The Pasha was not ready to come to terms even after that day's defeat, however, and on August 7th Commodore Preble ordered another attack. Again the harbor shook under the guns of the fleet and the forts, and at sunset Preble had to withdraw. To avoid further bloodshed the commodore sent a flag of truce to the Pasha, and offered to pay eighty thousand dollars for the ransom of the American prisoners, and to make him a present of ten thousand dollars more. The Pasha, however, demanded one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and Preble was not willing to pay that amount. So later in August he attacked Tripoli again. Each of these bombardments did great damage to the city, but the forts were too strong to be captured. The blockading fleet, however, held its position, and on September 3d opened fire again in the last of its assaults. In spite of the heavy firing the Pasha refused to pull down his flag.
On the night of September 4th a volunteer crew took the little Intrepid into the harbor. She was filled with combustibles, and when she was close to the Moorish ships the powder was to be fired by a fuse that would give time for the crew to escape in a small boat. The night was dark, and the fleet soon lost sight of this fire-ship. She took the right course through the channel, but before she was near the Moors she was seen and they opened fire on her. Then came a loud explosion, and the Intrepid, with her crew, was blown into the air. No one knows whether one of the enemy's shots or her own crew fired the powder. This was the greatest disaster that befell the United States Navy during all its warfare with the Barbary pirates. Soon after Commodore Preble sailed for home, though most of his fleet were kept in the Mediterranean to protect American sailing vessels.
The government at Washington, tired with the long warfare in the Mediterranean, soon afterward ordered the consul at Algiers, Tobias Lear, to treat for peace with the Pasha. A bargain was finally struck. One hundred Moors were exchanged for as many of the American captives, and sixty thousand dollars were paid as ransom for the rest. June 4, 1805, the American sailors, who had been slaves for more than nineteen months, were released from their chains and sent on board the war-ship Constitution. The Pasha declared himself a friend of the United States, and saluted its flag with twenty-one guns from his castle and forts.
In the Barbary States rulers followed one another in rapid succession. He who was Dey or Pasha one week might be murdered by an enemy the next, and that enemy on mounting the throne was always eager to get as much plunder as he could. Treaties meant little to any of them, and so other countries kept on paying them tribute for the sake of peace.
The United States fell into the habit of buying peace with Algiers, Tripoli, Morocco, and Tunis by gifts of merchandise or gold or costly vessels. But the more that was given to them the more greedy these Moorish rulers grew, and so it happened that from time to time they sent out their pirates to board American ships in order to frighten the young Republic into paying heavier tribute. Seven years later the second chapter of our history with the Barbary pirates opened.
II
The brig Edwin of Salem, Massachusetts, was sailing under full canvas through the Mediterranean Sea, bound out from Malta to Gibraltar, on August 25, 1812. At her masthead she flew the Stars and Stripes. The weather was favoring, the little brig making good speed, and the Mediterranean offered no dangers to the skipper. Yet Captain George Smith, and his crew of ten Yankee sailors, kept constantly looking toward the south at some distant sails that had been steadily gaining on them since dawn. Every stitch of sail on the Edwin had been set, but she was being overhauled, and at this rate would be caught long before she could reach Gibraltar.
Captain Smith and his men knew who manned those long, low, rakish-looking frigates. But the Edwin carried no cannon, and if they could not out-sail the three ships to the south they must yield peaceably, or be shot down on their deck. Hour after hour they watched, and by sunset they could see the dark, swarthy faces of the leading frigate's crew. Before night the Edwin had been overhauled, boarded, and the Yankee captain and sailors were in irons, prisoners about to be sold into slavery.
They had been captured by one of the pirate crews of the Dey of Algiers, and when they were taken ashore by these buccaneers they were stood up in the slave market and sold to Moors, or put to work in the shipyards. Other Yankee crews had met with the same treatment.
Now the United States had been paying its tribute regularly to the pirates, but in the spring of 1812 the Dey of Algiers suddenly woke up to the fact that the Americans had been measuring time by the sun while the Moors figured it by the moon, and found that in consequence he had been defrauded of almost a half-year's tribute money, or twenty-seven thousand dollars. He sent an indignant message to Tobias Lear, the American consul at Algiers, threatening all sorts of punishments, and Mr. Lear, taking all things into account, decided it was best to pay the sum claimed by the Dey. The United States sent the extra tribute in the shape of merchandise by the sailing vessel Alleghany; but the Dey was now in a very bad temper, and declared that the stores were of poor quality, and ordered the consul to leave at once in the Alleghany, as he would have no further dealings with a country that tried to cheat him. At almost the same time he received a present from England of two large ships filled with stores of war,—powder, shot, anchors, and cables. He immediately sent out word to the buccaneers to capture all the American ships they could, and sell the sailors in the slave-markets. The Dey of Algiers appeared to have no fear of the United States.
