The Birth of a Nation: Haiti

Flag of Saint-Domingue

The birth of a nation rarely comes easily or painlessly. Certainly our Founding Fathers understood that only through extreme sacrifice, sorrow and suffering could America hope to gain its independence from Great Britain. But at least to them the central issues of the conflict were clearly defined. But that was hardly the case in Haiti, or Saint-Domingue as it was originally called. Rarely in the course of human events has there been such a complexity of overlapping personal and national interests conspiring against each other and competing with each other.

In chapter seven of The Power and the Glory, Lt. Richard Cutler is aboard the newly minted frigate USS Constellation as she sails south from Baltimore to the West Indies. The sailing orders of her commander, Capt. Thomas Truxtun, are to engage the French Navy and harass French military bases in the Indies in cooperation with the Royal Navy. He also has secret orders to gather intelligence about a civil war that has erupted on Saint-Domingue. Truxtun brings into his confidence Lieutenant Cutler and Lt. James Carter, captain of Marines. He starts off the conversation by asking the two lieutenants what they know about Saint-Domingue. Richard knows a little, since his family owns a sugar cane plantation on Barbados. He says to his captain:

Captain Thomas Truxton

“As I understand it, sir, Saint-Domingue is a French colony on the western half of the island of Hispaniola, a hodge-podge of British, French and Spanish interests. Columbus was first to plant a flag there and thus claimed the entire island for Spain. That claim notwithstanding, French buccaneers soon settled on the western third of the island, since the Spanish preferred the eastern parts where the soil is richer. Over the years the French built up quite an imposing presence on Saint-Domingue. The British were late-comers, motivated, I suspect, by the quality of the coffee and cane fields. Until a few years ago they had no legal standing on Hispaniola. That changed when local slaves rose up and began slaughtering their white masters, French and Spanish alike. The Spanish invited the British in to help restore order on the island and at the same time drive out the French. I heard rumors that there was an agreement between the British and Spanish to divide the colony between them once the French were ousted.”

Toussaint L’Ouverture

Truxtun then informs the lieutenants that the two opposing armies in the civil war are let by Toussaint L’Ouverture and a man named André Rigaud. L’Ouverture was a former African slave whose benevolent master allowed him to learn several languages on his own. He also learned, on his own, military arts and history, his favorite book being Caesar’s Gallic Wars—in Latin. At first Toussaint had sided with the Spanish, but that loyalty proved to be ephemeral. As Truxtun explains:

André Rigaud

 “Early in ’94 Toussaint switched sides and declared himself for France. Exactly why, no one knows for certain. But since France abolished slavery in the Indies, it’s a fair guess he felt he owed allegiance to France. The Spanish also had promised freedom to their slaves but were slow to act on that promise. Great Britain -- Spain’s ally at the time as Mr. Cutler correctly informs us – has in fact reinstated slavery in the areas of Hispaniola it controls. The British fear, quite legitimately in my view, that emancipation on one island will encourage slave rebellions on other islands.” 

He allowed a moment for that information to sink in. “What you said a moment ago, Mr. Cutler, is accurate. Hispaniola is indeed a hodge-podge of foreign interests, and those interests have little regard for local citizenry. On Saint-Domingue there are – I should say, were -- approximately thirty thousand whites: government administrators, artisans, shop-keepers, and the like. Most of these people supported the French Republic. Others, the wealthier ones – the planters, the so-called grand blancs -- remained loyal to the Bourbon king, the exiled Louis XVII. When rebellion broke out, these royalists sided with the Spanish and British, hoping, I suppose, to somehow come out of all of this with the status quo intact. When that effort failed and the slaughter began anew, the grand blancs fled the colony right behind the petit blancs. Many of these refugees escaped to Cuba, taking with them what slaves they could and their experience in sugar production. 

“There’s more, I’m afraid. Also on Saint-Domingue are thirty thousand so-called gens de couleur, a rather elegant term for those citizens of mixed European and African descent. They are the offspring of white planters and their Negro mistresses who lived together in an odd form of common-law marriage that allows their offspring to inherit property. These people – mulattoes, you and I would call them -- are recognized as citizens of France. They form an elite group on the island. So elite in fact, that they consider themselves superior to both blacks and whites.  

