The Shores of Tripoli

by James L. Haley

  “But you will be no longer in command. What can you do in Naples?”

  “I will have the consul’s ear. Barton is an intelligent man; he knows there are those in the navy who are out for their own glory. If some officers try to thwart the president’s policy, he will know how to act.” Preble’s tone turned abruptly serious. “Mark me, now, once Barron has taken command, use all your resourcefulness to assist Eaton in his object, unless he receives a direct order to stand down, which is unlikely because he came here under instructions from President Jefferson himself.”

  “He believes in Eaton’s plan?”

  “The president is willing to gamble on Eaton to end the war. He would do anything for the government to stop hemorrhaging money on the navy. He recognizes that we have ended piracy on the sea, but it will begin again as soon as our backs are turned, unless we throttle these Berber warlords as they should be. Now, I will not order you to this service, but I want you to volunteer for it. Will you?”

  Instinctively, Bliven knew this was not a moment to hesitate. “Yes, sir, willingly.”

  Preble sighed. “Good man. And just think, you will be perhaps the only naval officer in the country who will win part of his glory in desert sands. Heh! Let others be jealous. Now, get your things packed. I want you over on the Argus tonight; you and Eaton will sail with the tide in the morning.”

  15.

  SEA OF WATER, SEA OF SAND

  March–April 1805

  The last thing Bliven heard before boarding the Argus with Eaton, bound for Egypt, was that Samuel Barron had arrived in Malta, so Preble had dispatched him just in time. Preble still seemed certain that Barron had had no hand in his downfall, which made his authority tolerable. But to the great preponderance of sailors who did not care who was in charge, sailors who could barely tell one from another, Barron stood out. Barron was a legend. The tale had raced through the fleet, during the Quasi-War with France a few years since, how as a third lieutenant he had saved the frigate United States. Her rigging had been set in Boston in the crisp of winter, but then in breathless summer, finding herself cruising the West Indies in search of French prizes, her rigging had slackened to the point where a sudden gale threatened to dismast her. The American navy was slow to learn this lesson; Preble and the Essex had only narrowly escaped such a fate, and the Congress was not so lucky, for she lost not only her masts but her bowsprit as well, and it required the closest management to limp her home for expensive and time-consuming repairs. Seeing the danger, Barron obtained the captain’s leave to command a crew and reset the rigging, which by pulling together timed to the gusts and the roll, they succeeded in doing. That Barron was a daring leader of men was established just that early in his career.

  Bliven had served on the Constitution so long now, he had almost forgotten how confining, how claustrophobic, the interior of a schooner can be. He almost felt as if his cabin were a coffin, but he knew he must make the best of it, for his Rollins Geography told him it was a thousand miles, more or less, from Tripoli to Alexandria. With a strong following wind they could do it in five days, but it was more likely to take two weeks. At least it was not as crowded as he remembered from the Enterprise, for Argus carried only a platoon of marines instead of the company they had squeezed into the ship on his first cruise. And as Eaton’s adjutant he would have no duties except as Eaton gave him. It was in the Argus’s diminutive wardroom that they took each other’s measure for the first time.

  “Mr. Putnam.” General Eaton looked at him as though he were appraising a needed but too-expensive utensil. Eaton was a large man just emerging from the prime of his life, with enormous blue eyes set beneath a prominent brow ridge, above which his forehead sloped back severely. No one could call him handsome, but he sat rod-straight, and even seated in his too-small chair he wore his uniform exceptionally well.

  “At your service, sir.” Bliven knew that his accent would give him away, and the accustomed ritual would have to be repeated.

  “Of the Connecticut Putnams, I’ll wager,” said Eaton.

  Only to himself did he sigh. “Yes, sir. General Israel Putnam was my great-uncle.”

  “Well, then.” Eaton’s countenance lightened, and his large blue eyes seemed as peaceable as a summer sky. “I feel myself in familiar company, then. I am from Mansfield.”