The truth of the matter was that his Highness the Dey, and also the Bey of Tunis, had been spoiled by England, who at this time told them confidently that the United States Navy was about to be wiped from the seas. English merchants assured them that they could treat Captain Smith and other Yankee skippers exactly as they pleased, since Great Britain had declared war on the United States, and the latter country would find herself quite busy at home. Algiers and Tripoli and Tunis, remembering their old grudge against the Americans, assured their English friends that nothing would delight them so much as to rid the Mediterranean of the Stars and Stripes.
The pirates swept down on the brig Edwin, and laid hands on every American they could find in the neighborhood. They stopped and boarded a ship flying the Spanish flag, and took prisoner a Mr. Pollard, of Virginia. Tripoli and Tunis permitted English cruisers to enter their harbors, contrary to the rules of war, and recapture four English prizes that had been sent to them by the American privateer Abellino. When the United States offered to pay a ransom of three thousand dollars for every American who was held as a prisoner the Dey replied that he meant to capture a large number of them before he would consider any terms of sale.
Our country was young and poor, and our navy consisted of only seventeen seaworthy ships, carrying less than four hundred and fifty cannon. England was indeed "Mistress of the Seas," with a great war-fleet of a thousand vessels, armed with almost twenty-eight thousand guns. No wonder that the British consul at Algiers had told the Dey "the American flag would be swept from the seas, the contemptible navy of the United States annihilated, and its maritime arsenals reduced to a heap of ruins." No wonder the Dey believed him. But as a matter of fact the little David outfought the giant Goliath; on the Great Lakes and on the high seas the Stars and Stripes waved triumphant after many a long and desperate encounter, and the small navy came out of the War of 1812 with a glorious record of victories, with splendid officers and crews, and with sixty-four ships. The English friends of the Barbary States had been mistaken, and Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli began to wish they had not been so scornful of the Yankees.
It was time to show the pirates that Americans had as much right to trade in the Mediterranean as other people. On February 23, 1815, a few days after the treaty of peace with England was published, President Madison advised that we should send a fleet to Algiers. Two squadrons were ordered on this service, under command of Commodore William Bainbridge. One collected at Boston, and the other at New York. Commodore Stephen Decatur was in charge of the latter division.
Decatur's squadron was the first to sail, leaving New York on May 20, 1815. He had ten vessels in all, his flag-ship being the forty-four-gun frigate Guerrière, and his officers and crew being all seasoned veterans of the war with England. The fleet of the Dey of Algiers, however, was no mean foe. It consisted of twelve vessels, well armed and manned, six sloops, five frigates, and one schooner. Its admiral was a very remarkable man, one of the fierce tribe of Kabyles from the mountains, Reis Hammida by name, who had made himself the scourge of the Mediterranean. He had plenty of reckless courage; once he had boarded and captured in broad daylight a Portuguese frigate under the very cliffs of Gibraltar, and at another time, being in command of three Algerine frigates, had dared to attack a Portuguese ship of the line and three frigates, in face of the guns leveled at him from the Rock of Lisbon, directly opposite.
The city of Algiers itself was one of the best fortified ports on the Mediterranean. It lay in the form of a triangle, one side extending along the sea, while the other two rose against a hill, meeting at the top at the Casbah, the historic fortress of the Deys. The city was guarded by very thick walls, mounted with many guns, and the harbor, made by a long mole, was commanded by heavy batteries, so that at least five hundred pieces of cannon could be brought to bear on any hostile ships trying to enter.
Decatur's fleet was only a few days out of New York when it ran into a heavy gale, and the wooden ships were badly tossed about. The Firefly, a twelve-gun brig, sprung her masts, and had to put back to port. The other ships rode out the storm, and kept on their course to the Azores, keeping a sharp watch for any suspicious-looking craft. As they neared the coast of Portugal the vigilance was redoubled, for here was a favorite hunting-ground of Reis Hammida, and Decatur knew what the Algerine admiral had done before the Rock of Lisbon. They found no trace of the enemy here, however. At Cadiz Decatur sent a messenger to the American consul, who informed him that three Algerine frigates and some smaller ships had been spoken in the Atlantic Ocean, but were thought to have returned to the Mediterranean.
Decatur wanted to take the enemy by surprise, and so sailed cautiously to Tangier, where he learned that two days earlier Reis Hammida had gone through the Straits of Gibraltar in the forty-six-gun frigate Mashuda. The American captain at once set sail for Gibraltar, and found out there that the wily Algerine was lying off Cape Gata, having demanded that Spain should pay him half a million dollars of tribute money to protect her coast-towns from attack by his fleet.
Lookouts on the Guerrière reported to Decatur that a despatch-boat had left Gibraltar as soon as the American ships appeared, and inquiry led the captain to believe the boat was bearing messages to Reis Hammida. Other boats were sailing for Algiers, and Decatur, realizing the ease with which his wily opponent, thoroughly familiar with the inland sea, would be able to elude him, decided to give chase at once.
