The end of the conquest under Napoleon III and the short-lived Arab Kingdom

All along the exhibition
historians share their analysis

Napoleon III’s Arab Kingdom
M. Levallois

In the wake of Abdelkader’s surrender, the short-lived Second Republic outlined a policy of assimilation and settlement. The 1848 Constitution stated that Algeria was a “French territory” and divided it into three départements. Yet the conquest wasn’t over and uprisings were severely crushed. From 1852, the Second Empire strengthened the role of the military in administering the territories and gave a new boost to the conquest. Once appointed governor of Algeria, General Randon first brought under submission the oases of the Algerian Northern Sahara and in 1857 Kabylia, the last independent stronghold at the heart of Algeria.

Poignard kabyle (flissah)
© Paris - Musée de l'Armée, Dist. RMN-GP/Emilie Cambier

From then on, the conquest was deemed complete despite a number of uprisings being put down in the newly conquered territories. In 1852 Napoleon III released Emir Abdelkader, who had been held captive despite the Duke of Aumale’s undertakings. Yet until 1860 he didn’t pay much attention to Algeria and considered it to be “a ball and chain tied to France’s feet”. Under the influence of Ismaël Urbain and Saint-Simonianist advisers, the Emperor devised a bold project during his two visits to Algeria in 1860 and 1865: achieving full political and economic equality between the mainland and Algeria, which he saw not as a colony but as an “Arab Kingdom”. He refused to subject the Arab and Berber population to the same fate as Native Americans, and claimed to be “as much the Emperor of the Arabs as that of the French”. However this fleeting “Arab dream” was wrecked by the opposition of the colonialists and the fall of the Second Empire.

Young visitors’ itinerary

Destination : Algiers the White

Following a plan for the invasion of Algeria originally developed under Napoleon I, two spies had drawn up maps and written reports intended to the invasion of Algiers. In 1830, as the French landed in the coastal town of Sidi Fredj, some 30 kilometres from Algiers, these reports and maps would prove useful for the armies of French king Charles X…

Appropriating the land : controlling the land, knowing and administering the people

Carnets d'Orient - Jacques Ferrandez - tome 2

Carnets d'Orient - Jacques Ferrandez - tome 4