The True History Behind The Man With The Black Box
The dawn of the 20th Century – historic people, places and events masterfully woven together with a horrific tale of good vs. evil – Colin Cahoon gives us The Man with the Black Box.
The following are essays by the author that delve into the true history behind The Man with the Black Box…
Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt
History has amazing parallels, and this wild political season reminds me of the presidential race of 1912 involving one of the characters in my book, Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt. In The Man with the Black Box, Roosevelt is serving his second term as president and struggling along with the rest of the world’s leaders to contain the First Moroccan Crisis and avoid world war.
Teddy Roosevelt was a fascinating character who lived one of the most interesting lives of any American. He was an avid outdoorsman, brilliant politician, war hero, author, tireless self-promoter and the youngest man to assume the office of President of the United States. JFK was the youngest elected President (at 43), but Teddy is the youngest to serve, having assumed the office at the age of 42 upon the assassination of President McKinley by an anarchist on September 6, 1901. Teddy nearly met the same fate on the campaign trail in 1912.
Roosevelt, a firebrand populist, narrowly lost the 1912 GOP nomination to Taft at a rowdy and contentious convention despite having the most pledged delegates prior to the convention. Feeling cheated by his party, Roosevelt ran in the general election as a third-party candidate for the Progressive “Bull Moose” Party, with Woodrow Wilson filling out the field as the Democrat candidate. In those days before television, candidates campaigned by travelling around the country and giving speeches to large gatherings, usually standing on a platform, a tree stump if that was all that was available, and yelling their speech at the top of their lungs. As Roosevelt was about to deliver one of these “stump” speeches, a would be assassin fired a bullet into his chest. Fortunately for Roosevelt the bullet first passed through his metal glasses case and then a single folded copy of his speech, thus slowing the bullet down sufficiently to keep it from entering his lungs. Roosevelt declined to be taken to the hospital and, astoundingly, delivered his 90 minute speech as blood seeped into his jacket for all the crowd to see. It was later determined that removal of the bullet was more dangerous than leaving it in place, so he lived the rest of his life with the lead slug embedded in his chest muscle.
Roosevelt continued his campaign, garnering enough votes from traditional GOP voters to insure the election of the little-known democrat, Woodrow Wilson. And the rest, as they say, is history.
Henry Petty-Fitzmaurice
by Alexander Bassano,photograph,1883
June 3rd, 2016
This day marks the 89th anniversary of the death of Henry Petty-Fitzmaurice, the Marquess of Lansdowne. Lord Lansdowne is one of the historical characters featured in my book, The Man with the Black Box, appearing as the British Foreign Secretary, a position he held during the backdrop of the book, the First Moroccan Crisis. Lord Lansdown is an interesting and important historical figure about whom little is written and less remembered. During his life he was one of the richest men in England, having inherited several large estates, but took public service as his first duty. He represented his country in several official capacities, including Governor General of Canada, Viceroy of India, Secretary of State for War, and Secretary of Foreign Affairs. During his time as Foreign Secretary, Lansdowne negotiated the Entente Cordiale with the French, a treaty that brought the two rival governments together and began the alignment of the world powers that led Britain to join with France in the fight against Germany in the First World War, an alignment previewed during the First Moroccan Crisis when the British backed the French against German provocations. Lansdowne was forced from the position of Foreign Secretary when the Liberal government came to power in January of 1906. He thereafter led the opposition in the House of Lords against the Liberal party’s socialist agenda. One might wonder if the First World War could have been avoided had Lansdowne remained in the Foreign office, as opposed to his more temporizing and illusive replacement, Sir Grey, but we mere mortals can only speculate.
Roosevelt and The Moroccan Crisis
Kaiser Wilhelm II ca. 1902
May 15th, 2016
On this date 111 years ago President Teddy Roosevelt wrote a confidential letter that helps us understand what he was thinking in the midst of the Frist Moroccan Crisis. This letter is recounted in my book, The Man with the Black Box.
In the spring of 1905 the world tottered on the edge of war. The British were backing the French in their resistance to the aggressions of the Germans, who in turn were backed by the Austrians. Contemporary dispatches reveal that all involved thought war was imminent unless the dispute between the two factions could somehow be resolved. The position of the other major European power, Russia, was not yet clear. Italy and Spain, two of the lesser European powers who had more skin in the game (Morocco was part of their Mediterranean backyard) were also holding their cards close to the vest.
