The Legion of the Damned tells the story of Bennett Jeffries Doty, an American soldier and adventurer who enlisted in the Foreign Legion, fought in Syria, deserted, and was captured and then sentenced to death. Fate intervened in the form of an American foreign correspondent covering the fighting in Syria, whom Doty met just days before deserting, and it was no doubt owing to this meeting and the ensuing publicity that Doty managed to escape his plight,...