In hindsight, Pope Urban II appears to have had two goals in mind for the men who went on his Crusade. First, he wanted to liberate the Eastern Christians from the Turks by driving them out of the territory of the Byzantine Empire. Second, he wanted to open a land route to the Holy City of Jerusalem and recapture it in the Pope’s own name.

Throughout 1095 Urban II preached the Crusade in his homeland of France. He had been born a French nobleman and well understood the mind of the French people, high and low born alike. Reaction to his sermons was greater than he probably ever imagined.

Urban II envisioned a well-organized Frankish expedition controlled by the church. He appointed Adhemar, Bishop of Le Puy to oversee the expedition of 1096. By this time, people from all levels of society were gathering in southern France, sewing red crosses on their clothes as a symbol of the Crusade to liberate the Holy Land.

At about the same time, a well-known preacher, Peter the Hermit of Germany, was also preaching the Crusade across his homeland of Germany, eventually forming what would be called the "Peasants Crusade" in Cologne. Without any planning, this mob (for lack of a better name) moved across Eastern Europe, arriving at Constantinople in August of 1096. Without adequate resources, they had been forced to pillage for supplies along the route. This naturally made them a general nuisance along the way, and they became unwanted guests upon reaching Constantinople. Shortly after the Peasant’s Crusade departed Constantinople, two other groups set out following Peter a few months apart. These groups were unruly and set about to massacre a large part of the Jewish population along the way. When they entered Hungary they ran afoul of the Hungarian King and in the end were stopped dead in their tracks. Most were killed but those that were captured ended their days as slaves.

Peter’s group eventually reached Constantinople where it continued to disrupt the local peace. The Emperor eventually won over Peter’s trust and loyalty and urged him not to push on without a "real" army. However, the Emperor was unsuccessful, and Peter was forced by his fellow leaders to push on for the East with a small Byzantine escort. Slowly, the impatient mob moved to the Turkish border. Upon crossing the Bosporus in October, the Turkish sultan, Kilij Arslan, ambushed and annihilated them. Peter himself happened to be seeking aid from the Emperor when this happened. A small band of his followers were saved by a Byzantine naval force and returned to Constantinople. Peter was no longer a player in the game.

The leaders of the second force of the First Crusade were much better prepared than Peter. They noted the mistakes that the earlier mobs had made with great interest. They chose to follow the Pope’s wishes. Gathering their forces and supplies in advance for the long trip, Bishop Adhemar, Count Raymond of Toulouse, Duke Godfrey of Lorraine, his brothers, Eustace and Baldwin, Bohemund the Norman of Taranto, and many others marched to Constantinople. These forces tended to arrive piecemeal, and as they did, the Byzantine navy ferried them across the Bosporus in early 1097. As each arrived, the Emperor would greet the leaders, entertain them, and attempt to bribe them into his way of thinking. Eventually, he managed to attain an oath of fealty from each of them for all previously held Byzantine lands that they retook. In return, he was to provide provisions and money to help them. For the most part he lived up to his end of the oath. The Crusaders did not!

Duke Godfrey, along with others, was not above blackmailing the Jewish population of the times. He let it slip out that he to planned to massacre Jews on the way, or Jews found to be friendly with the Infidel. The leaders of these Jewish populations appealed to their, mostly benevolent, lords race, to intervene. In addition the Jewish leaders sent Godfrey a large payment of money. This appears to have been his desire all along. He immediately informed everyone that he no longer intended to harm any Jews along the way.

Once amassed, the Crusaders proceeded to the Turkish capital of Nicaea. At this time, the Sultan, Kilij Arslan, after his victory over Peter’s group, was not bothered by the second expedition and was off raiding the lands of his archival. This over-confidence proved to be costly. Nicaea surrendered in June after a feeble attempt by Sultan Kilij and his army to break through the siege. The Sultan’s wife and family were in Nicaea.

Nicaea actually surrendered to Emperor Alexius, whose envoy and troops were ferried into the city at night under the very noses of the Franks. Though Nicaea represented their first victory, the Franks were furious at not being able to loot and occupy it. Many of the Frankish nobles saw this as the writing on the wall as far as trusting the Emperor. Already they began to regret the oath they had each given him!