  “Truly?” Bliven relaxed a degree at what he regarded as an offer of amiable superiority, which he did not mistake for familiarity. “My family know Mansfield well. In my grandfather’s time we lived in Putnam, but my father moved to Litchfield after he lost everything in the Revolution.”

  Eaton nodded. “And I was born in Woodstock, which is even closer to Putnam. We moved west when I was ten, although not so far west as your family.” He held up a hand for just a second. “Now let me finish reading.” He returned to Bliven’s orders, dual orders, competing orders, one from Preble and one from Barron.

  At length he rapped the edges of the papers on his camp desk to align them before setting them aside; he looked up and said, “Well.” His voice expressed a complete lack of commitment, but his eyes looked Bliven down and up, then sought out his eyes for any hint of temerity.

  “I hope you will not think me too young for the duty I have been assigned.”

  “Young man, I almost missed the Revolution. Had to run away from home when I was sixteen to join up, that was in seventeen and eighty. Made sergeant by the end of it. In no wise will you find me prejudiced solely on account of your youth. Carry out my orders promptly and well, and you will find me a just sponsor to add to what Commodore Barron writes of your gallantry in taking the Tripoli, and what Commodore Preble writes of your service to him.”

  “Thank you, General Eaton.”

  “But mark me: Falter, and you will wish we had not met this night.”

  “I hope I shall give you no cause for such censure.”

  “Very well, then. You are detailed to me, personally, as my adjutant. The marine detachment outside there have Lieutenant O’Bannon in command, but you will answer only to me. Now, Barron remarks particularly on your skill as a gunner. Do you feel that confidence is justified?”

  “Well, making allowance for one or two lucky shots, yes, sir.”

  Eaton evinced a wry smile for just a second before it disappeared. “There are four field pieces in transit from the squadron, with powder and shot. When they arrive, they will be under your command. Some of our Greek mercenaries say they have experience with artillery. You are to ascertain the fact of their proficiency, allow for some training, and do so with the absolute minimum expenditure of powder.”

  “I understand, sir. If I may ask, where are we going?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Sir, I understood that we were going to Alexandria, and I heard officers remarking earlier upon seeing traffic bound there and departing. We seem to have passed it.”

  “Ah. First we are going to meet one of my informants in the village of Rosetta, east of there, on one of the outlets of the Nile.”

  “I understand. Thank you, sir. Will that be all?”

  “Yes, Mr. Putnam. Good night to you.”

  Bliven returned to his cramped cabin, with that one word echoing and rattling around in his mind: the Nile. How often had he read about it? Would he see it, or would he be denied, as he had been at Pompeii?

  Dawn answered his questions as the Argus dropped anchor in the mouth of a river whose banks were a hundred yards apart. They entered the discharge enough to escape the sea swells, but, lacking a chart, they anchored when the sounding shallowed to eighteen feet. They lowered a boat, and with eight rowers pulling against the sluggish current, Eaton and Bliven reached Rashid—it was the French who renamed it Rosetta during their brief occupation—in forty minutes.

  The city was fronted by a sand beach along the river, which the cutter coasted up to and was hauled a few feet up onto the ground. Bliven h
ad not read of it, but he was astonished by its size, its activity, the abundance and intricacy of its architecture. Eaton knew it better, and explained that after the Ottoman conquest they had favored Rashid with its river traffic as a commercial center over the more ancient Alexandria, which was allowed to languish and fall into decay.

  The Napoleonic contests in Egypt had made such an impact that their Western uniforms drew little notice. Eaton seemed certain of where they were going, and Bliven felt very much in tow as they entered a principal square and then a shop in which Eaton ordered them cups of coffee—tiny cups, the coffee brutally strong but of a curiously sweet taste. He indicated a table well into the interior, which Bliven took to mean that Eaton did not wish them to draw undue attention to themselves.

  “Salaam!” Eaton rose and was greeted by a wizened old Arab, whom he allowed to embrace him although he was only tolerant of it. “Salaam!”