“The third group on the island -- by far the largest at more than 400,000 strong – consists of former black slaves. Most of these slaves came to Saint-Domingue in chains from the west coast of Africa. I need not describe to you the misery of their lives. So it should be easy to understand why they call Toussaint ‘Father Toussaint’ and look upon him as a saint or savior-- which to them, of course, he is. Thousands have flocked to his banner.” 

“Against whom? The French?” 

“Nor at all, Mr. Carter. Have you not been listening?” Truxtun’s tone conveyed more humor than reprimand. “As I told you, almost all whites in the colony have fled the island. Those who remain are connected in some way to the government or military. No, L’Ouverture is fighting the gens de couleur, the mulatto army led by André Rigaud, the militant extremist I mentioned earlier. Rigaud also knows a thing or two about military affairs--enough to conquer and control what amounts to a semi-autonomous state on the southern regions of Saint-Domingue. His objectives go far beyond that, however. He seeks what L’Ouverture seeks, to conquer the entire island of Hispaniola. L’Ouverture, it would seem, has a better chance of succeeding, since his army is considerably larger than Rigaud’s. That’s the point to remember. Two years ago L’Ouverture thwarted Rigaud’s attempt to assassinate the French governor of the colony, a general named Laveaux. As a reward for saving his life, Laveaux appointed L’Ouverture lieutenant-governor of Saint-Domingue and commander-in-chief of French forces on the island. Have I confused you yet?” 

Richard scratched the nape of his neck. 

“You’ve done a thorough job of confusing me, sir. This is all quite interesting, but if I may, what does it have to do with Lieutenant Carter and me?” 

“A great deal, Mr. Cutler, as I am about to tell you. Before I do, however, you should also know that agents acting on behalf of Toussaint L’Ouverture has been in secret contact with Mr. Adams, our president.”  

That information caused both lieutenants to blink. Then Truxtun delivered a thunder blow. 

“Toussaint has formally requested our government to lift our embargo on shipments to Saint-Domingue. He has also requested military supplies and food for his army. In exchange for our support, he has pledged to Mr. Adams that he will deny France the use of Saint-Domingue as a naval base in the West Indies.” 

Richard cast James Carter a stupefied look. Carter returned it with equal incredulity. Both men struggled to make sense of a labyrinth of double-dealing that seemed to expand in size and complexity with each sentence Truxtun uttered. 

“Captain,” Richard managed, “how can that be? Did you not say a moment ago that Toussaint L’Ouverture now commands French forces on Saint Domingue?” 

“I said exactly that. 

“Forgive me, sir, but how can the commander of French forces deny France the use of a naval base he is pledged to maintain and defend? 

Truxtun’s mouth twisted 

“I appreciate the difficulty you are having with this, Mr. Cutler. If it’s any consolation, I asked my superiors the same questions you and Mr. Carter are asking me. What you need to understand is that L’Ouverture’s true loyalty lies not with France, but with the former black slaves. He trusts no one: you, me, or anyone, foreigner or mulatto. But he will treat with you and me and with anyone else he believes can help him realize his ultimate objective.” 

“Which is?” 

“An independent nation ruled by freed black slaves.”

As it turns out, Truxtun was just getting warmed up. And considerably more mind-boggling revelations await the Americans during a meeting with Adm. Sir Hyde Parker at the British naval base at Port Royal, Jamaica. Ultimately, Toussaint L’Ouverture would realize his dream of an independent Haiti, in large part due to substantial American aid transported to Saint-Domingue through yet another strange twist in the interpretation of international law. But he would not live to see his dream fulfilled. Toussaint was captured by the French and sent to languish in a French prison, there to die on April 17, 1803. Later that year his most trusted lieutenant, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, finally defeated the last French army on the island, having earlier defeated the army of André Rigaud with help from the U.S. Navy.

Photo Credits [public domain]: Coat of arms of Haiti; Thomas Truxtun, painted in 1817 by Bass Otis; General Toussaint Louverture, pictured here on a Haitian banknote; André Rigaud.

Hingham, Massachusetts and the Boston Harbor Islands

Hingham, Massachusetts

As the author of the Cutler Family Chronicles, I had no trouble selecting Hingham as the home town of the American branch of the Cutler Family. (The English branch hails from Fareham, England and the West Indian island of Barbados.) Hingham was where my family and I lived for sixteen years and where we still have a wealth of friends and memories. While a resident there I served on a publishing committee offering oversight and insight to an official history of the town entitled Not All Is Changed. Much of what I learned during the course of that initiative is scattered throughout the volumes of the Chronicles, lending what I trust is a sense of authenticity to the descriptions and history of a New England seaside village.

