The Shores of Tripoli

by James L. Haley

  “Yes,” agreed Gavino. “That would be quite appropriate in both content and tone.”

  “Forgive my interrupting”—Sterett had sat quietly through the conversation, as became a lieutenant among captains—“but lest we forget, I believe you said you were going to give us further information about their fighting tactics.”

  “Ah, yes,” said Gavino. “Thank you.” He continued speaking as he rose and walked into his parlor, remaining well visible from the dining table. “I received a copy of a letter some time since from our consul, Mr. William Eaton. He had occasion to learn some facts firsthand, and I thought it might be useful one day, one moment—ah, here it is.”

  Gavino resumed his seat at the table. “Mr. Eaton says that the Berber ships are almost never comfortable engaging in cannon duels, broadside to broadside. That is understandable, given their lack of expert training in gunnery.” He searched rapidly through the letter. “Here it is: ‘Their mode of attack is uniformly boarding. Their long lateen yards drop upon the enemy and afford a safe and easy conveyance for the men who man them for this purpose. They throw boarders in from all points of rigging and from all quarters of the decks, having their sabers grasped in their teeth and their loaded pistols in their belts, so they have the full use of their hands in scaling the gunwales or netting of their enemy.’”

  “So,” said Dale, “they are brigands, and they fight like brigands.”

  All murmured in agreement. “Oh,” said Gavino, “one other matter. I took the liberty of contacting Mr. Leslie—oh, forgive me, Grand Admiral Murad Reis.” The captains laughed appreciatively. “I anticipated that you would desire an interview with him. However, he positively declines to meet you on your ship, here in the consulate, or on his ship. He will meet you only in a public tavern of his choosing.”

  “Ha!” exclaimed Dale. “So he is cheeky as well as no Christian.”

  “True, but I have heard that his taste in taverns is quite discerning.”

  “Well, to hell with him. We’ll just cork him up here for the duration. The only thing that maddens me is he won’t mind at all being left out of the war. We call that cowardice.”

  “Indeed,” agreed Gavino.

  “Well.” Dale slapped his hands on the table. “With thanks to you for your hospitality, and our compliments to your cook, whose name is—”

  “Mariah,” said Gavino.

  “Ah.” Dale extracted a small gold pin from his lapel. “Will you thank her for us, with this?”

  “She will be delighted.” Gavino saw them down to the quay and into his boat. “Communicate with me as much as you will; I will do all I can for you.”

  “Water is our great need,” Dale repeated.

  “I will do what I can.”

  • • •

  THE NEXT DAY, Dale took the President across the bay to Algeciras, where the presence of a forty-four-gun frigate did much to facilitate access to his detained supply ship, a private vessel, the Algonquin, contracted to the navy. Afternoon found Commodore Dale deep in her hold, inspecting her bill of lading in the dimness of a single lantern, in company with her captain, whom he would happily have killed.

  “Look at this!” sputtered Dale. “The bread is alive with weevils. There is no cheese at all, there are no candles, there is no—and what is this? Rice! We do not want rice!”

  “We are carrying the rice for a civilian client; it is bound for Toulon.”

  “Damn your civilian client, I have to fight a war—with this? And where is water? We want water most of all.”

  “I am sorry, Captain, the navy gave us no order to bring water. I imagine they believed you could water your ships when you arrived in Europe. Europe is not known as a desert.”

  “Spain is, in summer, I am told.”

  “Captain, as you can see, I brought every commodity that the navy contracted of me. I am sorry that the bread is somewhat spoiled.”

  “Somewhat!”

  The Algonquin’s captain swelled up for a moment. “I daresay it is in no more foul a condition than your own, after your crossing.”

  Dale hung his head for a moment, defeated. “Well, have everything that is consigned to us transferred to my ship at once. No more than it is, it should not take very long, should it?”

  That same afternoon, Bainbridge led a victualing party through Gibraltar’s markets. Backed by the pursers’ silver, they bought whatever the vendors would sell them of fresh fruit and vegetables, a live pig, and some hens for each ship. When Dale returned the next day his dismay over their supplies was shared among all the captains as they divided what there was of salt meat and wormy biscuit.

  Over three days they were able to water the ships, one lighter at a time, until the frigates had taken on ninety tons each, almost replacing what they had expended in crossing, and the Enterprise twenty tons. Dale dared not sail with less; they could not be certain of watering anywhere on the coast of Africa, and the closest friendly port was Malta.

  3.

  A TASTE OF BATTLE

  July–August 1801

  On his cutter back to the Enterprise, Sterett decided to hold close that part of his orders directing defensive battle only. She was a little vessel, but every man of her crew knew her reputation, of her having bested eight French privateers and taken them as prizes. For the men to learn now that they were forbidden to take prizes could be a mortal blow to their fighting spirit.

  The squadron weighed anchor on July 5, exchanging salutes with the British garrison as they left. Samuel Barron took his Philadelphia out into the bay, remaining within sight of Gibraltar. He had his lieutenants run drills with the gun crews, letting the Tripolitans safely behind the mole listen to the deep roar of his twenty-fours, daring them to run for it. The wait was diverting for a day, but then settled into glum boredom, realizing that the pragmatic if not cowardly Scot who had “gone Turk” would never challenge them. Trapping the two largest Tripolitan ships in Gibraltar was of critical service, but there would be no glory in it.