  The entire exchange took less than ten minutes before they were on their way back to the boat. “I had no idea you spoke the language, sir,” said an amazed Bliven.

  “Well enough,” said Eaton.

  “Did you find out what you need to know?”

  “Yes, Hamet Pasha is on his way down. I thought he might meet us here, but he prefers Alexandria.”

  “But if this is the larger town, wouldn’t you have better luck raising an army here than in Alexandria?”

  “I would think so, but I’m sure he has his reasons. It is forty miles closer to begin the march, but knowing him, there is always another game afoot.”

  They were back on the Argus by one o’clock and standing out to sea, beating to westward but making slow progress. The sea was easy, and Eaton had them put into a small bay and lower the boat. “I don’t know if this will interest you,” he told Bliven, “but come with me anyway.”

  They jumped from the boat onto the hard-packed sand and strode inland guided by the sight, on the rise, of a wrecked cart with one wheel off. It was all in a rush that Bliven became aware of the bones—a horse’s bones at first, at the front of the cart, but then nearby descried what he knew to be a human rib cage, partly buried in the sand. With his eye drawn down and then slowly looking in larger circles, he realized they had walked into a great field of bones, more ribs seeming to claw their way out of the sand, long bones and pelvises, skulls and parts of skulls. Whether once buried and slowly surfacing, or never buried and only slowly sinking, their empty eye sockets seemed loath to give up the light and the air. And all was silence but the rhythmic pounding of the surf and the rare cry of a gull.

  General Eaton leaned against the gate of a wagon half buried in the sand. “Well, Mr. Putnam, what do you make of it?”

  “What place is this?”

  “Abukir. Terrible battles were fought here.”

  Bliven shook his head, unsure how he should answer. “I’m sorry, sir, I’ve heard of it, but I don’t know that history.”

  “Napoleon defeated an army of British and Turks here in 1799; he lost about a thousand men, the Turks lost about eight thousand. After Napoleon left, the British retook it four years ago, as a preface to taking Alexandria. And all that happened after the sea battle out there in the bay—the French lost two frigates and eleven ships of the line to Admiral Nelson.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Bliven. “That’s the battle I heard of.” Extraordinary, he thought, that the French could lose eleven ships of the battle line in one action, and we had not a single one in commission, yet we aspired to be a respected power.

  “Indeed.” Eaton nodded. “Tell me, did you know your great-uncle, General Putnam?”

  “They tell me that he saw me and held me a few times, and wished a glorious career for me. I was but two years old when he died; I do not remember him.”

  “Do you find war glorious, Mr. Putnam?”

  “I—I might have done, but I killed two men when we took the Tripoli. I felt frightened, and then I felt sad, and sorry.” Oddly, at that moment, what he most remembered was how carefully he had tried not to step in their blood.

  “Ah, but when you returned home, and you and your shipmates were all welcomed as heroes and were given bounty pay and shore leave, and everyone knew who you were—did you not enjoy that acclamation?”

  “I did, yes,” admitted Bliven.

  “That was well,” said Eaton, “for you deserved it. You served honorably and returned victorious in the service of your country. But I mean war itself, battle—glorious?” Eaton pushed himself away from the derelict wagon, searching the sand for a moment before he picked up a bleached skull, holding it away from him to let the sand drain out a great jagged wound at the back that was likely the cause of death. “Here.” He handed it out to Bliven, who took it. “That man had a name, and joys and prospects that were cut off. Perhaps he had a wife, and children, who never saw him again, parents who grieved for him. Tell me, how many people live in your Litchfield?”

  “About four thousand, General.”

  “Well, eight thousand died on this beach in the Battles of Abukir. Imagine two of your entire towns consigned to violent death here. Imagine what this place looked like then. What it smelled like. That is what real war is like, and not many men can make a career of it.”

  “No, sir. But many must stand ready to, to protect what we have won already. Is that not true, sir?”

  “It is. It is.” Eaton looked around bleakly and then squarely at Bliven. “I just wanted to satisfy myself that you are not one of those who enjoy it.”