Old Ship Church

Founded in 1633 as Bare Cove, Hingham was incorporated in 1635 under its new name. Many of the early settlers—including Samuel Lincoln, an ancestor of President Abraham Lincoln—fled from Hingham, England to America in search of religious freedom. In 1681, they built a meeting house on lower Main Street in the shape of an upside-down ship’s lull. That building stands today as Old Ship's Church and is the oldest continuously used house of worship in America. It is also the only remaining Puritan meeting house in New England.

At the outbreak of rebellion in 1775, many residents of Hingham were Tories, that is, they remained loyal to England. However, British blunders and excessive punishments for perceived offenses against the Crown persuaded most Hingham Tories to turn coat and become patriots. In the Cutler family, eldest son Will Cutler was seized by the British off Marblehead and dragged off his family’s merchant brig to serve in the Royal Navy. Soon thereafter, as the mandated sentence for striking a ship’s officer, he was whipped to shreds and then hanged from a larboard yardarm. When contrite British authorities in Boston delivered Will’s tortured body to his father, there was no longer any doubt as to where Cutler loyalties would henceforth lie. Will’s younger brother Richard spends the remaining years of the war in a personal quest for revenge.

Gen. Benjamin Lincoln

During the Revolutionary War (or the war with England, as it was then called), Hingham saw little of the war’s brutal devastations. In fact, not long after the British garrison evacuated Boston on March 17, 1776, the theater of war shifted to the southern states, thus sparing most of New England from the rebellion’s fury. Hingham’s main claim to fame in the conflict comes from one of its prominent citizens, Brig. Gen. Benjamin Lincoln. Lincoln was one of General Washington’s best and most trusted senior officers. At the Battle of Yorktown, he served as Washington’s second-in-command and it was he who accepted Lord Cornwallis’s sword of surrender.

Because the South Shore town of Hingham is located only about an hour’s sail from Boston (assuming fair winds), in early colonial times it became an important commercial center, much like Salem on Boston’s North Shore. In the Chronicles, the Cutler family maintains a small shipping office in Hingham and a much larger one on Boston’s Long Wharf, from where it manages its global commercial interests. Sailing back and forth by boat was rarely a challenge, courtesy of the thirty-four islands (six of which are in Hingham Bay or Hingham Harbor) that, combined with the long, narrow Nantasket peninsula, provide a protective barrier for the eastern and southern extremities of greater Boston Harbor. Today, these jewels of islands offer a tourist’s dream of hiking trails, beaches and historic forts, and are easily accessible by ferries and shuttle boars operating out of Boston, Hingham and other coastal communities.

World's End

A visit to these islands is highly recommended. So is a visit to Hingham and its scenic South Shore neighbors of Cohasset, Hull, Scituate, Duxbury and Plymouth. When in Hingham, be sure to stop by World’s End, a 250-acre peninsula jutting into Hingham Bay that offers spectacular views of sea and fields and groves of trees. What is now a state park and conservation area was designed in part by Frederick Law Olmstead, the landscape architect who designed New York’s Central Park. In 1945, World’s End was considered as a site for the headquarters of the newly formed United Nations.


Photo credits [all public domain]: Old Ship Church, 19th Century woodcut by Hosea Sprague; General Benjamin Lincoln, painted by Charles Willson Peale; World's End, Hingham, Massachusetts, USA. Landscaped by Frederick Law Olmsted.

Early American Lighthouses

The Cutler Family Chronicles is a six-book series that profiles the American perspective during the Age of Sail. Because the Cutler family is engaged in overseas commerce—as well as in the fledgling U.S. Navy—much of the action takes place at sea. Lighthouses therefore play a subtle yet important role in these novels.

Below is a brief profile of the lighthouses that appear in them.

BOSTON LIGHT

Constructed on Little Brewster Island at the entrance to Boston Harbor, Boston Light appears in several volumes of the Chronicles beginning with the first volume, A Matter of Honor, since Boston was home port to the Cutler family. First built in 1716--and the first lighthouse in the colonies--it was rebuilt in 1783 after the British blew it up as they evacuated Boston in March of 1776. It now stands at 98 feet and is the second oldest working lighthouse in the United States (after Sandy Hook Lighthouse in New Jersey).