The fleet headed up the Mediterranean June 15th, under full sail. The next evening ships were seen near shore, and Decatur ordered the frigate Macedonian and two brigs to overhaul them. Early the following morning, when the fleet was about twenty miles out from Cape Gata, Captain Gordon, of the frigate Constellation, sighted a big vessel flying the flag of Algiers, and signaled "An enemy to the southeast."
Decatur saw that the strange ship had a good start of his fleet, and was within thirty hours' run of Algiers. He suspected that her captain might not have detected the fleet as American, and ordered the Constellation back to her position abeam of his flag-ship, gave directions to try to conceal the identity of his squadron, and stole up on the stranger. The latter was seen to be a frigate, lying to under small sail, as if waiting for some message from the African shore near at hand. One of the commanders asked permission to give chase, but Decatur signaled back "Do nothing to excite suspicion."
The Moorish frigate held her position near shore while the American ships drew closer. When they were about a mile distant a quartermaster on the Constellation, by mistake, hoisted a United States flag. To cover this blunder the other ships were immediately ordered to fly English flags. But the crew of the Moorish frigate had seen the flag on the Constellation, and instantly swarmed out on the yard-arms, and had the sails set for flight. They were splendid seamen, and almost immediately the frigate was leaping under all her canvas for Algiers. The Americans were busy too. The rigging of each ship was filled with sailors, working out on the yards, the decks rang with commands, and messages were signaled from the flag-ship to the captains. Decatur crowded on all sail, fearing that the Algerine frigate might escape him in the night or seek refuge in some friendly harbor, and the American squadron raced along at top speed, just as the Barbary pirates had earlier chased after the little brig Edwin, of Salem.
Soon the Constellation, which was to the south of the fleet and so nearest to the Moorish frigate, opened fire and sent several shots on board the enemy. The latter immediately came about, and headed northeast, as if making for the port of Carthagena. The Americans also tacked, and gained by this manœuvre, the sloop Ontario cutting across the Moor's course, and the Guerrière being brought close enough for musketry fire.
As the flag-ship came to close quarters the Moors opened fire, wounding several men, but Decatur waited until his ship cleared the enemy's yard-arms, when he ordered a broadside. The crew of the Algerine frigate, which was the Mashuda, were mowed down by this heavy fire. Reis Hammida himself had already been wounded by one of the first shots from the Constellation. He had, however, insisted on continuing to give orders from a couch on the quarter-deck, but a shot from the first broadside killed him. The Guerrière's gun crews loaded and fired again before the first smoke had cleared; at this second broadside one of her largest guns exploded, killing three men, wounding seventeen, and splintering the spar-deck.
The Moors made no sign of surrender, but Decatur, seeing that there were too few left to fight, and not wishing to pour another broadside into them, sailed past, and took a position just out of range. The Algerines immediately tried to run before him. In doing this the big Mashuda was brought directly against the little eighteen-gun American brig Epervier, commanded by John Downes. Instead of sailing away Downes placed his brig under the Moor's cabin ports, and by backing and filling escaped colliding with the frigate while he fired his small broadsides at her. This running fire, lasting for twenty-five minutes, finished the Moor's resistance, and the frigate surrendered.
The flag-ship, the Guerrière, now took charge of the Algerine prize, and Decatur sent an officer, two midshipmen, and a crew on board her. The Mashuda was a sorry sight, many of her men killed or wounded, and her decks splintered by the American broadsides. The prisoners were transferred to the other ships, and orders were given to the prize-crew to take the captured frigate to the port of Carthagena, under escort of the Macedonian.
Before this was done, however, Decatur signaled all the officers to meet on his flag-ship. In the cabin they found a table covered with captured Moorish weapons,—daggers, pistols, scimitars, and yataghans. Decatur turned to Commandant Downes, who had handled the small Epervier so skilfully. "As you were fortunate in obtaining a favorable position and maintained it so handsomely, you shall have the first choice of these weapons," he said. Downes chose, and then each of the other officers selected a trophy of the victory. That evening the squadron, leaving the Mashuda in charge of the Macedonian, resumed its hunt for other ships belonging to the navy of the piratical Dey.
The fleet was arriving off Cape Palos on June 19th when a brig was seen, looking suspiciously like an Algerine craft. When the Americans set sail toward her, the stranger ran away. Soon she came to shoal water, and the frigates had to leave the chase to the light-draught Epervier, Spark, Torch, and Spitfire. These followed and opened fire. The strange brig returned several shots, and was then run aground by her crew on the coast between the watch-towers of Estacio and Albufera, which had been built long before for the purpose of protecting fishermen and peasants from the raids of pirates. The strangers took to their small boats. One of these was sunk by a shot. The Americans then boarded the ship, which was the Algerine twenty-two-gun brig Estedio, and captured eighty-three prisoners. The brig was floated off the shoals and sent with a prize-crew into the Spanish port of Carthagena.
