Burning of the Frigate Philadelphia

views updated

Burning of the Frigate Philadelphia

Barbary Pirates

Engraving

By: F. Kearney

Date: 1808

Source: Burning of the Frigate Philadelphia in the Harbor of Tripoli, February 16, 1804. The engraving was done in 1808 by F. Kearney.

About the Artist: F. Kearney was an artist who worked in the early 1800s.

INTRODUCTION

The first war fought by an independent United States was a war against terrorism, the Tripolitan War against pirates on the Barbary Coast of North Africa from 1801 to 1805.

From the fifteenth through the early nineteenth centuries, pirates from the Muslim kingdoms of Tripoli, Tunis, Morocco, and Algiers increased their kingdom's wealth and terrorized Europe by seizing merchant ships and their crews on the Mediterranean Sea and holding them for ransom. During the eighteenth century, a French Roman Catholic religious order called the Mathurins existed for the sole purpose of raising funds to ransom captives from Barbary pirates.

Before U.S. independence, American vessels in the Mediterranean received some measure of protection from the British navy. The British, in fact, could have crushed the Barbary pirates, but instead chose to buy protection while allowing the pirates to remain as a threat to Britain's maritime rivals. With independence in 1783, however, the United States became responsible for protecting its own merchant vessels, and in 1784, Congress appropriated $80,000 for tribute to the Barbary Coast states.

Thomas Jefferson, however, was a vocal opponent of appeasement. In 1785, Algerian pirates captured two American vessels and demanded tribute of $60,000. Jefferson, at the time U.S. ambassador to France, urged instead the formation of an international naval coalition to subdue the Barbary States, but his efforts were unsuccessful. Abroad, England and France found payment of tribute less expensive than military action. At home, the fledgling United States had no desire to go to war and instead signed a treaty with Morocco in 1786 guaranteeing annual payments. By 1797, similar treaties with the other Barbary kingdoms were in place. Meanwhile, in 1795, the United States had paid nearly a million dollars in cash, supplies, and a ship to ransom 115 U.S. sailors from Algiers.

Matters took a new turn in 1801, when Jefferson became president. That year, the pasha of Tripoli reneged on its treaty with the United States, demanding an immediate large payment and annual tribute of $25,000. When Jefferson refused, Tripoli declared war on the United States on May 14, 1801. In response, Jefferson dispatched to the region a squadron of warships under the leadership of Commander Edward Preble, launching a four-year war, the Tripolitan War, with the Barbary Coast.

Jefferson met with considerable criticism at home for resorting to warfare. This criticism grew louder in 1803, when Tripoli seized the frigate Philadelphia and her crew. In February 1804, however, Lieutenant Stephen Decatur and a party of U.S. sailors managed to board the Philadelphia in Tripoli's harbor and, rather than allowing Tripoli to keep the vessel, destroyed it.

PRIMARY SOURCE

BURNING OF THE FRIGATE PHILADELPHIA

See primary source image.

SIGNIFICANCE

Commander Preble took aggressive action. He formed a naval blockade of the Barbary Coast, quickly subdued Morocco, and launched five bombardments of Tripoli. Hostilities continued until 1805, when a naval expedition under the command of Commodore John Rogers and a land force led by Captain William Eaton threatened to invade Tripoli and replace the pasha with his brother. Faced with overwhelming U.S. military power, Tripoli signed a treaty on June 4, 1805, requiring no further payment of tribute.

The United States, however, continued to pay tribute to Algiers until the outbreak of the War of 1812, when Algiers declared war on the United States and demanded an increase in its annual tribute. Again the United States responded with military force. A naval expedition led by Decatur, now a captain, and Commodore William Bainbridge was launched on May 10, 1815. After American forces quickly seized two Algerian ships, Algiers capitulated and signed a treaty on June 30 requiring no further tribute.

American vessels in the Mediterranean faced no further threats from the Barbary kingdoms. Several European nations continued to pay tribute until the 1830s.

Tripoli, the site of the first American overseas military action, was immortalized in U.S. military history in the opening line of the Marine hymn: "From the halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli." One of the ships that led the bombardment of Tripoli, the USS Constitution, popularly known as "Old Ironsides," went on to further distinction in the War of 1812.