In August of 1803, Boston Light and Cape Cod Light at Truro are the last glimpses of Massachusetts available to Midshipman James Cutler as USS Constitution sails eastward into the night toward the Barbary Coast of North Africa (as depicted in A Call to Arms).

As an interesting side-note, Boston Light was staffed and maintained by the United States Coast Guard until 1998, at which time it became fully automated. It was the last lighthouse in America to employ and house a keeper and his family on site.

PORTLAND LIGHT

Richard (Cutler) was seated at his desk, but he had turned his chair around and was facing aft with his feet up on the narrow crimson-cushioned settee running athwartship afore the stern window (of his family’s double topsail schooner, Falcon). That window was open, and Richard appeared to be looking out to southwestward, toward the town of Cape Elizabeth, where a massive structure clearly defined as the base of a lighthouse stood on a far-off promontory known locally as ‘the Neck’.   

This paragraph appears in chapter 4 of For Love of Country. It describes the beginnings of what was to become Portland Light, a project begun in 1787 at the directive of George Washington and completed in 1791.

Standing at a height of 101 feet, it is the oldest lighthouse in Maine (until 1820, a part of Massachusetts). Like most lighthouses of the period, it was conical in shape and used whale oil lamps for illumination.

SANDY POINT LLIGHT

Referred to today at Great Point Light or Nantucket Light, Sandy Point Lighthouse was a wooden tower constructed in 1784 at the end of a seven-mile spit of sand on the northerly extreme of Nantucket Island. Standing guard near the waters where Nantucket Sound and the Atlantic Ocean converge—and where treacherous shoals lurk—Sandy Point Light served as a lifeline to mariners of all states and nations, including whalers returning from the Pacific and those aboard the Cutler sloop Elizabeth battling a fierce winter gale following an encounter with a French privateer.

CAPE HENRY LIGHTHOUSE

Designed by the famous New York architect John McComb, the Cape Henry Lighthouse on Virginia Beach has stood sentinel at the entry-way of Chesapeake Bay, protecting commercial traffic coming in and out of the bay as well as American privateers slipping in and out of the Chesapeake during the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812 to wreak havoc on British shipping. The Chesapeake became an important destination for the Cutler family after it opened a second shipping office in Baltimore to serve the rapidly growing interior of the United States, In The Power and the Glory, Richard Cutler sails from Boston to Baltimore to meet with Capt, Thomas Truxtun, with whom he serves as second lieutenant in USS Constellation during the Quasi War with France,

HATTERAS LIGHT

On July 10, 1797 Congress appropriated $44,000 for the construction of two lighthouses on the coast of North Carolina: one to be built on Hatteras Island and the other in the harbor of Ocracoke a few miles south.

Hatteras Light is among the more important lighthouses in the United States since it is located near the infamous Diamond Shoals, more ominously referred to as “the graveyard of the Atlantic,” It is here where the cold waters of the south-bound Labrador Current clash with the warm waters of the north-bound Gulf Stream, creating chaos amid a large area of sandbars and shoals extending fourteen miles out to sea.

In fair weather, the 112-foot high lighthouse can be seen by mariners eighteen miles offshore, a blessing that no doubt has saved countless lives over the years.

TYBEE ISLAND LIGHTHOUSE

Located on Tybee Island at the mouth of the Savannah River, the first rendition of Tybee Island Lighthouse was completed in 1736 at the directive of Gen. James Ogelthorpe, governor and founder of the colony of Georgia. At the time, at 90 feet in height, it was the tallest structure in colonial America,

As witnessed by Richard and Katherine Cutler (in How Dark the Night, to be released by the Naval Institute Press in October) after a run-in with the notorious pirate Jean Lafitte in New Orleans:

Off to the east of the city was yet another beacon of civilization: a lighthouse on what the sloop’s master identified as Tybee Island. Tybee Light, originally constructed in 1736, was the first lighthouse to grace these southern American waters. It had been destroyed by fire and rebuilt twice, Richard recalled reading in a maritime journal, and today rose one hundred feet from its island base. To Richard and the others sailing with him across the eighty-five miles separating Sea Island from Savannah, the gradual emergence of Tybee Light on the northern horizon had been a most welcome sight. 

Photo credits [all public domain]: Morning Off Boston Light by Clement Drew, 1879; Portland Head Light Station, Cape Elizabeth, Maine, U.S.A.; 1995 photograph of the first Cape Henry Light; The famous lighthouse on Cape Hatteras, 2006; Historic Tybee Island Light Station, taken November 2004.

