# French control of North Africa?



## Rajani (Sep 7, 2011)

I'm currently working on a story that takes place in roughly 1901, with several scenes taking place in North African cities.  I'm wondering if anyone could help me with North Africa's relationship to France around that time, specifically Algeria and Morocco--I haven't been able to find very much on the Internet.  Thanks!


----------



## The Backward OX (Sep 8, 2011)

I did a bit of googling and found plenty. Perhaps you need to be more creative with your search terms. Also, don’t forget the links that you’ll find.


----------



## C.M. Aaron (Sep 24, 2011)

The French incorporated Algeria into their colonial empire in the 1830s and 1840s. Tunisia was added in 1881. Morocco was still an independent sultanate in 1901. The French really moved in on Morocco after the Algeciras Conference in 1906. In 1901, Morocco was a failing state with bandits and warlords running wild in the desert. In 1905, one of those renegade warlords kidnapped two American citizens and held them for ransom for several months. This led to the belief that outside powers had to police Morocco, hence the conference. The UK was the most influential foreign power in Morocco until the conference. They let the French take over because they really did not want Morocco. The exception to what I said above was that Spain held a small narrow strip of Morocco along the southern shore of the Strait of Gibraltar. What that meant, I'm not sure. I suspect that the sultan of Morocco was the nominal leader of the entire country, but the Spanish did not let him make any decisions of real consequence in their little section. I think the French did the same thing when they moved in. They left the sultan as a figurehead but did not let him make any real decisions.   C.M.


----------



## Rajani (Sep 25, 2011)

Thank you so much!  I did do some different search terms, and found a few helpful pages.  I didn't know the United Kingdom was involved as much.  This makes everything so much easier...


----------

