While not as reliant on overseas trade as some other nations, such as the British, in the early 19th century, the United States still had a brisk trade, mostly exporting goods. Once independence from the British was gained, something that was lost was the protection of the Royal Navy concerning merchant traffic. While most areas of the world were relatively safe, one area where American ships were in some danger was the Mediterranean. There, the Barbary states along the coast of North Africa would prey on US merchant ships. Not only would they take the ships and cargo, but the crews were held for ransom. In order to prevent this from happening, these states would ask for an annual tribute to be paid in exchange for not molesting US merchant shipping. These states were mostly city/states along the North African coast with Tripoli being one of the bigger ones.

Eventually, the US was fed up with paying tribute so sent warships into the Mediterranean to help protect shipping. These fleets were rarely very large as the United States had a very small Navy that consisted of just a few newly built frigates and some smaller ships. However, American frigates were quite large in comparison with European designs and not ships to be trifled with, especially by Barbary pirates. Barbary ships were able to tackle weakly or unarmed merchant vessels, but not an American warship.

The Mediterranean fleet was a one year tour with ships being exchanged to return to the US for refit. The commodores in charge of this fleet ranged from excellent to ineffective. During 1803, the ineffective commodore Morris was in charge of the fleet and spent most of the time in harbor, allowing the Tripolitanian pirates the opportunity to prey of shipping. Late in the year, Morris was replaced by commodore Preble along with two frigates; USS Constitution and the largest ship in the US Navy at the time, the frigate Philadelphia. During a mission to blockade Tripoli in very late 1803, Philadelphia had the misfortune to run aground on an uncharted shoal just outside Tripoli harbor. Efforts to free the ship, including tossing overboard all stores, all the guns and even cutting the foremast came to naught and the ship and crew were taken by Tripoli. Later refloated by a storm, the Tripolitanians also managed to salvage the guns and stores due to the shallow water. Having this ship now meant trouble.

Fortunately, it would be time before the ship was brought back to fighting condition. This was especially true as there was no wood in the area good enough to make a new mast. Most masts and similar naval stores were exported from the United States, where there were still plenty of forests capable of producing quality trees for this purpose.

This gave Preble time to plan for a mission to deny the Philadelphia to the Barbary state. It was soon realized that stealing the ship would be difficult and have little chance of success. The only real option was to burn it. Volunteers were called for and pretty much every man in the fleet volunteered. The task of leading the party was given to Lt. Stephen Decatur. What followed was a tale of plans gone awry, brilliant planning and just plain good luck as Decatur was able to fulfill the mission.

Hope you do not mind me not giving away the specifics on the raid. They read like a movie and author Mark Lardas has done a superlative job of telling the tale. This is all enhanced by superb artwork, both modern and period to help drive home how truly fortunate Decatur was during the raid.

It makes for a gripping tale that I am sure everyone who starts to read the book will find so engrossing as to be difficult to put down. 

January 2012

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