In this volume is told the genuine true story of the first crusaders. It begins with their setting out, and it ends with the death of the last survivor. Almost a thousand years have passed since then, and the lives of these men are known to us only by the chronicles of their days. Upon these original chronicles the story in this book is based. It does not deal with the legends that grew up after the crusades. It is not history revised and re-written. It is the real firsthand account story of a dozen men, most of them leaders, who started out on that long journey - what they saw on the road, and what they did, and what befell them.