capture of Aqaba in July 1917. Rather than attack the heavily defended port from the sea, the Arab forces approached overland through the desert, taking the Ottoman defenders by surprise.

It was a remarkable military achievement.

Lawrence became a legend, and the legend grew. His later writings, particularly Seven Pillars of Wisdom, helped shape the story the world came to know.

But while the cameras and history books would eventually concentrate on the adventurous Englishman in Arab dress, something rather more complicated was happening behind the scenes.

The complications behind the legend

In 1916, while the war was still raging, Britain and France negotiated what became known as the Sykes–Picot Agreement. Russia assented to the arrangement.

The agreement was named after the British diplomat Mark Sykes and the French diplomat François Georges-Picot. Its purpose was to establish how much of the Ottoman Empire's Arab territories Britain and France expected to control, or dominate through spheres of influence, if the Ottoman Empire was defeated.

In other words, the two imperial powers were planning their post-war arrangements while the outcome of the war remained uncertain.

The agreement envisaged British and French zones of control and influence, with a separate international arrangement proposed for parts of Palestine.

It was not a finished blueprint for every modern Middle Eastern country, and the borders we know today emerged through further negotiations, mandates, conflicts and political decisions. Nevertheless, it revealed the competing ambitions of two powerful allies.

And there was a problem.

Britain had also been corresponding with Sharif Hussein of Mecca about Arab independence. The precise extent of the territory Britain was prepared to recognise as independent was disputed, but the correspondence created expectations that sat uneasily alongside the secret Anglo-French arrangements.

Then came the Balfour Declaration in 1917, in which Britain expressed support for establishing a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine, while also stating that nothing should prejudice the civil and religious rights of the existing non-Jewish communities there.

There were now several promises, ambitions and expectations in play, and they did not fit together neatly.

The man caught between two worlds

Lawrence did not negotiate the Sykes–Picot Agreement. He was not sitting in a room with Sykes and Picot, drawing lines across a map and deciding the fate of millions of people.

Lawrence worked with Arab leaders and fighters, supporting their campaign against the Ottomans while serving British interests.

There is considerable evidence that Lawrence became deeply troubled by the conflict between the aspirations of the Arabs with whom he worked and the policies being pursued by his own government. He later criticised the settlement and the way Arab expectations had been handled.

Perhaps that is why Lawrence of Arabia continues to fascinate us. He was an archaeologist who became a soldier, a reluctant participant in events of enormous consequence, and a man whose reputation eventually grew larger than the man himself.

The world remembers the blue-eyed adventurer riding across the desert. It remembers the battles, the robes and the extraordinary exploits.

But behind the legend was a complicated human being, living with the consequences of choices made in extraordinary circumstances.

History gave him a name that would last a century. Whether the man himself ever found peace with that legacy is another question entirely.

A tragic end to an extraordinary life

Lawrence's story did not end in the deserts of Arabia. It ended on a quiet country road in Dorset, far removed from the battles that had made him famous.

In May 1935, riding his beloved motorcycle, he swerved to avoid two boys on bicycles and suffered injuries from which he would never recover. Six days later, he was dead. He was only 46.

There were those who questioned whether the accident was quite what it appeared to be. Rumours of assassination and other explanations followed, as they so often do when a famous life ends unexpectedly.

But perhaps the greater tragedy lies elsewhere.

Here was a man who had experienced extraordinary adventures, earned international fame and played a part in events that would shape his lifetime. Yet in his later years, he sought to escape the fame that had grown around his wartime exploits, enlisting in the RAF under an assumed name.

His experiences during the Arab Revolt left him with difficult questions about his own role in events, and about the difference between the hopes with which a war is fought and the reality that follows.

We cannot know everything that passed through his mind during those final years. Nor can we know what further work he might have undertaken had he lived.

What we do know is that the man behind the legend was considerably more complicated than the blue-eyed adventurer immortalised on the cinema screen.

And perhaps that is reason enough to remember him.