Ingenious Escape from Old Mill Prison

During the Revolutionary War there were two prisons in England that confined captured enemy sailors. One was Forton Prison in Portsmouth and the other was Old Mill Prison in Plymouth.

Old Mill Prison

At the end of Part I of A Matter of Honor, protagonist Richard Cutler is taken prisoner after a raid on the English seaport of Whitehaven led by Capt. John Paul Jones (the subject of an earlier blog). Richard and several other Americans are carted off to Old Mill Prison, to presumably wait out the war before being tried and hanged as traitors or pirates. (American sailors who fell into British hands were not treated as prisoners of war until after the Battle of Yorktown.) Old Mill was a massive structure with both an inner and outer wall. Within the inner wall were Long Prison, where Americans were held, and another prison across the compound to house French captives.

Old Mill is described in part as follows:

The prison was more massive than he (Richard Cutler) had first imagined. Within the huge rectangular stone structure was another, smaller rectangle of identical construction and proportions, except that at its entrance was a wide-open wooden gate. Between the double walls was a grassy area encircling the entire inner yard. This yard was perhaps twenty feet in width to the east and west, thirty or thirty-five feet to the north and south. Near where Richard stood, between the two north walls, were two substantial stone buildings. One, Richard assumed by the guards posted at the entryway, was most likely the prison offices. The other looked to be a military barracks. Idling about in both the outer and inner yards was a large number of scruffy-looking men walking solo or in small groups.

Among those “scruffy-looking men” Richard would come to know in Old Mill are such future naval heroes (and future characters in the Cutler Family Chronicles) as Silas Talbot, Richard Dale, and Joshua Barney. Although these men and their compatriots had attempted many escapes, few had been successful. Outside the prison walls were legions of local citizens known as “Janners” who were awarded ₤5—a year’s salary for a farm hand—for every escaped prisoner they turned in to the Home Guard. A number of tunnels had been dug and an equal number had been unearthed by snooping prison guards and local militia.

The captured American officers are mulling over their wretched state of affairs one evening after a dinner of land-snail stew. Another tunnel was under construction, this one heading north rather than to the east, which afforded the shortest way out and was the direction to which every tunnel to date had been attempted. The logic of digging to the north was that prison officials would not expect a tunnel to be dug underneath where they worked all day. Thus they would not think to look for one there.

During the meeting Richard Cutler has a sudden notion. In alow but excited voice he tells his fellow inmates that the tunnel has already reached its destination even though it reaches barely beyond the inner wall. His fellow officers stare at him in bewilderment.

What happens next is perhaps best conveyed in dialogue:

“This is nonsense!” Joshua Barney scoffed. “Richard, have you taken leave of your senses? What are you suggesting? That we dig just to the Outer Yard? Hell, boy, we can walk out there any time we want, the gate’s wide open ‘till nightfall. What about the outer wall? We can’t just walk out through the main gate, pretty as we please.” 

Joshua Barney

Richard grinned at him. “Yes we can, Joshua. Yes we can. Hear me out. Silas, how often do they rotate the guards out of here?” 

“Every three months, from what we’ve observed.” 

“Exactly. And how often do they rotate the officers?” 

“Every six months.” 

“Right. So when is the next time officers and guards are rotated out together? Most of them anyway.” 

Talbot gave that some thought. It was Russell who answered. 

“The first of October, three weeks from now. 

Silas Talbot

Richard nodded. “That’s how I figure it.” His right hand was working in quick chopping motions.  

“So on October second, we’ll have a new batch of officers in our midst, plus a fresh rotation of militia guards, most of whom, we can fairly presume, will be strangers to each other. On that one day, an officer could walk in or out of this prison, pretty as you please, as you put it, Joshua, based on one credential: his uniform. Do you agree?” 

The officers stared at Richard, digesting his train of thought. 

“I think we can agree with that, Richard,” Talbot said, scratching his head. “But where are you leading us?” 

Agreen (Crabtree, a fellow midshipman and Richard’s close friend throughout the series) slapped his knee hard. 

“I know where he’s leadin’ us, Silas! Jesus Christ, it’s so obvious we should all have thought of it, long ago. He’s leadin’ us into the Prison Office, the building right between the two gates where they keep the officers’ uniforms. Our tunnel’s headin’ straight for it. Come up through the floor at night, don those uniforms, hide out ‘til dawn, then walk out early before the real officers are awake. Bugger, but I’ll look good in a lieutenant’s uniform!” 