The world began to look increasingly to an up-and-coming power with no interest in the conflict to mediate the crisis and bring peace, if even temporarily, back to the continent. Teddy Roosevelt, better remembered today for his muscular foreign policy, actually relished the role of peacemaker as evidenced by his successful mediation of the bloody Russo-Japanese war later that year. What troubled the British about involving Roosevelt in a European dispute was their perception that the rough and ready President would be predisposed to back the bombastic German Emperor, Kaiser Wilhelm II. The British would have paid dearly to know what the American President thought about the Emperor.
On May 15, 1905, President Roosevelt revealed his thoughts on Kaiser Wilhelm in a confidential letter to his close friend and ally, Senator Lodge. Below is an excerpt that gives us the insight the British so desperately wanted at the time. You’ll have to read the book to find out how this insight might have shaped history.
It always amuses me to find that the English think that I am under the influence of the Kaiser. The heavy witted creatures do not understand that nothing would persuade me to follow the lead of or enter into close alliance with a man who is so jumpy, so little capable of continuity of action, and therefore, so little capable of being loyal to his friends and steadfastly hostile to an enemy. Undoubtedly with Russia weakened Germany feels it can be fairly insolent within the borders of Europe. I intend to do my best to keep on good terms with Germany, as with all other nations, and so far as I can to keep them on good terms with one another; and I shall be friendly to the Kaiser as I am friendly to everyone. But as for his having any special influence with me, the thought is absurd.
King Edward VII visits Paris
King Edward VII ca. 1898
May 1st, 2016
On this day 111 years ago at the height of the First Moroccan Crisis (the backdrop to my book), the British monarch, King Edward VII, arrived in Paris to assure the French government that if war came with Germany, the French could count on the British to come to their aid. The King also took the opportunity to spend his evenings with the best courtesans Paris had to offer.
The Entente Cordiale – Changing the Course of History
The Entente Cordiale sounds like a mixed drink today, but in 1904 a series of agreements by this name, some public and others secret, changed the world order in Europe and laid the groundwork for World War One. This Entente also sets the stage for the First Moroccan Crisis which serves as a backdrop for my novel, The Man with the Black Box.
During the two previous centuries France and Britain had been the dominant world powers, constantly embroiled in open and covert conflict with each other on a global scale. For hundreds of years French and British warships patrolling waters from the Caribbean to the Indian Ocean approached each other with open aggression, or at least serious trepidation, never knowing for certain if their governments thousands of miles away were officially or unofficially at war with each other. Even when technically at peace, French and British “privateers” waged economic warfare on the two countries’ seagoing commerce.
At the turn of the 20th Century the historical hostility between Britain and France was as strong as ever. Their latest colonial enterprises were focused on North Africa, with the French working the western portion (Algeria and Morocco), and the British the eastern portion (Egypt). C lashes in between these two parts of the continent were inevitable and nearly lead to war more than once.
The rise of Germany as a world power in the late 1800s provided an incentive for France and Britain to put their past enmity behind them. The German Army humbled the French in the war of 1870, and thirty years later the Germans embarked on a warship building program that, from the British perspective, could only be intended to challenge the British Navy’s dominance of the seas. The sudden appearance of this German bully on the world scene pushed the French and British into discussions about future cooperation and friendship.
These discussions of peace and mutual assistance were advanced by two visionary men, French Foreign Minister Delcasse’, and British Foreign Secretary Lord Lansdowne. The latter of these two men is a prominent character in The Man with the Black Box. Delcasse’ and Lansdowne were both dedicated patriots and pragmatic diplomats. Together they eventually steered their governments toward signing a series of agreements, referred to collectively as the Entente Cordiale, that brought France and Britain closer together and headed in the direction of their eventual alliance in the Frist World War against Germany and Austria. One of the agreements of the Entente Cordiale gave Britain uncontested claims to Egypt and recognized France as the dominant power in the affairs of the technically independent country of Morocco.
The German government was furious when it found out about the Entente Cordiale, because they were not involved in any of these important discussion and they much preferred the Brits and French at each other’s throats as opposed to hand-in-hand. In an attempt to break up this recent friendship between their two rival powers, the Germans decided to create an international incident that would blow up the Entente Cordiale and humble the French once again. On March 31, 1905, the world was rocked by the German-provoked “Tangier Incident,” the beginning of the First Moroccan Crisis. And the rest, as they say, is history.