  “Sir?”

  They walked, leaving deep divots in the dry sand, back down to the boat. “Some men,” said Eaton, “are born to spread death and destruction. If you must have a war, it is lucky to have them on your side. But such are the men who start wars, too. You can probably look around among the commanders of your own ships and identify such men, could you not?”

  Bliven found himself somewhat alarmed. “Sir, I could not name them without impugning their patriotism.”

  “Well said, Lieutenant. It is not important for you to name them, only to recognize them, and be on your guard against letting them influence you.”

  • • •

  THE WIND WAS still almost against them and it was a hard two days to make the twenty miles through the mole into Alexandria. Bliven was on deck to assay as much of the city as he could see, and indeed, it made a poor comparison to Rashid. Yet plainly it was very old; he regarded the Fortress of Qaitbay at the entrance of the harbor, at the extremity of the island of Pharos, which he had read was built from stones of the great lighthouse after it fell, indeed erected on the very foundation of the lighthouse that was one of the Wonders of the Ancient World. Though they passed within easy view, Bliven raised his spyglass to see it in detail. Its construction was a mishmash of stones, white and cream and brown, seemingly both limestone and sandstone, the fifteenth-century stones sharp-cut, other stones ancient and very worn. Its curtain wall and central keep seemed of the same vintage as European castles, and cannon now jutted from the crenellations that once sheltered archers. In his mind’s eye, though, it was easy to superimpose the ancient lighthouse, more than three hundred feet high.

  Somewhere probably within his sight, Cleopatra seduced Julius Caesar, and later, after Marc Antony’s death, ascended to her tomb and let the asp bite her. Bliven had been at sea long enough to know that his passion for history had made him the butt of jokes, but here in this ancient place, it exasperated him how the past could be so alive to him, or he to it, that it almost spoke to him, and others heard nothing.

  “Lieutenant Putnam?”

  He shook from his reverie. “General Eaton.” He saluted.

  “It is nearly time. We and the marines will make a camp near the beach east of the city. Hamet Pasha will know to join us there.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “We will hire pack animals, so there is no need to travel too lightly. Pa
ck some changes of clothes and things you will need. We will assemble on the spar deck and leave in an hour.”

  “Yes, sir.” In his cabin Bliven packed his sea bag as though he were going home; he had left most of his books with Preble on the Constitution, but one item did catch his eye, the large jambia dagger that he had snatched from the pile of weapons on the Tripoli before they were thrown overboard. He pulled it out of its worked leather sheath and regarded the gleaming blade before replacing it. He almost stuffed it into the bag, but then thrust it through his belt, the way it was meant to be carried.

  When he reached the spar deck, Lieutenant O’Bannon, tall, black hair, gray eyes, and intensely earnest, had already assembled his marines, and the bosun’s crew were getting the Argus’s cutter over the side. In the bottom of the cutter he saw that Eaton had procured two tents, one for himself and one for the two lieutenants; the marines would sleep out, or have an open tarpaulin of sailcloth to keep them dry, in the unlikely event of rain. Even as they set up camp, a dozen rough-looking riders galloped into their camp and identified themselves as having been sent by Hamet Pasha to find Eaton. They were Maronite mercenaries from the Levant; one was sent back to guide Hamet to the camp as the others made their camp, apart but within sight of Eaton’s.

  Before sunset they had organized a camp and prepared a dinner—rations from the Argus, he noted, salt beef, peas, and bread, and as they ate he noticed one thing amiss. “General Eaton, sir?”

  “Mr. Putnam?”

  “Excuse me, sir, but today is Wednesday, and navy regulations specify pork and rice on Wednesdays. Are you quite certain this is permitted to have beef on a Wednesday?”

  Eaton smiled tightly. “For our purposes, yes, but I am glad you mention it. The Arabs loathe pork, they detest pork, consider it unclean, and I made certain to bring none. It would make a very bad impression for us to be seen eating pork. Take care you acquire none, and pass that on to O’Bannon and the marines. Do you understand?”