Decatur, being unable to sight any more ships that looked like Moorish craft, and supposing that the rest of the pirate fleet would probably be making for Algiers, gave commands to his squadron to sail for that port. He was determined to bring the Dey to terms as quickly as possible, and to destroy his fleet, or bombard the city, if that was necessary. When he arrived off the Moorish town, however, he found none of the fleet there, and no apparent preparation for war in the harbor. The next morning he ran up the Swedish flag at the mainmast, and a white flag at the foremast, a signal asking the Swedish consul to come on board the flag-ship. Mr. Norderling, the consul, came out to the Guerrière, accompanied by the Algerine captain of the port. After some conversation Decatur asked the latter for news of the Dey's fleet. "By this time it is safe in some neutral port," was the assured answer.
"Not all of it," said Decatur, "for we have captured the Mashuda and the Estedio."
The Algerine could not believe this, and told the American so. Then Decatur sent for a wounded lieutenant of the Mashuda, who was on his ship, and bade him confirm the statement. The Moorish officer of the port immediately changed his tactics, dropped his haughty attitude, and gave Decatur to understand that he thought the Dey would be willing to make a new treaty of peace with the United States.
Decatur handed the Moor a letter from the President to the Dey, which stated that the Republic would only agree to peace provided Algiers would give up her claim to tribute and would cease molesting American merchantmen.
The Moor wanted to gain as much time as possible, hoping his fleet would arrive, and said that it was the custom to discuss all treaties in the palace on shore. Decatur understood the slow and crafty methods of these people, and answered that the treaty should be drawn up and signed on board the Guerrière or not at all. Seeing that there was no use in arguing with the American the Moorish officer went ashore to consult with the Dey.
Next day, June 30th, the captain of the port returned, with power to act for his Highness Omar Pasha. Decatur told him that he meant to put an end to these piratical attacks on Americans, and insisted that all his countrymen who were being held as slaves in Algiers should be given up, that the value of goods taken from them should be paid them, that the Dey should give the owners of the brig Edwin of Salem ten thousand dollars, that all Christians who escaped from Algiers to American ships should be free, and that the two nations should act toward each other exactly as other civilized countries did. Then the Moorish officer began to explain and argue. He said that it was not the present ruling Dey, Omar Pasha, called "Omar the Terrible" because of his great courage, who had attacked American ships; it was Hadji Ali, who was called the "Tiger" because of his cruelty, but he had been assassinated in March, and his prime minister, who succeeded him, had been killed the following month, and Omar Pasha was a friend of the United States. Decatur replied that his terms for peace could not be altered.
The Moor then asked for a truce while he should go ashore and confer with the Dey. Decatur said he would grant no truce. The Algerine besought him to make no attack for three hours. "Not a minute!" answered Decatur. "If your squadron appears before the treaty is actually signed by the Dey, and before the American prisoners are sent aboard, I will capture it!"
The Moorish captain said he would hurry at once to the Dey, and added that if the Americans should see his boat heading out to the Guerrière with a white flag in the bow they would know that Omar Pasha had agreed to Decatur's terms.
An hour later the Americans sighted an Algerine war-ship coming from the east. Decatur signaled his fleet to clear for action, and gave orders to his own men on the Guerrière. The fleet had hardly weighed anchor, however, before the small boat of the port captain was seen dashing out from shore, a white flag in the bow. The excited Moor waved to the crew of the flag-ship. As soon as the boat was near enough Decatur asked if the Dey had signed the treaty, and set the American captives free. The captain assured him of this, and a few minutes later his boat was alongside the flag-ship, and the Americans, who had been seized and held by the pirates, were given over to their countrymen. Some of them had been slaves for several years, and their delight knew no bounds.
In so short a time did Decatur succeed in bringing the Dey to better terms than he had made with any other country. When the treaty had been signed the Dey's prime minister said to the English consul, with reproach in his voice, "You told us that the Americans would be swept from the seas in six months by your navy, and now they make war upon us with some of your own vessels which they have taken." As a fact three of the ships in Decatur's squadron had actually been won from the English in the War of 1812.
The Epervier, commanded by Lieutenant John Templer Shubrick, was now ordered to return to the United States, with some of the Americans rescued from Algiers. The fate of the brig is one of the mysteries of the sea. She sailed through the Straits of Gibraltar July 12, 1815, and was never heard of again. She is supposed to have been lost in a heavy storm in which a number of English merchantmen foundered near the West Indies.
