The Rise and Fall of British Crusader Medievalism, c.1825–1945

This book investigates the uses of crusader medievalism – the memory of the crusades and crusading rhetoric and imagery – in Britain, from Walter Scott’s The Talisman (1825) to the end of the Second World War. It seeks to understand why and when the crusades and crusading were popular, how they fitted with other cultural trends of the Victorian and Edwardian eras, how their use was affected by the turmoil of the First World War and whether they were differently employed in the interwar years and in the 1939-45 conflict. Building on existing studies and contributing the fruits of fresh research, it brings together examples of the uses of the crusades from disparate contexts and integrates them into the story of the rise and fall crusader medievalism in Britain.

Introduction PART I: RISE 1. The Victorian Foundations of British Crusader Medievalism 2. ‘We Hope Every Crusader will Grow Up an Accomplished Christian Gentleman’: Young Crusaders 3. Gospel Crusaders PART II: FALL 4. ‘My Dream Comes True’: Crusading in the Great War 5. Interwar Crusading 6. A Deep Engagement with Crusadery: ‘The Tenth Crusade’ of The Most Noble Order of Crusaders (est. 1921) 7. ‘A Crusade Which Lacks a Cross’?: Crusader Medievalism and the Second World War Conclusions: Rise and Fall

Mike Horswell completed his PhD at Royal Holloway, University of London, in 2017 under Professor Jonathan Phillips. He is the author of several articles and chapters on the memory of the crusades in the modern era and has and enduring interest in the ways in which the past is used, reinvented and redeployed.