Victorian Crusaders: British and Irish Volunteers in the Papal Army, 1860-1870
by Nicholas Schofield
Helion & Co, 223 pages, £29.95
If one wants to understand why the shibboleth of Papal Infallibility intruded itself into European affairs in the last third of the 19th century, then one has to take seriously the matter of Italian reunification, the rise of Garibaldi and the loss of the Papal States. A Punch cartoon of 1870 summed it up perfectly: Pius IX clutched St Peter’s keys to his chest while handing over a sword marked “Temporal Power” to Victor Emmanuel II, saying “I must needs surrender the sword, my son, but I keep the keys!”