Algiers had now been brought to her knees by Decatur, and he was free to turn to Tunis and Tripoli. The rulers of each of these countries had been misled by the English agents exactly as had the Dey of Algiers, and the Bey of Tunis had allowed the British cruiser Lyra to recapture some English prizes that the American privateer Abellino had taken into harbor during the War of 1812. Like Algiers, both Tunis and Tripoli were well protected by fleets and imposing forts. Decatur, however, had now learned that downright and prompt measures were the ones most successful in dealing with the Moors, who were used to long delays and arguments. He anchored off Tunis on July 26th, and immediately sent word to the Bey that the latter must pay the United States forty-six thousand dollars for allowing the English Lyra to seize the American prizes, and that the money must be paid within twelve hours.
The United States consul, Mordecai M. Noah, carried Decatur's message to the Bey. The Moorish ruler was seated on a pile of cushions at a window of his palace, combing his long, flowing black beard with a tortoise-shell comb set with diamonds. Mr. Noah politely stated Decatur's terms.
"Tell your admiral to come and see me," said the Bey.
"He declines coming, your Highness," answered the consul, "until these disputes are settled, which are best done on board the ship."
The Bey frowned. "But this is not treating me with becoming dignity. Hammuda Pasha, of blessed memory, commanded them to land and wait at the palace until he was pleased to receive them."
"Very likely, your Highness," said Mr. Noah, "but that was twenty years ago."
The Bey considered. "I know this admiral," he remarked at length; "he is the same one who, in the war with Sidi Yusuf, burned the frigate." He referred to Decatur's burning the Philadelphia in the earlier warfare.
The consul nodded. "The same."
"Hum!" said the Bey. "Why do they send wild young men to treat for peace with old powers? Then, you Americans do not speak the truth. You went to war with England, a nation with a great fleet, and said you took her frigates in equal fight. Honest people always speak the truth."
"Well, sir, and that was true. Do you see that tall ship in the bay flying a blue flag?" The consul pointed through the window. "It is the Guerrière, taken from the British. That one near the small island, the Macedonian, was also captured by Decatur on equal terms. The sloop near Cape Carthage, the Peacock, was also taken in battle."
The Bey, looking through his telescope, saw a small vessel leave the American fleet and approach the forts. A man appeared to be taking soundings. The Bey laid down the telescope. "I will accept the admiral's terms," said he, and resumed the combing of his beard.
Later he received Decatur with a great show of respect. The American consul was also honored, but the British was not treated so well. When a brother of the prime minister paid the money over to Decatur the Moor turned to the Englishman, and said, "You see, sir, what Tunis is obliged to pay for your insolence. You should feel ashamed of the disgrace you have brought upon us. I ask you if you think it just, first to violate our neutrality and then to leave us to be destroyed or pay for your aggressions?"
Having settled matters with Tunis, Decatur sailed for Tripoli, and there sent his demands to the Pasha. He asked thirty thousand dollars in payment for two American prizes of war that had been recaptured by the British cruiser Paulina, a salute of thirty-one guns to be fired from the Pasha's palace in honor of the United States flag, and that the treaty of peace be signed on board the Guerrière.
The Pasha pretended to be offended, summoned his twenty thousand Arab soldiers and manned his cannon; but when he heard how Algiers and Tunis had already made peace with Decatur, and saw that the Americans were all prepared for battle, he changed his tactics and sent the governor of Tripoli to the flag-ship to treat for peace. The American consul told Decatur that twenty-five thousand dollars would make good the lost prize-ships, but that the Pasha was holding ten Christians as slaves in Tripoli. Decatur thereupon reduced the amount of his claim on condition that the slaves should be released. This was agreed to. The prisoners, two of whom were Danes, and the others Sicilians, were sent to the flag-ship, and by way of compliment the band of the Guerrière went ashore and played American airs to the delight of the people.
The American captain now ordered the rest of his squadron to sail to Gibraltar, while the Guerrière landed the prisoners at Sicily. As the flag-ship came down the coast from Carthagena she met that part of the Algerine fleet that had put into Malta when the Americans first arrived in the Mediterranean. The Guerrière was alone, and Decatur thought that the Moors, finding him at such a disadvantage, might break their treaty of peace, and attack him. He called his men to the quarter-deck. "My lads," said he, "those fellows are approaching us in a threatening manner. We have whipped them into a treaty, and if the treaty is to be broken let them break it. Be careful of yourselves. Let any man fire without orders at the peril of his life. But let them fire first if they will, and we'll take the whole of them!"
The decks were cleared, and every man stood ready for action. The fleet of seven Algerine ships sailed close to the single American frigate in line of battle. The crews looked across the bulwarks at each other, but not a word was said until the last Algerine ship was opposite. "Where are you going?" demanded the Moorish admiral.
"Wherever it pleases me," answered Decatur; and the Guerrière sailed on her course.
Early in October there was a great gathering of American ships at Gibraltar. Captain Bainbridge's fleet, which included the seventy-four-gun ship of the line Independence, was there when Decatur arrived. The war between the United States and England was only recently ended, and the presence of so many ships of the young Republic at the English Rock of Gibraltar caused much talk among the Spaniards and other foreigners. The sight of ships which had been English, but which were now American, added to the awkward situation, and more than one duel was fought on the Rock as the result of disputes over the War of 1812.