  Bainbridge shortened sail in the Essex so as to remain in company with the heavily laden Grand Turk. They departed Gibraltar in company with the President and Enterprise, but soon fell astern of them and eventually dropped from their sight. As they turned east, Bliven finally saw, a distance to the north, the famous Rock, its beetling white cliffs plunging from the heights perpendicularly to the sea. It is justly famous, he thought, it does not disappoint, it was one of the sights of the world that he desired to see, and now he had done. The winds were light and Dale was in a hurry, at a disadvantage in keeping up with the Enterprise; therefore, James Barron set studding sails for extra canvas, giving Bliven the thrill of seeing a frigate at her most majestic, plowing along under an absolute cloud of canvas. They noisily dropped anchor in the harbor of Algiers on July 9.

  Commodore Dale obtained an audience with old Mustapha Dey, who received him and James Barron on his dais in the courtyard of his palace. Situated at the crest of the hill overlooking the harbor, it was surrounded by the crowded warren of the casbah. “My intention is to honor my agreement with your country,” he told Dale through an interpreter, who was a black American. “Thus you will understand our great anxiety, that your country should fulfill its part of the treaty, which, as of this moment, it has not done.”

  Dale thought he had never seen such brilliant light as reflected off the limestone walls of the palace courtyard, intensifying the July heat, the more keenly felt for being in their most formal dress uniforms. He must be doing it deliberately; Dale thought, he must enjoy watching us wilt like lettuce. “I have the honor to inform Your Highness that the treasure ship Grand Turk left Gibraltar with us, accompanied by another frigate. The Grand Turk is carrying all the tribute that was agreed for this year, and she should arrive on tomorrow.”

  Mustapha stroked his voluminous white beard as he listened both to Dale and to his black interpreter. He nodde
d and said, “That is good to hear, and good to know that our American friends value our continued good will. Will you please to take some refreshment before you go?” He made a small gesture, at which a servant approached them with a tray. Dale and Barron each took a large porcelain cup, cold to the touch, and the servant took up a silver ewer and filled them with cold, clear water.

  Dale stared at his cup, disbelieving, and then drained it. It was cold and delicious. In what other way could hospitality and mockery be so exquisitely combined? He knew that the old dey was waiting, just waiting, for him to ask to water his ships, but by God he would die of thirst before asking anything of this horrid, simpering old tyrant. Barron followed his lead in replacing their cups on the tray. “Your Highness is very kind. The ship that will arrive tomorrow is escorted by the frigate Essex, under command of Captain Bainbridge, whom Your Highness will remember from last year. He will oversee conducting your tribute ashore.”

  “That will be most satisfactory.” The slight inclination of the dey’s head was their cue to withdraw; they stood to attention and saluted, and were escorted by janissaries back to the wharf.

  “Did you forget to ask to water the ships?” asked Barron.

  Dale’s sudden glare at him revealed in an instant that he was joking. “God rot him.”

  The jetty where their cutter had tied up was lined with the bagnios, the infamous dungeons that had confined countless thousands over the centuries. They were empty now because the European slaves were dispersed to hard labor around the city. There were not supposed to be any Americans among them, since the crew of the Betsy had been ransomed, but Dale wondered if that was true. They were met on the jetty by the American consul in Algiers, Richard O’Brien, who accompanied them out to the President.

  He wore his disdain for the Berbers on his sleeve. Mustapha would growl, he said, but he thought would not bite. He made no secret of the fact that he would prefer to see all the Barbary lords swinging on gallows. “Oh, my,” he said repeatedly as they approached the President. “You have no idea, after two years in this godforsaken place, how it cheers me to see such a testament of American power. Won’t you have someone show me around your ship?”

  “With pleasure,” Dale answered. “I will conduct you as we talk.” In the first half-hour of their interview they descended from spar deck down to gun deck to berth deck to orlop deck, and then back up to the commodore’s cabin.

  “Tunis should present the least of your difficulties,” said O’Brien. “In fact, I am told you may water and provision there.” He echoed, however, Gavino’s warning about Yusuf Karamanlis and Tripoli. “Understand me rightly, that man is a killer, and no mistake. Do not present yourself in the city as you did here, or you will have to be ransomed.”

  At the first sight of the Essex and Grand Turk the next day, Dale and Sterett weighed anchor, east for Tunis, where indeed they were welcomed, quickly watered and provisioned, at handsome profit to the bashaw there, but that was to be expected. They conferred quickly with the consul, William Eaton, who confirmed with further particulars his account of the mode of Tripolitan warfare that Gavino had read to them.

