“The Crescent has many valuable presents on board for the Dey, and when she sailed was supposed to be worth at least three hundred thousand dollars. Twenty-six barrels of dollars constituted a part of her cargo. It is worthy of remark that the captain, chief of the officers, and many of the privates of the Crescent frigate have been prisoners at Algiers.”[19]
There must be few Americans who do not blush for the want of public spirit which in this ship was so concretely exhibited.
A treaty had been concluded with Tripoli in November, 1796, at a cost of nearly fifty-six thousand dollars, and one arranged with Tunis in August, 1797, at an estimated expense of one hundred and seven thousand dollars, but these estimates were much increased by our yielding to later demands. This treaty, finally concluded March 26, 1797, was ratified by our Senate on January 10, 1800. Its conclusion was due largely to the efforts of William Eaton, who had been appointed consul to Tunis in July, 1797. He held true views of the situation. “The United States set out wrongly and has proceeded so. Too many concessions have been made to Algiers. There is but one language which can be held to these people and this is terror.”
Eaton, born in Connecticut in 1764, was a Revolutionary soldier at sixteen, a graduate later of Dartmouth College, and in 1792 a captain in the army. He was a most interesting character whom it would have been well, on account of his bold and active spirit, to have put in entire control of our diplomatic affairs in Barbary. We shall hear of him later.
CHAPTER X
The depredations of the new French Republic had come to give an impetus to our new navy, and on April 27, 1798, $950,000 was appropriated for its increase, and a regular navy department created. Benjamin Stoddart, of Georgetown, in the District of Columbia, was the first secretary. War against France was formally declared, in so far as authorizing, on July 9, 1798, the capture of French ships, and authorizing the President to issue commissions for privateers. On the same day a marine corps of 881 of all ranks was established, to be commanded by a major. By July 16th the total force authorized then and previously was twelve frigates, twelve sloops-of-war from 20 to 24 guns, six smaller sloops, besides galleys and revenue cutters; a total of thirty.
The first ship to get to sea under the new organization was the Ganges, a purchased Indiaman, which sailed under command of Captain Richard Dale on May 22, 1798, on a coasting cruise with orders to capture all French cruisers on our coast with hostile intent. The Constellation, 38, Captain Truxton, and Delaware, 20, Captain Decatur, followed in June. The last made the first capture, a French privateer of 14 guns and 70 men. She was condemned and bought into the navy under the name of Retaliation, with Lieutenant Bainbridge in command. The United States, 44, Captain Barry, went to sea early in July, followed by the Constitution, 44, on the 20th, with four revenue brigs of from 10 to 14 guns each. There were at sea in all, in 1798, fifteen ships of the navy and eight revenue vessels, many of which latter were finally taken into the navy. It is worthy of note that one of these, the Pickering, was Preble’s first command.
All of these vessels except the George Washington, Merrimack, and Ganges, the Montezuma, Baltimore, and Delaware, and the Herald, Richmond, and Retaliation were built by the Government.[20]
One of the first affairs of the new navy was a notable case of impressment of British seamen from the Baltimore, acting as convoy to a number of merchantmen. Meeting a powerful British squadron off Havana, Captain Phillips of the Baltimore was informed by the British commodore of his intention to remove all British seamen from his ship. Phillips announced his intention of surrendering his ship rather than to submit to the outrage. Unfortunately there was a lawyer on board as passenger, and Phillips asked his judgment as to the legality of the British commander’s procedure. Had Phillips acted as he at first intended, viz.: to resist to the utmost, short of an engagement which would have been folly against three line-of-battle ships, he would have done well, but his legal friend found reasons for yielding, which was done. Five men were taken, and three ships of the convoy seized, for what actual reason Cooper, who gives this case in great detail, does not say. Phillips was handicapped by his inexperience as a naval officer, having been only just appointed into the navy from the merchant service. There were, too, dissentient opinions even among patriotic Americans of standing as to the justice of the British claims, many upholding the, then, British doctrine of inalienable allegiance. Even so considerable a person as Gouverneur Morris, one of the ablest men America has produced and of large diplomatic and political experience, maintained the view. It was the first of many cases which had so large a part in bringing on the War of 1812.
In November the Retaliation was captured by a French squadron, and Bainbridge was a prisoner for the first, though not for the last, time in his career. By the good fortune of the release of his schooner as a cartel he was enabled to return home.