László Almásy in East Africa in 1929 From silent movie 'Durch Afrika mit Automobil', courtesy of Kurt Mayer

Castle Bernstein  (Austria)

He drove first a car in Egypt, along the Nile, into the Sudan in 1926, and came back for experimental shorter reconnaissance journeys as well as hunting in the following years. To demonstrate the hardiness of  Steyr vehicles he drove first in the deep desert. 

Steyr touring car in Meroe,1926 From Almásy's book 'By motor-car into the Sudan'

In 1929, as prelude to his later desert expeditions, he penetrated East Africa, the Sudan and Egypt with two Steyr XX lorries. Rudi Mayer,  a  Styrian film maker created a documentary of the 12-000 kilometer long and adventurous  journey. 
(The negative material was found  by his son, Kurt Mayer and restored. The 110-minute-long silent movie was presented in 1997 in Vienna, London and in 1998 in Budapest.) 

Almásy in front of the Grand Hotel,  Khartum, Sudan in 1929 From 'Durch Afrika mit Automobil', courtesy of Kurt Mayer

This documentary film offers an unusual opportunity to see real  African scenes from the late twenties of the last century. We can see the real Almásy who led the expedition. The film shows him as a tall, lean  Hungarian aristocrat with good sense of humor and  special communication abilities. 

Up to the 1930s Almásy developed a passion for the desert and connected the company of other desert fools or researchers. He was lured by the secrets of the Libyan Desert. In this period of the history of the geographical exploration of the Eastern Sahara one can observe an interesting transition: the new expedition technology revolutionized desert expeditions. 

Almásy was an excellent driver and pilot and could make use of the new technology at high level. On the other hand the lack of official support forced him to find financial support and organize  international expeditions. 

Sir Robert Clayton East-Clayton at Ain Dua in 1932

In 1932 Sir Robert Clayton East-Clayton, Wing Commander Penderel and Patrick Clayton (all English) joined with Almásy in an  expedition, in order to find the legendary lost Oasis, Zerzura (also called Zarzura). 

Major Penderel of RAF in 1932

The 1932 Almásy- Clayton expedition combined first automobile with light airplane  (Gypsy, Havilland Moth I, called actually Rupert!) for reconnaissance in this area and two wadis, dry valleys in the huge Gilf Kebir plateau were discovered from the air. 

'Rupert' flying to Kharga in 1932

The following year both wadis were found by the expedition of surveyor Patrick Clayton, who mapped immense unknown areas of the Great Sand Sea and could make a detour for the Gilf Kebir.

In the same year, in 1933 Almásy's both patrons, Prince Kemal el Din and the young baron, Sir Clayton died and his expedition plans collapsed. 

Almásy at Prince Kemal el Din's memorial tablet at the southernmost point of Gilf Kebir

The young and brave English widow, Lady Dorothy Clayton, went to the desert in remembrance his husband - who died very shortly before his planned venture with Almásy. 
she accompanied Patrick Clayton on his to Kufra after his second visit to the valleys (Wadi Abd el Malik, Wadi Hamra) and their joined expedition visited 'Zarzura' before they all returned to Cairo. 

The Great Wall- the Gilf Kebir plateau

View of Wadi Talh in 1933

They left Kufra on the same day Almásy and his expedition arrived ... 

During the Almásy-Penderel expedition, Almásy, following the route, actually a camel path described by an old Tebu man, found the third valley, Wadi Talh. 

Zerzura ? 1932

The legendary Zerzura was discovered!- at least in the opinion of Almásy. 

Vast areas of the Gilf Kebir region were also explored, including the later infamous Aqaba pass. Dr. László Kádár, later President of the Hungarian Geographical Society, and the geographer of this 1933 expedition made several important geomorphologic observations on the physics of  blowing sand. 

En route to Kufra in 1932

The most important result of he 1933 Almásy expedition was the discovery of the prehistoric rock art sites in the Uweinat and Gilf Kebir region (Ain Dua, Karkur Talh, Wadi Sora). 
 

Map detail showing Uweinat

In the following years Almasy led more desert expeditions, guided Leo Frobenius, a German ethnographer and renowned orientalist, and explored and surveyed the Gilf Kebir, the Great Sand Sea and the Wadi Hauar in the Sudan. Meantime he worked in Egypt as a flight instructor at Al Maza airfield ,which name has nothing to do with his name. 

Res.Capt. Almásy, Hungarian Air Force 1941

In 1939, when he was not allowed to stay and work in Egypt, he returned to Hungary. In Budapest he was found by German Abwehr, and as a reserved captain of the Hungarian Air Force he was ordered to join the German Afrika Korps. He was, however, not a Nazi, neither secret agent, during war operations he was involved in he always wore military uniform. 

In 1941 and 1942 he served as a desert expert to General Erwin Rommel, and led secret missions, including the most audacious Operation Salaam, when he took two German agents from Libya to Asyut, Egypt, across the desert and deep behind the Allied lines.

This does not mean at all that Almasy was ever a German agent! 

The photos taken during this fantastic journey reveal the fact that Almasy commanded his car patrol in German uniform and their cars (captured Fords) were marked by the German military signs.

The two German agents were arrested in a few days in Cairo and one of them, Eppler told during his interrogations a fabricated story. After the war he even published his desert tales, which became popular, despite the obviously contradictory facts. Unfortunately, the British publications also supported this view.

Operation Salaam,  A. at the junction of the road to Asyut, Egypt 1942

After World War II Almasy was captured and tried by the People's Court in Budapest. After months of interrogations and tortures he was found 'not guilty' and released.

Interestingly enough, he escaped via Rome with the assitance of British intelligence...

He was allowed to return to Egypt, where he would have liked to continue his scientific research work. To improve his financial background he sold luxury cars (Porsche) for Egyptian aristocrats, but could not return to the desert to find the lost army of the Persian king Cambyses (for details see Herodotus). 

In 1951, while on a visit to Europe, he took ill and died of dysentery in a hospital in Salzburg , Austria as the nominated technical director of the Desert Institute of Cairo. 

Sanatorium Wehrle, Salzburg

He was buried there in the public cemetery in Salzburg.His resting place was forgotten, but found again and  in 1995 a gravestone was erected.

No rest, however, in a year his remnants may be removed and buried in the grave of war heroes.

Almásy's grave in Salzburg Prehistoric swimmers are painted on the stone...

The text is based on a paper published in Hungarian in the Hungarian Geographical Society's Journal: 
Török, Zsolt :'László Almásy: The Hungarian explorer of the unknown Sahara.' In: Földrajzi Közlemények, (1997), Vol. CXXI., No. 1-2, pp. 77 - 86.

Zsolt Török is a historian of cartography and geographical exploration and an Almásy- researcher since the age of ten, when he read a book of Almásy.  He was born in the Hungarian town where the explorer lived in the 1930s.  He lives near to Budapest in a country home  with his wife, four sons, a dog and a cat.

He has spent many years with research, and on the basis of the facts and documents he could find he published his first study on Almásy in Hungary in 1989. He was  interviewed by The New York Times and other newspapers and televisions in Hungary and abroad after the English Patient  had been presented. 

He is the author of the first Almásy biography, Salaam Almásy, published in Hungary in 1998. This is an unusual biography of an extraordinary person: it presents surprising and never published facts of the real "English" patient, recreates the historical atmosphere,  tells a true and fair story in the style of the journals of the desert explorer... 

Dr. Zsolt Török is  Associate Professor of Cartography at Eötvös University,  Budapest, Hungary. He is the only traditional map and globe maker, in his private workshop he revived the traditional art of cartography.
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