He beamed at Richard. Richard beamed back. 

Talbot held up a hand in caution.  

“Steady on, lads. Steady on. Let’s consider this.”  

Searching for the weak links, Talbot and the other officers ran their minds down the chain of sequential steps that under Richard’s plan would take them from Long Prison under the inner wall, up into the Prison Office, and out through the main gate. They could identify none until Eleazar Johnston asked: “How many uniforms do we reckon are in there?”  

“I don’t know,” Richard confessed. “But there have to be quite a number. Every British officer is issued at least two uniforms in case one gets soiled.” 

“If we’re caught wearin’ those uniforms,” Barney pointed out, “sure as hell we’ll be hanged as spies.” 

Richard acknowledged that.  

“Perhaps, Joshua. But it’s a risk worth taking, don’t you think? Once we’re outside, we can get rid of the red dress coat. The rest of the uniform’s pretty much the same as standard Continental Navy issue.”
Barney pursed his lips reflectively.  

Capt. Richard Dale

“You’re overlooking something,” Richard Dale observed. “I grant you the sentries guarding the gate may be new, but so many officers leaving the compound so early in the morning would certainly arouse suspicion. They’d want to confirm everything with Cowdry (the prison warden) before opening the gate. Don’t forget, their ass would be on the line.” 

Discouraged agreement rumbled among the Americans. The weak link in the chain had apparently been identified. 

Crabtree snapped his fingers. 

“No, wait,” he exclaimed, rising to his feet. “We’ve been thinkin’ about this wrong. We don’t all need t’ be officers. Most of us can be what we are: prisoners. We only need a couple of us in uniform. We go in the buildin’ at night, through the tunnel, just as Richard said. When we come out the next mornin’, the prisoners are bound up, bein’ led out by the officers. For further interrogation on Yarmouth we tell the guards at the gate. On orders from Admiral Digby himself, we say. What sentry, first day at his new post, facin’ the prison brass, would challenge that?” 

 “He’s right,” Russell concurred, and everyone’s mood brightened considerably.

As a footnote to history, the plan as depicted above worked. The American officers made good their escape and made their way back to sea. Most of them went on to fight the British until the end of the war.

Photo Credits: The Old Mill Prison From a 19th-century illustration [public domain]; Sketch of en:Joshua Barney circa 1800 [public domain]; Engraved portrait of Silas Talbot, the second captain of the :USS Constitution [public domain]; Captain Richard Dale, USN [public domain].

Horatio Nelson Speaks to the 21st Century?

Barbary Wars

The novels of the Cutler Family Chronicles span the years 1774 to 1815 and have, as backdrops, the creation of the U.S. Navy and the emergence of the United States as an overseas commercial power during the Age of Sail.

During the last fifteen years of this period the United States became inevitably embroiled in the Napoleonic Wars that were ravaging Europe. During America’s quasi-war with France in the late 1790s, and again during the First Barbary War in the early nineteenth century, Great Britain viewed the fledgling United States as an ally, either because we were fighting the same enemy – France – or because Britain and her overseas colonies desperately wanted to buy what America had to sell. Aside from exchanging private recognition signals with American warships and escorting American merchantmen through pirate-infested waters, the Royal Navy opened its bases in the West Indies and the Mediterranean to American naval vessels.

Admiral Horatio Nelson

The early years of the Napoleonic Wars were also the capstone years of England’s most revered naval hero: Horatio Nelson. Richard Cutler, the main protagonist in the Cutler Family Chronicles, comes to know Nelson primarily because his wife Katherine, a young woman born and raised in the shadow of English aristocracy, was once engaged to marry the dashing young post captain. Although Katherine never again sees Horatio after she weds Richard Cutler and sails to America, the two sea officers have several occasions to cross tacks with each other during the years preceding the epic sea battle off the southwest coast of Spain in 1805 that immortalized Nelson’s life. 

