Harper's Young People, August 3, 1880 / An Illustrated Weekly

by Various

THE STORY OF THE AMERICAN NAVY.

BY BENSON J. LOSSING.

Chapter IV.

Commodore Preble sailed from the United States for the Mediterranean in the frigate Constitution late in the spring of 1803. The ships of the squadron did not sail together. Bainbridge, with the frigate Philadelphia, first entered the Strait of Gibraltar, and found a Moorish corsair cruising for American prizes. He captured her and took her to Gibraltar. When Preble arrived he proceeded to Tangiers with the squadron, when the Emperor of Morocco declared that he had never authorized any depredations on American commerce. The affair was amicably settled. Soon afterward the Philadelphia chased a corsair into the harbor of Tripoli, and in so doing struck upon a sunken rock. She was fast bound. The Tripolitans captured her, made Bainbridge and his officers prisoners of war, and consigned the crew to slavery.

With Preble was Stephen Decatur, a gallant young Lieutenant, son of a veteran naval commander. He was in charge of the brig Enterprise, with which, late in December, he captured a Tripolitan ketch laden with girls which the ruler of Tripoli was sending as a present to the Sultan. The maidens were landed at Syracuse, and the ketch (which was renamed Intrepid) was used by Decatur in an attempt to recapture or destroy the Philadelphia. With seventy daring young men he sailed into the harbor of Tripoli on a bright moon-lit night (February, 1804), the Intrepid assuming the character of a vessel in distress. Most of her officers and men were concealed.

The Intrepid went alongside the Philadelphia, when Decatur, followed by his men, who sprang from their hiding-places, boarded the frigate, slew many of her defenders and drove the rest into the sea, set her on fire, and escaped with only four men wounded. This daring act produced great commotion in the harbor. The Philadelphia was soon in flames; the great guns of the castle and of the corsairs lying near thundered incessantly; and to this roar of artillery was added that of the cannons of the frigate as the flames reached them. The heroes of this exploit were received at Syracuse with demonstrations of great joy, and Decatur was promoted to Captain. The ruler of Tripoli was abashed by this display of American energy and valor.

DECATUR AND HIS MEN BOARDING THE GUN-BOAT.

The harbor of Tripoli was guarded by batteries mounting more than a hundred heavy guns, by numerous gun-boats and other vessels, by twenty-five thousand soldiers, and a sheltering reef. Undismayed by these, Preble entered the harbor in the summer of 1804, with the Constitution and several gun-boats, and opened fire on the formidable defenses. In that engagement Decatur again displayed his valor. He captured one gun-boat, and boarded another, on which he had a fierce hand-to-hand fight with its powerful commander, but triumphed. The Americans withdrew, but renewed the struggle a few days afterward, when a hot shot exploded the magazine of one of the American gun-boats, killing two officers and eight of the crew. When the smoke cleared away, Midshipman Spence and eleven others were seen on the sinking vessel working her great gun. Giving three cheers, and firing it at the enemy, they were picked from the water a few minutes later, for the vessel had gone to the bottom.

In a fourth attack on Tripoli by the gallant Preble a sad accident occurred. It was determined to blow up the cruisers in the harbor by a floating mine or huge torpedo. The Intrepid was laden with a hundred barrels of gunpowder, over which were laid shot, shell, and irregular pieces of iron. In charge of Captain Somers, she was towed into the harbor on a very dark night (September 4, 1804), when all eyes were strained to observe the result. Suddenly a fierce and lurid light shot up from the dark bosom of the waters, like a volcanic fire, and was instantly followed by an explosion that shook earth and air for miles around. Flaming fragments rose and fell, and then all was profound darkness again. Somers and his companions were never heard of. They probably perished by the premature explosion of the mine.

Soon after this, Preble, who had done excellent service in the Mediterranean, was relieved by the arrival of Commodore Barron, prepared to carry on the war with Tripoli vigorously, but it was ended by treaty early the next year.

The ruler of Tunis was yet insolent, but the appearance of an American squadron of thirteen vessels before his capital soon so humbled him that he sued for peace and made a treaty. A small American naval force was kept in the Mediterranean, and for several years the Barbary powers kept their hands off American commerce.

At the close of the war of 1812-15, the Dey of Algiers, believing the British navy had utterly destroyed that of the United States, sent out his corsairs to depredate on our commerce. Determined not to pay tribute or longer endure his insolence, the United States accepted the Dey's challenge to war, and sent Commodore Decatur with a small squadron to humble him. Decatur sailed in May, 1815, and as soon as he entered the Mediterranean he found the Algerine pirate fleet cruising in search of American vessels. In June he captured the flag-ship of the Algerine Admiral and another corsair, with six hundred men. With these he entered the harbor of Algiers, and demanded the instant surrender of all American captives in the hands of the Dey, payment in full for all American property destroyed by his forces, and the relinquishment of all claims to tribute from the United States thereafter. The terrified ruler hastened to comply. Obeying the summons of the Commodore, he appeared on the deck of the Guerrière (the flag-ship), with his civil officers and the captives. Having complied with all demands, the Dey left the vessel in deep humiliation.

Decatur now sailed for Tunis, and demanded and received of its frightened ruler $46,000, in payment for American vessels which he had allowed the British to capture in his harbor. Then the Commodore went to Tripoli, and summoned the Bashaw, or Governor, before him. He demanded $25,000 of him for similar injuries. The Tripolitan treasury was empty, and Decatur accepted, in place of cash, eight Danish and two Neapolitan captives held by the Bashaw.

This cruise of a little American squadron in the Mediterranean Sea in the summer of 1815, and its results, gave full security to American commerce in these waters, and greatly exalted the character of the government of the United States in the opinion of European nations. A portion of its navy had accomplished, in the way of humbling the rulers of the Barbary States, and weakening their power for mischief, what the combined governments of Europe had not dared to attempt. Decatur was the most conspicuous hero in the war with the Barbary States.