The Boys of 1812 and Other Naval Heroes

by James Russell Soley

"CROWDING ON THE RAIL WITH THEIR SCIMITARS."

The American blue-jackets were now in no humor for trifling. Their blood was up, for they were indignant at such unheard-of treachery, and it looked as if there would be no question to settle about prisoners, for the reason that none of the Tripolitans would be left alive. But the polacca was by this time in a sinking condition, her mizzen-mast was shot away, her deck was slippery with blood, and the dead and wounded were lying about in heaps; and the Rais, Mahomet, himself wounded and disheartened, convinced that the time had come when neither ferocity nor fraud could help him, threw his flag into the sea and prostrated himself upon the rail, begging for quarter. Then Lieutenant Sterrett, who was as generous as he was gallant, ordered the firing to cease and took possession of the enemy.

As the polacca could not be made a prize, the Americans cut away her masts, threw overboard her guns, and left her with the surviving fragment of her crew to make the best of her way back to Tripoli. Upon her arrival, the Pasha was so incensed at the news of her defeat that he had the Rais, wounded as he was, mounted on a jackass and paraded up and down the streets of the city, after which he was given five hundred blows of the bastinado. Such was the result of the first fight between the Americans and their piratical enemy, and it was a long time before the latter forgot the lesson.

By the autumn of 1801 the terms of enlistment of Dale's crews having nearly expired, his ships were ordered home, and in the next spring a new squadron was sent out under Commodore Richard Morris, Congress having meantime passed an act that was to all intents a declaration of war. But the new commodore was not an energetic man, nor did he seem to concern himself much about what was to be done; and a whole year was passed by the squadron in fruitless cruises among the Mediterranean ports, sometimes convoying merchantmen, sometimes merely lying in harbor, but doing little or nothing against the enemy. At the end of this time the President found it necessary to replace Commodore Morris by a more active man; and in the summer of 1803 he was ordered home, and upon his arrival was dismissed the service.

Already the Government had determined to fit out a new squadron, and to take more vigorous measures against Tripoli; for the people were rightly impatient at the dallying which had prolonged through two years this war with a little barbarian State, and it was against the navy that this impatience was mainly directed. Strange as it may seem, party feeling had run so high that the gallant exploits of the French war were thought by many Americans to be the bad results of a mistaken policy, rather than a source of pride and satisfaction to the country; and the officers and seamen of the navy, who were then and who have always been the single-minded and devoted servants of the people, were looked upon simply as the instruments of an odious party that meanly cringed to England and sought to embroil us in a war with France. In the last general election this party had been defeated and broken up, and the navy came in for a large share of the popular condemnation; which, as we at this day can clearly see, was exceedingly unjust to the brave men who composed the service.

Whatever men may have thought and said about the navy, it was evident that nothing but a naval war would bring Tripoli to terms, and the Government set about the work in earnest. Four new ships were built, which, though they were small, were well suited to their purpose,—the brigs "Argus" and "Siren," and the schooners "Nautilus" and "Vixen." Two of the larger frigates were sent out,—the "Constitution" forty-four, and the "Philadelphia" thirty-eight, the latter commanded by Captain Bainbridge; and last, but not least, one vessel of the old squadron remained, the schooner "Enterprise," which had already made herself famous under Sterrett, but which was to acquire still greater fame under Lieut. Stephen Decatur, who now commanded her.

The new squadron was strong in its ships, but its efficiency was mainly due to the officer who was ordered to take the chief command, Com. Edward Preble. Although not an old man, he was one of the few veterans of the Revolution that were still in the service; and though he had been a mere lad when he first sailed as a midshipman in the Revolutionary cruisers of Massachusetts, he had served throughout the war, and had learned well the lessons of naval discipline. What Paul Jones was in that war, and what Truxtun was in the West Indies, Preble became in the campaign against Tripoli,—the central figure of the war. He had around him the best and bravest of the young officers of the new navy,—as good as any navy the world has ever seen, but up to this time untried and unknown,—and it was Preble who in great measure made them what they afterward became.

Among the first of the new vessels to come out was the "Philadelphia." She had no sooner arrived in the Mediterranean than she made a most unexpected discovery. She had left Gibraltar to search for some Tripolitans that were reported to be cruising somewhere off the coast of Spain. One evening after dark, off Cape de Gatt, she fell in with two vessels,—a ship and a brig. Captain Bainbridge hailed the ship, which proved to be the "Mirboka," a cruiser of Morocco; and allowing her to suppose that he was English, Bainbridge ordered her to send him her passports. The Moorish officer who came on board the "Philadelphia" fell into the snare, and told Bainbridge that the brig which he had with him was an American. This was an extraordinary piece of news, for Morocco was then at peace with the United States; yet here was one of her ships-of-war preying on American commerce. The Moors must have thought that a State which could not protect its vessels from the attacks of Tripoli need not be much respected, and that the time was ripe for them to take a hand in the plundering which their neighbors were carrying on with such success and profit; so they had sent out their cruisers, and this was the first that had made a prize. The captured ship was the brig "Celia," of Boston, whose crew and captain were at that moment confined in the "Mirboka's" hold, to be carried to Morocco and sold as slaves or held for ransom. Fortunately Captain Bainbridge had arrived just in time to rescue the prisoners; and seizing the "Mirboka," he took her with him to Gibraltar.