One such occasion (in the recently published A Call to Arms) is in November of 1803 prior to a grand fete hosted by Sir Alexander Ball, the British governor of Malta, at the island’s magnificent San Anton Palace. Adm. Horatio Lord Nelson, commander in chief of British forces in the Mediterranean, and Captain Richard Cutler, USN, are meeting in private before the gala affair begins. With them in the small but comfortably appointed room are Captain Jeremy Hardcastle, RN, Richard’s brother-n-law and Nelson’s life-long friend, and Agreen Crabtree, Richard’s first officer in USS Portsmouth. A story that Jeremy has to relate to Richard and Agreen follows an account by Agreen regarding an earlier encounter between Portsmouth and a Tripolitan corsair. After the corsair captain strikes his colors and surrenders his ship, he orders his gun crews to open fire on the American frigate as she is lowering away her boats, an act of cowardice and dishonor that kills a number of defenseless American sailors. Captain Cutler immediately orders all sail clapped on and chases after the corsair, fleeing for her life toward the safety of Tunis. Portsmouth overtakes the corsair and reduces her to matchwood.

 What Jeremy Hardcastle has to relate is historically accurate in detail, as is the gist of Nelson’s response to Agreen’s comment. (Note: also historically accurate is the treachery of the corsair captain.)

We should listen carefully to what Nelson has to say.

    “It started right here off Malta,” Jeremy explained. “For no apparent reason two Algerian corsairs attacked one of our sloops of war. The sloop managed to escape into Grand Harbor, and a frigate was dispatched to hunt down the two corsairs and sink them. Which she did. The dey of Algiers, a chap named Mustapha, was so enraged he ordered British citizens in Algiers imprisoned and their property confiscated. When Horatio learned of that, he led Victory and a squadron of seven frigates from Toulon to Algiers and immediately started bombarding the city. Within an hour, the dey sent out a boat to the flagship under a white flag. Horatio paid it no mind. He kept the guns hot until the outer wall of Algiers had collapsed and fires were burning within the city. Finally, the dey had himself rowed out to the flagship, pleading to Horatio and Allah for mercy. I can’t speak for Allah, but Horatio agreed on the condition that he release British citizens from prison, restore their possessions, and compensate them for their trouble. And on the condition that Mustapha promise never again to impugn England’s honor. Thus far, he has acted the angelic school boy, bowing and scraping before a stern school master. Is that a fair summation, Horatio?”
    “I daresay it is,” Nelson responded.
    “And I daresay the dey learned a hard lesson that day,” Agreen added, setting off a round of chuckles.
    “I agree with you, Agreen,” Nelson said gravely,” and I am not trying to be witty in saying that. Mustapha learned the same lesson as your corsair captain. And those with Western minds must learn it as well: that the only thing these Arab despots seem to understand is brute force. That is the only anecdote to their tactics. They use diplomacy as either a tool to get what they want or as a delaying tactic. That is one reason I would not have an Arab in my fleet, except as a prisoner.”

Putting aside for the moment the politically correct world in which we live, had the State Department heeded Nelson’s words more diligently, would the four Americans killed during the terrorist attack on Benghazi last September be alive today?

I simply pose the question.

The “Volcano Ship” USS Intrepid

Destruction of Fire Ship Intrepid

In late summer 1804 the war against Tripoli was not going well. True, the third U.S. naval squadron sent to the Mediterranean under the command of Commo. Edward Preble had twice assaulted the capital and destroyed a number of enemy batteries and gunboats. But despite Preble’s impressive efforts the fortress city still stood in defiance of the United States, and the bashaw (king) of Tripoli, who had initiated the war, remained contemptuous of U.S. naval strength. His corsair fleet remained largely intact in the harbor below his castle, and the 115 cannon in the city’s defenses remained trained on the American ships standing offshore, hardly touched by the withering broadsides of USS Constitution and the other ships in the squadron, including a number of bomb ketches on loan from the king of Sicily.

Commodore Edward Preble

Worse, Preble had received a dispatch from Secretary of the Navy Robert Smith with the unwelcome news that a fourth squadron was underway from Portsmouth, Virginia, under the command of Commo. Samuel Barron. Since Barron had seniority over Preble, Preble’s days in the Mediterranean were numbered. If he were to make a meaningful contribution to the successful conclusion of the war, he needed to act quickly. After mulling over his options he settled on a course that no one could have suspected, not even his loyal squadron commanders whom he referred to affectionately as “my boys.”

What he decided to do was transform the captured ketch Intrepid into what he designated as a “volcano ship” – an extreme version of the more familiar term “fire ship.” If the ketch could steal in to Tripoli harbor under cover of night and a Mediterranean rig, reach the very walls of Tripoli and set off an explosion for the ages, in one bold stroke the entire pirate fleet could be destroyed and considerable damage done to the city itself.

