Mohamed ben Zamoum
French officer
Mohamed ben Zamoum (born in Naciria (Laazib Nzamoum) in 1795 and died in the same city in 1843) was a Kabyle marabout and tribal chief who participated in the Algerian resistance against the French conquest of Algeria.
Family
Mohamed ben Zamoum was born in 1795 in Naciria region into the Kabyle Iflissen Umellil confederacy.
He was part of the noble family of Ben Zamoum who reigned over the confederation of Iflissen Umellil.
Mohamed had several children, the best known of which are Hocine ben Zamoum and Omar ben Zamoum who succeeded him in 1848 in command of the Iflissen Umellil confederation.
His grandson Ali ben Zamoum also played a major role in the Kabyle resistance against French troupes coloniales, from 1844 to 1848.
French conquest of Algeria
Just after the surrender of Dey Hussein on 5 July 1830 and the capitulation of the Casbah of Algiers, Sheikh Mohamed ben Zamoum, leader of the Iflissen Umellil confederation, organized with the tribal chiefs of Kabylia and Mitidja (Especially the Ait Masra and the Ait Salah) a meeting in the Bordj Tamentfoust. As a result of this meeting, which began on 23 July and ended on 26 July, the leaders decided to resist the French presence and joined their forces and mobilized to join the popular response after the fall of Algiers.
This meeting occurred when General Victor de Bourmont did not follow the advice of Mohamed ben Zamoum in the letter he had addressed to him to dissuade him from initiating a military expedition of the First Battle of Blida.
Nevertheless, de Bourmont began his campaign against Blida on 23 July after having contracted a connivance with the bey of Titteri in Médéa, the named Mustapha Boumezrag.
The defeat of the 1,200 infantry, 100 cavalry, and artillery pieces on which General de Bourmont had based in his expedition against Blida and its surroundings, had convinced Sheikh ben Zamoum that resistance against the French was possible and that the combat would settle the positions of the belligerents.
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