  Throughout these days, Bliven Putnam and Sam Bandy gained in their apprenticeship as midshipmen. They stood their watches, studying the function of every sail and every line, as willing to learn from the lowly tars as they were from the lieutenants. David Porter had main charge of them. He was twenty-one, with a taut face, thin lips, black hair over fair skin; he was severe but usually decent. He gave their lessons in navigation and seamanship, and even tested them with mock questions of the very kind he knew would be asked of them on their lieutenant’s examinations. He imparted his facility with sextant and chronometer, at which Sam Bandy excelled, and with the guns, at which Bliven showed the greater aptitude, perhaps because good shooting required an art and an instinct that went beyond the rote calculations of navigation. There was an indefinable feel that told when a ship was nearing the end of its uproll or downroll, how long the match would take to catch the primer, how far to the target and how to gauge its roll with his own, how far a ship would travel between firing and the ball striking—and all that was the difference between shivering or breaking a mast, and wasting a shot into thin air. Bliven seemed to have been born with this, but Sam was his master at trigonometry.

  Second Lieutenant Curtis, whom they had both learned to fear, continued to instruct them in what he knew best: fighting, with saber and dagger. After their most elemental lessons, each session seemed to degenerate into a genuine fight for their very lives. After two weeks Curtis took away the wooden swords and had them fight with their real cutlasses, to accustom them to the desperation of it, the gravity of it. They could not be certain whether, given a weak moment in their guard, Curtis would actually kill them, but neither would take that risk. Like being dropped in a foreign land with none to speak their own language, it astonished them how quickly they became proficient with swords. And beyond one’s own proficiency, Curtis hammered it into them how one day their lives would depend on being able to read the eyes of an opponent, to take swift advantage of just the slightest second’s hesitation. A poor lesson inevitably resulted in an extra watch, or a stint aloft, or standing at the bow with a ball in each hand. He refrained from whipping them, but they always knew it was a possibility, and it disturbed them to see his eyes shine when the ship’s company had to turn out to witness punishment of some luckless tar.

  By the time they raised Tripoli off their starboard bow on July 25, Baltimore and innocence seemed a lifetime behind them. The President and the Enterprise anchored outside the harbor, and Dale, heeding all he had been told, sent a letter ashore for the bashaw. He offered the friendship of the United States and of its president, and a cash gift of ten thousand dollars, if the bashaw would terminate the war. If not, he wrote, “The Squadron under my command will do Every Thing in its power to distroy the Corsairs and other Vessels belonging to Your Excellency.” Dale could fight, but he could not always spell. His reports were always straight from his pen, never corrected by a clerk, but the secretary of the navy could always depend that Dale could get across his meanings with exceptional clarity.

  For three long days there was silence from the city, before a boat returned with a truculent and insulting letter from Yusuf. Trying a second tack, Dale wrote again, reminding the bashaw that under the terms of their treaty, disputes were to be submitted to the dey of Algiers for his arbitration. Unknown to Dale, that was the worst thing he could have done, for the whole point of Yusuf’s demanding greater tribute from America was his assertion that he was now the equal of the dey and entitled to equal tribute.

  It was now two-thirds through the summer, and the heat coming off the African desert was sweltering. They had topped off their casks in Tunis, but by the end of the month water was again running dangerously low. Dale called Sterett over for a talk. The nearest fresh water was at Malta, although they could not be sure how much they could obtain. It might be delicate. British friendliness to the Americans could vary from port to port, according to the inclination of the local commander; they had been fortunate in Gibraltar. Dale ordered Sterett to Malta, and he filled Enterprise’s hold with empty casks. Cautioning him to be faultless in his salutes and formalities with the English, he dispatched him on July 30.

  For hours after he left Tripoli harbor, Sterett stood on his small quarterdeck, immovable as a golem, marveling angrily at being put to such an errand as fetching water. He respected Dale and would not cross him, but the President’s capacious hold could lay in forty-five thousand gallons of water. He could go to Malta and take on water until his deck was awash and not come back with half so much. The President’s four hundred fifty hands received the approved ration of one gallon per day, per man. The navy cared little what they did with it; they could drink it or clean themselves with it or wash their clothes in it, but in this brutal heat they drank it, and they could not do with less. Four hundred
fifty gallons per day, plus changing the water in the steep tub four or five times each day—for if the men were fed meat that was not rinsed of its salt their thirst would become ravenous. Calling it five hundred gallons per day and starting from a full hold, Dale must replenish after ninety days, with some of that expended in reaching a port for water. Eventually, unless he had a supply ship in continual attendance, Dale must withdraw to Tunis or back to Gibraltar.

  Shortly after setting the forenoon watch on August 1, a cry came down from the lookout: “Sail ho! Sail! Ho!”

  Sterett had not even finished climbing the ladder when he asked sharply, “What do you see?”

  “A funny little bastard of a ship, sir. Square-rigged on the foremast, lateen-rigged on the main and mizzen. Not very big. Queer-looking thing.”

  “Do you see her colors?” Sterett shouted up.

  “Tripolitan, sir.”

  Sterett took out his glass and looked for himself. “Indeed she is,” he said almost hungrily, seeing the three red and two yellow stripes of that Berber state’s pennant. In the circle of the glass Sterett made out the rigging of a polacca, which for more than a century had been one of the favorite raiding vessels of the Barbary pirates. It was plain that she was steering obliquely for them. Sterett’s breath quickened as he pitched himself up for a fight. “Beat to quarters,” he ordered tightly. “English colors, Bosun, run them up.”