Every carpenter in the squadron was put to work planking up her magazine in the hold and loading it to the brim with five hundred barrels of powder, five tons in all. On the deck directly above the magazine, one hundred 13-inch shells and fifty 9-inch shells were carefully stacked within a rectangular wooden bin built to accommodate them. Under the watchful eye of the squadron commanders, two holes were drilled into the bulkhead of the magazine amidships. Into these were inserted gun barrels stuffed with fuses that were connected to a main fuse at the end. These two main fuses were connected on the outside to a shallow trough of powder that ran the length of the ketch on the starboard side forward to a scuttle near her bow and aft to her companionway.

The train of powder could thus be fired from either the bow or the stern of the vessel. The length of the two main fuses was set to burn for eleven minutes before the main fuses set off the smaller fuses inside the gun barrels. The smaller fuses were timed to burn for four minutes before they ignited the powder in the magazine. Once the train of powder was lit, the thirteen Americans had fifteen minutes to get off Intrepid and board the pinnace and cutter being towed behind the ketch. The schooner Nautilus would be hove to close in to the reefs, to pick them up and convey them back to the flagship, escorted by the schooner Vixen and the brig of war Syren.

Commodore Preble chose Lt. Richard Somers to command Intrepid. Every squadron commander had begged for the honor, but Somers got the nod. Joining him as volunteers were Midshipman Henry Wadsworth (Longfellow’s uncle), Midshipman Joseph Israel, and ten carefully selected American sailors.

Lt. Richard Sommers

At eight o’clock in the evening of September 3, 1804, Intrepid sailed from the squadron standing several miles offshore from the city of Tripoli. She made it through the Western Passage into the harbor of Tripoli. Then, with a white blinding eruption of light and an ear-rupturing concussion that could be heard and felt well out to sea, she exploded – as it turned out, prematurely, before she reached the city walls. Why, no one is certain to this day. The most likely explanation is that Intrepid was approached by Tripolitan gunboats and Lieutenant Somers set off the charge himself. Earlier, aboard Constitution, he had vowed to do just that in such a circumstance, preferring death to the dishonor of surrendering and the disgrace of turning over vast quantities of munitions to the enemy. The twelve American heroes sailing with him understood that preference when they volunteered.

Following is a scene from chapter 12 of A Call to Arms. It depicts an exchange between Commodore Preble and Lt. George Reed, acting captain of Nautilus. The morning after the explosion Preble had signaled Nautilus to come alongside the flagship and report.

“Lieutenant Reed, what can you tell us?” Preble shouted through a speaking trumpet.

Reed raised his own trumpet from the larboard railing of the schooner. All eyes aboard the flagship were riveted upon him. He hesitated as he delivered his reply, as if fearful that speaking aloud of such things would somehow cause them to become a reality.

“Sir,” Reed reported, “we followed Intrepid until two or three minutes before the explosion…We thought she had reached her destination, but alas…she had not. From what we observed this morning…there has been little or no damage…either to Tripoli or to its navy. And sir…It is my sad duty to report…that Captain Somers and every member of his crew…have vanished.”

“Repeat that, Lieutenant. And speak up, man! Vanished, you say?”

“Yes sir,” Reed replied more distinctly. “Vanished. There is no indication either of the crew or the two boats. No indication whatsoever.”

“So what you are telling me, Mr. Reed, is that the crew of Intrepid has either perished or been taken prisoner.”

“Yes sir. We…I fear so, sir.”

“Dear God, Henry…” (Midshipman Ralph) Izard whispered to himself, staring out blankly to the area where Intrepid had exploded. (Midshipman) Jamie (Cutler) placed a hand on his shoulder, as much to comfort himself as his friend. Both of them realized, as well as anyone, that not one of the thirteen Americans had been taken alive. Jamie felt the warm damp of tears in his eyes and tried, unsuccessfully, to blink them away.

“Very well, Mr. Reed,” Preble shouted through the trumpet. “Please advise Mr. Smith and Mr. Stewart (captain of Vixen and Syren, respectively) to rejoin the squadron. You may continue to reconnoiter, but stay out of effective range of the shore batteries. We shall suffer no further casualties this day.”

“Aye, aye, Captain.”

It was, ironically, that very afternoon, as the squadron continued to reel from such a devastating loss of shipmates, that the topgallants of USS President and USS Constellation were sighted bearing down from the north. The Mediterranean campaign of Commodore Edward Preble, so full of promise, had come to an end.