The Battle of Dorylaeum (31 June, 1097)

Infuriated over the loss of his capital, wife and treasure at Nicaea, Sultan Kilij Arslan planned, as he had for Peter, to ambush of the Crusaders further along their march. This time, the headstrong Sultan mistook the Crusader vanguard (led by Bohemond) for the main army and attacked it headlong. The attackers drove the Crusaders all the way back to their camp. Then, as many soldiers are prone to do, they stopped to sack and pillage the camp. The Franks had fought long and hard, holding the Turks long enough for the main Crusader army (led by Raymond of Toulouse) to come up on the Turk flank. This was followed by the sudden appearance of Adhemar with a small force in the Turkish rear, and the Turks were soundly beaten.

With most of his army destroyed, the Sultan Kilij Arslan was forced to harass the Crusader advance through Anatolia. The campaign became a march of endless skirmishes and forays into the rough land through which the Crusaders marched. During skirmishes with the Turks, some Franks claim to have seen visions of angelic warriors assuring them that they had been chosen to liberate Jerusalem. The march was a terrible ordeal, with more men and beasts dying at this stage than in battle. Throughout these sufferings the Crusaders felt that their God was testing them, and, while some chose to desert, most pushed on to meet the challenge.

Antioch, 1097-1098

After passing through Anatolia in the fall of 1097, the Crusaders came to Antioch. Over the winter they laid siege to the city. Meanwhile, Baldwin, (brother of Duke Godfrey) separated from the main army. He befriended the Armenian Christians as he passed through their country in 1097, taking all of the Turkish garrisons. In February of 1098 he occupied the city of Edessa as his domain and was adopted by its king, Thoros (who conveniently died shortly there after). In Antioch, the Turkish Sultan Yaghi, tried to bribe his nearest neighbor, the Emir of Aleppo (whom he had betrayed earlier) to aid him against the Franks.

Meanwhile, the siege continued on, until Bohemund found a traitor in Antioch that allowed the Crusaders to enter and capture the city. By June 1098 they had slaughtered or driven away the entire population of Antioch. The Crusader knights, by this time, were virtually without horses. Soon after, a Turkish army led by Kerbogha of Mosul arrived. He had been delayed, attempting to retake Edessa on the way. He then laid siege to those that had formerly been besieging. Count Raymond, the military leader of the Crusade up until now, fell ill and the command passed to Bohemond, who promptly attacked the Turks on 28 June. With the discovery of the Holy Lance of Christ in Antioch, the Crusaders sallied out of the city and defeated the Turks. This victory was made that much easier by the bickering and mistrust of the various Turkish leaders who made up the force. The Turks fled back to Mosul.

The Franks now pushed on towards Jerusalem, their final goal. But when they moved out it was with three less leaders. Baldwin of Edessa now had a domain on the frontier. Bohemund, declaring himself Prince of Antioch, stayed behind to rule his new realm. Bishop Adhemar, the spiritual leader of the army died of typhoid.

Jerusalem, 1099

The Crusaders, now led by Count Raymond and Duke Godfrey, were intent on gaining Jerusalem. To expedite this they accepted gifts and neutrality of all the Moslem coastal cities along the way. By June 1099, the Crusaders were outside the Holy City. The Franks did not impress the Egyptian governor. He expelled the Christians from the city, fortified it and sent word to Cairo for help.

Upon arriving at Jerusalem, the Crusaders hastily attacked the great walls and failed. Sure of relief, Iftikhar waited for over a month behind the city walls. On the night of 13 July, the Crusaders stormed into the city and massacred the population, Turk, Christian and Jew alike; no man, woman or child was spared.

The New State Of Outremer

The Crusaders chose Godfrey of Lorraine as the King of Jerusalem. History has shown us that the First Crusade was a success. The Crusaders formed a new state called "Outremer," made up of four new Christian polities (the County of Edessa, the County of Tripoli, the Principality of Antioch, and the Kingdom of Jerusalem). This, in turn, helped relieve the pressure on Constantinople, temporarily, and recaptured the Holy City of Jerusalem. This state was to be severely tested for the next several centuries. When it failed, it fell back into the desert sands from which it had come.

Thus ended the First Crusade. The next forty to fifty years would see a strengthening of the states that became known as Outremer, as the Christian domains came to be called. However, the other lords of Outremer considered themselves more or less independent of the New Kingdom of Jerusalem and its "elected" king. This would all change when Saladin arrived in the Later Crusader period.

More History of the Crusades

Introduction
First Crusade
Second Crusade
Third Crusade
Fourth and Fifth Crusades