The Dey of Algiers, left to his own advisers and to the whispers of men who were jealous of the United States' success, began to wish he had not agreed to the treaty he had made with Decatur. His own people told him that a true son of the Prophet should never have humbled himself before the Christian dogs. In addition the English government agreed to pay him nearly four hundred thousand dollars to ransom twelve thousand prisoners of Naples and Sardinia that he was holding. Before everything else the Dey was greedy. Therefore when Captain Oliver Hazard Perry, the hero of the battle of Lake Erie, brought out in the Java a copy of the treaty after it had been ratified by the United States Senate, and it was presented to the Dey by the American consul, William Shaler, the ruler of Algiers pretended that the United States had changed the treaty, and complained of the way in which Decatur had dealt with the Algerine ships. Next day he refused to meet Mr. Shaler again, and sent the treaty back to him, saying that the Americans were unworthy of his confidence. Mr. Shaler hauled down the flag at his consulate, and boarded the Java.
Fortunately there were five American ships near Algiers; and these were made ready to open fire on the Moorish vessels in the harbor. Plans were also made for a night attack. The small boats of the fleet were divided into two squadrons, to be filled by twelve hundred volunteer sailors. One division was to make for the water battery and try to spike its guns, while the other was to attack the batteries on shore. Scaling-ladders were ready, and the men were provided with boarding-spikes; but shortly before they were to embark the captain of a French ship in the harbor got word of the plan and carried the information to the Dey. The latter was well frightened, and immediately sent word that he would do whatever his good friends from America wanted. The next day Mr. Shaler landed again, and the Dey signed the treaty.
The fleet then called a second time on the Bey of Tunis, who had been grumbling about his dissatisfaction with Decatur's treatment. He too, however, was most friendly when American war-ships poked their noses toward his palace. After that the Barbary pirates let American merchantmen trade in peace, although an American squadron of four ships was kept in the Mediterranean to see that the Dey, and the Bey, and the Pasha did not forget, and go back to their old tricks.
So it was that Decatur put an end to the African pirates, so far as the United States was concerned, and taught them that sailors of the young Republic, far away though it was, were not to be made slaves by greedy Moorish rulers.
V
THE FATE OF LOVEJOY'S PRINTING-PRESS
Ever since the thirteen colonies that lay along the Atlantic coast had become a nation ambitious men had heard the call, "Go West, young man, go West!" There was plenty of fertile land in the country beyond the Alleghany Mountains, and it was free to any who would settle on it. Adventure beckoned men to come and help in founding new states, and many, who thought the villages of New England already overcrowded, betook themselves to the inviting West. One such youth was Elijah Parrish Lovejoy, who came from the little town of Albion, in Maine, and who, after graduating at Waterville College, had become a school-teacher. This did not satisfy him; he wanted to see more of the world than lay in the village of his birth, and when he was twenty-five years old, in May, 1827, he set out westward.
The young man was a true son of the Puritans, brought up to believe in many ideas that were already often in conflict with the views of men of the South and West. He reached the small city of St. Louis, in the pioneer country of Missouri, and there he found a chance to teach school. He wrote for several newspapers that were being started, and in the course of the next year edited a political paper that was urging the election of Henry Clay as President. His interest in politics grew, and he might have sought some public office himself had he not suddenly become convinced that he was meant to be a minister, and determined to prepare for that work at Princeton Seminary. When he returned to St. Louis in 1833 his friends helped him to found a weekly religious paper called the St. Louis Observer.
The editor found time from his newspaper work to ride into the country and preach at the small churches that were springing up at every crossroads. Missouri was more southern than northern, and he saw much of slave-owning people. It was not long before he decided that negro slavery was wrong, and that the only way to right the wrong was to do away with it altogether. He began to attack slavery in his newspaper and in his sermons, and soon slavery men in that part of Missouri came to consider him as one of their most bitter foes.
Lovejoy had married, and expected to make St. Louis his permanent home. But neither all the men who were interested in the Observer, nor all the members of his church, approved of his arguments against slaveholding, and when he was away at a religious meeting the proprietors of his paper issued a statement promising that the editor would deal more gently with the question of slavery in the future. When Lovejoy returned and read this statement he was indignant; he was not a man to fear public opinion, and he attacked his enemies more ardently than ever.
The law of the land permitted slavery, and many of the chief citizens in the frontier country approved of it. They hated the Abolitionists, as those who wanted to do away with slavery were called. When men were suspected of having helped to free slaves, or of sheltering runaway negroes, they were taken into the country and given two hundred lashes with a whip as a lesson. Sometimes Abolitionists were tarred and feathered and ridden out of town; often their houses were burned and their property destroyed. Lovejoy knew that he might have to face all this, but the spirit of the Puritan stock from which he sprang would not let him turn from his course.
He went on printing articles against the evils of slavery, he denounced the right of a white man to separate colored husbands and wives, parents and children, brothers and sisters, or to send his slaves to the market to be sold to the highest bidder, or to whip or ill-use them as if they had no feelings.
There was danger that the young editor would be mobbed, and the owners of the Observer took the paper out of his charge. Friends, however, who believed in a free press, bought it, and gave it back to him. Waves of public opinion, now for Lovejoy, now against him, swept through St. Louis. By the end of 1835 mobs had attacked Abolitionists in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, and the news fanned the flames of resentment against them in Missouri.
Lovejoy had good reason to know the danger of his position. One September day he went out to a camp-meeting at the little town of Potosi. He learned that two men had waited half a day in the village, planning to tar and feather him when he arrived, but he was late, and they had left. When he returned to St. Louis he found that handbills had been distributed through the city, calling on the people to tear down the office of the Observer. A newspaper named the Missouri Argus urged patriotic men to mob the New England editor. Crowds, gathered on street corners, turned dark, lowering looks upon him as he passed, and every mail brought him threatening letters. He would not, however, stop either writing or preaching against slavery.
His work constantly called him on journeys to small towns, sometimes several days' ride from his home. Late in 1835 he was at a meeting in Marion when reports came that St. Louis was in an uproar, that men who opposed slavery were being whipped in the streets, and that no one suspected of being an Abolitionist would be allowed to stay there. Lovejoy had left his wife ill in bed. He started to ride back, a friend going some seventy miles with him, half of the journey. The friend urged him not to stay in St. Louis, pointing out that his young and delicate wife would have to suffer as well as he. Travelers they met all warned him that he would not be safe in the city. He rode on to St. Charles, where he had left his wife. He talked with her, and she told him to go on to his newspaper office if he thought duty called him there.
St. Louis was all excitement and alarm. The newspapers had attacked the Observer so bitterly that the owners had stopped printing it. A mob had planned to wreck the office, but had postponed the task for a few days. Men went to Lovejoy and told him he would not be safe in the streets by day or night. Even the men of his church would not stand by him, and a religious paper declared "that they would soon free the church of the rotten sheep in it," by which they meant Elijah Lovejoy and others who opposed slavery.
This Yankee, however, like many others who had gone to that border country in the days when bitterness ran high, had a heroic sense of duty. He wrote and printed a letter to the people, stating that men had no right to own their brothers, no matter what the law might say. The letter caused more excitement than ever.
The owners of the Observer went to Lovejoy and requested him to retire as its editor. For two days it was a question what the angry mobs would do to him. Then a little better feeling set in. Men came to him, and told him that he must go on printing his paper or there would be no voice of freedom in all that part of the country. A friend bought the newspaper from its owners, and urged Lovejoy to write as boldly as before. This friend, however, suggested that he should move the newspaper across the state line to Alton, Illinois, where feeling was not so intense. Lovejoy agreed, and set out for Alton; but while he was preparing to issue the paper there the same friend and others wrote him that his pen was so much needed in St. Louis that he must come back. He did so, and the Observer continued its existence in St. Louis until June, 1836.
There was so much strife and ill feeling, however, in Missouri that the editor decided his newspaper would be better supported, and would exert more influence, in Illinois. Accordingly he arranged to move his printing-press to the town of Alton in July. Just before he left St. Louis he published severe criticisms of a judge of that city who had sided with slave-owners, and these articles roused even greater resentment among the rabble who hated Lovejoy's freedom of speech.
If some of the people of Alton were glad to have this fearless editor come to their town, many were not. Slavery was too sore a subject for them to wish it talked about publicly. Many people all through that part of the country looked upon an Abolitionist as a man who delighted in stirring up ill feeling. Lovejoy sent his printing-press to Alton by steamboat, and it was delivered at the wharf on a Sunday morning, about daybreak. The steamboat company had agreed to land the press on Monday, and Lovejoy refused to move it from the dock on the Sabbath. Early Monday morning five or six men went down to the river bank and destroyed the printing-press.
This was the young editor's welcome by the lawless element, but next day the better class of citizens, thoroughly ashamed of the outrage, met and pledged themselves to repay Lovejoy for the loss of his press. These people denounced the act of the mob, but at the same time they expressed their disapproval of Abolitionists. They wanted order and quiet, and hoped that Lovejoy would not stir up more trouble.
The editor bought a new press and issued his first paper in Alton on September 8, 1836. Many people subscribed to it, and it appeared regularly until the following August. Lovejoy, however, would speak his mind, and again and again declared that he was absolutely opposed to slavery, and that the evil custom must come to an end. This led to murmurs from the slavery party, and slanders were spread concerning the editor's character. All freedom-loving men had to weather such storms in those days, and Lovejoy, like a great many others, stuck to his principles at a heavy cost.
The murmurs and slanders grew. On July 8, 1837, posters announced that a meeting would be held at the Market House to protest against the articles in the Alton Observer. The meeting condemned Lovejoy's writings and speeches, and voted that Abolitionism must be suppressed in the town. This was the early thunder that heralded the approach of a gathering storm.
The Yankee editor showed no intention of giving up his stand against slavery, but preached and wrote against it at every opportunity. As a result threats of destroying the press of the Observer were heard on the streets of Alton, and newspapers in neighboring cities encouraged ill feeling against the editor. The Missouri Republic, a paper printed in St. Louis, tried to convince the people of Alton that it was a public danger to have such men as Lovejoy in their midst, and condemned the Anti-Slavery Societies that were being formed in that part of the country. Two attempts were made to break into his printing-office during the early part of the summer, but each time the attackers were driven off by Lovejoy's friends.
The editor went to a friend's house to perform a marriage ceremony on the evening of August 21, 1837. His wife and little boy were ill at home, and on his return he stopped at an apothecary's to get some medicine for them. His house was about a half mile out of town. As he left the main street he met a crowd of men and boys. They did not recognize him at once, and he hurried past them; but soon some began to suspect who he was, and shouted his name to the rest. Those in the rear urged the leaders to attack him, but those in front held back; some began to throw sticks and stones at him, and one, armed with a club, pushed up to him, denouncing him for being an Abolitionist. At last a number linked arms and pushed past him, and then turning about in the road stopped him. There were cries of "Tar and feather him," "Ride him on a rail," and other threats. Lovejoy told them they might do as they pleased with him, but he had a request to make; his wife was ill, and he wanted some one to take the medicine to her without alarming her. One of the men volunteered to do this. Then the editor, standing at bay, argued with them. "You had better let me go home," he said; "you have no right to detain me; I have never injured you." There was more denouncing, jostling and shoving, but the leaders, after a short talk, allowed Lovejoy to go on toward his house.
Meantime, however, another band had gone to the newspaper office between ten and eleven o'clock, and, seeing by the lights in the building that men were still at work there, had begun to throw stones at the windows. A crowd gathered to watch the attack. The mayor and some of the leading citizens hurried to the building, and argued with the ringleaders. A prominent merchant told them that if they would wait until the next morning he would break into the newspaper office with them, and help them take out the press and the other articles, stow them on a boat, put the editor on top, and send them all down the Mississippi River together. But the crowd did not want to wait. The stones began to strike some of Lovejoy's assistants inside the building, and they ran out by a rear door. As soon as the office was empty the leaders rushed in and broke the printing-press, type, and everything else in the building. Next morning the slavery men in Alton said that the Abolitionist had been silenced for the time, at least. They looked upon Lovejoy, and men of his kind, as a thorn in the flesh of their peaceful community.
There were still a small number of "freedom-loving" people in Alton, however, and these stood back of Elijah Lovejoy. Although two printing-presses had now been destroyed, these men called a meeting and decided that the Observer must continue to be printed. Money was promised, and the editor prepared to set up his press for the third time. He issued a short note to the public, in which he said: "I now appeal to you, and all the friends of law and order, to come to the rescue. If you will sustain me, by the help of God, the press shall be again established at this place, and shall be sustained, come what will. Let the experiment be fairly tried, whether the liberty of speech and of the press is to be enjoyed in Illinois or not." The money was raised, and the dauntless spokesman for freedom sent to Cincinnati for supplies for his new office.
That autumn enemies scattered pamphlets accusing Lovejoy and other Abolitionists of various crimes against the country. Although few people believed them, the circulars increased the hostile feelings, and disturbed many of the editor's friends. Some of the latter began to doubt whether the Observer ought to continue its stirring articles. Some thought it should be only a religious paper. But Lovejoy answered that he felt it was his duty to speak out in protest against the great evil of slavery. He finally offered to resign, if the supporters of the paper thought it best for him to do so. They could not come to any decision, and so let him continue his course.
The third printing-press arrived at Alton on September 21st, while Lovejoy was away attending a church meeting. The press was landed from the steamboat a little after sunset, and was protected by a number of friends of the Observer. It was carted to a large warehouse to be stored. As it passed through the street some men cried, "There goes the Abolition press; stop it, stop it!" but no one tried to injure it. The mayor of Alton declared that the press should be protected, and placed a constable at the door of the warehouse, with orders to remain till a certain hour. As soon as this man left, ten or twelve others, with handkerchiefs tied over their faces as disguise, broke into the warehouse, rolled the press across the street to the river, broke it into pieces, and threw it into the Mississippi. The mayor arrived and protested, but the men paid no attention to him.
Lovejoy's business had called him to the town of St. Charles, near St. Louis, and he preached there while his third press was being attacked. After his sermon in the evening he was sitting chatting with a clergyman and another friend when a young man came in, and slipped a note into his hand. The note read: